The Autumn 2010 Joules catalogue has been lying around in our house for over a week now.  It’s moved from the doormat to the kitchen to the coffee table to the catalogue pile. The trouble is, it’s still in its polywrap.  Unopened.

In my household, this is a bit of a mystery.  We’re mail order enthusiasts and all three women (daughters 16 & 19, and, erm, 40-ish other half) are hawk-eyed fashionistas.  So why has it failed to do it’s job of grabbing the reader’s attention and luring them inside?

My observed theory has two parts.  Firstly, it’s not obviously a Joules catalogue.  The clothes that the model is wearing, lovely though they may be, are not recognisably Joules.  We know the Joules signature stuff when we see it – and this isn’t it.  And as for the logo?  It’s so subtle that you’re pretty likely to miss it completely at a quick glance, given the other headlines and calls to action that feature prominently on the cover.  I think this is a missed opportunity.  Perhaps it’s a deliberate ‘trojan horse’ tactic to get the reader inside without knowing it’s Joules – in an effort to reach a wider audience.  Even so, I can’t help feeling that the value of brand recognition and customer loyalty is being ignored.

Secondly, there’s the matter of this word ‘catazine’.  Let’s face it, it’s not a word that’s bandied around much outside direct marketing circles.  It’s jargon – not common parlance.  I don’t understand the need to use it at all.  After all, when you visit Joules online you don’t see the word ‘website’ as a massive headline at the top of the homepage.  Customers are smart enough to know what they’re getting without being hit over the head with it.  Good content in a catalogue enriches the customer experience and helps reinforce brand positioning and differentiation.  I’m all for it.  But the catazine word is unnecessary – especially when it’s at the expense of branding.  In my household at least, it was clear turn-off.

Now – recent reports indicate that Joules is doing phenomenally well – so clearly they know what they are doing.  All I would say to them is this: you’ve got a strong brand and a good story to tell so don’t hide it – shout about it.

There’s no doubt that the web continues to evolve into an increasingly visual medium. Consumers like pictures, and they like video even more. So – as the technology continues to evolve at warp speed – maybe now’s the time for small business to sit up and pay attention?

Video has the power to showcase products and build brand awareness in a unique and compelling way. By engaging, educating and entertaining visitors, the niche retailer has the opportunity to connect with their customer in a way that cultivates loyalty and encourages ‘social dissemination’ of the brand. It’s no surprise to learn that video is the most ‘shared’ content type on the web.

“Isn’t that all a bit fluffy?” I hear the cynics cry. Well, maybe – but it’s only the start. Consider the importance that Google now attributes to video and you’ve got an altogether more measurable incentive to rethink your strategy.

Since the roll-out of the Google “Caffeine” upgrade earlier this year, the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPS) are increasingly dominated by real-time and video results – part of Google’s mission to deliver fresher, richer results. Video in particular, seems to get preferential treatment (unsurprising, given that Google owns YouTube). Not only do video results now capture some of the prime real estate in the list of organic results, but the new left nav column provides advanced search options on video results that reflect their enhanced status.

Video for ecommerce

As well as generating qualified traffic for your website (more on video SEO below), you can employ video effectively to increase conversion in the following ways:

1. Product demonstrations. The next best thing to seeing the product in “real life”, a video gives a visitor the opportunity to see its features in action, and provide some human scale. It’s an opportunity to assert your ‘authority’ as an expert and build consumer confidence.

2. Brand building. No matter how carefully you’ve crafted the copy on your About Us page to skillfully convey the uniqueness of your product or service, and your company values, relatively few people will read it. By providing supplemental video you can engage those unwilling to read the blurb, and do it in a way that makes it easy for them to share it with their friends.

3. Customer service. Whether it’s to provide answers to frequently asked questions, share customer testimonials, provide instructions, or simply put a human face to your operation – customer service video can help break down resistance and smooth the visitor’s path to purchase.

What makes a good video?

OK, so it all sounds quite good in principle and you’ve probably got some ideas on what to do. Here’s the conventional wisdom on what makes a good video for an ecommerce site:

1. Keep it short. The first 15 seconds are critical – so save your best for first. Three or four minutes is a good length as a rule, but note how Google enables you to search for videos of different length. No doubt there’s a trade-off opportunity in terms of competition and ranking.
2. Make it relevant. Treat your customers (and Google) with respect. Unless your video can educate, engage or entertain – you’re probably best thinking of a better idea.
3. Make it SEO smart. Like the rest of your content, you need to optimise it for organic search. I explain this in more detail below.
4. Shoot it in HD. It’s just a hunch, but I think HD will rank probably rank better than not. Google presents you with the option to filter out HD videos, and I think that’s a pretty good indication of its preference.

