Digital And eCommerce Strategy - AUSSIE JOHNNY DIGITAL

Digital Marketing And eCommerce Strategy

My experience with digital and eCommerce strategy goes beyond content management and social media engagement. During the financial crisis of 2008, my first online venture collapsed due over to a large majority of the businesses listed ceased to exist when it was time to collect payment. A majority of those listed businesses were boutique work from home start-ups that could not ride beyond the crash.

As I transition into digital marketing consultation in 2009, I was fortunate enough to start out as a business consultant because of this rocky period. Existing businesses that survived wanted to fill the void left by a sudden lack of competition. This was also a time when businesses that still made a tiny profit decided to sell up and move on, those businesses were often brought by people that were experienced in the business, but lacked the knowledge to run a business, reach new customers online or retain existing customers with digital touchpoints.

Small Business - Real Case Study

Overview

This particular high editorial men’s fashion website launched with a backing of 150,000 Euros from prominent investors, outside expertise in all areas, other than digital marketing and an amazing content editor. Within a year, the start-up was on the verge of bankruptcy and the founders had not paid themselves for months and debts mounting against the company. The company took me on as a consultant as a “last ditch effort” to raise more funds with a sound digital marketing strategy in place.

Intervention

The plan was to launch an online fundraising campaign to inject some much-needed cash into the start-up. This business concept was a long-awaited dream for the main co-founder. The new funding would not only help the business to stay afloat, but to also save the livelihood of three employees and keep the dream alive!

My role was to create a digital marketing plan to help convince the current investors to inject more money into the start-up, before the kickstarter was launched. During my initial online assessment of the business, I identified numerous issues with the website that hindered customers completing a purchase, payment security risks that led to several fraudulent transactions and the customer journey did not align with the business owners concept.

The outcome

The overall mismanagement of the business during the last year led to the original investors parting ways with the company with no further financial investment.

The kickstarter went ahead with disappointing results and the business closed down its headquarters not long after.

My assessment highlighted to the co-founders in how not to run an online business, by establishing the responsibilities and allocating the daily workflow to be handled by the right people within the company, the importance of outsourcing critical functionality to reduce employment costs and idleness. Structuring the website to align with the company’s vision.

I did not receive a full payment for my involvement with the company for obvious reasons however, the company co-founders believed they would have done alot better if I advised the business from the start. This job did lead to more opportunities and two lifelong friends which is more important than any financial sum!

Highlights

– The owner could not understand the errors so I built the website in lego, to explain issues in child-speak

– Creating the only online profitable PPC campaign that cost only 100sek (10 euros) leading to their first and only paid traffic sale, a profit of 93%!

– The job gave me personal confidence delivering results in non-English speaking country

Medium Size Business - Real Case Study

Overview

This particular start-up had recently won a business innovation award when I agreed to come on board. Recently receiving investment funding in the millions of dollars, they wanted to expand globally by utilizing my expertise in created a sound digital marketing strategy.

The Set-up

The first task was updating the website.

The information and visuals were part of the older business model and had not been updated since the early 2000’s. After I concluded a SWOT analysis, we designed a new website that resonated with the company’s primary product concept statement.

There was emphasis to create technical information that could be easily found on the website with the intention to reduce customer support. The after service on the products was so complex it could only be handled by the company engineers that were busy working within other areas in the company. Can you imagine the cost of hiring engineers and having them employed in a customer call centre role?

Part of my consultation was to provide advice on several aspects of the business operations, this included a strategy in reaching potential prospects overseas, since Australia was not the marketing place for this technology at the time.

Update

– The company products can be found in every country, including Antarctica.

– The winning product has expanded into a range to suit every customer’s needs.

– The business now has international offices and production plants.

– This business has won more awards in business and innovation.

– Starting with four friends, the company now employs over 250 globally.

– Since my time as a consultant, I have made life long friends with some of the staff.

Corporate Entity - Real Case Study

Overview

This company is one of the largest distributors in fashion, footwear and apparel in Scandinavia and the Baltics states. Initially, this business was at the forefront of digital technology in the early 2000’s, but when I first assessed the company’s digital footprint, there seemed to be no clear e-commerce strategy in place and their online presence existed in one .com location and an Instagram profile.

Multitude of tasks

Businesses that have been successfully operating for the past 20 years may still be going strong today, but failing to adapt online could mean losing market share and profitability. This particular business started as a two-room corner office operation, expanding to five sales offices, over 30 showrooms and a massive warehouse complex, with operations spanning over nine countries within 20 years of operation and with double-digit growth for many years.

When I first started working with this company, at times they were still capturing clients with carbon copy booklets, all sales personnel had individual excel spreadsheets and software was not integrated.

The general attitude was, “it’s working, why change it”.

With such a successful performance history, the very thought of implementing change was extremely difficult and in this particular business case and it took several months to convince key management to invest money into online capabilities, integrated technology and updated software, as well as creating the mindset of operating in modernization environment.

One day, I mentioned, “you are most likely hemorrhaging sales and increasing the workload of staff with unnecessary multiple handling of basic information”. This got the conversation flowing in the “Right direction”.

In the most recent years, the company had been dogged by change management consultants with lofty ideas laid out using complex flowcharts and beautiful Euler diagrams, but the cost of implementing change, as well as maintaining the new technology adaptations was always profoundly expensive. Not only there was a financial cost of any major overhaul, there was a genuine concern that the change process would interrupt the daily operations, especially during the peak period.

When I had received the approval to work on the company’s digital transformation and change management, we have managed to reduce the overall financial cost of the project by a significant margin and disruption to the staff’s daily routines has thus far being minimized.

The Overhaul – Digital transformation and change management

This job will eventually be completed in 2021 due to the current situation of COVID-19.

Some of the highlights involved with the project:

– To reduce change anxiety, we involved staff engagement and included regular updates of changing processes and scheduled staff training ahead of time.- Even before COVID-19, I felt web-based infrastructure was key for a more life/work balance lifestyle, especially since the company was international.

– Mobile-first everything, from analytical reports to product information, I had pushed for all information to be available within a few taps of your mobile phone.

– By implementing client relationship management software, all brand managers can now instantly share client information, link meetings and management can stay more connected. Previously staff kept all information separately and to themselves via notes or excel spreadsheets, this led to redundant and duplicate information.

– Through digitalizing all potential clients and client information and notes, all staff involved are now connected, from sales and invoicing to shipment and deliverers.

– My personal key point was the creation of many input areas and integrated information flow, with mobile-first approach to retrieve and update information.

– A digital marketing platform for wholesale and retail sales. When I first met with the company, online retail was not existent and wholesale business was at times still a pen and paper operation.

– In terms of social media stores, admittedly this was poorly implemented due to the decision to save financially on website platforms. Management could not see my reasoning on how important these features were in terms of how consumers shop online, especially via mobile.