“I see too many people make impulsive decisions based on subjective judgements – ‘style over substance’.”
Christopher Thomas is Managing Director at Cloggs.co.uk. He originally trained as a Chartered Accountant with KPMG before leaving to take the family retail business into the world of online in 2001. Cloggs.co.uk are up for a whopping 5 awards at this year’s eCommerce Awards for Excellence: Best Clothes, Shoes & Fashion eCommerce, Multiplay eCommerce Company of the Year, Best eCommerce Design (1 year or older), Best eCommerce Customer Service Award and Medium eCommerce Company of the Year. Christopher chats to us ahead of the Awards evening on the 30th of September.
1. What is the best piece of business advice you’ve ever been given, and who was it from?
“It’s the little things, the nothing things, the ‘it won’t take a minute’ things, the done and then forgotten things that make life worth the fight” – Andy Scott, 2013
2. What do you think will be the biggest eCommerce disrupter of 2016?
We’re very interested in NFC technology. With physical and online retail integration such a focus of ours, the opportunity for smart devices to offer a very personalised shopping experience is an extremely exciting one for any eCommerce business moving forward.
3. What advice would you offer to anyone starting up an ecommerce business?
Get your market research done. Understand how competitive the marketplace is and what you can do to stand out from the crowd. You need to understand your market inside out to identify areas where you can stand out and improve to build your business. Market research also provides you with the foresight of areas that work well and are a success, so that you can adapt these ideas and implement them into your own business plan.
4. What’s the most common mistake people make when implementing a new ecommerce strategy?
I see too many people make impulsive decisions based on subjective judgements – ‘style over substance’. We champion a data-driven approach in everything we do – it has to be about the stats. Particularly when you’re looking at a website day in, day out, it’s very easy to become influenced by a variety of factors. By taking a data-driven approach and supplementing it with rigorous A/B testing, you avoid your judgement becoming clouded.
5. Which organisation or brand’s approach to ecommerce do you most admire, and why?
Dr Martens. For such a large brand with a wealth of history, they always manage to remain current and capture the attention of their audience. Their social media campaigns are vibrant and full of life – they always create engaging hashtags to get their followers excited, and they’re fantastic at inspiring user generated content which minimises the need for their own photography resources, and really involves the audience directly within the brand’s marketing campaigns. By staying ahead of the curve when it comes to digital presence, the brand stays at the forefront of everyone’s minds and their eCommerce approach is most definitely something other brands could and should learn from!
6. Who should we all be following on Twitter for ecommerce advice, insight and best practice?
Shopify @Shopify on Twitter. Shopify is an ecommerce platform from which businesses can set up their own ecommerce stores and sell their products. It allows businesses to design their own stores and then successfully distribute goods from their platform.
Though Cloggs.co.uk doesn’t utilise the shopify platform, their Twitter account is excellent. It provides sound ecommerce advice for businesses of all sizes, successfully hosts regular Twitter chats using an independent hashtag which engages plenty of independent users.
They offer insight and advice from every aspect of running an ecommerce website – from the design and layout of your ecommerce website to the more technical behind-the-scenes techniques to convert customers and buying behaviour. They offer webinars and engage their readers in conversation through many different platforms a method.
A real example of a brand who offers a service, but still provides sound ecommerce advice, insight and best practice for brands who don’t utilise their product.
7. What is the future of the high street?
To be an effective, well integrated showcase of a strong web presence. The customer experience needs to be seamless whether browsing online or in-store, and the services offered to a customer online need to be echoed on the high street. For example, delivery to-store and next day delivery of products – the opportunity to browse full ranges and not simply what’s on display in the store. A lot needs to happen first to allow high streets to evolve and embrace more digital techniques though.
8. Do you think there is a skills gap in ecommerce? If so where?
Definitely, but it’s getting better. The fast-paced and ever changing world of the internet means there are regularly new platforms developing for audiences to engage with brands, digest media and indeed shop too! These new platforms provide brands with new opportunities to market themselves to customers, but of course the responsive nature of the industry means there is a definite skills gap in the world of eCommerce marketing and search engine optimisation too – as what we knew as best practice even a year ago is now vastly out of date.
The exciting and responsive nature of this means digital marketers now have to be on the ball, constantly learning and developing their techniques to ensure brands are appropriately engaging with their customer base in as many ways as possible. We’re getting much better at embracing these new technologies, and as such we’re seeing the skills gap closing, but it’s absolutely something that employers are looking for more of these days because there are so many opportunities to be made with new and exciting platforms.
9. Why did you enter the eCommerce Awards for Excellence?
We’re always looking for opportunities to benchmark the business against our peers and learn where we can improve on what we currently do. The eCommerce Awards for Excellence is an excellent display of businesses who are excelling within their fields, and provides us with the opportunity to learn from the best practices of our peers and assess our own eCommerce strategies in a new light.
10. What’s the biggest challenge when selling online to multiple international regions?
Complying with local legislation, in particular variations in things such as VAT. The laws and legislations for any country are complicated and essential to get right, but it becomes increasingly tricky when you have to ensure your products are marketed, distributed and generally complying with the laws and legislations of several different countries at the same time. VAT in particular is a complex one, and indeed one that is essential to get right. It requires a lot of research and seamless execution to ensure you’re selling properly and legally to multiple international regions.
11. What is the biggest challenge facing pure-play ecommerce companies right now?
The digital world and how customers can access and browse it is constantly evolving with new platforms and means of digesting media developing every day. Sales and marketing techniques are constantly evolving to meet these new platforms and the demands of customers who are becoming increasingly tech-savvy. The challenge is keeping pace with those changes and ensuring your ecommerce business caters for your customers at all times in light of these changes.
Follow Christopher on Twitter: @chriscloggs
The post We Champion a Data-driven Approach in Everything We Do, says Cloggs.co.uk MD, Christopher Thomas appeared first on eCommerce Insights.