What makes a video good enough?

This is perhaps the biggest psychological barrier that small businesses face when considering video. Does my video need to be professionally produced, or is it something we can do inexpensively in-house? Do my customers expect slick production standards, or is ‘basic’ acceptable?

With a Flip camera or iPhone 4 you can quickly and easily capture decent HD video. All the software you need to add the bells and whistles is readily and cheaply available to download. If you do any of your own product photography, you probably already have most of what you need, and someone who understands how to do it. That’s one end of the scale.

Although no-one wants to damage their brand with unprofessional content, ask yourself what’s good enough for the purpose you’re seeking to fulfil. We live in the YouTube age where consumers accept clips with a wide variety of production standards – ranging from zero to Hollywood. With a steady camera, decent lighting, and a reasonable quality voiceover – you can, for example, produce a perfectly respectable product video. When you need something more professional, you may be pleasantly surprised with the cost that you can negotiate with a specialist.

The SEO factor

Optimising your video for SEO is really no different to optimising any of your other content. Here’s a checklist for making sure your video appears in Google’s blended search results:

1. Start with your keywords. Before you even start making your video, choose two or three keywords maximum on which to base your content. Make sure you use these keywords in the video title, tags, description and any back-links you create to the video.
2. Lead with the product. If it’s a product video, make sure the first few frames feature a shot of your product, as YouTube will use this as a static image for your video.
3. Post on YouTube. Google owns YouTube, so you can bet that it’s well indexed. Create your own YouTube channel and include links back to your site in the description for each video (use a URL shortener). Organise your content, customise your channel, work your tags, and manage your comments in a pro-active way.
4. Add a transcript and subtitles. It’s definitely worth getting to grips with the new closed caption feature in YouTube, given that subtitles and transcripts are translated into other languages – and indexed in all of them.
5. Create inbound links to your video. As with other content, it’ll rank better when other sites are linking to it – especially if those links include the relevant keywords. Start by linking from your blog, your Facebook page and your Twitter feed. Book-marking your video with social book-marking sites like Digg, Stumble and Delicious will help others find your video and create their own links to it.
6. Participate and promote. Engage the YouTube community by using the Like, Comment, and Favourite features on other people’s videos. Promote your own videos across your other channels, even your catalogue, your delivery notes, your customer service emails.
7. Analyse. Start with YouTube’s built-in Insight reports – especially the “Discovery” data that tells you how viewers found your video. Then use Google analytics to generate more sophisticated reporting on the performance of your YouTube channel, and the conversion rate of the visitors it sends to your ecommerce site.

Ready to have a go?

An increase in qualified traffic and conversion rates is a powerful incentive – so how do you get started?

Perhaps you already have a social media champion or other marketing staffer who can drive a test project forward. Why not take advantage of a forthcoming photo shoot, a trip to a supplier, or a gathering of customers? The team members in a small business invariably have a rich resource of material and ideas between them. Your suppliers may even already have video content that could be repurposed.

So why not take your top ten keywords from your latest keyword research and brainstorm video ideas based on those words alone. Choose one, make it happen, and start measuring. As they say in the movies, the rest will be history.

Case study: Teaching a close shave drives qualified traffic

Robert Johnston, owner of my local barbershop and shaving emporium The Gentleman’s Shop, decided to make a short video called “How to get a great shave every morning”. It’s six minutes long and cost £1,000 (and a free shaving set) to have it professionally produced.

Since posting it in September last year, it’s been viewed over 26,000 times. Over 75% of those views are from people who found the video through the YouTube – in other words, people who’ve probably never heard of the Gentleman’s Shop. That’s a lot of qualified traffic – qualified by the store’s most important keywords – that is getting delivered to the site. And the video will continue to deliver traffic for weeks, months, and quite probably years to come as people continue to discover, discuss and share it.

Article licensed for publication with Creative Commons “Attribution” terms.

First published in Catalogue & e-Business Magazine, September 2010

Do your staff-related anxieties betray a lack of ‘readiness’?

Ask a small business owner what worries them most in relation to staff or employment issues and one answer crops up again and again: how would I cope with the sudden loss of a key employee?

Isn’t this a great metaphor for the ‘growing up’ of a small business?  Perhaps the “key employee” concern is actually a symptom of deeper, underlying anxieties that owners experience as they nurture their business from infancy to maturity.  It begs the question: what does it actually take for your business to become bigger than any single person within it?

Indeed, there’s plenty to worry the owner/employer in a small, growing business.  From recruiting and retaining the right staff to staying on the right side of an ever growing number of legal requirements, accommodating progressive working practices in a small team, dealing with discipline, and facing up to tough decisions when tough decisions need to be made.  If you’re like me, you didn’t go into business to handle all this stuff.  Some of us are simply not equipped with the necessary diligence, patience and communication skills.  It took me a few years to realise that the most useful person in my business was the person who managed all these things for  me – but I never looked back.

