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VIEWPOINTS
Making Connections Life as an independent retailer can be a lonely one, though many indies are finding huge benefits in joining forces with fellow retailers and other local bodies for mutual advantage. PG taps into the experiences of a trio of retailers who have done just that. Far left: Chris Fox delves into some Father’s Day offering at Wishes of Cudworth. Bottom left: Wishes of Cudworth has nearly 5,000 Facebook followers, one that speaks ‘Pirate’. Left: Wishes of Cudworth kicks-off its ‘Cudworth is Cool!’ local shop campaign.
The hub of the matter Chris Fox’s brainchild is giftshophub.co.uk, a friendly online marketing resource for independent shops, small businesses and artists. As also the digital content manager for greeting card shop Wishes of Cudworth in Barnsley (run by his life partner Julia Keeling), Chris explains how forming the Cudworth Businesses & Community Together (CBCT) has helped to build a better Cudworth for retailers and residents. “How many ‘likes’ does your Facebook page have? I only ask the question as it seems many people judge success on their total ‘likes’. Business owners can be distracted trying to gain more social media followers while ignoring their Facebook pages’ daily interactions from its current ones. Would it not be better to judge the success of our digital marketing by daily comments, shares and enquires?
We may aim for thousands of Facebook followers but is it the correct philosophy for a small independent shop? If you don’t sell online then surely the goal is to connect with your local area? That it’s more about quality than quantity of digital interactions? As the digital content manager of greeting card shop Wishes of Cudworth, I’ve always had one simple goal: To get people in to the shop. Whilst researching this column I decided to review our Facebook stats for our shop. It made for an interesting read.”
Demographic dissection “We currently have just under 5,000 Facebook followers, with 4,711 based in the UK, which is good news. However, we do have followers in the US, India, China, Tunisia and Iraq. When we dig deeper, just over half our followers live in Barnsley where our shop is located. Sure, there is a good mix of followers in the surrounding areas like Sheffield, Rotherham plus Doncaster, but there’s plenty in London and further afield too. The outcome is that, if anything, our shop’s digital reach is too big. That sometimes we are failing to connect with our local community. We know our customers and it’s not the ‘Pirate’ speaking fella who lives in China! He’s a good chap but he’s not popping into Wishes anytime soon. To combat this digital disparity we’ve recently started a new community association called Cudworth Businesses & Community
PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
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