Shipping Notifications for Ecommerce: How to Turn Delivery Updates Into a Growth Engine

2026 Edition · 9 min read · By the ShippyPro Product Team

Shipping notifications aren't a nice-to-have. They are the single most impactful post-purchase tool available to ecommerce merchants — and most stores are either not using them, or using them wrong.

Up to 80% of all ecommerce support tickets are customers asking some version of the same question: "Where is my order?" These WISMO tickets cost real money — agent time, response overhead, follow-ups — and they damage customer trust even after they're resolved. The uncomfortable truth is that most of them are entirely avoidable.

When 98% of customers say delivery experience is a key factor in brand loyalty, and 70% won't purchase again after a failed delivery, shipping communication isn't back-office ops. It's customer experience. It's retention. It's growth.

This guide breaks down what shipping notifications actually are, how the best merchants use them, what to send and when, and how to build a notification system that works across every carrier you use — without adding a single manual step to your workflow.

What shipping notifications actually are — and what they aren't

Shipping notifications are automated messages sent to customers to update them on the status of their order as it moves through the fulfillment and delivery process. They cover the period between "label created" and "package delivered" — the exact window that generates the most customer anxiety and the most support volume.

They are not the same as order notifications. Order notifications cover the purchase phase: order confirmation, payment receipt, order processing. Shipping notifications cover the logistics phase — and that distinction matters, because it's the logistics phase where things go wrong, where customers get nervous, and where your brand either builds or loses trust.

What they look like in practice: an email when the label is printed, an SMS when the parcel is out for delivery today, a WhatsApp message if there's a problem at customs, and an email confirmation when the package is delivered — optionally with a review request attached. Four messages. Each one serving a specific purpose at a specific emotional moment in the customer journey.

The real cost of doing nothing

If you're currently relying on carrier notifications — or sending nothing at all — here's what that actually costs you.

WISMO tickets (Where Is My Order?) are the single largest category of ecommerce support inquiries, accounting for up to 80% of total volume. Each one costs agent time to look up the order, time to write and send a response, and often a follow-up when the answer isn't satisfying. Multiply that by hundreds of orders per month and you're looking at a significant portion of your support budget spent answering a question that a well-timed notification would have answered automatically.

Failed deliveries add another layer of cost. When a parcel is returned because the customer wasn't home, you pay for redelivery, additional customer service time, and potentially a refund. 36% of failed deliveries happen because the recipient simply wasn't available — a problem that a well-timed "Out for Delivery" alert solves directly.

And then there's the loyalty cost. 70% of customers are unlikely to purchase again after a failed delivery experience. But research consistently shows it's not the failure itself that drives churn — it's the silence. Customers who receive proactive communication during a delay are far more likely to stay loyal than customers who only find out there's a problem when they chase it themselves.

How shipping notifications actually work

The mechanics are straightforward once you understand the flow. Your ecommerce platform — Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, or wherever orders come in — passes order data to your shipping software when a purchase is made. When a label is generated, a tracking number is assigned and the first notification trigger fires.

From that point, the notification system monitors carrier tracking APIs in real time. When DHL marks a parcel as "out for delivery," or when Evri reports a delivery exception, that event flows into the notification system and is evaluated against your rules. Does this trigger an email? An SMS? A WhatsApp message? To which customer? With what content?

The system populates your template with order-specific data — the customer's name, the product they ordered, the tracking link, the estimated delivery date — and sends it through the configured channel. No manual input. No copy-paste. No checking portals.

ShippyPro Track & Trace handles this entire flow automatically, connecting with 160+ carriers worldwide and triggering branded notifications based on real-time tracking events. It integrates natively with Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, BigCommerce, PrestaShop, and 80+ other platforms — so order data flows in automatically and notifications go out without any manual steps.

The four notifications that do most of the work

You don't need twenty different notification types to see results. Four well-configured messages cover the vast majority of what customers need — and what your support team is currently fielding.

1. Shipped

Triggered when the label is created or when the carrier makes the first scan. This email confirms the order is on its way, provides the tracking number with a link to your branded tracking page, and sets the expectation for delivery timing. It's a milestone notification — customers want to reference it later, which is why email is the right channel here. It also dramatically reduces "when will it arrive?" inquiries before they start.

2. Out for Delivery

This is the highest-impact notification in your entire stack. Triggered when the carrier marks the parcel as out for delivery, it tells the customer their package is arriving today — giving them the chance to be home, ask a neighbor to collect it, or redirect it to a pickup point. Without this notification, 36% of delivery attempts fail because nobody is available. Send it via SMS or WhatsApp, not email. This is time-sensitive. Customers need to see it within minutes, not whenever they next open their inbox.