Whether you’re a startup or an established niche brand, it’s likely you’ve built your own team – like all the best sports teams – around a backbone of key players with appropriate complementary skills.  Often they’ll be your co-founders, or your first “proper” employees – the ones you hired to bring-in the experience and expertise your business needed to maintain that forward momentum. Not surprisingly then, the loss of a key employee – part of the “backbone” of your team – can feel like having your legs kicked out from beneath you.

But hang on – surely “no one is indispensable”?

This slightly odious and over-used cliché perhaps ought to be reserved for use by football managers, politicians, and blood-thirsty sales managers.  Unpleasant as it is (one to avoid in the exit interview), I think it’s actually a useful litmus test for how “ready” your business is to cope with an unexpected disruption.  On one end of the scale, you’re utterly dependent on your key employee and it’s a case of “help, how will we manage?”.  At the other end of the scale, the business has moved on to a different place.  You’ll be sorry to see your valued colleague go, but it will be a hiccough rather than a disaster.  You can and will survive without her.

Let’s pursue this line of thinking further, examining the three stages of dependence on key employees, then identifying the traits of a small business that has matured sufficiently to efficiently handle the loss of a key employee.

Stage 1: RELIANCE

This is where it hurts most.  You’re working in an environment of perpetual change as the business evolves on an almost daily basis.  Decisions are taken on the hoof.  Your “backbone” team may be just one or two others, supplemented with some support staff.  There’s scant opportunity for documenting organisational processes or job specifications – there’s just no point as they’ll be out of date in no time.

Some businesses settle into this stage of development and are successful despite it.  For others, the nature of being a niche multi-channel retailer dictates that processes must be formalised if scalability is to be achieved.  If one of your key staff ends up on parental leave, emigrates to Canada, or falls long-term ill – you’ve got a serious challenge.  Whether on a personal level the circumstances elicit grief, commiseration, or congratulations – on a professional level you’ll be wishing your business was better prepared to ameliorate the significant and sudden impact of such an unforeseen departure.

Stage 2: VULNERABILITY

Your “backbone” of key players has strengthened and your team of support staff has grown – but you’re not out of the woods yet.  You’ve implemented company-wide systems and processes that are accessible and understood by all.  These include procedural manuals, up-to-date filing systems (both electronic and paper), properly administered software usernames and passwords, job descriptions, responsibilities and management authorities – all up-to-date and well documented.

Although no less likely to lose an employee, you’re already better placed to cope with the consequences – at least in terms of training a replacement should you be lucky enough to find one quickly.  And here lies the heart of your vulnerability: finding the right person can be nigh on impossible if you’re located ‘out of town’ (as many of us are), don’t have a big budget to splurge on a headhunter, and haven’t groomed an appropriate deputy from within your ranks.  Few small businesses are so risk averse that they invest in key person insurance.  It’s expensive (until you need it) – and doesn’t do anything to recruit new customers or increase order values.  However, depending on the policy wording and the circumstances, it could cover your recruitment costs as well as some hired help from a consultant or interim manager, giving you a little more time to reorganise internally.  It’s worth remembering too that consultants often have their ear to the ground and are sometimes able to recommend candidates who may not even be looking for a new job.

Stage 3:  MATURITY

Sensible enough not to rely on chance, by now you’ll have take steps to ensure that your business is underpinned by robust general health and sound organisational practice, coupled with a specific plan for replacing key personnel.  Your team may not be any bigger than it was at stage 2, but the momentum of your business will be more consistent, your growth will be more manageable, and you’ll be ready to handle the unexpected in ways that you previously never imagined.

A great example of this would be the rehearsal of certain situations – and we’re not talking about the fire drill (although that’s useful too).  Such rehearsals are particularly important if you’re likely to recruit a replacement from within your business, or merely re-organise responsibilities in order to best match the potential of your existing team.  Build a culture of shared responsibilities within teams by rotating duties, shadowing managers, and using holidays as an opportunity for support staff to practice an increased level of responsibility.  By encouraging a culture of nurturing and mentoring, junior staff members will enjoy a head start should they be required to step up and take on additional responsibilities.

Another example of ‘readiness’ is the business owner who has worked at developing and maintaining their professional network, paying particular attention to individuals they imagine could slot nicely into the business.  If you can name your reserve “backbone” of key staff, even it’s just a mental wish list, you’re more than one step ahead of the game.

