Bringing Business to Retail

Q4 has a way of filling every available minute. Stock is arriving. Orders need to be packed. Staff need to be rostered. Customers need help. Christmas ranges need organizing. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, you're still supposed to send your weekly email and keep showing up on social media. The problem isn't that retailers don't know marketing matters. The problem is that when the business gets busy, marketing is often the thing that gets pushed to "later." And later rarely comes. In this episode, Salena Knight shares three simple strategies to keep your marketing moving when you're already at capacity. 1. Set a sales target and check it every Monday When Q4 gets busy, it's easy to stop looking at the numbers and simply hope sales come in. Instead, Salena recommends setting your target now and checking in on it every Monday. Knowing where you are versus where you need to be gives you a much clearer idea of what action needs to happen that week. 2. Prioritize what actually makes money Not everything on your to-do list is equally important. Salena shares the example of a boutique owner who was overwhelmed with everything she needed to do. When they stripped the list back, it came down to two priorities: find staff and make money. When time is limited, the tasks that directly contribute to revenue need to get a place in the calendar rather than waiting for a gap that may never come. 3. Double dip your marketing You don't need to create brand-new content for every channel. Take the newsletter you've already written and turn it into several social posts. Use the same promotion on your website, in-store signage, text messages, and email. The content you've already created can work harder for you. The bigger takeaway is that busy season isn't the time to try to do everything. It's the time to prioritize the marketing that actually moves the business forward. And if you need help knowing what marketing needs to happen and when, Salena's free 12-week holiday marketing calendar maps out the key marketing activities from October 1 through Christmas.

In this episode, Salena Knight explains why the products you regret buying can be some of the most valuable data in your retail or ecommerce business. It is easy to focus on best sellers, products that sold out, and suppliers that performed well. But your clearance section, old stock, and products that have been sitting in the warehouse can tell you just as much - and sometimes more - about your buying decisions. Salena walks through how to look beyond "it didn't sell" and identify what actually went wrong. Was the product itself the problem? Did you buy too much? Was the colour selection wrong? Was the price too high? Did demand only appear after a significant discount? She also explains why clearing old stock isn't enough. If you don't understand the buying decision that created the excess inventory, you risk making the same decision again with a different product. You'll learn how to: Use old stock as buying data Distinguish between a product problem and an overbuying problem Look at sales performance alongside discounts and timing Identify patterns across seasons and product ranges Recognise assumptions that influence your buying decisions Turn disappointing inventory into a lesson for future buying Ask better questions before repeating a buying decision The key takeaway: You've already paid for the stock. Make sure you get the lesson from it, too.

You found the perfect product. You know your customers will love it. So you buy it. But what if that isn't enough to make it a good buying decision? In this episode, Salena challenges the way retailers think about inventory and explains why buying isn't just about finding products that fit your brand or that you believe will sell. Every dollar you put into stock is a dollar that can't be used somewhere else in your business, which means every product needs to earn its place. Salena walks through how to think about inventory as an investment, why your revenue and profit goals should influence your buying decisions, and why the speed at which a product turns back into cash matters just as much as whether it eventually sells. You'll also hear how one retailer discovered that the brand they thought was performing well wasn't the whole story. Once they looked more closely at the individual products, they found that bright prints were selling much faster than the plains and neutrals. That kind of insight can completely change what you choose to buy next. If you're heading into a major buying season and want to make decisions based on more than instinct, this episode will help you look at your inventory through a much more commercial lens. Register for the free Q3 Masterclass Series here.

In this episode, we're talking about a problem a lot of retailers are feeling right now: getting customers to your website is costing more, so how do you make more money from the traffic you already have? Krisztian Kiraly, International Partnership Manager at OptiMonk, joins us to unpack the idea of "conversion before acquisition" - improving the customer experience and conversion rate before simply spending more to acquire additional traffic. We talk about why independent retailers and ecommerce businesses can't win by trying to outspend massive marketplaces like Amazon, Temu and SHEIN, and what they can do instead. A big focus of the conversation is the changing role of the product page. As customers increasingly discover products through Google, Google Shopping and AI tools, they may arrive directly on a product page without ever visiting the retailer's homepage. That means your product page needs to do much more than list a product. It needs to sell it. Krisztian shares five areas retailers should focus on to improve their product pages, including better imagery, benefit-led headlines and stronger trust signals. We also get into AI-powered personalisation and how retailers can make the experience more relevant based on where customers came from, what they've viewed and what they're likely looking for. In this episode, we discuss: Why rising acquisition costs are putting pressure on ecommerce profitability The "conversion before acquisition" mindset Why your product page is becoming your new landing page and salesperson The role of reviews, testimonials, customer photos and videos in building trust How AI is changing the customer journey What hyper-personalisation can look like in ecommerce How to get more revenue from the traffic you're already paying for Free audit and consultation: ConversionLift AI consultation