Getting dropped off by Zappos shuttle
In January I toured the Zappos head office in Las Vegas. I had read Tony Hsieh’s book, Delivering Happiness, and was eager to see the concepts he’s talked about in-person.
Wow. I am blown away.
Zappos.com is the world’s largest online shoe store, but they’re probably better known for their amazing corporate culture. During my tour, I was able to experience that culture first-hand.
I’ve built a number of web sites for businesses in Stony Plain and Spruce Grove:
It’s easy to forget about our visitors and focus on what we want in our website: perhaps a pretty design, a robust online catalog, or a flashy animation. Let’s look at your site from your audience’s perspective.
[In business] you shouldn’t swim upstream. Don’t try to change people’s behavior. Go to where your customers are. – Ramit
Like Ramit, I learned this lesson the hard way. Growing up in a small town, I always wished there was a small, local shop I could visit to buy clothing, skateboards, and snowboard equipment.
Years later, after graduating from university, I decided to make it happen. Together with two partners, we launched The Real Deal: a local skateboard shop in a small town. Our mantra was: “You don’t need to go to the city to shop, you can shop local!”
And our shop was awesome. We really cared about our customers. We had a well designed store interior. We stocked the best brands.
Here’s the problem: the city was only 40 minutes away. Everyone in our small town was already used to driving to the city. They would make a day of it on Saturday or Sunday. With a whole day of shopping, they could visit multiple shops, with a bigger selection than we could ever have. Our customers weren’t shopping local.
We thought we could change their behavior. We launched “shop local” campaigns, we developed relationships, and we offered competitive pricing. We also sponsored local athletes, put on shows, and even launched our own magazine. But none of that mattered, because local consumers liked going into the big city for shopping.
Don’t ever lose track of the idea that a business needs to make money. In retail, that means lots and lots of traffic. If there’s no traffic at your proposed location, in doesn’t matter how awesome your shop is or how good your idea is, it’s not going to fly. This applies to other businesses as well: you can’t change the way an entire market operates.
The questions we need to ask are: what are my potential customers doing right now? How do they shop for my proposed product or service? How can I go to “where they’re at?”