There’s no magic vaccine that will immunise your business against the disruption of key employee loss.  It may not happen to you, or if it does, you might be lucky and find a queue of fantastic replacements forming miraculously outside your door.   If the queue doesn’t materialise, the greater the ‘state of readiness’ in your business, the more chance you have of mitigating any adverse impact and unnecessary delays.  Who knows, you might be smart enough to turn this number one challenge into an unexptected opportunity to propel your business forward to the next level.

So here’s a parting thought for you, and one that depends on your personal aspirations for the business:

At what point do you throw yourself into the equation? What if that key employee is you? Wouldn’t it be a testimony to your success if the business could dust itself down and move forward without you?

Article licensed for publication with Creative Commons “Attribution” terms.

First published in Catalogue & e-Business Magazine, April 2010

The theory goes that direct commerce is a cash-generative business. Our customers generally pay up front, and we in turn negotiate credit terms with our suppliers. So why is cash flow and funding so often cited by niche merchants as the factor that most inhibits their growth?

No prizes for providing the answers. Most businesses start life underfunded. Things very often take longer than anticipated. Not
everything works to plan (some mistakes being more costly than others).  We need more and better people. Ultimately, having tasted some success, we become impatient for growth and need to invest so that the momentum can be maintained.

For these reasons and others, it’s not unusual for direct commerce businesses to need an injection of cash. Take care! Raising finance for your business should not be undertaken lightly. At best, securing funding is a time-consuming diversion from the core business. At worst, it can be a stressful, expensive, and often needless denouement for a promising brand. You could end up diluting your ownership and increasing your personal liability.

If you’re investing in premises or equipment, consider the leasing options. If you’re facing a short-term cash-flow blip, think creatively and work through the usual list of cash-saving and cash-generating measures. If you’re certain an injection of finance is what the business needs, steel yourself for the task ahead, and don’t delay with getting started.

Preparation

The financing paradigm works like this: The more desperate you are to raise cash, the harder it is and the longer it will take. Don’t leave it too late, or you’re at risk of gravely compromising your negotiating position and reducing your options. Figure out your strategy and have a plan in place before you need it. You’ll be grateful later on.

Often businesses struggle to raise funds in times of distress purely because they’re so busy fire-fighting the symptoms of their funding problems that they can’t spare the time to start planning their way out. Never has it been more important to have a firm grip. If you’re on top of your business planning, can point to a recent set of key performance indicators, and are up to date with your financial reporting, you’re more than halfway there.

Develop a good pitch—two sides of A4 or approxima tely 10 slides. Avoid too much detail, but don’t leave out the key information (how much money you need, why you need it, and what you’ll give in return). Don’t write it as a speech; make it an outline that you can talk around and expand on.

Separately, have ready a good written business plan including your financials. You’ll need a standard nondisclosure agreement if you’re going to be sharing it with someone with whom you don’t already have a confidentiality understanding.  Think of potential investors as customers: They’ll certainly exhibit similar behavioural traits as part of their decision-making, and you need to accommodate them all. In the same way that your prospects make an instant decision on whether to engage further with your brand based on the look and feel of your catalogue or website, potential investors will quickly form an initial decision based on what they think of you as much as your business.  You can’t beat having the facts and figures at your fingertips to support
any questions you may have to respond to, but at the end of the day, it’s the sizzle that sells the steak in your business. You’ll need to demonstrate passion, belief, and management capabilities as well as a firm grasp of details.

Your options

The amount of funding you’re seeking will, to a certain degree, dictate the most appropriate source. For smaller amounts (perhaps up to £50,000), your bank will probably be your first port of call. An extended overdraft facility secured against the assets of the business is likely to be your best outcome. In today’s climate, however, the bank is likely to take the opportunity to secure any liability with a personal guarantee or a charge over your house—not something to rush in to without proper consideration. Many entrepreneurs are willing to go there, but all breathe a huge sigh of relief when they are finally released from such a guarantee.

The government’s Enterprise Finance Guarantee is designed to encourage banks to provide small and midsize businesses with funding of up to £1 million. The anecdotal evidence is that lenders will still seek personal guarantees (although they are not permitted to take a charge over a principal private residence) and are fairly picky when it comes to businesses with few assets on their balance sheet other than stock. Talk to your bank or consult the Business Link website for a list of participating lenders.

Most venture capital companies are uninterested in making investments of less than £1 million and anyway usually require a level of professional due diligence and legal work that would knock it into touch as an option for most smaller businesses.

Friends and family can fill a gap at the lower end of the spectrum with either a loan or an equity investment. Mixing personal affairs with business can sometimes be difficult, particularly if a dispassionate outlook is required. Each party needs to know what he’s letting himself in for, and some expense on an appropriate agreement is certainly worthwhile.

