Moving to technology and the nut and bolts of operating a site. Yahoo! Stores is well known as an excellent place to get started in online retailing and you’ve been on it for years now. Now that you’ve become a successful retailer, what are the pros and cons for remaining with Yahoo!?
Yahoo! offers retailers a very affordable platform that saves you lots of headaches. I think it would be difficult to find a PCI compliant, fully hosted ecommerce platform for the same budget. Particularly if you went the do-it-yourself route, say, by getting a server from Rackspace. While I think the price provides excellent value, your flexibility is limited. The back-end prevents you from doing some things simply. You’re forced to customize and create workarounds. There are extreme differences between an established platform like Yahoo! and Magento, which was designed from scratch for web 2.0/3.0 (or whatever they’re calling it these days).

As a company, we’re pretty loyal to Yahoo! and the Yahoo! platform. Still, if a company knows that it will grow beyond $5-15M in annual sales, I think they are going to ultimately regret choosing Yahoo! When we launched our newest store, I wanted to see what I was missing, which is why I researched alternatives and ultimately chose Magento. Revamping that site has been a good learning experience and an opportunity to really see the pros and cons of Yahoo!

Is Yahoo! a flexible platform for integrating the latest operational, web design, merchandizing and payment technologies and services?
Yahoo! isn’t a platform that offers the latest and greatest. It is always a couple of steps behind and there are number of integration and technology challenges that are really frustrating. One of the most obvious examples is integrating an alternative payment option like Google Checkout. While the Google Checkout icon can help your PPC clickthrough rates, if you actually want to integrate it, you’ll violate the terms of your Yahoo! agreement.

Talk about the Yahoo! Stores retailer and developer communities…what are their value?
These communities are really important. When we started out, we didn’t outsource anything because we couldn’t afford it. We learned Yahoo’s proprietary programming language, RTML, and grew the site to a level where we could afford to outsource. Once we had a development budget, we tapped the developer community. The sites wouldn’t be where they are today without the contributions of the professional store developer community.

Talking specifically about the Yahoo! platform, what are three things that you did that you would have done differently had you known better?
A. I’d like our site to be faster. We need to make some optimization changes but I’m going to have to do some research because I’m not sure right now if it is the underlying code or a graphics issue.

B. We need a lot more sophistication in our supplier chain. I would have really loved to have spent a lot more time developing real-time integration of our inventory data. We’ve since created workarounds but they are not as ideal as doing the most effective way right from the beginning.

C. The third change would have been to spend a lot more time and care building our product database. It is really valuable to have complete product information or attributes (notably dimensions and weights). This is especially true for retailers who drop ship. Complete product data helps minimize shipping costs. It helps you provide real-time shipping calculation to customers when they are in your shopping cart. It helps you calculate by dimensional weight. I can’t overemphasize the importance of having an accurate and up-to-date database.

How does Nextopia’s site search technology and modules that you use fit into the Yahoo! Stores world?
Nextopia integrates very easily into the Yahoo! Stores platform and we’ve been a happy customer for over three years. In a perfect world, your product database includes all of the relevant product attributes, which enables you to filter search results. In general, site search benefits a retailer in proportion to the completeness of the underlying product database. By working with Nextopia, we’ve been able to implement some solutions but as I said just now, I really wish we had built our database with complete product attributes from the beginning.

Enough about Yahoo!, let’s talk about Magento and your newly revamped site, IslandBeachGear.com.
Even though Magento’s basic version is open source and the vendor doesn’t charge for it, it isn’t your least cost option by any means. Magento is neither simple, nor is it free. It took many, many hours to develop our IslandBeachGear.com site to the point where it is now. It required a lot of tweaking to get it right and you’ll probably require some knowledgeable developers. We used a combination of in-house resources and some third-party development. Additionally, the hosting level you need to have a fast website is expensive.

Nextopia Site Search integrated on a Magento site-IslandBeachGear.com

In contrast, you can get a Yahoo! Store up and running in no time. In about twenty minutes, I could create a functioning one or two SKU Yahoo! Store that could actually take orders and process payments. It wouldn’t look pretty but it would work. In contrast, Magento isn’t nearly as easy to use. The tradeoff is much greater flexibility. I’ve been very impressed by the design and usability and the out-of-box functionality. I love the flexibility. There is no limit to what I can do. I haven’t run into one adjustment or request that we couldn’t implement. With Yahoo, I run into roadblocks all the time. Magento is designed using the latest software technologies and online retailing, marketing and merchandising processes. The SEO capabilities, integrated reviews and real-time inventory access are great. That said, I would love it if Magento provided an on-demand platform like Yahoo!

