What makes "specials" such a powerful marketing tool for 3PL warehouses

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3PL Warehousing Space gets crowded

As the 3PL warehousing space gets more crowded, the challenge for finding new customers is becoming paramount. Where does a 3PL start, when looking for a customer? Especially, since customers can come in all shapes and sizes. You could have a young e-commerce company, which has been content with working on drop ship basis with their vendors, suddenly deciding to host inventory and outsource order fulfillment. You could have a wholesale distributor, who have had his own warehouse building, but has now grown too big for it. Most of the businesses that go un-harnessed fall into the category of small and medium sized businesses looking to outsource their operations to an order fulfillment company.

Online marketing, is there room for everyone ?

For businesses looking for 3PL warehousing and order fulfillment services, tool of choice undoubtedly is the online search engine. The problem that the 3PLs face is that a search engine can only host so much information on the first few pages. Most of these spots are taken up by the heavy hitters in the industry, leaving the smaller 3PLs, or newer entrants, at a disadvantage. For smaller 3PLs it may be close to impossible to get that coveted spot on the search engines.

Even if your business was to appear on the first two pages in the search engine, how do you distinguish yourself. It seems like in the world of 3PL warehousing, most companies are offering services that are very similar. And worse, they are located close to you.

Specialized Search Engines

There is an alternative to marketing your business online. You can list your business on an online search engine that specializes in your industry. SpaceSpecials.com is one such search engine which specialize in promoting businesses that offer public warehousing and e-commerce fulfillment.

The main advantage with a vertical search engine such as SpaceSpecials.com, is that customers visiting a specialized search engine are much closer to making a decision, as opposed to a visitor browsing on the general search engine. The industry insiders are speculating that the vertical search engines which are industry specific will play an important role in the near future. To the point that they may even threaten the dominance of Googles and Yahoos when it comes to searching for businesses.

It is not hard to see that a favorably positioned vertical search engine on Google search will allow the users searching for a warehouse to perform more informed searches using criterion such as geographic location and services offered. The warehouse seekers now have a much better tool at their disposal as opposed to sifting through pages of information which may or may not be relevant.

The other good news is that listing on a specialized search engine costs fraction of what it costs to stay optimized on the major search engines.

Power of “ warehouse specials”

If all your competitors are offering pretty much the same services and worse they all seem to be located in the vicinity. What is a 3PL warehouse to do ? How can you raise that flag and shout “hey look at me, over here !!!”

Well one way to do that is to offer “specials” on warehouse space or services. The concept of offering specials is not a new concept, for almost all other businesses this has always been a preferred way to attract new business.

Special offers are more relevant to 3PL industry, than in any other industry. Public warehousing is noncommittal in nature. Which means anytime a customer scales back or there are seasonal highs and lows, you will either have excess warehouse space sitting around or you will have labor twiddling their thumbs. This weakness can be turned into a great opportunity for attracting new business.

By making informed decisions based on past experience, most logisticians or sales personnel can estimate, how much of the space will remain available and for how long. Using this informed judgment, you can put up a special offering and offer that space at a special discounted rate for that period, same goes for services offered.

Examples of Specials

Some examples of specials would be:

1. XYZ warehousing is offering 10% discount on storage for the first one year in their new facility in South Carolina. Call Bob at ext 122.
2. Special offer on Kitting and Assembly. 20% discount on Kitting and Assembly services for the first one year of signup.
3. Special offer on Gift Wrapping. Free Gift wrapping for the first six months of signup.
ABC warehousing is offering 10% discount on all all handling charges in all their locations.


Similar offers of discount on storage, pick and pack, cross docking etc for limited time can be placed as often as you want. SpaceSpecials.com will let you place your advertisement and specify an expiry date for the special offer. The special offers are also pushed to the major search engines for greater visibility.

Why is this not happening already ?

Why is this not happening already, because currently 3PL warehouses do not have a place where they can advertise such specials. What we need is a warehouse portal which is known for listing “specials on warehouse space and services”.

SpaceSpecials.com does just that. We already have a very favorable ranking in major search engines, and even though we are barely few months old, we are starting to get motivated customers on a daily basis. By putting specials on warehouse space and services you are keeping yourself ahead of the competition, while running your business at optimum capacity.

Act Now !!!

Talk to your sales team, manager, owner, come up with the specials for the season. This is the right time to solicit new business as the holiday buying season is almost here and many e-retailers and wholesalers would be looking to outsource part or all of their order fulfillment business. SpaceSpecials will get your word out.