An angel at the table

Finally, and usually most appealing for small businesses, are independent investors, more commonly known as business angels. Such individuals can make ideal partners. To start, a quick deal is often possible, minimising the disruption to your business. They will usually have solid general business acumen and broad experience, providing you with a useful and interested sounding board. Occasionally, if you’re lucky, they will have direct relevant expertise of your product or your business model and will be enthusiastic about contributing some of their time at a strategic level on a regular basis—something that can be incredibly valuable to your business. As a stakeholder in your business, an angel will be highly motivated to safeguard his investment and deliver a significant return. This can often mean that he will assist you with securing additional funding further down the road.

To improve the odds of partnering with the right angel, you need to do some homework. How do you define the ideal investor? Do you want a back-seat investor or an active one? Is his network important to you?  Are there particular areas where your angel investor could usefully focus? Are you ready and willing to listen and learn from the investor? When you meet potential angels, take the opportunity to interview them and to make sure they really do understand the dynamics of your business model.

Angel investors do not usually want control of your business, but they’ll expect a significant equity stake, usually between 20 percent and 40 percent, to provide them with the upside they are looking for.  They tend to be highly motivated to participate to some degree. They won’t want to run your business (that’s your job), but they will expect certain management controls to be put in place. It’s definitely worth dealing with these principles early on, to avoid surprises or misunderstandings later. Make sure that they are incorporated into your shareholder agreement.

Many entrepreneurs baulk at the prospect of angel financing because of the implications for their own shareholding. If your balance sheet is weak, it can be hard to justify a bullish valuation of your business, even though you believe in its potential. The outcome can be an unpalatable offer in terms of the equity you need to hand over for the investor’s cash. This is a good time to start thinking creatively.  Some equity will strengthen your balance sheet, but so long as your investor feels he is being offered enough of an upside, consider a hybrid deal that includes some loan stock. Very often the prospect of extracting a proportion of his investment at an early stage is an attractive way of reducing his risk. It leaves more equity for the business owner, some of which could be offered as options to incentivise key staff.

Raising finance can be a tough exercise, and you’ll need to wear your thick skin. But finding the right sort of partner can be a tremendously revitalising experience for you and your business. Many of the most successful brands in the sector today have been through the process several times. It’s part of running a business, and the ambitious entrepreneur will treat it as an opportunity rather than a chore.

Red flags to an angel investor

Seven signals to avoid when pitching to a potential investor:

• The creditor black hole. Don’t imply that you’re raising funds to pay
  off creditors—focus instead on how the cash will add value or unlock
  potential.
• Silly salaries. Never mind what you think you’re
  worth; investors want to see you sharing the pain, investing some
  sweat. None will begrudge you an attractive bonus linked to
  performance, however.
• Wobbly morale. Your team can easily and
  unwittingly betray any cracks in morale. Work hard to unify your staff
  and bolster morale before introducing 
an investor.
• A flawless business. Your proposition becomes less plausible if it fails
  to acknowledge any weaknesses. After all, a canny investor will treat
  them as opportunities.
• Unrealistic valuation. Of course you want to hang on to equity, but don’t let that drive an overoptimistic valuation of your (cash-strapped) business.
• Risk blindness.Risk-free businesses are fantasies. Make sure you demonstrate awareness of the risks your company faces with some basic sensitivity analysis.
• Arrogance.You may think you know everything there is to know about
  your business, but afford potential investors some credit. There may be
  plenty you can learn from them, even if you don’t make a deal.

Resources for finding potential angels

• Angel Investment Network
• Angels Den
• British Business Angel Network
• Business Link
• Cmypitch

Article licensed for publication with Creative Commons “Attribution” terms.

First published in Catalogue & e-Business Magazine, January 2010

Art by Bubbo-Tubbo

Many niche multi-channel retailers don’t have an organisation big enough to support the in-house marketing expertise they need to grow their business at the pace they’d like. Often, the owner/manager will be working with limited resources, trying to navigate through an array of online tip-sheets and free advice to discover a strategy that’s effective, economical and sustainable.  I know, because that was me.

I’d make the annual pilgrimage to events like ECMOD and listen in awe to the quality of expertise on offer, wishing I could afford to bring my whole team, or even better, bring the experts into my own business and ‘internalise’ the learning.

So you can imagine how excited I was to get involved, through Gramar Investments, with the development and launch of an innovative online training program for ecommerce merchants.  The course mixes advice from many of the real-life experts I might encounter at ECMOD or equivalent events in the US, with the fictional story of a young, glamorous entrepreneur and her blossoming online cosmetics business.

The story is told through the eyes of Frank, a private investigator working for an undisclosed jealous rival.  His files, consisting of audio, email correspondence and notes, make up the course materials that are used to reinforce the key learning points of the program in a compelling, memorable and fun way.

