Rob King, Content Manager at Micksgarage.com gives an insight into the practical day-to-day tactics employed in a thriving eCommerce business. Packed with plenty of actionable, take-aways you can try immediately!

1. Content is King
email - video – photography - category management - social

2. Do’s & Don’ts:
DON’T mention religion……ever
email

3. Bad taste
I’ll never buy from you again
In some countries you’d get beheaded for that!
“ “
email

4. Do’s & Don’ts:
DO: Visualise your audience then test, test & test again
email

5. Go Create!
Plain text: Great deliverability but no visual impact. html templates: Simple & fast to set up but poor inbox consistency, repetitive, limited
creativity & flexibility. Image mapping: Great flexibility, great inbox consistency but slow load times. No text version. Slicing: Great
flexibility, visual impact, inbox consistency and load times
Optimised
Platform consistency – creativity – speed - open rate - revenue
email

6. When?
Largely over emphasised. There are hundreds
of reports & studies all contradicting each
other.
A bit of common sense & some A/B testing
brought us to a set of simple guide lines we
generally work to:
• General car parts: 11am-2pm mon-fri (needs)
• Tools, accessories, gadgets: 7.30pm-8.30pm (wants)
• High value items: 25th – 30th of the month (pay day)
• 9am– 10am mon-fri (work stuff)
• Friday afternoon (limited numbers)
• 4pm-6.30pm (home/dinner)
email

7. Subject lines, open rates, segmentation & personalisation
Hi %First Name%, How Are Your New %Make% Wind Deflectors Working Out?
Mass
mailing
17-19%
open rate
‘Spam’
keywords
effective
Segmentation, relevance & personalisation are key to open rate
email

8. video
We did some in-house A/B testing and found that when a
video was present on a product details page it drove a sales
increase of 40% Hence why we now have an in-house team of
experts working on video.
“
John Smyth – head of marketing, Micksgarage.com
video

9. video
“
video

10. Software & Hardware
We use the Adobe Creative Suite. Videos are edited in Premier Pro and After Effects provides text, graphics & special effects, Lightroom
and Photoshop are used for photography and email creation.
Basics - Camera, tripod, lights, mic, backdrop: €1290
Total: €5635
video

11. video
+ AVS video editor

12. Despite filming in a dark warehouse and working on a part of
the car that would normally be in shadow, through good
lighting setup we have a clear, bright and crisp view of what is
going on. (shot in 1080p full HD)
Full HD
Aspect ratio
Framing
Sound
Light
2010
2014
Video Content :
• Attention spans are short but don’t assume your video has to be a certain length
• Watch-ability is key. No matter what the subject, your video has to be interesting enough to watch
• Get straight to the point. Don’t tell people what they’re about to see, get on and show them. (20% of viewers gone in 1st 10s)
• Know your stuff! Unscripted usually works better. That said, planning is essential. Have a clear vision & concept worked out
• Accuracy! Remember there are no pedants on the internet!
• Make sure the piece flows. if you do need a script, try to bullet point the topics you need to talk around, it will help you plan your shots
• Research. Watch similar videos, learn from their mistakes, fill in the blanks & make yours better!
“
“
video

13. • Cut out customer service issues
• Increased positive product reviews
• Cut returns by over 50%
Product placement – Einszett Gummi Pflege
• Nov 2011: €255 profit (before wind deflector video)
• Dec 2011: €2258 profit (after wind deflector video) – 785% increase
Driving Revenue Through Video
Get creative & utilise video to drive real revenue
video

14. • 3.6m video views
• 1.1m from embedded player
• 25,000 views per week
• 1964 CTA clicks YTD
• Average view duration: 1.57 (48%)
• Top 10 videos all ‘How To’
Before ‘How To Video’
• 45 subscribers per month
After ‘How To Video’
• 200 subscribers per month
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
Video Analytics
video

15. Category management is a huge, multi-faceted area
of the business that largely revolves around data and
analysis. Knowing your product range inside out,
understanding the competition, using sales history to
forecast and plan promotions and understanding the
additional volume you need to drive to achieve
targets.
Product Check list:
• Description
• Attributes
• Facets
• Related products
• Bundles
• Images
• Video
• 360
• Brand
With over 1.5 million products in our database,
assigning category managers to key product ranges
was crucial in helping us realise sales potential.
Category management

16. Description Templates
By using dynamic content in product listings, in much the same way we do
in email, we reinforce confidence in the product through personalisation
and confidence that the user is purchasing the correct item.
Category management

17. What posts work?
Know your fan base
Check out your insights
social

18. Engagement
Interaction
Personality
Support
Brand
Confidence
Inter company relationships
Sales
62 interactions, 3.5K reach
variety – photos – news – competitions
Video – humour - genre – advice – ask!
controversy (careful now) – mention the
government if you dare!
social

19. The Twitter Machine
• Make use of the background
• Activity
• Relevance
• Keep sales messages to a minimum
• Engage / interact
• Post with image
• Video: screenshot image
email

20. The Filter:
• Jumping on the bandwagon
• Editorial pieces /Original content
• Opinion
• SEO optimisation
social

21. Stuff you can try immediately:
• Download AVS Video editor for FREE
• Shoot a video on your smart phone, upload it to YouTube and link (annotate) to a product
(Don’t forget to include a related product in your video!)
• Double your Facebook activity for a week and monitor the change in reach and likes.
• Do the same for Twitter
• Run a simple Facebook competition
• Segment your email list
• Go on a half day film/photography course
• Use your website on a daily basis – see it through the eyes of your customer
• Let your company’s personality shine through
recap

22. Any Questions?