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Link Roundup: Thursday, February 2, 2012

February 2, 2012 by John Suder

A roundup of ecommerce, retail and design news you may have missed:

[RETAIL] [ECOM] Facebook Commerce Holds Promise for Retailers

[RETAIL] Top retailers saw big holiday traffic gains thanks to Facebook marketing

[DESIGN] What Does The Perfect Mobile Interface Look Like? (Don’t Ask Siri)

[RETAIL] [MOBILE ECOM] Shopkick: We Helped Drive More Than $110M In 2011 Revenue For Brands And Brick And Mortar Retailers

[ECOM] E-Commerce Site For Household Goods Alice.com Raises $3.6 Million

[DEVELOPMENT] 10 Signs Your Team Isn’t Really Agile

Link Roundup: Thursday, January 19, 2012

January 18, 2012 by John Suder

A roundup of ecommerce, retail and design news you may have missed:

[ECOM] Hackers Steal User Names and E-Mails from Zappos and 6PM.com
Hackers broke into the data servers of online retailer Zappos and affiliate site 6PM.com, stealing sensitive user data, the companies announced. No credit card information was stolen. Zappos sent an email to all customers to reset their passwords.

[RETAIL] Retail Sales Growth Expected To Slow In 2012
Retail sales are expected to climb 3.4% in 2012 to $2.53 trillion, cooling from growth of nearly 5% last year, the National Retail Federation estimates.

[DESIGN] Three Men And A Basement: How Carrot Creative Grew
How three college grads worked in a basement and lived off of ramen as they built “the best and brightest social media agency on the planet.”

[RETAIL] Lessons Learned from the 2011 Shopping Season
A report from the Dachis Group.[Full report here.]

Dachis Group – 2011 shopping season infographic

Good Old-Fashioned Customer Service in the Online World

September 6, 2011 by Bart Mroz

We build eCommerce stores for a living and take big pride in what we do. We compare what we do to the physical world of building actual stores where architects and builders get involved. But this post isn’t about that. This post is about a small town store and the 90 year-old guy named Uncle Joey who owns the place.

Over the Labor Day weekend I visited the small hardware store to check up on Uncle Joey and see how he was feeling after a recent operation. He looks great, considering he just had surgery. But the kicker came in when he started talking about how the business is going. Now you have to picture the hardware store and the office he works in. It’s one of those little places packed to the brim with practically anything you can imagine (Batteries? Check. Lawn Chairs? Check. Left-handed Socket Flange Adapter? Check.).  The office is still run the old-school way: no computers – just slips of receipts, IOUs, and a good accounting ledger.

As we talked, he made a comment about the ‘big box’ stores and how they don’t have qualified help. He compared to the little hardware store that we were standing in, where staff knows every screw, bolt, and toilet flapper that goes with everything and they know exactly where it’s at in the store. Of course, there’s  no way to make the ‘big’ store like this, and yes, you’re right – the prices are better over there. Maybe. The big stores have the upper hand on the lumber and big building supplies but they don’t on the everyday things. They usually order their stock for the year and can’t adjust it like the small store. They also get their own custom tools made just for them at lower prices and from what I understand the quality is not the same.

The old timer went through an example of a tool that he carries at the store and compared it to the big store tool. Same make and model, but one produced especially for the big store and one for other. The tool was more expensive in the small store but the quality is a lot better and the service can’t be matched.

The point being made is that theres’ a great value in good-old fashioned customer service. How do you handle your customers? What kind of loyalty programs to have in place? Are you bending over backwards to handle any complaints or issues? Just because you can’t ‘see’ your customers, doesn’t mean you have to view them as juts a transaction number. Take some time to get to know who your customers are. Interact. Set up surveys. Solicit opinions on Twitter and Facebook. Make a movie with your staff and post it to You Tube. Make your business more human.

If you need a lesson on how to handle customers in your online store, take some time offline and go visit Uncle Joey.

Photo of ‘Ralph’s’ used above is from the book Store Front: The Disappearing Face of New York.

