Startup Smart recently sat down with the founders of Australian startups Vinomofo (an online wine store) and Brosa (an online furniture marketplace) to talk about their respective customer acquisition strategies. Other online store owners could certainly pick up more than a few points from these two successful e-commerce businesses. Below are some of the highlights from the interview.
Vinomofo
Vinomofo’s customer acquisition strategy involves giving $25 credit to new signups and their referrers. Vinomofo co-founder Justin Dry explained that they tested various incentive schemes. “We started with it loaded towards the invitee, with nothing for the recipient, and then the other way around. It started with $10 but we realised we were willing to pay $50 to get them to try Vino, and once they try it they’ll stick around,” he said. Dry believes that referrals attract loyal customers, as word-of-mouth promotion—in which customers do the promotion themselves—tends to be more powerful than other modes of advertising.
Brosa
Brosa, on the other hand, touts the effectiveness of organic customer acquisition methods. The Melbourne-based online furniture store has been enjoying a huge spike in customers –as much as an increase of 40-50% growth monthly—mostly through blogs and social media posts. Founder Ivan Lim shared that they’re focusing on this since content marketing is low cost and doesn’t disappear once you’ve stopped pouring money into it, unlike ads. “We’ve got a content team of about five that we’ve built up, and the traffic it drives is really good. It’s content that we were going to write anyway, so when you research what people are looking for, you can blend that with what you were writing anyway and it’s really powerful,” he explains.
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