Thanks to the changing tech landscape, shops are now more affordable and more flexible than ever, plus, the demand for shops has never been higher! Before I joined commonsku as the Chief Content Officer, I spent years as a distributor focused on the company stores/shop space, after taking hundreds of calls from prospects and setting up many shops, I learned how to quickly qualify the best opportunities, focus on the most profitable ones, and grow those with the most potential. In this series, we’ll discover the keys to unlocking the most profitable shops.
We kicked off this series about shops by sharing how to qualify the best shop opportunities, then we discussed ways to price your shop, but this third key is a secret you cannot refuse to ignore. By doing this one thing, you greatly increase your factor of success, sometimes fourfold!
What’s the secret?
Most shops launch with a misunderstanding. It’s the same fallacy that dooms many retail experiences, the myth of “if you build it, they will come.”
Most shops never reach their full potential because of one simple problem: marketing.
A shop, even a company shop (maybe particularly a company shop) is like any other retail or e-commerce experience, without continual marketing, your shop will disappear if not kept in the minds of buyers frequently. And with shops, as with any online experience, it’s not just about frequency, but also the type of marketing and the messaging.
Even when your shop is giving away FREE MONEY (from a budget allocation per employee or from an advertising budget for a bank branch or franchise) you still have to market your store to them frequently!
We once had a franchisor client that allocated $1,036 from a co-op advertising fund to each franchise so that they could use the money for a specific set of print materials, there were 713 franchises, that’s a $738,668 opportunity. By September of its first year, only 16% had spent their free money. 16%!
Or take the example of an employee apparel program: A successful credit union with strong employee loyalty launches a shop by giving a $150 annual budget allocation to each of their 350 employees for apparel. It’s a $52,000 opportunity if you get 100% participation. But by mid-year, only 50% of the employees have spent their full budget.
You would think that FREE MONEY would ensure success. You’d be wrong. You launch the shop and then wait for the orders to start rolling in. Which they do … but with only partial participation. And even then, of that participation not everyone uses their full allocation at once. The shop surges for a brief moment, fizzles, then dies.
And this happens far more often than you would think, in fact, with most stores, whether it’s a store that allocates a budget to employees for apparel or a bank or franchise that allocates an advertising budget, you still have to advertise your shop!
Why?
Multiple reasons: Just like your chaotic inbox, their inbox is flooded with priorities. In our franchise example, some folks didn’t see the notice. Others saw it but thought they would spend that money later, then they forgot. With our credit union example, some saw the email, even visited the shop, but they didn’t see anything they wanted to purchase.
Even an immediate budget allocation doesn’t guarantee orders will roll in. Likewise, if you launch a direct-to-consumer shop, you can’t take it for granted that they will buy nor that they will even remember that the shop exists. You must rely on persistent touch-points and careful merchandising to continue to capture more of that budget.
It’s not enough to build a shop and populate it with cool merch. It’s never a “one-and-done” launch. For one, tastes vary, and you’re hitting a moving target. So, your initial merch selection, while carefully crafted with your key buyer, might not encompass the needs of your market, initially. This is why it’s imperative that you coach your buyer that a shop is an ongoing opportunity that will require persistent marketing and frequent refreshing of merchandise.
Additionally, If your key buyer works hard with you to co-create a shop for their company, they too have to understand this or your shop will fail because once they launch it, they too, will think their work is done. Moreover, they have a busy schedule with tons of priorities, the shop was just one of their many initiatives. Once they create it, they move on to the next fire. But you need to guarantee success, which is why you should retain control of marketing.
If at all possible, ask your buyer for permission to market the shop to buyers on their behalf.
Most corporate clients are very guarded about vendors emailing their employees or shop constituents directly, whether it’s a consumer shop, camp shop, franchise system, or a bank with branch managers.
One way to help them overcome their reluctance is to demonstrate how you will market the shop: Build them an email template (using a service like MailChimp) customized for their shop. The email should feature their branding, not yours, “The ABC Company Shop,” not “The Ace Promos Shop.” The reason? You want the end-buyers to understand that this is their shop, they already have an affinity for their brand, while many of those end-buyers might not even know you exist. There is much less confusion (and less push-back) when it’s an email coming from their own branded property. Demonstrate to your client not only how cool the newsletter would look, but also let them know what you plan to promote and the frequency of your promotions.
And if your buyer refuses to give you control of the marketing, you should still include a suggested marketing plan for the shop and frequently check with your buyer on the progress. A few ideas that will jump-start your shop marketing plan:
Craft the introductory shop message yourself. Even if you are not the one sending the introductory email, by crafting the message yourself, you’re helping your buyer do the heavy lifting and you are controlling the most important part of the introduction: messaging.
What to include: If it’s a shop that allocates a budget per buyer, state this in the introduction. Also, include your email address or phone number for any questions or assistance. Moreover, let them know that you will be updating the shop with new merch on an ongoing basis.
Reminders: If there is a budget involved, send frequent reminders of their spend or their remaining allotment. For example, the credit union shop customers who have a $150 spend allocation might need a regular reminder that they have free money waiting that they haven’t yet spent. You can even determine who hasn’t spent their budget yet and send a reminder to that targeted list only.
Limited Time Only: Magic words. If it’s a time-limited shop like a pop-up shop, remind them how long the shop will be open and when it will close and send multiple reminders between opening and close. The closer you get to the close date, the more frequent your marketing should occur.
NEW! (See how that simple word got your attention?) Use your monthly newsletter to introduce a few new items. Refreshing your shop with new items will keep your audience engaged, moreover, by introducing new items, it will guarantee you cover all the varied merchandise needs. One distributor said, “The best thing I ever did for our shop was to feature an item of the month. By doing so, you create buzz and drive constant traffic to the site as people anticipate seeing what’s new every month. Plus, you quash any negative complaints of ‘never having anything new.’” One shop they created ran for nine years and it featured about 15 products that drove 85% of the business. However, to keep the shop “fresh”, they launched dozens of new products every year, whetting the appetite of returning buyers and intriguing new buyers to purchase.
Why to buy: One other secret that can make it a goldmine is that most shops are usually launched to solve one initial problem, such as capturing apparel sizes or aggregating orders. But as a shop matures, you’ll discover even more opportunities than the initial problem you were trying to solve. Use your monthly newsletter to feature use-cases or examples of why they should purchase. When a florist launches a new store, you’ll get more frequent emails around Mother’s Day or Valentine’s Day because those are high seasons for purchasing. Likewise, with your shop, you’ll experience seasonal opportunities as well, like fall and winter jackets or golf season or spring/summer wear. And if it’s a corporate shop, there are other use cases: employee anniversaries, milestones, sales achievements, new hires, etc.
If all of this sounds like a lot of work, sometimes it is, at first. But the more of these you do, the easier it will become. And you must remember this, that you have two buyers you are trying to impress, not just the end-user, but your initial buyer, the one who recruited you to build the shop in the first place. Your buyer wants the shop to be successful too, so make it a success for you and your buyer and you’ll retain the business longer.
The bottom line: You can launch the coolest shop, with the most innovative products, to an audience with free money to spend ... and get only a fraction of your anticipated return.
The great advertising mind David Ogilvy once said, “It takes a big idea to attract the attention of consumers and get them to buy your product. Unless your advertising contains a big idea, it will pass like a ship in the night. I doubt if more than one campaign in a hundred contains a big idea.”
Persistent marketing is the primary secret of all successful shops.
commonsku has three amazingly simple types of shops to fit your needs, a Marketing Shop, Pop Up Shop, and a Company Shop, for more information, check out our shop options here.