3. Delivered

Triggered when the carrier confirms successful delivery. Confirms what arrived, when, and where — and opens the door to your next engagement. This is the moment customer satisfaction peaks. A well-placed review request here converts at significantly higher rates than a review campaign sent a week later. Optionally include a discount on the next order. Use email — it's a milestone moment and one customers will return to if there's an issue.

4. Exception

Triggered when something goes wrong — a delay, a failed delivery attempt, a customs hold, an address problem, a package returned to sender. This is where most merchants fail entirely. Instead of proactively communicating a problem, they wait for the customer to notice and contact support. The result: frustration, churn, and a flood of tickets. The fix is simple: send an SMS or WhatsApp alert the moment an exception event is detected, tell the customer what happened, and tell them what to do next. Proactive exception communication doesn't just reduce tickets — it turns problems into trust-building moments.

Email, SMS, or WhatsApp: how to choose the right channel

Channel choice is not a preference question. Different notifications serve different purposes at different emotional moments — and the wrong channel means the message doesn't land.

SMS open rates exceed 98% within the first three minutes of delivery. Email open rates for transactional shipping messages typically run between 60–80% — far higher than promotional email, but far slower. For anything time-sensitive, SMS or WhatsApp is the only rational choice.

What good shipping notifications actually look like

The difference between notifications that reduce support volume and notifications that don't usually comes down to three things: specificity, tone, and next steps.

A bad "Out for Delivery" notification says: "Your parcel is on its way." A good one says: "Your order of [Product Name] is out for delivery today, [Date]. If you won't be home, you can redirect it to your nearest pickup point here: [link]." One answers the question. The other opens three more.

For exception notifications the gap is even wider. Most merchants send nothing when a delivery fails. The ones that do often send a vague "there was an issue with your delivery" message with no context and no clear action. The best merchants send: what happened (failed delivery attempt, address issue, customs hold), what happens next (second attempt scheduled, customer needs to update address, duties need to be paid), and exactly what the customer should do — with a direct link to do it.

Content checklist for every notification:

Beyond the basics: using conditional logic to get smarter

Once your four core notifications are live, the next step is making them contextually relevant. Basic notification systems send the same message to everyone. Advanced systems — like ShippyPro's AI Shipping Automation — support conditional rules that change what gets sent based on carrier, destination, order value, or shipment status.

Practical examples of conditional logic that drives real results:

If carrier = DHL Express AND status = Exception → send WhatsApp with DHL customer service number and direct rebooking link. If destination country = international AND status = Customs Hold → send Email with explanation of the customs process and what the customer may need to pay. If order value exceeds £200 → send SMS for Out for Delivery (higher stakes warrant higher urgency). If package is going to a pickup point → send WhatsApp when available for collection, including opening hours and collection deadline.

This logic doesn't require developer work. It requires a platform that supports it — and a short setup session to configure the rules once.

Why multi-carrier coverage changes everything

If you ship with more than one carrier — and most merchants do — your notification system needs to work consistently across all of them. The challenge is that each carrier uses different tracking status terminology, different status codes, and different exception classifications. What DHL calls "shipment out for delivery," Evri might call "with driver," and Royal Mail might call "item with delivery agent."

Without a normalization layer, you'd need a separate notification setup for every carrier. With a system like ShippyPro Track & Trace — which integrates with 160+ carriers and normalizes all tracking data into a unified status feed — your notification rules work identically regardless of which carrier handles a given shipment. DHL, Royal Mail, Evri, DPD, UPS, FedEx, GLS — one rule set covers all of them.

How to measure whether your notifications are actually working

The impact of shipping notifications is measurable. If you set up a baseline before going live — counting weekly WISMO ticket volume and failed delivery rate — you'll have clear before-and-after data within the first month.

The KPIs that matter most are: WISMO ticket volume week-over-week (target: 50–80% reduction), failed delivery rate (target: 20–35% reduction), Email open rate for shipping notifications (benchmark: 60–80% for transactional messages), SMS and WhatsApp open rate (benchmark: 90%+), and customer satisfaction score or NPS trend over time.

Beyond the operational metrics, watch your review volume. If you're adding a review request to your Delivered email, review conversion rates are a direct signal of how well that notification is performing. ShippyPro's analytics tools provide visibility into all of these metrics in a single dashboard, making it straightforward to track performance and identify which notifications are driving the most impact.