Delivered online and on-demand, Frankly eCommerce enables your whole team to participate by working through the course materials collaboratively: tagging, sharing and commenting on lessons in a way that works best for your company.

The course is released to limited number of users in March 2010 however we’re currently inviting e-commerce retailers to sign up for free beta access in February, qualifying them for priority access when the full course is released.  Please register your interest for the free trial at www.franklyecommerce.com.

Follow Frankly eCommerce on Twitter

Between Tesco and Amazon, I could buy everything I need this Christmas.  I’d be confident about having huge choice, paying reasonable prices, and getting decent service.  It sounds like a no-brainer – so why would I rather sell my soul to the devil than make my holiday shopping so simple?

The answer is that I’m passionate about independent retailers.  Whether that’s local bricks and mortar or niche online specialists, I believe they’re the grass roots of our retail economy and the lifeblood of many local communities.

It’s easy to see this in our high streets and town centres.  Independent retailers are part of our national fabric, making each town distinct from the next, supporting the local economy, and absorbing the money we spend into the local community rather than syphoning it off to institutional shareholders.

And when you think about it, it’s no different online.  Specialist independent online retailers don’t inhabit cyberspace – they’re based in local communities too; providing employment, spending money, supporting local causes.  In fact, for many small communities that were previously ‘geographically challenged’ for retailing, the internet has provided a new lease of life for the local economy.

Good independent retailers – whether online, on the high street, or both – very often offer surprisingly competitive prices, excellent service, and plenty of choice.  What makes them different is the selection they make on your behalf of what to sell, the guidance of personal recommendation, the feeling that you’re really valued as a customer, and the knowledge that you’re supporting the sort of independent business that you’d never want to disappear.  For me, that’s a no-brainer.

Happy shopping!

Picture by LoopZilla

Angel funding is often an attractive option for businesses that need a fresh injection of finance.  If you find the right investor, it can be quick and cost effective.  Often, your angel investor will be willing to contribute time as well as money to help safeguard their investment and push for an exciting return.  Usually, they will have general business experience but if you’re lucky, their experience will be directly relevant to the type of business you run.

In the catalogue and e-commerce sector, there is no real network of angel networks with direct experience of the sector.  Without doubt, there are a number of individuals prepared to make (sometimes discreet) investments in other businesses – but these people can be hard to wheedle out.  To address this, I decided to form a syndicate of investors clearly focussed on funding businesses in the catalogue and e-commerce sectors only, where we have direct and relevant experience that we can contribute to the growth of the investee business.

Our syndicate is called Gramar Investments.  If you’re interested in investing alongside us, or you have an investment proposal you would like us to consider, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.  You can read more about our ‘investee profile’ on the Gramar Investments website.

How a retailer of adventure luggage attracts high-converting traffic with search-friendly content (and has a lot of fun in the process)

When I met him in June at the Internet Retailer conference in Boston, he’d just spent a week on a 500-mile off-road expedition putting a brand new Land Rover LR3 through its paces in Colorado, courtesy of Land Rover Lifestyle magazine.  By the time you read this, he’ll have just arrived back from a three-week expedition to a remote corner of Namibia.  All this, while running a successful and growing retail brand back home in Montana.  How does he get away with it?  Well, put simply, Jim’s business is Adventure.Like his father before him, Jim Markell was a parachute rigger in the marines.  Day in, day out, paratroopers quite literally put their lives in his hands every time they jumped out of a plane.   Today, he applies the same perfectionist’s appreciation of quality materials and attention to detail to manufacturing and retailing the Red Oxx range of premium adventure luggage.  Needless to say, every piece has an unconditional lifetime guarantee.

Building a content-rich landscape

I was already a fan of his product range thanks to an introduction from a colleague in the US, but now I’m an admirer of his marketing strategy too.  Why? Because Red Oxx uses content not only as the cornerstone of a successful, long-term, sustainable search strategy, but it positions this content at the heart of a wider marketing strategy in a manner that leverages its effectiveness exponentially. More on this “holistic” approach later, but first a summary of the tactic.

Over several years, Red Oxx has been publishing informative articles of around 800 words, framed around particular keyword phrases developed using tools such as Wordtracker or Keyword Discovery.  Importantly, the focus is deliberately on longer keyword phrases of three or four words, thus avoiding the most popular and competitive phrases.  They’ve found that the fourth word in a keyword phrase can add the extra degree of specificity that results in significantly higher click-through and conversion rates.

For example, when the airlines changed the rules for carry-on luggage post 9/11, there was a surge of interest in the subject from travellers worldwide.  It was also a subject of particular interest to Red Oxx, who make a range of bags based around these regulations.  Keywords phrases were researched and informational content was crafted, generating a surge of traffic to the site and a very short payback on the effort employed.  So successful was this particular campaign that it still generates top 10 organic rankings for certain keyword phrases and a steady stream of high-converting traffic more than six years later.

