Autumn Newsletter 2009

Autumn Newsletter - 2009

Autumn comes to the Leven Valley Autumn is upon us and we thought you might like a reminder with this photo by Mike Morton.   Let's hope the winter will be kind to us. Let's face it, we don't mind cold and frosty, even a bit of snow as long as it gets rid of those germs and brings a good spring and summer next year eh?

Dear Colleagues,

Pat Billingham

I'm afraid we have to start off with a very sad message. On Sunday Last Pat Billingham of Decoflora died suddenly; our thoughts are with Geoff and his family at this time. Pat was a lovely lady and over the years she became a very good friend, her warmth and humour will be missed greatly by many.

Looking Forward and Planning

Getting Ready for Christmas

I know we are still in our "summer" if you can call it that, and that Christmas really seems a long way off. For families I suppose it is, but for retailers it is just around the corner and if you want to have a successful Christmas then the Planning Starts Now!
 
According to Experian, Christmas 2008 was for retailers, the worst since the recession of the early nineties and this year looks as though it will be equally challenging.
 
There will be fierce competition out there for the hard earned cash of the consumers and tight marketing budgets with even more pressure on businesses to justify marketing spending and maximise the returns on their marketing investment will be the norm.
 
If you want to compete and stay ahead of the game there is not time to lose. This Christmas will be one where the need to grow revenue (sales) and building your customer loyalty will be a top priority for all businesses large or small.

Some Important Statistics

Let's get some statistics out of the way first.

• Online retail spending increased by 14.2% with UK consumers spending £4.67 billion on line in December alone, which equates to £77.00 per person. 
• Traffic to online retailers hit its peak on Boxing Day. Traffic started to increase significantly on Christmas Day which saw bigger returns than the same day in 2007. Boxing Day was big news for those who were trading off line with a 12.5% increase over 2007. 
• On the high street the big brands do best over the Christmas Period with on-line retailers doing significantly better post Christmas than during the run up to the holiday, probably with the January Sales and other promotions. But High Street footfall fell by 3.1 % in December against the previous year.  
• Between Christmas 2007 and Christmas 2008, fashion was the fastest growing sub-sector. 

Some Key dates

1. For on-line retailers the pre-Christmas peak in traffic was Sunday 30th November. The peak period lasted around 10 days between Saturday 29th November and Monday 9th December 2008, after which traffic to online retailers fell away rapidly.  
2. Monday 8th December 2008 was the biggest online shopping day in 2008 as online sales hit £ 320,000,000. This Monday in December has become known as "Mega Monday" traditionally the second Monday in December and the increase was 14% over the previous Mega Monday in 2007. At this moment in time it is thought that there is no reason why this might not continue, although having said this, pundits are building in the caveat that much depends on the economic situation at the time. Though no one wants to use the phrase, "green shoots" quite a few may be thinking it and preparing campaigns to get ahead of the others. 
3. Tuesday 23rd December was when Pre- Christmas foot-fall peaked as folk rushed to the shops to buy their last minute presents and pick up bargains with many of the January Sales starting early. Traffic to On-Line outlets was low in the final run up to Christmas but it was still higher than it was in 2007 and people started researching for early sales on line. Many on line and off line sales started on Christmas Day. 
4. Boxing Day was the busiest day of the year for on-line retailers. 

The source of the data is Experian

What can we learn form all this?

The first thing that comes to mind with me is - if you run a business, you really can't ignore the Internet any longer. It does not matter what kind of business you run or whether it is product orientated or service based.
 
If you don't have a presence on the World Wide Web you could well be facing a continuing scenario of diminishing returns.
 
I mention this simply because you may have suppliers who are not on the web, or friends in businesses that are not in competition with you who don't have a website. Point this out to them, you will be doing them a favour and if they come to us for their website you could be picking up a nice piece of commission.

OK, armed with that kind of statistical knowledge how can we get the best from both our online shop and our bricks and mortar outlet?

Well, one thing we can learn from the statistics is that if you have an online business then you need to plan promotions a little earlier than those who don't have on line facilities. Remember,

• That online sales peaked earlier than the off line 
• You will need to stress last date when you can guarantee delivery before Christmas 
• You will be able to decide the best time to email customers and let them know when you might be having a late night shopping event if you have bricks and mortar outlets, or perhaps a pod-cast or video session on your website if you are on line. 

Now is the time to look at your plans for this coming Christmas.

Here are some of the things you may want to consider.

It is critical to make a plan, but be aware that you need to be flexible enough to move away from the plan if economic climate changes occur. Although your plan may be the first thing to go "out the window" if any dramatic changes do occur, at least you will l have the basis of something to adapt and work with. It will help if you commit your plan to paper and allow everyone that needs to see it, see it. It should also be in your head, so you know quickly what to do or when and where to change things.
 
Here are just some of the things you may want to include in your plan.

1. What will you stock,  
2. How you will sell it? 
3. What automatic up-sales could you offer and how 
4. Do I want a Christmas seasonal look to the pages?  
5. Should this seasonal theme stretch to promotions for January Sales, Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter?  
6. What will the special offers or promotions be? 
7. What can I do to make it easier for them to buy from me?  
8. If you are service based, what can I say to make them want to speak to me or make an appointment with me for before or after the holiday? 
9. Why should they deal with me / us rather than our competitors? 
10. What are our competitors doing?  
11. Can you do it better, cheaper, faster?  
12. Is our Product and Service Quality better than our competitors, if not how do we make it that way? 
13. When will be our last day for delivery to make sure any presents arrive before Christmas? 
14. What fudge factors or wriggle room can I build into deliveries or replacements that ensure we keep the customer when problems arise? 

