“We haven’t had a package delivered in some time.”
“When’s our next package arriving?”
These are just some of the conversations that happen almost daily in my neighborhood, and they remind me of how much we love the small joys of ordering online, receiving packages, and getting the happy jolts of surprises as if we didn’t know they were coming.
Retail therapy is booming, more so than ever. With declining attention spans and the constant chase of bursts of dopamine, all consumers are looking for instant gratification, quicker bursts of joy, and endless little moments of “your order has arrived”. In a time like this, with the expectant customer sitting at the edge of their seat tracking their packages, real-time tracking is no longer a bonus for retailers and e-commerce businesses; it’s a baseline expectation. Whether you’re managing thousands of daily shipments or scaling as a small business, customers and stakeholders expect real-time updates at every step of the order journey. This is where modern order management software and robust order fulfillment solutions come in.
According to a study by Gartner in 2021, around 58% of delays can be reduced with real-time tracking, meaning endless supply chain efficiency. This is just one of the reasons why, for growing small businesses, adding an intelligent order management system (OMS) with real-time tracking to the tech stack is a game-changer. Let’s explore more!
Why Real-Time Tracking Matters in Fulfillment
1. Customer Expectations Change FAST
Today’s consumers are heavily attuned to a market constantly flooded with new products every day. Their needs change on an hourly basis. However, their need to get faster fulfillment stays the same. When they’re ordering from your brand, they want to know when their order was placed, processed, dispatched, and when it will arrive. Time-stamps, emails, messages, tracking links – most consumers are open to engaging with communication that helps them keep track of their purchases. Any visibility gap can lead to mistrust, WISMO (“Where Is My Order?”) calls, and poor customer satisfaction.
2. No Room for Operational Errors
Warehouse teams and supply chain processes can no longer sustain with traditional ledgers, phone calls, and books to track orders. This is what real-time tracking solves. With real-time tracking, warehouse teams, support agents, and operations managers can see the exact status of an order and intervene proactively in case of delays or routing issues. Real-time tracking helps reduce customer claims by up to 25%.
3. Reduced Support Load
A lot of the supply chain processes get automated with real-time tracking offered by a robust order management system. This means your workforce gets time to focus on decision-making and planning. Small businesses with lean teams benefit the most. Fewer customer service calls mean teams can focus on revenue-driving activities instead of troubleshooting.
4. Better Last-Mile Experience
Customer satisfaction is paramount, as every successful brand will tell you. Customer experience doesn’t just restrict itself to a great product search and ordering process on a clean website or a well-designed store. Brands have to make sure customers love shopping from them from start to finish. Real-time visibility helps customers track their deliveries, reschedule drop-offs, and stay updated, making the final mile as smooth as the first.
5. Data-Driven Insights
Data is king, and you need customer-led insights to make your brand stand out from a horde of options. The right order management systems (OMS) provide analytics around fulfillment speed, delays, and bottlenecks, helping businesses constantly optimize processes and keep working towards building better customer experiences.
Core Features of Real-Time Order Fulfillment Solutions
To leverage the full benefits of real-time tracking, your order management system software should offer:
- Live Order Tracking: See every order’s status from confirmation to doorstep.
- Carrier Integrations: Automatic syncing with courier partners and logistics systems.
- Exception Alerts: Get real-time updates for delays, failed attempts, or issues.
- Inventory Sync: Ensure items are always available and visible across channels.
- Customer Notifications: Trigger SMS or email updates automatically.
- Analytics Dashboard: Visualize fulfillment SLAs and identify inefficiencies.
Order Management Software (OMS) for Small Business: Why It’s Essential?
Many small businesses still rely on spreadsheets or outdated systems. As they scale, this creates fragmentation in order processing, shipping, and returns. Here’s why they should adopt modern order management software for small businesses:
- Real-time inventory sync across sales channels.
- Faster and more accurate order processing.
- Integration with shipping partners for streamlined dispatch.
