Ever bought a product online or received a gift box from a brand? With a large number of e-commerce startups across clothing, beauty, and product subscription, there is great demand for branded boxes and packaging material. Even offline businesses are equally serious to make their mark with custom packaging.
A custom packaging website offers an online custom packaging solution to brands, companies and individuals to customize and brand their own retail packaging or shipping boxes. Platforms like Pakible and Packamatic have gained popularity at an astounding rate.
The immense popularity of this industry motivated FATbit researchers to do an in-depth analysis of the business model, website features, and core functionality. This post also aims to help entrepreneurs build smarter Custom Packaging platforms.
Before going ahead, let’s take a look at the basic business model:
The packaging industry is highly fragmented with thousands of manufacturers across the globe. The main aim of a product packaging website should be to streamline the process of ordering customized packing boxes and remove the hassles of searching quality manufacturers.
A custom packaging website offers the functionality that makes it easy for users to choose the packaging material as per their requirement and customize it with their own text, logo and colors. Offering in-house design services for more complex box designs is also a good option. Profits are made on every order.
There are established names in the industry that identified the vacuum earlier and are making handsome profits. Here are the biggest ones:
Now that we have an overview of the basic business model and know how these platforms make money, let’s learn about the most important website features
Your custom packaging design & ordering venture requires user-friendly features to make a name in online custom packaging industry. Let’s discuss the major features and areas of the leading websites which should be present in your portal.
The website homepage must be informative and personalized for target audience. Homepage should be welcoming and efficiently share important business details. Plan a dynamic tagline with different packaging options for the first fold. Introduce the main customization tool in the homepage itself.
Every online venture tries its best to entice visitors into buying the product or exploring the service. Include a dedicated section on homepage to explain the working of your platform and its efficiency as compared to other packaging services. The working of the website can be planned in a simple way. A visual illustration is easy to understand and will leave a lasting memory.
Your site should offer box packaging in various sizes to make it easy for users to select the desired boxes. Some service providers like Packamatic uses 3-D imagery to give businesses better control and customization powers. Whatever you go for, make sure the customization functionality is easy to understand and use as small business owners have limited technical know-how.
The site must make it easy for users to make informed decisions. After a user selects one of the boxes, provide a detailed description along with images. Researchers at FATbit found this to be highly user-friendly and recommend a similar approach to create your custom design and ordering venture for packaging.
Adding different style packages will help advanced users who want extensive customization. Add some low budget styles that can help users to take quick decision. Partner with merchandise makers to create special offers on bulk purchases.
Give users the ability to add text and/or logo depending upon the pack they have selected. This will help businesses and brands in creating their packaging materials according to their brand presence. Give the option to download the logo and also to create a new one with ease. Earn additional income by pitching the service of logo design for businesses who don’t have one.
Pro tip – If building on a clone script, pick a flexible one so that new features can be added.
Another stand out aspect should be color customization feature where a user can select color of the text as well as box material. Make provision of a extensive color palette or add custom color based on HEX code. This is crucial from branding point of view. So, don’t compromise with features related to this aspect.
Add an intuitive tool to select the quantity of the boxes. A real time price value can be also presented to the user, which shows the price per unit. This makes it easy for the users to have an idea of the cost per box.
After completing the customization of the box, users should be redirected to adding shipping details. Following details can be sought:
Order verification and confirmation can be done through text message or email.
The final step of ordering customized packaging is placing the order and making payment.Your site must provide a full breakdown of the final cost, along with taxes, shipping cost and cost per unit in order to have transparency. Catering to the local audience of a developing nation? Offer Cash on Delivery option. Businesses will love you for it.
Visitors sometimes find it difficult to understand a particular feature. A well-designed help chat option is a lifesaver on such occasions. FATbit analysts recommend a similar approach while designing the Help section for your custom packaging clone.
Custom packaging platforms like Pakible and PackLane are working with the same idea of on-demand custom packaging service, and expanding their presence. As far as functionality is concerned, Pakible takes the cake. Packamatic on the other hand trumps it with its intuitive design approach.
The fact of the matter is that custom packaging service belongs to the future, and any website with advance features will surely attain success. Whether you choose to build a custom packaging clone on ready-made script or hire a team of developers to create it from scratch, make sure you add above listed features.
Do you have a unique online business idea? We have the developers who can code it for you. Get in touch for business consultation and cost estimation
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