 

Dear 37signals: We Cheated On You (And We’re Sorry)

July 21, 2011 by Bart Mroz

We're Sorry

We’ve been true to the productivity apps from 37signals since way back when Basecamp was first released. It was love at first sight – there was nothing else like it at the time and we couldn’t get enough. And the relationship just got better and better as they released new companion products. Our clients loved it too. And although we used other tools for code repository and bug tracking – our relationship was solid. We thought nothing would cause us to stray.

But, as any relationship goes, you start to grow weary of the same-old same-old. (“That new app with the shiny whistles sure looks good. I sure wish we could do what that app does but within Basecamp”). We developed a roving eye. We also decided we’d be better off with an integrated self-hosted system (“And think of all the money we’d save!”)

activeCollab caught our eye, We tried the demo and loved it. We were hooked. We quickly switched everything over, got our clients up to speed on the new system. We loved how much it could do, how extensible and customizable it was. (“It does everything! How could we have lived so long without this!”)

Like every new love, it was exciting and exhilarating.

At first.

Then we noticed something. The level of internal and client communication had dropped off. We were using features for the wrong tasks. We had trouble finding simple things, which led to time being wasted. But, we stuck with it. We were certain this was just a learning curve. But, alas, we were trying to talk ourselves into staying in the bad relationship – doing whatever we could to make it work. In the end, we knew what had to be done. We have nothing against activeCollab – it’s a really great product – but it’s not for us. We realized what we probably knew all along – stay with what works.

37signals is an amazingly successful company because they build great products, but they also put a lot of thought into the simplicity of the design. Less is more. Less sometimes works twice as good as more.

We’ve gone back to Basecamp and Highrise. And like any long-term relationship, we got right back into a comfortable, familiar groove with our project management.

We’re glad to have you back. We’re sorry we cheated on you.

Oh, Look – It’s Our New Website!

July 11, 2011 by John Suder

Sometime over the last 24 hours, our crack team of programmers and designers have unleashed the latest version of the SUMO Heavy Industries corporate website.

History SUMO Heavy Industries has been officially in business since May of 2010. After creating the initial visual identity, we quickly put together the site on WordPress and launched. We were quite pleased (at the time) that we were able to put together a decent looking site in such a short window of time.

But, as is the case of most design firms and interactive agencies, as we grew we had a case of ‘the cobbler’s son has no shoes’. (For those that don’t get the reference, we were basically selling a service that we sorely needed ourselves.) This isn’t unusual in the service business – you’re too busy growing the business and keeping customers happy. Something’s got to give, and most times it’s the self-promotion/marketing that falls short.

The Process: Throw It All Up and See What Sticks
 I’ve been bitching about the old site design for some time – it didn’t showcase our strengths as an eCommerce agency, but mostly because I allowed a hideous photo of myself to used in my bio.

Since, I’m the lead creative here at SUMO, it was up to me to herd the cats get some ideas presented and move the design process forward. And from experience, the hardest story to tell is about yourself. Also, our Team Leaders come from three very different disciplines – designer, programmer, business development – so we all see things very differently. This is a good thing for client work because it enables us to work as a cohesive unit to get projects up and out. Working on internal projects, however, is a whole other ball game. Each of us has a different set of expectations. Luckily, there’s no ego-tripping here; at the end of the day we’re all looking to build something that we can be proud of (and hopefully make some scratch).

So, we went through the first set of concepts like a kid on a sugar buzz. Trying different concepts, styles, typography. Throwing in bells, removing whistles. Which is OK in the initial stages. Throw it all in. The hard part is removing enough so it looks good, but not sacrificing message or continuity. And all the while trying not to come off as gimmicky, or showcase a design fad that will look dated in 6 months. We originally started off with a one-page design…which quickly morphed into the design you see here.

SUMO Site LeftoversSome of the design elements that didn’t make it onto the site (‘ribbons’ are so February 2010).