Swimming with sharks as a marketing strategy?

Where the example above was a somewhat opportunistic tactic straight out of the guerilla-marketing handbook, the next example epitomizes a slow burn and sustainable content strategy that has become the mainstay of the Red Oxx approach to generating qualified traffic from search.    It’s based simply on understanding their customers – what sort of people they are, and perhaps more importantly, what sort of people would they like to be.  By tapping into these aspirations with content that allows the merchant to interweave their brand and product, there is an opportunity to create the content-rich landscape that the search engine robots really appreciate.
Take swimming with sharks.  Hammerhead sharks to be specific – on Cocos Island, 300 miles off the Pacific coast of Costa Rica.  Yes, it really exists (I spent five eventful days there once, but that’s another story), and it’s one of the world’s top Scuba destinations where you’re guaranteed to see more varieties of shark in greater quantities than you might previously have thought advisable or even possible.

So Jim and his cousin Shawn took a trip there a couple of years ago with a company specializing in live-aboard diving trips.  They came home with some nice pictures, a bit of video, and enough words to create a series of four 800 word articles for the Adventure Journals section of the Red Oxx website.  Of course, no detail is spared when it comes to describing the choice of kit bags to take along for the ride – but the content is nevertheless compelling: detailed, well written, keyword rich, and supported by some visually appealing pictures and video.

The articles were all written in-house, and then optimized for search by an agency at a cost of around £250 each.  The cost of adding the supporting video content was probably less than £1,000.  The articles rank more highly than the website of the dive company that took them there.  Even with the cost of the trip factored in, it paid for itself within a year and, two years on, continues to pull in a steady stream of traffic with those high-ranking four word phrases (try “costa rica cocos sharks” and you’ll no longer be surprised to see a retailer of adventure luggage at number 3 on the first page).  The expectation is that it will continue for many years to send qualified prospects to the Red Oxx website at no additional cost – but this is not the only benefit.

Realising the holistic benefits

As I hinted earlier, the real benefits start to kick-in when your content becomes part of a wider strategy for your website. Dovetail with your email marketing in a way that reinforces your brand and supports your merchandise offering.  Allow your content to intertwine with your product pages and vice versa.  Your overall site search visibility will improve as people link to your content or click through from search results pages.

For Red Oxx, this strategy has delivered consistent and profitable double-digit organic growth.  It does no paid search.   It never sacrifices margin by discounting products in order to generate sales.  It no longer needs to tour the circuit of specialist consumer exhibitions (although they still do, mainly to gather ideas for fresh content).  Customers themselves generate a significant amount of content in the form of product reviews and travel diaries.  Jim even boasts of impatient email subscribers demanding to know when the next bulletin is being broadcast so they can read up on the latest Adventure Journals!

Of course, where merchants selling commodity products may struggle to achieve similar success, Red Oxx is a brand that is made for this strategy.  They make a unique range of products with a great story, and sell them to a booming market niche made up of voraciously inquisitive customers with money to spend. Notwithstanding the caveats, the Red Oxx story provides food for thought for any small online business, not least being this: if your brand is your passion, creating lots of keyword rich content can be not only fun, but perhaps the best long term investment you can make in your website.

Take-away points

• If your brand has a good story – tell it
• Write for the person you customer would like to be
• Research the long keyword phrases that will provide the sweet spot
• Create a content-rich landscape to boost overall site visibility
• Think holistically about your content

Article licensed for publication with Creative Commons “Attribution” terms.

First published in Catalogue & e-Business, September 2009

How to cut through geek-speak to unmask a supplier’s viability.

Ask the right question and a prospective technology supplier will reveal wonderfully useful information to help you in your evaluation. While merchant’s can feel intimidated by acronyms and jargon, you *can* talk tech about the product you’re thinking about buying. The secret is to ask qualitative questions, then follow the scent of evasion and pride. That’s because it’s often not just about the technology.

Most importantly, reflect on the fact that the more critical the supplier’s role in your operations, the greater the scrutiny you need to apply to the supplier itself -  the actual company. Products matter, software features matter, technology “stacks” sort of matter — but they evolve at a pace few of us are likely to totally understand. Trust your supplier to *really* understand. Through evaluating its technology, you can lead your supplier to demonstrate whether the company itself deserves your trust and investment.

Here’s an example:
A multi-channel merchant in search of a new ecommerce platform asked our evaluation of the search engine friendliness of a supplier’s URL’s or links. “They end in .asp. Is that OK?” Our question in reply, having nothing to do with SEO, sought to reveal the product’s technology foundations: “Why not end URL’s with .aspx?”  The intent of asking this is not to make a value judgement on the technology per se, but to give us an opening to explore the product’s evolution and infer the company’s health.

