Beachluxe.com.au co-founder Sasha Lincoln lists her top three tips to bring your business to the next level.
Tip 1: Solve a problem that you’re faced with, chances are that others are too.
Being Noosa locals where the beach is a daily ritual, we were constantly on the hunt for beautiful swimwear that not only made us feel good, look good and that was good for the planet too.
We found it really hard to find swimwear and accessories without having to trawl the internet for them, or spend hours sorting through racks at the shops trying to find something different and not mainstream.
After looking into it further, there wasn’t a one stop shop for boutique labels catering to all your summer needs. While there are marketplaces that exist online, they have tens of thousands of items, and it becomes so overwhelming to have to sort through it all. So by curating boutique summer labels and housing them in one place not only solved our problems, but those of the market too.
Tip 2: Don’t compromise on your vision and accept that Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Our vision is to become THE destination for boutique designer swimwear and beach accessories.
We have a lot of brands and influencers reaching out that don’t necessarily align with our vision or brand, but would help us significantly increase our market audience with these ‘quick wins’.
Whilst it’s very tempting to go down this route, it’s really important not to lose sight of your vision, and to set goals and milestones to help you get there. It’s also important to realise the vast majority of businesses aren’t overnight successes - they take years to get traction; especially in a highly competitive, saturated and fast moving market.
Having a clear, guiding vision that you continually check back to will ensure you’re staying on track to building your vision.
Tip 3: Customer Service is king (or queen in our case).
Never underestimate the power of amazing customer service.
Everything we do is to help make our customers feel they’ve had the best experience ever. From hand-written thank you notes to mailed out christmas gift vouchers, always be thinking about ways to surprise and delight your customer.
Being a new e-tailer in the market it’s beyond important to hold onto your existing customers too.
Customers also don’t stop at those who have purchased something either - we’re talking about all the potentials, whether they come from social media comments, DMs or email.
Respond to everyone, and respond quickly, otherwise they’ll likely go somewhere else.