Once we decided where we were headed, I kept my head in Photoshop for a few weeks tweaking the page concepts and sharing ideas with the team. We all work remotely, so using online chat keeps things moving quickly (while also attending to client work). One tool that really helps us to visualize how a site will function in the real world is the InVision app (see my gushing school-girl review of InVision here). This application allows you to create working prototypes that you can share and comment on with your team or clients. It helped us move more quickly through the design process, but more importantly, it helped identify UX issues before writing any code.

Filling in the Blanks
 Now that we had the design roughed in, we began filling in the content. Writing up the client pages was easy. ‘Less is more’ when writing for the web. Also, we understand that most folks have the attention span of a mosquito, so we kept it short and simple. We know, you just want to see the pretty pictures.

Moving Forward
 We’re already discussing the next version of the site, as we know we’ll outgrow this one before we know it. This time, we’ll be working on the new one before the old one loses its spark. Or until I get sick of my photo.

We’d love your feedback on the new site. Leave a comment or send your praise (or scorn) to hello@sumoheavy.com.

SUMO Masters of eCommerce & Design: An Interview with Listrak’s Ross Kramer

May 23, 2011 by Bart Mroz

SUMO Masters of eCommerce and Design

Today we begin a series of interviews we’re calling ‘Masters of eCommerce and Design’. These are interviews with well-respected leaders in our industry. If you’d like to be interviewed (or would like to suggest someone who should) give us a shout at hello@sumoheavy.com. Enjoy the series!

Name: Ross Kramer Title: CEO Company: Listrak Age: 36 Location: Lititz, PA Contact: rkramer@listrak.com

 

“In God we trust. All others bring data.”

Ross is a co-founder and CEO of Listrak. He has nearly 15 years of executive leadership, successfully launching and directing three technology start-ups. Ross has led Listrak from concept to leading email marketing solutions provider serving online retailers, interactive agencies, and direct marketers. As CEO, Ross is responsible for charting Listrak’s strategic vision and direction. Ross is a thought-leader within the online marketing community, lending his expertise to conferences, seminars, and webcasts. Ross is also a frequent contributor of email best practices articles and can be found in eM+C, Adweek, Internet Retailer, MarketingProfs, Website Magazine, Direct Magazine, and other publications. Ross also shares his expertise on Listrak’s podcast Email Marketing Today and its webinars.

1. You started your first company when you were still in college. Can you tell us about your experience?

I had always worked for myself. I had a paper route as a kid, painted houses as an early-teenager then started assembling and selling computers in my parent’s basement. When I got to Penn State in 1994 the commercial Internet was just getting its legs and it’s been a wild ride ever since. I’ve had a very solid group of smart, innovative and dedicated team members where a lot of credit needs to go. Plus a lot of very loyal customers who have been with us as we have evolved from a web hosting company to an application development company to an email marketing company.

2. Can you tell us about Listrak and how it started?

When we were building Ecommerce sites in the late 90’s we couldn’t overlook the impact that email marketing was having on our clients. Since web hosting was becoming commoditized we decided to commercialize and build out Listrak in 2001. We bootstrapped the whole thing – didn’t raise any outside capital and used the cash flow from our hosting and professional services business to build the product business. That was probably the smartest move we have ever made.

3. We’ve recently completed some work with you on your new product. Can you tell us why you chose Magento?

Email marketing solutions for Ecommerce are a major focus for us. We’re helping merchants increase ROI and customer experience by enabling them with the technology to easily segment and target customers with relevant content. We’re doing this by analyzing both on-site click-stream behavior as well as order history. This is a major differentiator from other email service providers.

We partnered with SUMO Heavy Industries to build our Magento Extension which securely ships on-site behaviors such as shopping cart abandonment, browse/abandonment, etc. to our business intelligence data warehouse which powers triggered email messages. The Magento extension also synchronizes order history as well as newsletter signups.

This year we became a Magento Silver Partner and so far the experience has been excellent. Magento is a solid platform that is growing by leaps and bounds. We’re thrilled to be growing with them.

