Is your online store ready for Singles’ Day?

Singles’ Day takes place on Friday, 11th November!

The Chinese unofficial holiday and shopping event brings in billions of dollars annually. Last year, during the two-week shopping events leading up to Singles’ Day, Chinese consumer spending on Alibaba’s eCommerce platforms totalled 84.54 billion U.S. dollars- that's more than USA Black Friday and Cyber Monday campaigns combined!*

Singles’ Day is about revelling in singledom, focusing on yourself, and, most notably for online retailers, splurging on gifts. If you’re an online business whose customer base is primarily in China, Singles’ Day is an important event to get involved in. Equally, if your store sells commodities that are popular for the market, you may also benefit from the increased attention surrounding the holiday. Here are some tips on making the most of Singles’ Day and low-cost shipping services to China.

How to prepare your store for Singles’ Day

Singles’ Day is a great shopping holiday to get involved with, especially if you sell on Shopify, Etsy, eBay or other online marketplaces. We’ve compiled some tips on how to make your store stand out from the crowd and increase online sales:

Offer order value discount

Threshold discounts are great incentives for customers to add a few more items to their basket to qualify for the deal. You could offer basket discounts or free delivery over a certain amount. For example, ‘11% off your basket on orders over £50’ or ‘free economy shipping on all orders over £100’. These online discounts can help boost profits and increase your average order value.

Introduce Express delivery options

A company that offers Express and Timed international shipping options will stand out against competitors only offering one standard service. Our partnership with globally-recognised parcel delivery firms like DPD and UPS offers speedy Express delivery to China. It's important to offer low-cost international shipping so businesses can be prepared for international holidays. Recently, we introduced ECMS courier services so that businesses sending to Asia-Pacific could benefit from cost-competitive worldwide delivery.

Personalise the post-purchase experience

Once customers have placed an order, they are eager to know their order’s whereabouts. So, why not offer your customers free tracking AND personalise the portal with your branding?

With a free Branded Tracking portal, your brand can be at the forefront even after the sale. Personalise the page with a unique tracking URL, company logo, company name, company URL, colours and banner image. The banner image is the perfect place to offer a post-purchase promotional code and encourage customers to buy from your store again.

Promote on social media

These days, brands need to be active across social media channels to reach a broad customer base. You can get involved with Singles’ Day by creating an online countdown to the Day or posting short promotional product videos. You could use #singlesday to boost brand awareness.

Send a parcel to China with Interparcel

If you’re looking to send parcels to customers in China, you’ve come to the right place. ECMS, FedEx Express, Landmark Global, Parcelforce, Spring Global and UPS are some of the reputable couriers with whom we offer low-cost delivery services to China. Browse our range of discounted Economy, Express and Timed services at the click of a button.

Please note: Delivery to China starts from £9.70 per parcel. Service blocks above display the lowest price available for the parcel delivery service, not specifically for shipments to China.

Please remember!

Check Prohibited and Restricted items

You must check China’s prohibited items guidelines before placing your order with us. Thankfully, you can filter our list by country and courier, so you can be confident your item is suitable for shipment.

Address your parcel correctly

When you book a courier service to China, please enter the delivery city or postcode so we can format the address correctly.

Complete a customs invoice

All parcels entering China must be cleared through Customs. We’ve incorporated filling out the customs form during the booking process so you can complete the form with ease.

Track your parcel online

For peace of mind, you can track your parcel once it has been collected online using our free Tracking Portal. You can also opt-in to our email or SMS tracking notifications.

Start shipping with Interparcel

We hope our advice above will help you to prepare your eCommerce store for the upcoming Singles’ Day surge in sales. Of course, offering fast and low-cost shipping will help you stand out of the crowd and entice some extra sales. If you haven’t already, create a free account with us today and benefit from fantastic shipping tools and features:

• Automatic address correction: no more incorrect addresses
• Multi-channel fulfilment: collate orders from multiple eCommerce platforms into one place
• 'Send Again' and 'Return Parcel' actions: to streamline repeat and return orders
• Parcel Presets: save parcel details for speedier sending on future orders
• Branded Tracking: customise their own branded tracking portal and obtain a unique URL
• Unlimited no-cost printing options: print your 6x4 shipping labels and A4 documents directly to your printer

At Interparcel, we want all businesses to access reliable and cheap courier services! If you have any queries about how we can help, give our customer service team a call, email, or live chat message.

*Source: Alibaba's gross merchandise volume on Singles' Day from 2011 to 2021