As ecommerce continues to grow at unprecedented rates, the two web giants want their share of the pie. And customers want faster and faster delivery of anything they buy online – and the ability to return it for no charge. It’s why Amazon made a big splash about drone delivery (which will get packages to customers within 30 minutes) even though the service has yet to take off.

So Google and Amazon are frantically setting up warehousing and distribution centres across the U.S. so they can make faster local deliveries.

The Downside of Ecommerce Success

Google and Amazon have buckets of cash to throw at the problems that arise from hot ecommerce markets. That is, what do you do to meet demand, especially when it’s sudden?

For the rest of us, the solution of meeting the customer demands of a successful ecommerce venture is not so easy.

For ecommerce SMBs, from basement start-ups to full-fledged operations, managing all the logisitics of their business, from sales and operations, to warehousing and distribution, can be crippling.

Ecommerce businesses are built around selling a product and/or service. They became successful by offering their customers something they couldn’t get from the competition. The logisitics that set them apart from their competition include their product development, sales, marketing and customer service. That’s the core of their business.

The logisitics around the supply chain, warehousing and shipping are common to every company that sells a tangible product. So they are outside the core competencies of an ecommerce business.

In other words, to stay ahead of the competition, and reduce the headaches that come with sales growth, ecommerce businesses should focus on the core logisitics that made them successful.

And leave the rest to a reliable third-party logisitics company.