4. What do you think is the next thing in eCommerce?

Wow – too much to name. One thing that is working well in retail email marketing is the human influence factor of social proof. Right now we’re just scratching the surface by including things like customer product reviews in email to increase relevancy which drives demand. As social commerce becomes more main stream a plethora of relevant “social proof” data will become available as content to be used within email. For example, if we’re Facebook friends and you like and comment on a product that I add to my shopping cart – that comment will display (with comments from my other friends) in an email campaign that I receive if I fail to checkout. That’s going to be cool.

Fun Fact:

Our first office after the dorm room didn’t even have a bathroom. In the winter, we had to put on our coats and walk around to the front of the building to use the bathroom. That was a character builder.

The Friday Five for May 13, 2011: The First Birthday Edition

May 13, 2011 by John Suder

On this very special edition of the Friday Five, we’re celebrating our first year in business as SUMO Heavy Industries. Just think, only a year ago we were working out of the back of a coffee shop and now today we’re an international conglomerate with 26 worldwide offices and a staff of over 1,500. (Ok, I made that last part up, but it’s been quite a ride this last year.) We’ve had some ups and downs, we’ve learned a whole lot along the way and we’re excited about the future of our business and our industry.

With that said, we present for our Friday Five: The Five Things We Love. These are the things that keep us happy, motivated and excited about our future:

1. Our Clients It goes without saying that we wouldn’t be anywhere without our clients. Sure, they help keep the lights on, but their continued support and suggestions have helped us grow and become a better company.

2. Our Tools With team members scattered across the globe, flexibility and collaboration are key to our work environment. Here’s a quick rundown  of just a few of our favorite tools that keep us on track:

ActiveColab We recently switched to ActiveColab as a project management solution. It’s self-hosted (so it’s less expensive in the long run) and extensible.

Campfire With remote teams, you need to keep in constant contact. Emails and phone calls don’t always work, especially when you’re trying to work out a problem or talk through something visually. Campfire from 37Signals keeps things moving with real-time collaboration and chat.

Google Apps Rock-solid email, awesome web tools, shareable docs – all in the cloud.

Magento Our eCommerce platform of choice. 3 years and counting with a rapidly growing install base, Magento has become the preferred platform for online retailers.

WordPress We could fill a page singing the praises of WordPress. WordPress is the blogging platform that’s blossomed into one of the best site building and CMS tools available.

Beanstalk The easiest way to code, collaborate and deploy (as their site says). We love these guys.

3. Our Industry We’re fortunate to be able to do business in the era of the connected web. We’ve got freedom, flexibility, and the opportunity to connect and work with so many talented people we would have otherwise never have met.

A year ago, we decided to focus our energies on eCommerce development. It’s a challenging environment that forces us to keep up with changing technologies and platforms, but we couldn’t be happier.

4.  Our ‘Partners in Crime’ (The people who help us get things done) We can’t possibly do everything on our own (and we really shouldn’t try) so we rely on some of these people who are the experts in their field and make us looks good:

Blue Acorn They’re actually competitors – but we have a huge amount of respect for these guys and often help each other out with project leads or Magento issues.

SEER Interactive They’re SEO Rockstars. We’re big fans of Wil Reynolds and how he runs his business. Expect big things from these guys in the future.

FreshID We’ve been working with FreshID since the start of our company and love their work.

I-SITE They gave us our first client and project. We’re thankful to Ian Cross and the team for believing in us and giving us a great eCommerce project right out of the starting gate.

Destination Marketing We’re currently working on a project with them and are really impressed with thier work.

Listrak The masters of eCommerce email. They’re a client but we also collaborate on projects with them.

And of course, we’d be amiss if we didn’t thank our friends and family for putting up with our craziness over the last year. We wouldn’t be where we are without your patience and support.

5. Our Team These are the folks that make it happen  and put in the hours of sweat and tears to create the incredible projects that make our clients happy.