(We also answered the SEO question, too: Yes, .asp URL’s can assist your SEO efforts providing they resemble an English sentence, containing relevant keywords separated by hyphens, and in a “readable” style.

Let’s explore this example further: If a supplier’s product still relies on Microsoft’s old-style Active Server Pages, which a .asp file extension implies, then its notable that the product isn’t yet upgraded to the .NET framework. That matters because .NET is integral to Microsoft’s technology strategy — released circa 2002.

Seven years ago? Ah, so there’s a legacy flavor to this supplier’s product! There may be a perfectly good explanation for the supplier holding back. Ask for it. Maybe they’re not profitable enough to make the necessary investment. Or don’t think they have to bother given past success and present busyness. Or they won’t explain either way, being evasive. And maybe that’s because the founding partners split, and the remaining partner lacks expertise in managing technical operations and so he outsources its “maintenance” to India, and the software hardly evolves anymore.

All very interesting. But what, if you don’t know the difference between .asp and .aspx! How would you ever spot a vulnerability like that?

Even if tech acronyms are like Greek to you; still you can learn from this exchange. Ask leading questions, appealing to the supplier’s aspirations for its own product. People love to talk about their ‘babies’. Ask for qualitative descriptions. Prompt the supplier to describe what they’re proud of; they do have something to be proud of, yes? Pride’s important.

Suppliers also know what’s old and crusty about their product; give them a chance to describe all the great improvements they have planned. Ask why it matters to them. Sniff for evasion. Then read between the lines. Listen. Sometimes say nothing. Grunt and nod a bit.

Regardless of your comfort level with technology, remember that any question you ask will be more useful if it can’t be answered with a yes or a no. Your most effective questions will be those that can’t be answered with a definitive, factual response. Factual questions are less useful because we’re assuming you don’t know enough to evaluate the technical decision-making that drives a product’s evolution. “What’s the technology behind your product?” might serve to open the conversation, but does it mean anything to you if the answer is .php or .asp or .jsp?

Probably not. But you can learn to follow a scent. What sounds evasive? When do you hear pride? Explore this with multiple points of contact within the supplier’s company. Trust where it leads you, and keep asking why. In the end, you’ll be better informed when it comes to the biggest decision:  can you trust the company?

Cheat Sheet

Qualitative, leading questions you can ask a prospective supplier about its technology product without speaking geek:

1. Why is that important?
2. How does that help you serve me better?
3. What’s exciting about that to you?
4. Which part of it are you proud of?
5. How would you improve / upgrade that if you could?
6. Why haven’t you done it already?
9. When did you last do something like that?
7. What part draws the most support questions?
8. Why do you think that is?
10. What else?

About the authors:

Patrick Pitman, CEO of E-business Coach,
implemented his first ecommerce site in 1996.

Murray Kenneth has been a multi-channel merchant since 1998 and currently offers advice and
investment to growing merchants.

Article licensed for publication with Creative Commons “Attribution” terms.

First published in Catalogue & e-Business, June 2009

Image by mcsandstrom

Having been through a “recovery” myself, I understand the challenges faced by businesses in the multi-channel retail sector facing a distress situation.  I’ve therefore assembled a consortium of investors willing to provide recovery finance, management input and board level advice to small and medium sized multi-channel retailers.  If this is of interest to you, please contact me.

2009 looks set to be challenging year for multi-channel retailers of all sizes.  Inevitably, the combined pressures on cash flow of a squeeze in margins and a drop in consumer spending will be more than some companies can bear, given a heavy reliance on cash from sales to keep up with creditor payments.  Fixed overheads are often not easy to slash and the very nature of a multi-channel business that relies on direct mail as a significant generator of sales means that investment in printing and mailing can require additional funding.

In 2004 my own business reached a stage where, despite healthy sales growth, it became virtually impossible to raise further funding for recruitment due to the level of creditor liabilities in the business.  A costly outsourcing error compounded the problems and took the business to the brink.  The ensuing insolvency proceedings and rescue package were possibly the most challenging period in my career.  However, the brand was saved along with the jobs of the team and, freed of the crippling burden of its liabilities, the new business structure took the brand to profitability in its first 18 months of trading.

Of course it’s always easier the second time round.  Costly mistakes can be avoided and the optimum business model can be adopted from the outset.  High level advisory input will help the management team remain focussed on the important strategic levers and targets within the business.  In short, a business recovery can unshackle you and your team from the burden of financial stress and help your brand realise it’s true potential.

For a discrete and no-obligation preliminary conversation, please contact me.