Thanks very much to Patrick. Great information and guidance from someone who’s been in the ecommerce trenches for a decade. As you can see, the road to success requires a lot of hard work and iterative trial. If you fish or know someone who fishes and might appreciate an angling-themed Christmas gift, you know where to start your shopping.

Can you give us a quick summary of your company, operations and markets.
We’re an ecommerce retailing company, currently operating four sites in the fishing and outdoor leisure markets. Our corporate headquarters are in Somers Point, NJ and we run our Island Beach Gear retail store in Ocean City, NJ. In total, we have 25 full-time employees. We’ll add seasonal staff during the peak fishing and beach-related retailing months (spring and summer). Our fishing sales are split 80% in the United States, with the balance from overseas markets. The big overseas markets are South America and the United Kingdom with some sales in parts of Asia. Our beach gear sales are almost exclusively North American sales.

Who are your competitors?
We’re a specialty fishing retailer. We don’t generally–or even try to–compete against mass merchandizers like Wal-mart or the national chains like Cabela’s or Bass Pro Shops. We win customers on service and know-how, not private branding or discounting. There are probably 6,000 independent fishing retailing stores in the United States, the vast majority of which are small Mom and Pop stores. To give you an idea of the market fragmentation, a really successful independent fishing retailer will do one million dollars annually in sales. But while they’re small, these local stores are really important because they know their regions. They know specifically what works in the local rivers and lakes and costal waterways. In contrast, our specialized knowledge is product-centric. Our company and our sales reps have lots of product knowledge, but the local fishing market knowledge is found in local stores. A final word on this retailing category is the fact that people who like to fish have been much slower to adopt to Internet product sourcing than in other categories.

Let’s talk about mixing fishing and business, or in your case, making fishing your business. How often do you actually get out and test the products you sell?
While I do get out on the water, I’m the head guy so I’m not out as much as our customer service and sales staff. Our product buyers and customer service team all fish a lot because they have to test lots of gear to figure out what we should buy. I tend to test the beach gear products more often than the fishing catalog.

Let’s start by talking big picture. Your retailing properties target outdoor pursuits that are restricted by climate seasonality across much of the North American continent? How does the seasonality of your customer base affect your operations?
We sell a good amount of gear twelve months per year. We sell all types of fishing gear, primarily saltwater, although we also sell freshwater and fly fishing. But saltwater is definitely our focus. While fishing sales increase considerably in the summer, the winter months are not exactly dead. The seasonality issue is certainly real but we balance that against a very wide product selection.
How has your customer base been affected by the economic downturn since 2007?
Although our number of orders for the 2009 fiscal year were up over 2008, average order value was down. We’ve done much better than the industry average, I think, in 2010.

Has their behavioral change affected your growth plans?
When economic times are tight, focus on the things that are working. At times, your focus could be to gain market share, not lose it. We’re trying to do a better job at everything we do. We’ve reduced our PPC spend as well as adjusted some of our other marketing activities. Inventory projection is always a gamble but we have reduced large inventory purchases to extend our cash resources.

Has it changed your plans for upgrades in technology, marketing activities or third party services that you use?
I’m constantly evaluating third party add-ons like Nextopia site search, and I probably get several phone calls per week from vendors pitching me on some third party tool or conversion booster. I like to listen to learn if we’re not doing something that we should. You really have to distinguish between what can help you and what will waste your time. If something comes out that is better than what we’re using, we’ll make the change.

Nextopia site search helps fishing enthusiasts find exactly what they need among the thousands of product SKUs on TackleDirect.com

Two things I noticed that you are not using are reviews or videos on TackleDirect. Why not? Reviews are available on some of your sites but not all of them. Are you planning on integrating them any time? What are you thoughts about user generated content (UGC) and online retailing?
It is time to get serious about both reviews and video across all of our sites. Incorporating reviews into Yahoo! Stores isn’t easy. We evaluated review technology for our Yahoo! sites a while back and it was premature. We’ve also found limitations with PowerReviews on the Yahoo! platform. To really do the job well, we’ll probably have to redesign our product layout because our current site design doesn’t work easily. It will take some effort. In contrast, the Magento site (IslandBeachGear.com) included review software from the beginning. Integrating reviews into that site was far easier.