A big shout out goes to (in no particular order):

John, Bob, Monica, John, Kamil, Kamil, Kamil, Tom, Piotr, Piotr, Szymon, Karol, Bart, Krzysztof, Wokciech, Jackek, Lukasz, and Adam.

And That Coffee Shop We Started Out In… We’d also like to thank owners Bob and Tom of BODHi Coffee on 2nd Street in Society Hill for fueling us up and giving us a great space to work out of. They’ve been in business exactly one week longer than us and are still serving up great Stumptown coffee and locally grown, fresh organic food.

What’s in Store for the Next Year? We’ll be rolling out a new website, cranking out a few internal projects that we hope to release into the wild shortly, and otherwise kicking out some great projects for our clients. Stay tuned!

Goodsie: Making Online Retail Easy

May 3, 2011 by John Suder

You’ve got an idea to sell a product online, but you either feel intimidated by the choices or scared away by the potential cost. Some solutions are just too much if all you’re trying to do is sell a small line of hard goods (like t-shirts).

Goodsie (recently launched by HiDef, of Flavors.me fame) looks to meet that need. For just 15 bucks a month, you can have a robust, online store up and running literally within minutes.

Setup Setting up the store is a snap using their design panels. On the ‘Store’ panel, you fill in the vitals like store name, description, contact info and shipping.

Design In the ‘Design’ panel You choose the layout of store (basic, one-column, two-column, left/right alignment etc.) You can then start customizing the look of the store by choosing color schemes, fonts and adding images.

Adding Products Now you can add products. Again, the intuitive menus leads you thru the process. You can add the descriptions and upload several thumbnails per product. Repeat as necessary.

Payment Gateways Goodsie at this time offers three payment solutions: Paypal, Google, and Amazon. Personally, for small shop operators, I think this will suffice.

The Store Experience The store experience is pretty straightforward. Large thumbnails click though to simple detail pages. The focus with Goodie pages are the product (and that’s what it should be).

Goodsie isn’t for everyone, but I’d recommend it for anyone starting out to build a brand, to test a niche store or as an extension to an Esty store.

Goodsie HiDef

What’s Your ‘Magic Number’?

April 6, 2011 by Bart Mroz

What's Your Magic Number?

In the first conversation with potential clients, we ask up-front what their budget is. Ecommerce projects are long, time- and resource-consuming…and costly.

The other day I was on the phone with a potential client, and I got excited because the project they were describing is fantastic. It’s the right type of client that is excited by the branding and the design we can do for them. They are also the type of client that would like to try new things and has technical challenges, like trying to integrate into a warehouse or an accounting system. I get jazzed up and imagine the possibilities with the client and the fun we can have. I think about the future at all the great things we can do together. The conversation is going great, an hour flies by. Then I ask the question …

“What’s your budget for the project?”

Now, in that type of conversation I would assume that the budget is something we can work with. However, on a number of occasions ( and this happens more often than not) I get the answer that goes something like this …

“Well, we don’t know” “We have about $5,000 for the whole project” “You tell us. We’ve already gotten some quotes” “Budget?”

In all cases, I get my heart broken. I get excited about the potential of the project but than I get an answer that just totally deflates the conversation. The first answer “Well, we don’t know” can be taken a few ways. The client is shopping around, they do have a number in mind (but won’t tell), or they need to be educated.

If they need to be educated, we’re happy to walk them throughout the process of what it takes to put an ecommerce site together. Some clients have an idea to start selling online but they do not realize that there are a lot of moving parts. In that instance we don’t mind helping to define the objective and come up with the right budget.

For potential clients: Don’t hide or keep the budget a secret. It is a lot easier for us to come up with a business solution to your problem when we know what we have to work with.

Scenes from the Magento Imagine eCommerce Conference

February 17, 2011 by John Suder

The Magento Imagine eCommerce Conference took place last week in Los Angeles. Hats off to the Magento team for putting together this amazing sold-out event. Our minds are reeling from all that happened out there, so we’re still working on our recap.

In the meantime, here’s a video review and some images from the event:

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4462_ST2_0023

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Full Flickr set here.

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