heartharmony.com.au

Yesterday I took some time out to read this month’s edition of Nett magazine – and was fascinated by the story about Big Brown Box who have had phenomenal growth in the online world in a very short time.

Reading it, I was reminded that if you want to grow your business there is one equation you need to be aware of – business growth costs time and/or money. You either invest your time or the time of your team to learn how to do a particular thing and then implement it, or you spend money and get it done for you.

Big Brown Box went with the spend money approach. As they so rightly put it, they had a parent company with very deep pockets that funded 12 months of research, planning and fine tuning before the company went “live” on the net.

But even if you don’t have  the level of backing that Big Brown Box had, their strategy is very easy to adapt no matter the size of your business or the money you have to invest. Here’s a snapshot of what they did in that 12 month period:

1. Conduct extensive research on what consumers wanted from an online store – the “essential requirements and minimum standards … before they would buy online”. They used the findings to shape their online strategy. Many businesses miss the research phase – but businesses win or fail based on their initial research.
2. Know what makes them unique – they looked at best practice around the world for online stores and created a service that was unique to the Australian market (free delivery across Australia). Yes, this USP can be matched by other online brands in the future, but they have market leading advantage.
3. Get the basic functionality right – think like a customer and not like a Geek. Customers look for things on your site in different ways to people who intimately know your business. Make it easy for customers to navigate around your site and find what they are looking for.
4. Education not just information - If you are online, one of the key roles you have is providing education and not just information. How can you educate customers about your product or service?
5. Encourage interaction – “the best recommendation is from happy buyers” – Actively seek honest feedback on your site. Big Brown Box requests a product review after each purchase and follows up those who don’t submit a review.
6. Balance SEO (search engine optimisation) with paid traffic - most businesses need both in order to be successful. In both strategies – focus on the smallest niche at individual product level for best results.
7. Aggresively target quality links back to your site to boost your rankings.
8. Build strong alliances with influential people on the net – Big Brown Box targets influential bloggers as a way to get their brand out there.
9. Track & respond to online discussion of your brand – both good and bad comments need to be addressed. Take negative feedback on board and acknowledge any mistakes.
10. Have an exceptional customer service team that are empowered to take action to resolve complaints. Your online business is only as good as the humans behind it.

Each of these 10 things can be implemented in your business, no matter your marketing budget. You may need to invest time to achieve the same results, but each is very “doable”.

What can you do in your business today after learning from the success strategies of the Big Brown Box?

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

We put your business into words

Heart Harmony – Freelance Copywriter