Any comments on UGC?
One thing I’d really like to create is some kind of customer showcase. We receive hundreds of pictures every year. We’ve received everything from pictures of landing a 1,000 lb. blue marlin, to a variety of world record catches to little kids who caught something really special. My favorite, though, has to be a picture several years ago from three guys who went to Thailand. One of them landed a huge tuna using a very special and very expensive fishing reel that cost over $1,300. What I loved about the picture was that the boat they were sitting in, a very beaten up 14′ aluminum, was probably worth $50.

Come back in a couple of days for the second part of our interview with Patrick.

1. What are the three most important ecommerce metrics that you track?
First, I really dislike ecommerce metrics such as time on site or bounce rates. I don’t give them any value. The data can be meaningless. If you’re going to use bounce rates you need control rates. If you use really advanced analytics, bounce rates can be meaningful. But in general, though, I don’t think it means much unless you have really sophisticated analytics tools and know how to use them. Similarly, I don’t concentrate on macro stats like revenue or transactions.

It is really simple: consistent flow of quality traffic and maintaining conversion are the keys to making money on the Web.

2. For a new retailer just starting out, what are three things you would recommend they do?
You can’t start top down. You need to drive the revenue first and then convert it. The first two employees I would hire are an SEO specialist and a conversion specialist.

The money that these two people bring in will pay for themselves 20:1. The money they make supports everyone else.

The third thing I’d do is invest money in your website. For example, Nextopia’s technology has such long-term positive revenue and ROI ramifications that it is just stupid not to implement it on your site.

3. Benefiting from hindsight, what are some things that you did that you wished you hadn’t?
It depends on the size of your company. In my personal experience, my mistake was failing to hire enough people who can drive revenue. To avoid this I would have hired more ROI optimizers and conversion optimizers.

Those are the people I want our company to hire. I’d also look at people who understand multivariate testing and really good persuasive copywriting.

When you look at filling these kind of testing and optimizing positions, I really can’t see any diminishing returns from hiring lots of people to fill them. There is a lot of room to grow before you dominate a niche so hire as many of them as you can afford.

4. What single thing that you’ve done has had the greatest impact on your business?
Without a doubt, it has been hiring analytics and SEO people. Since I joined BrickHouse Security, we’ve tripled our sales. Analytics really plays a crucial role in our success.

5. The proverbial magic wand…If you could wave one and invent some technology that would make your days easier, what would it do?
It would have to be cloning. I’d love to be able to clone my team. What you can never have enough of is people who can drive traffic and then convert it into paying customers. Sure, it is a human resources obstacle but we’re lucky because our CEO comes from an SEO background. He understands the importance of people who bring people to our website.

There is also a ton of technology that I’d love to have. I’d like really good call tracking. Attribution is an area where a lot of vendors are promoting solutions but, frankly, it is really difficult.

Thanks again to Ryan for taking the time to expound on his equation for success in the ecommerce world.

Let’s move to technology and the nut and bolts of operating BrickhouseSecurity.com?
We host with Yahoo! Stores. We moved to that platform in late 2005 and the reliability has helped us become an Internet Retailer Top 500 site.

What are some of the vendors you use?
Yahoo! for hosting. Google, Omniture, and Yahoo! for analytics. We use Nextopia for site search.

How important is site search to your company?
Fifteen percent of our revenue comes from the search box on our site. A lot of our site visitors do not land on our home page. Site search really helps our visitors who arrive looking for specific things. They want to navigate directly to the product rather then click on links. A lot of people want to click on the product images that we display as part of our Nextopia AutoComplete module.

How do you integrate site search into your website?
We’ve been using Nextopia’s EcommISearch module for the past year. It integrates very well into the Yahoo! Stores environment. Nextopia has also spent a lot of time ensuring that it integrates well with Google Analytics.

I can see every search term typed in, which search terms converted and exactly where they converted. I see the traffic sources that are directing people to our site, and our revenue per customer. I can easily see whether we need to do a better job of optimizing our landing pages.

