Barcodes are essential to promote and achieve process efficiency in the e-commerce industry. They play a crucial role in product’s unique identification, ensuring that information about each product is accurately represented and is updated consistently throughout its lifecycle. Barcodes simplify inventory management and enhance order fulfillment processes, making them indispensable for online retailers. In this blog you will learn the importance of adopting authorised product barcodes for your e-commerce selling journey, the types of barcodes, where to get these barcodes from and how to get them.
Understanding the Importance of Product Barcodes in E-commerce
Standardisation is critical in every aspect of our lives; barcodes help businesses bring and implement standards of product identification in the e-commerce industry, facilitating unique identification of each product being sold. This translates to faster and more reliable order processing, enhancing customer satisfaction. Barcodes also facilitate seamless integration with logistics systems, enabling precise shipping and delivery tracking. Overall, their application in e-commerce significantly boosts operational accuracy, efficiency, and the overall customer experience.
To effectively implement barcodes in your e-commerce operations, utilising a product barcode generator is crucial. In India, only GS1 India is authorised to issue barcodes to Indian businesses that plan to sell products in the online and offline markets. When a company gets registered for GS1 barcodes, they are provided with a Global Company Prefix (GCP) to access their DataKart account. DataKart is the national product data repository of products available in the Indian market.
DataKart helps create unique barcodes for each product, ensuring accurate identification and tracking throughout the supply chain. Each barcode number carries specific information about the product it represents. Understanding the barcode number meaning is crucial for accurate product identification and tracking. For example, the first few digits of a barcode indicate the country code, ‘890’ is the company prefix allotted by GS1 to GS1 India. The country code is followed by the company code – that is the code assigned by GS1 India to that specific company for its unique identification. The next few digits represent the product code and the last digit is termed, the ‘check digit’, used to validate this Global Trade Item Number (GTIN). This standardised structure allows efficient and error-free data management across various systems.
How Product Barcodes Benefit E-commerce Businesses
Barcodes provide several benefits to e-commerce businesses, including enhanced inventory management, improved order fulfilment and shipping, and a seamless customer experience.
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Streamlining Inventory Management
Barcodes facilitate efficient inventory tracking and management by providing a unique identifier for each product. This allows e-commerce businesses to monitor stock levels in real-time, reducing the risk of overstocking or stockouts. Real-time inventory updates help businesses respond quickly to market demands, ensuring that popular products are always available for customers.
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Enhancing Order Fulfilment
Barcodes play an essential role in optimising order processing and fulfilment. They reduce errors by ensuring the correct products are picked, packed, and shipped to customers. This improves shipping accuracy, leading to higher customer satisfaction and fewer returns. Barcodes also speed up the fulfilment process, allowing businesses to handle more orders efficiently.
This reduces errors and enhances customer satisfaction by ensuring orders arrive correctly and on time. Barcodes also help businesses track shipments, providing customers with real-time updates on their order status.
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Facilitating Seamless Customer Experience
Barcodes enhance the customer experience by providing easy access to product information and enabling mobile shopping and online reviews. Customers can scan barcodes to learn more about products, check reviews, and even make purchases directly from their smartphones. This technology enhances trust and transparency, as customers can verify product authenticity and origin.
Future Trends and Innovations in Barcode Technology
QR barcodes – a type of 2D barcodes are the future of barcode technology globally. With their increased data storing capacity they can store additional information such as expiry date, manufacturing date, trademark or licences, nutritional information and usage instructions. QR codes also have the capability of directing users to product’s/company’s official website wherein customers can locate more information about the products. This will unlock doors to new possibilities as QR barcodes will help in shaping a world wherein information is readily available to all, thus empowering the end-consumers.
Advancements in barcode technology are continually shaping the e-commerce landscape. 2D barcodes/QR codes have capabilities that extend beyond traditional product labelling. These innovations will further enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of e-commerce operations. The integration of technologies like Blockchain and Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is transforming barcode technology, making it more versatile and powerful. Barcodes are now used for a wide range of applications, from tracking product location during transit to providing real-time updates on inventory levels. These advancements are driving new efficiencies and capabilities in e-commerce.
Conclusion
Product barcodes play a key role in the e-commerce industry, providing essential benefits such as enhanced inventory management, improved order fulfilment, and a seamless customer experience. As technology continues to evolve, barcodes will become even more integral to e-commerce operations, driving efficiency and customer satisfaction.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
1. What is a barcode in any product?
A barcode is a machine-readable code that represents data about a product. It consists of a series of vertical lines parallel to each other or a 2-dimensional structure, which can be scanned to retrieve information.
2. How does the barcode work?
Barcodes work by encoding data into a visual pattern that can be read by a barcode scanner. The scanner reads the pattern of lines and spaces, converts it into an electrical signal, and decodes it into the original data.
3. What is the main use of barcode?
The main use of barcodes is to uniquely identify products. They are used in inventory management, order fulfilment, and point-of-sale systems to streamline operations and improve accuracy.
4. How do I create a barcode for my product?
To create a barcode for your product, you must register with GS1 India. After registration, you can use a product barcode generator to generate a unique barcode for your product.
5. How do I use a barcode to identify a product?
A barcode can be used to identify a product by scanning it with a barcode reader. The reader decodes the barcode and retrieves the product information stored in a database.
6. Which barcode to use for products?
The choice of barcode depends on the type of product and the industry standards/sector. Common barcodes include GTIN-13 for retail products, QR codes/Data matrix in pharmaceutical sector, and GS1-128 for logistic units
7. Are all product barcodes the same?
No, product barcodes differ by format and data type. Various industries use distinct barcode standards tailored to specific applications, ensuring efficient and accurate product identification.
8. What is the full form of barcode?
‘Barcode’ is not an abbreviation so does not have any full-form. The process of barcoding refers to the method of encoding information using a pattern of bars and spaces for machine-readable data.
9. What is an 8-digit barcode?
An 8-digit barcode, or EAN-8/GTIN-8, is a compact version of the EAN-13/GTIN-13 barcode. It’s ideal for small items with limited packaging space.
10. How do I verify a product by barcode?
To verify a product by barcode, enter the GTIN or EAN number on the Smart Consumer mobile or web application. The application will provide you all the information listed with that specific product, thus ensuring the product is genuine.
