Showing posts with label Ecommerce. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ecommerce. Show all posts

Friday, November 27, 2009

Yes, Kemo Sabe, This Company Is Succeeding In Today’s Economy!

Want real positive simple answers to why this giftware supplier company is making it?

1. Products people want to buy are offered for sale at fair, affordable retail prices. Simple as it sounds many companies today have beaten to death tired old product lines because they get a big mark up or they don’t have the monies to develop new designs. Most old giftware today is in the "dollar store" graveyards and competes directly with the "Brand" offerings at rock bottom prices. The perceived value is still there on this new companies products, they sell thru and the "Brand" retailer gets great turns because it is priced right. Many giftware companies are still slapping new or licensed art on old tired junk, this is not 2010 product development, those days are gone....

This "new" company understands that impulse products must do more than one thing in the market today. Being a “dustible” (A giftware or Collectible that now or in the future collects dust on a shelf) doesn’t sell in today’s economic environment. Products today have 3 seconds to stoke the emotion of a buyer, cruel as it sounds. This company positively pushes specific targeted responses and connects with the individual buyer’s “emotion button.”

2. Internal systems are state of the art, outsourced, and yield variable overhead at low cost. VOIP Phones, Cloud email, I.T., accounting, HR, customer service infrastructure, and web services, etc, are all outsourced and the savings are given back to the end customer in lower prices, again giving the products high perceived value and high turns for the retailers.

3. Interactive consumer mindset. One of their top selling “Giftibles” is designed for today’s and tomorrow’s buyer enlisting the capability to have the product interact with a personalized live website as an ongoing ROI service.

4. Aggressive marketing that finds the customer and supports the brand for its retailers. Infomercials, Permission email marketing, Direct Marketing, and a number of innovative techniques that are proprietary all support their retailers and drive end customers to their dealers in an ongoing effort. They are playing offense, not defense with their marketing and sales in conventional and unconventional ways!

Who is this company that “get’s it” in today’s challenging marketplace? The company is called Little Gifts (http://www.littlegifts.com/) and is one of the top giftware companies listed on this year’s best seller list by Giftbeat magazines 2009 charts (Pet gifts) (http://www.giftbeat.com/ ). One of its hot items? IDtag.com (http://www.idtag.com/ ) is a non evasive, privacy protected pet system that invokes a gift and interactive web solution for finding lost pets. Great sellers are breed specific targeted affordable impulse items for owners of specific dogs, cats, etc.

The owner’s did not drop out of the sky with their innovations, rather learned the gift marketplace after being highly regarded consultants (for some of the “big Dog” brands back in the day). Growing up in the new interactive world Little Gifts owners took the entrepreneurial path and combined their business know how and consulting experience with their own money to create this vision of what works. This product line and company is gift, collectible, and decorative accessories circa 2010. They have reinvented the successful gift company model for the next decade.

So Kemo Sabe, better to light a candle than curse the darkness of this consumer economy, lessons learned from today’s buyer are showing the way. This is one case study with a happy ending, these folks are adapting and being rewarded for creating a new business model; they should be congratulated!

You might want to take a page from their book and forget about all those Indians that are swarming around your present situation.......

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Ecommerce And Interactive Avatar Advertising Inside The Box; Do You Know Where Your Children Are?


First The Basics Of The Interactive Virtual Landscape Inside The “Box”:

•At least one or more Nintendo Wii (younger and family friendly games), XBOX 360, and PS3 (Older, albeit more “mature” rated) game systems are in many homes today.
•Most non gamers (and Parents) are unaware of the virtual worlds that come into your homes when these boxes are hooked up to the internet live.
•Avatars are the alter ego virtual travelers created by the player inside the interactive worlds.
•Interactive product placements, Ecommerce and youth advertising inside these boxes are now a billion dollar industry! Surprise!

Recently, I worked with an advertiser in Manhattan who is heavily involved in a beta project where local advertisers and promotions are triggered and rotated by the location of the Ip address visiting the live games inside Nintendo, Xbox, and PS3. The idea is national ads and product placements show up as the visitor travels through the game or a chat mall. The real trick for him was targeted local ads are triggered (i.e. Joe’s local pizza place) by the IP address or the visitor can punch in a zip code if they are traveling into a temporary city (future business trips into say San Francisco to see where 2 for 1 restaurant coupons are available to print off).

Perhaps this national interactive advertising is not new to any Ecommerce and Interactive experts, but what was new to me was my “Local” AVATAR could go into a name brand store or local (i.e. virtual 3D Radio Shack or locally owned Betty’s clothing store) and make a purchase in 3d with my credit card. This was an incredible customer experience for me as I don’t actually go to malls anymore to buy “stuff”. The experience was a virtual web shopping site in 3d while I was strolling along talking to other Avatars. That week my purchases came to my home on time and in good condition, just like making a website purchase. Also of note, above the buildings in virtual beta town, one could clearly see the graphic ads were targeted to me in the demo, with a few national Nike billboards thrown in for good measure.

Just as a heads up, today’s kids are not out playing street football, or dressing Barbie as much as they used to, but they are very active! We as Ecommerce and Interactive Marketers can curse the generational darkness or we can go into these AVATAR boxes and find our future buyers in their native habitat. This new Interactive advertising world can be a force for good or bad, but it will be a force to be reckoned with in the future. Good luck, the Ecommerce and Interactive Marketing game just changed…………..