With an online outlet to your business it is essential to make sure you have data (lists and contact details) that it are up to date, clean and accurate so your communications get to where they need to be when they need to be there. Also, this is the time for sending out offers and ideas for last minute shoppers and for upselling. You would not believe how many small firms do not Up - Sell.

What's Upselling?

Upselling is what Amazon and other websites do when you buy something from them. They accept your order and at the same time tell you what other items people bought who bought the same thing you just paid for. They also tell you what might be similar or complement what you have just bought.

Upselling then is adding to the sale you have just made

What in your range of stock could be up-sold and how could you best do that? (You may want to speak to us on how to achieve it)
 
Think of it, a man comes on line and buys a blouse or top for his wife or girlfriend; you can then point out other items that would match the blouse/top – how could you help him with colour matching?

How could you apply this in your business?

1. If you know what your Christmas lines will be, now is the time to research the best keywords and key phrases for them.  
2. Get working on the pages, content, images, text and links. You don't have to make them live yet, just hit the hide box in the page settings and it will stay hidden to visitors until you want to make it live. 
3. Have a look what your competitors are doing. We can tell you how to find out what keywords they are using.... 
4. Make sure your shipping costs are up to date and well published. Many sales don't make it through because shipping costs are not clear or added properly. 
5. Make sure your email package can use HTML and then you can make your emails to clients interactive. 
6. Think about getting a cross selling format in place with one of your suppliers or colleagues that is not in competition with you and where they complement your products. You could both be earning commission from one another if you set up affiliateships  
7. Consider using the Social Networks like Facebook and Twitter to help spread the word 
8. Set up a Blog if you have not already done so, if you are not sure what it is or how to do it - we will help. 

How can you obtain the contact details of prospective clients?

• Around 80% of businesses don't bother to collect contact details of their customers; particularly where a bricks and mortar shop is concerned. Why I will never know.
    
• Even when customers come into your shop off the street, there is no reason why you can't have a register for them to write their contact and email address so you can send then your next catalogue or information about future changes to the shop or product range.
    
• To so many it is just "One More Thing" they have to do and can't be bothered with.
    
• I would like you to take a moment and think about this.....
    
• The vast majority of homes are now on the Internet, which means they can be contacted 24/7 – 365.
    
• If you have a list of your visitors/customers' - their name, address, email address you can post out information to them any time or email them with your latest season's stock. If you don't have those contact details – you can't do a thing about it when you change your stock for the spring or have an offer that they probably could not refuse.
    
• If you are not online have the list near to the payout/checkout and get your staff to ask them to fill it in. Some won't give you the details, many will and every one you collect is a valued client waiting for you to give them the opportunity to buy from you when you change lines, have a sale or create a new catalogue.
    
• If you don't like the sound of a list that everyone can see, think about using slips that are deposited in a box.
    
• Make sure your privacy policy is on the top of the register and around the area where you intend to collect those details.
    
• You can outshine even the biggest of your competition by keeping accurate data (something many large organisations fall down on, and by sending out informative news regularly.  

Another area where you can beat the big boys is in after-sales service. Make sure you stay in contact with your clients and visitors, ask them

• Did they receive the goods on time and in good condition? 
• How the delivery went, was the driver courteous and helpful? 
• How could you improve things? 
• Would they recommend you to their friends and family? 
• Would they like to be kept informed of new lines, sales and seasonal offers? 
• Would they like to be part of a focus group where they could test products for you? 

One of the biggest complaints for online purchases continues to be that the items bought did not reach the addresses in time for Christmas or Birthdays because there was a discrepancy in the address.
  
Pay particular attention to the data you do have; addresses, telephone numbers and email – get it right first time and you will have a loyal and satisfied customer for many years to come.
 
In this day and age far too much time is spent on closing one sale and not in keeping the customer for life....think about it and how it could improve your sales by taking this kind of approach.

If you have a Website, collecting email addresses of clients and those who just visit your website is an absolute must

This is where the big companies outpace the small businesses by far. Why, because they understand the value of the contact details and because they have software that will take the hard work out of sending regular emails for them. The email software will have Auto Responders, something I mentioned before and it is here that you can really clean up against your small business competition if you are prepared to get to grips with the technology and marketing material you will need.

What do I do when I've collected all those email addresses?

You use them!
 
They are your stock in trade for marketing your goods and services.
 
With your contacts lists you can send out

• Newsletters 
• Articles 
• Leaflets 
• Special Offers 
• Seasonal Offers 
• Sale notices 
• Open Day and late shopping info 
• New product or new service details 
• Notices about Enhancements to Products and Services 
• Birthday greetings 
• New client welcomes 
• After sales care etc 

What's more you can automate it and all you have to do is produce the literature that goes out with the mailings. The software does the rest. You set the times, frequency what the message carries etc and that's it. It's all very professional and it produces good business.

What more could you want?
 
You'll be surprised how much time it saves you.

Whilst we do have lists in our software on the Cumbria Business Portal where you can collect contact details and send emails to the members of those lists, they are basic lists and cannot cope with auto responders and sending out stuff on a pre-programmed basis which is why we now use AWebber.
 
 This newsletter arrived via our new email marketing supplier and they are giving a very generous offer to any of our clients who would want to use their well tried and tested system which of course we recommend.

AWebber are offering you your first month of 500 emails along with the other features for just $1.00 - Yes One Dollar.

Click the AWebber icon to find out more and to book your trial offer price.
 
Thanks again for taking the time out of your busy schedule to read this article. If there is anything that strikes a chord with you let us know.

If you would like to discuss any of the above feel free to give us a call on 015395 31338

Warm Regards
 
David