Use Product Tags to Automate Decisions and Save Money!

We are continuing to enhance the features of the “Products” area of ShipStation and this week we released a feature that can be extremely handy in the process of automating your shipping selections. We now allow products to automatically “Tag” orders that contain them. This can have several advantages from simply informational to surprisingly functional. Here’s a quick example of how you can use product tags to save money using cubic rates.

Intelligently Qualifying Orders for Cubic Pricing

Cubic pricing can provide some fantastic cost savings on certain packages, but not all.  In this example, we’ll tag some specific products that we know fit the cubic pricing “sweet spot”.  We’ll then create a filter and automation rule that will automatically assign a cubic package and service for the orders.

Step 1)  In the products area, we can open a product to modify the settings.  We’d typically use a Regional Rate box to ship this product, which is a decent rate, but if it’s shipping to Zone 5 or higher, we can do even better with cubic rates!  We start by creating a new order tag called “Cubic Option” and apply the tag to this product.

Since product tags are automatically assigned to orders that contain them, any new order that is imported will also have the “Cubic Option” tag assigned to it.

Step 2) In settings, we create a new filter that will isolate orders that  contain the “Cubic Option” tag.  We also want to make sure it’s a domestic shipment.  Finally, we want only orders that are going to Zone 5 or higher.

Now we can isolate any order that is appropriate for cubic rates.

Step 3) Lastly, let’s create an automation rule that will setup cubic shipping settings for any order that matches the filter we created in step 2.

After we save the rule, we should start seeing orders for this product automatically configured to ship with cubic rates!

Other uses for Product Tags

• Identify orders that are back-ordered, made-to-order or otherwise take longer to fulfill.  You can even create an automation rule for those products to automatically place them On-Hold for a period of time.
• Identify orders that might need special care or handling.  You can add an internal note for your packing team with an automation rule.
• Identify orders that should be insured and automatically request  insurance.
• Identify orders that contain sensitive materials.  You can create an automation rule to require adult signature confirmation if needed.