BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news
If you can keep offering a service, DO. We’ve seen many businesses across the high street and online changing or adapting their offer to allow them to continue to serve customers. From hotels and restaurants now offering delivery services, to coaches and PTs putting on virtual coaching sessions ensuring we all stay fit and healthy. A client of mine is offering free collections for products they service, to enable the flow of work to continue
Think about your core business. If you have a website selling products, push it, bring people to your site, now is the time to engage new customers. If you offer a service, make people aware of it, but make sure they have a way of engaging with that service in a safe way (so no personal contact/visits if at all possible). Internet searches are on the up, as people try to fill their days, so now is the time to make the most of your social channels, try some facebook advertising, some google ads and of course look to your customers, suppliers & local businesses to help spread the word.
Can you offer free delivery or collection? Look to run some sale offers to grab peoples attention. Also look at producing some supporting content for your best selling product or service, whether that be some written blog posts or product page updates, or videos to explain what you do and how it can benefit potential customers. People have time on their hands and, as we know, our fellow cyclists geek out on detail, so be the purveyor of that content and gain their trust and respect. Making hay now will help once this is all over and you may even change a few peoples perceptions of you and your business.
Now is the time to think differently, don’t rely on what has got you to this point, think of new angles, look around at what other people are doing and if you’re really stuck for ideas, seek out a specialist marketing agency to help you out.
Above all, stay safe.
A couple of our own clients are still open and active; in fact, of them has just posted its best ever monthly sales! All of that shows that small businesses, if they’re able, can still be effective, and there is absolutely still interest in all things bike-related…
J-Tech Suspension
As a small business servicing suspension and selling suspension products and upgrade options, JTech has the ability to continue to work and deliver their service for their customers’ suspension.
To protect staff and customers they have changed their operations so they are no longer accepting personal visits to their workshop. All product is cleaned upon arrival and cleaned prior to despatch, additionally to assist customers wanting their suspension serviced whilst they are maybe spending less time on the bike, they have waived the DPD collection fee of £14, so they will now collect product directly from the users home Free Of Charge, just a small piece of out of the box thinking, helping them stay active.
They have seen online store sessions and sales increase over the past few weeks and bookings for servicing are still good, with slots filling up fast over the coming weeks.
invisiFRAME
With invisiFRAME being a DIY option, now is a great time for customers to get their bike protected and ready for when the gnarly riding returns. As well as their kits they are seeing plenty of interest in the decal side of their business, as people look to add a bit of extra colour to their bikes to cheer themselves up.
They have 2 members of staff cutting and packing (both working at a safe distance apart), the rest of the team are working from home and continue to process orders from around the world. Being run by an ex-nurse they have put in place all necessary practices to ensure the safety of their staff and customers.
Website traffic to their site over the past 3 weeks has seen an increase of nearly 25% over the same period last year. They continue to invest in online advertising, website optimisation and ongoing marketing support to help them continue to be visible in this ever-changing landscape we are currently experiencing.
