IN DEEP ....

Introduction

Lustythreads.com is a pure dot com firm based in Australia established in 2002 with the intention of reaching as many customers as possible. Today, Lustythreads.com exports Australian designed undergarments to more than 43 countries.

Contents

(i)                  Location, location, location. What it means to a pure online firm.

(ii)                Lustythreads.com and Internationalisation

(iii)               Generating traffic on the internet

(iv)              Creating awareness and credibility

(v)                Increasing customer satisfaction

(vi)              Difference between marketplace and marketspace

 

(i). Location, Location, Location

When starting a brick and mortar business, the location of the premises is one of the major factors in determining whether or not the business will be successful. One good example would be Starbucks Coffee. Being an upscale business, it positions its premises in high traffic, prime locations such as SS15 in Subang Jaya and 2 outlets in Sunway Pyramid shopping mall. Although costs are high, the guaranteed traffic justifies the initial outlay.

 

For an online-only business, physical location is not an issue. The internet reaches almost all countries around the globe. The marketplace is huge; over 1.46 billion people have access to it either at home, work or an internet café. (Internet usage statistics, http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm accessed on 16/9/08). Statistically speaking, even if 0.001% of internet users visit an online business website, that is about 14 thousand visitors and potential customers.

An online business needs to have a huge online presence. Firstly, the domain name must be catchy, easy to remember, and stir curiousity among the internet community. Sites like buy.com, amazon.com and in the local scene, blooming.com.my have easy to type names that people can easily identify.

On a lesser scale, the location where the server hosting the website is located is sometimes important. If lustythreads.com thinks its business will mainly come from America, it only makes sense to locate the server over there. This is to reduce latency (or the time it takes data to be transmitted) and access times. However, with modern broadband technology, this lag is not often noticeable.

 

(ii). Lustythreads.com and Internationalisation

Right from the start, lustythreads.com was meant to be an online store. The founders Victoria Brown and Jennifer St George think there was a huge market potential online. With the aid of modern delivery and parcel services, the goods can be delivered in 3 days within Australia and under 2 weeks to any other part of the world. (Australian Post, http://www.auspost.com.au/). They also set up distribution centres in UK and in America to decrease wait time.

 

The original plan for the business did not have intentions to start locally first in Australia then expand worldwide. Instead, the founders had great confidence that they can satisfy worldwide customers with their product offerings. There is no distinction between their home and international markets. The internet has no boundaries.

(iii). Generating traffic on the Internet

Lustythread.com mainly form strategic alliances with partner involved in the related businesses. Careful consideration must be practiced to ensure that their brand name is not associated with websites with poor reputation.

 

A new affordable means to advertise is through the social networking site, Facebook. This site has over 100 million active users. (The Facebook Blog, http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=28111272130) The targeted demographics can be identified as Facebook stores its users location, age, gender and other vital information. Advertisers can target their ads with 100% precision. Facebook charges its advertisers by impressions, or how many times an ad is viewed. (Facebook Ads, http://ads.facebook.com). For US$10, an ad can reach 20,000 specific users for a week. Not only is it cheap, but it is also very effective in promoting a product or a website.

(iv). Creating awareness and credibility

In the early part of the century, most consumers were wary of new online businesses. During this time, there were countless scams floating around through e-mail and pop-up advertisements. Credit card fraud was also rampant due to lack of security features and bank and government laws and protection.

(30% done, 10 hours til presentation!)