- Better customer communication and fewer missed deliveries.
- Affordable scalability for D2C and B2B channels.
How Increff’s Order Management System (OMS) Powers Real-Time Tracking
Increff’s OMS order management system software is designed to optimize the entire supply chain cycle with real-time supply chain visibility at its core. You get precision and speed along with accuracy and intelligence – virtues that ecommerce and omnichannel businesses need to manage daily operations and long-term growth.
➤ Real-Time Inventory and Order Sync
You get 15-minute syncs across multiple channels, consolidating orders from brand websites, marketplaces, offline stores, and B2B platforms. This process enhances traceability, eliminates overselling, and enables proactive replenishment.
- Inventory updates every 15 minutes across warehouses and channels.
- Granular inventory visibility down to bin/SKU level.
- Automated blocking of low-availability SKUs to avoid stockouts.
- B2C and B2B workflows, including bulk invoicing, delivery scheduling, and dispatch tracking.
- Catalog-level control for pricing, tax rules, discounts, and warehouse-level restrictions.
- Separate inventory pools for different channels (D2C vs Marketplace vs B2B).
➤ Smart Shipping
Shipping is managed with automated workflows based on real-time data, making sure that all orders arrive on time, through the right channels.
- Plug-and-play integrations with 20+ courier services.
- Auto-generating shipping labels and tracking IDs for each order.
- Live order state sync: packed, dispatched, in-transit, delivered.
- Integration with 3PLs for tracking, NDR (non-delivery reports), and RTO (return-to-origin) resolution.
➤ Returns Handling
Returns are managed as intelligently as forward orders. Increff’s order management system software classifies returns into resellable or damaged inventory, ensuring that resellable items are quickly reintegrated into stock and sold via second-cycle sales.
- Complete visibility into reasons for return.
- Real-time exception alerts to flag delays or failed deliveries.
- Support for customer-initiated returns across channels.
- Quick remediation and customer outreach before escalations happen.
- Credit note generation and auto-refund initiation with marketplaces.
➤ Operational Intelligence with Data-backed Insights
Increff’s OMS provides decision-makers with deep insights into operational performance and inventory health.
- Dashboards for fulfillment performance, cancellations, return reasons, order aging, stock cover, and more.
- Channel-wise and warehouse-wise performance reports.
- Insights to identify dead stock, fast movers, best liked, and reorder opportunities.
- Continuous improvement through data-backed decisions.
➤ Plug-and-Play Integrations
With open APIs and pre-built connectors for Shopify, Amazon, Flipkart, Nykaa, WooCommerce, and ERPs like SAP, Increff OMS is easy to implement with minimal tech overhead.
Real-Time Order Tracking in Action: The Business Impact
Recognizing the critical nature of these challenges, we at Increff offered a unique blend of advanced and customized solutions. We deployed a comprehensive solution integrating Warehouse Management System (WMS), Order Management System (OMS) and Cloud Warehousing as a Service (CWAS) that changed the game for GlobalBees
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Final Thoughts
Whether you’re a scaling startup, an enterprise, or a growing small business, investing in a real-time order management system can be a driver for you. Modern order fulfillment solutions with live tracking capabilities enhance customer satisfaction, reduce errors, and help you build a smarter backend. When selecting your order management software, ensure it offers:
- Real-time inventory and order tracking
- Multichannel order sync
- Integrated fulfillment workflows
- Easy carrier integration
- Return and exchange automation
- Scalable infrastructure
The ideal order management system software doesn’t just manage orders – it empowers businesses with agility, intelligence, and reliability.
In today’s hyper-connected ecommerce world, visibility = value. The sooner your software delivers that, the faster your small business scales.
Increff’s order management software combines cutting-edge tracking, intelligent routing, and seamless integrations to redefine how orders are managed, shipped, and delivered. Our product experts are here to help you know more about how it can benefit your business. Request a call here.
