Yesterday, I received an email from one of the internet marketing mailing lists I subscribed to. The email asked me to visit and opt-in to the Yanik Silver’s Underground Seminar in order to watch the presentation by Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.com. For those who don’t know, Zappos is a shopping site, similar to Amazon, with a focus on shoes, clothing, and other apparels. The video lasted for a total of 75 minutes, divided into a 40 minutes presentation section and another 35 minutes Q&A. I really enjoyed the whole video as Tony revealed his philosophies and strategies on running his 1 billion dollar business. So, here are the 5 things that I learned from Tony Hsieh.
1. Have a vision
Tony is a big believer in having a grand vision and big dreams. He built Zappos from the ground up, thinking bigger every time he hit the goals. He also believed that you should be chasing your vision, instead of money or any sort of monetary rewards. If you focused on the money, you’ll quit when the tough times come. But if you focused on chasing your vision, the money will come to you.
2. Be True to Your Brand
Zappos stands for great customer service. Every new employees, no matter what position they are in, have to join this 5 weeks compulsory customer loyalty training, where they’ll work at Zappos’ call centers and warehouses. The focus on customer service is also apparent when you use their site to shop. The 1-800 numbers are located at the top page in every single page in their site. They also have the 24 hour warehouse to ensure faster delivery, free shipping and return shipping, and 365 days return policy.
3. Focus on Repeat Customers
Zappos focus most of their efforts on maintaining current customers rather than finding new ones. Meaning that Tony and his team never counts the one-time transaction value, but the lifetime value of customers. And the lifetime value of Zappos customers is pretty damn high, as much as $500 per customers. Repeat customers spend more and complaint less because they already know what they could expect from you or your site. So, as suggested by Tony, find the formula to get your customers come back again and again, and you’ll be set.
4. Focus on People
When you just started, you probably need to do everything by yourself because you don’t have the money to hire anyone. But as your business grows, you’ll need to start hiring employees. The hiring process in Zappos is not straight forward at all because it’s not only about hiring a guy with the right skill sets for the job. Through the 5 weeks customer loyalty training I’ve mentioned above, each new employees are tested if they could fit into the Zappos’ working environment that focus on exceptional customer service. If they fail to meet expectation, they’ll be fired, even though their actual position doesn’t require them to work in call centers or warehouses at all.
5. Create and Commit to Core Values
Core values are what the people working in the company, from the lowest positions to CEO, believe the company stands for. Zappos have this culture book that contains employees’ thought on what the company currently stands for. This culture book is updated every year and contains the ten Zappos’ core values. Some of them are embrace and drive change, deliver wow through service, pursue growth and learning, and do more with less. These core values are not just words written on a piece of paper. They act as principles and guidelines when decisions, no matter how minor or negligible they are, have to be made.
Here are the 5 lessons on brand and business building I learned from Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.com. I want to put the link to the presentation video here but I can’t seem to find the URL anymore (I think they replaced it with a sales page). Although this post only represents less than half of what Tony talked about, I am hopeful that you could learn and implement them in your online business. Feel free to leave comments or tweet it if you like it.
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Andi,
They are good things, We should keep those in the mind always.
Thanks For Sharing.
Sahil Kotak´s last blog ..Find Best Paying Affiliates Programs
Nice points. I can agree no more on your points. For me focusing on your customer (readers in my case) is the most important thing.
Agent 001´s last blog ..Why I unfollowed John Chow on Twitter?
yeah, but how does it translate to blogging?
Money-Era´s last blog ..How much does 1 million e-mail addresses cost?
@ Money Era
That’s a good question. I haven’t really think of how it applies to blogging. But I’m writing this for those who are building an online business. I mean, even blogging is part of building an online business, right? When you’re big enough and start outsourcing your designs or programmings or other administrative jobs (reply to emails, etc), you can use Tony’s expertise to help you ^-^.