I’m sure you spend hours looking at logs, Do any particularly weird search terms jump out at you?
Strangely enough, the most common search term is nothing. Lots of people don’t enter a search term, yet still click submit. We just direct those searchers to the new products page.

Long tail searches on our site can reveal some really “interesting” interests that people have. Queries relating to monitoring or recording cell phones are pretty common. Unfortunately, that’s illegal so we can’t help them. Lots of people are interested in detecting bugs or are suspicious about the possibly of hidden cameras lurking in their homes of offices. They think their smoke detectors might contain hidden cameras, and many times they are right (see Erin Andrews).

Two other interesting product categories are covert surveillance and GPS Tracking. We have taken products normally sold to the government, and made them consumer friendly in terms of use and price.

Let’s talk specifically about Nextopia’s AutoComplete with Images technology.
AutoComplete with Images has really helped us. Let me explain – we first started off using Nextopia’s AutoComplete module which just displayed keyword suggestions to our customers. We later upgraded to their affordably priced AutoComplete with Images module which extends keyword suggestions to includes top converting keyword and product names and thumbnails that link directly to product detail pages. Think of it as a guided search box experience.

How does it work?
As soon as a customer begins typing into our search box, they are automatically presented with both keywords and products relevant to their search. The display instantly changes as a searcher inputs more characters. It starts predicting as each character is entered and dynamically changes the display of suggestions. Visitors end up seeing related queries and products right away, bringing them close to the point of conversion. So, customers can either click on a suggested keyword and proceed to do a search on our site OR they can click directly on a thumbnail of relevant products and be directed right to a product detail page.

Nextopia's AutoComplete site search technology on BrickHouseSecurity.com

Ex. A customer searching for the term ‘usb’ is “autosuggested” 5 top keyword suggestions for search and 6 top converting products with ‘usb’ in the product name. With each keystroke, suggestions dynamically change to display the most relevant set of suggestions.

What issues were you trying to address by integrating it?
First of all, we wanted to direct people to what they want and need. We found people often don’t use the best search terms so a system that suggestively prompts them is much better. A lot of people search for uses of products; not necessarily the products themselves. We wanted to enhance this process. We’ve found that product images are the best way to direct people. We now put them immediately in contact with the product.

We wanted to present historically strong sellers and direct people to those pages. The Nextopia technology pulls data from our sales history and changes as sales rise and fall over time and incorporates this data into their algorithm. We also spend a lot of time optimizing these pages. We ensure that our product pages include cross-selling information, recommending other products and coordinating products.

Another issue for to think about is this…if your product pages aren’t very good, then you might be better off putting them in contact with a product list than giving them a choice of which ones to select.

What was the AutoComplete implementation process?
It is real easy since we were already an existing eComm|Search customer and were already submitting tracking codes for each product SKU. That was it. Nextopia’s developers did the rest.

What kind of metrics are you seeing with the AutoComplete with Images module?
Upgrading to Autocomplete with Images was a great move as it converts twice as well as the base AutoComplete module. We started showing four images and then expanded to six images per query. Half of our searchers click on the product images in the search now. Overall, revenue is 8% higher. We’ve seen close to a 2% rise in overall site conversion, which I think will jump to 3-3.5%. That is very big for a site like ours.

Any other comments?
Nextopia’s AutoComplete with Images module is worth thousands and thousands of dollars to a larger website. In addition to the revenue it creates for us, it makes it really easy for our staff to find products. In fact, pretty much everyone in sales and support uses it to quickly find products in our catalog, even if it wasn’t designed for them.

I’m also experimenting with the number of pictures to display. I have six images showing now. If I want, I could have 8-10 pictures. I’m going to keep testing. I know that if I put it 10 images at a time, I think I could lift sales another 15%. It’s pretty tempting to fill up the screen and quickly give direct people to the highest selling products.

Finally, we’ve found that more people who use site search arrive organically than through PPC ads.

That’s great info Ryan. Thanks for your time.

Internet Retailer – June 8-10, McCormick Place West, Chicago, IL (Booth #414)
I’ll be in the booth, along with Chris, Ruby and Christian. Stop by to receive a gift worth receiving. One hint: it is very Canadian. I guarantee that you won’t find it anywhere else on the expo floor. Prepare to be thrilled!

We’re also planning some major improvements to our website during the summer. One of the key changes will be the inclusion of much more video so we’re shooting on-site interviews with customers discussing their operations and Nextopia experience. So if you’re not camera-shy, and have 15 minutes to spare on Wednesday, RSVP to me as soon as you can.

Yahoo! Merchant Summit – June 11 – 8:00am – 5:30pm, McCormick Place West, Chicago, IL
Yahoo! is one of the platforms we frequently work with and this conference is one full day on how to supercharge your Yahoo! Stores business. We look forward to meeting up with many of our Yahoo! Stores-hosted customers, such as .

In addition to exhibiting at this one-day event, I’m also on the “Power of Design” panel, speaking on the importance of usability and design. We’re going to discuss a variety of issues, such as which design techniques are critical for merchants and how simple decisions like the placement of the search box can affect your site performance.

Hoping to see you in Chi-town at either of these events, or both.
Sanjay

Let’s talk technology and the nut and bolts of operating your website. You’re on the Miva platform? What do you see as the pros and cons of it?
We were already established on the Miva platform (hosted with Cyberhost) before I arrived. It is secure and works 24/7. Even though we’re on an older version, it works well and I’ve had a good experience. Although some things are not as customizable, we’re not looking to upgrade MIVA. We’re developing a custom shopping cart, though, because we want some additional flexibility and customizable functionality.
What about processing and payments?
We don’t do any card processing online. It is all offline and non-real-time. Part of the reason is security. Part of the reason is that we’re not a widget company that ships boxed inventoried products the same day. Rather than dealing with backorders, we find it better to process the order as it it is filled. The benefits of doing offline processing definitely outweigh the benefits of doing it online. We deal with fewer refunds and backorders.

How do you handle international customers? Any special fraud programs in place?
We do address verification, and direct contact and confirmation with international customers. Because each order is hand processed we can spot inaccuracies and potential fraud threats. Any orders over $300 require a special form we send after the order has been placed.

You have a corporate policy against shipping to Mexico, Russia and all of Africa. Why?
There is just too much fraud that takes places as a result of doing business with these countries to make it worthwhile.

Let’s talk customer acquisition. It looks like word of mouth is important? Event marketing, I assume is big, too.
Both are really important. We do word of mouth and event marketing across the country. We don’t host events ourselves. Instead, we get involved with green living events around the country, such as The Green Festival in San Francisco, Green America and numerous other conferences. I love trade shows and I’m trying to find an herbal IT conference that I can attend. Haven’t found one yet, unfortunately.

Let’s talk SEO.
We do all of our SEO in house. We use Google Analytics and Google Base for our shopping feeds. Also, we cover our keywords, meta-data, headers, alt tags etc… everything indexable to keep us in the search light.

We use Nextopia’s technology in a several different ways. We use the EcommISearch module for our site search and the new Out of Stock Alerts module which enables customers to add their email on a per-SKU basis. When we receive new product and update our inventory and shopping cart, the system automatically sends out an email. It is a great way to drive sales.

Selecting Nextopia for our site search has been one of the best decisions we made. I love Nextopia. I really do. I’ve really enjoyed working with the engineers tremendously. When I’ve needed applications developed, they’ve gone above and beyond the call of duty several times. Probably the main reason our relationship works is that they’re the right size of company for us. I know I can talk to Chris Bannister (my Nextopia account rep) and get stuff done. I work with other vendors and don’t get anywhere near the same level of personalized attention. With other vendors, I’m not just not as important. With Nextopia, I am really, really important.

The Right Amount of Cardamon at Just the Right Time

Let’s talk Social Marketing. You’re tied into Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and You Tube. What does social marketing do for you?
Keeping in touch with the herbal community is critical for us. Social marketing gives us a face, so we’re not an anonymous wall. It allows customers to talk to us as well as interact. As we both participate in this discussion and observe it, we find out what our customers want.

Mountain Rose Herbs launched a user generated video contest in October 2009. Customers were asked to showcase their love of herbs, teas, spices, oils, and all things botanical.
The creator of the winning video received $1,000 and featured placement through the company’s social media accounts.
The idea came from internal discussions. The promotional video introducing the contest really captures who we are as a company. We wanted the video to encourage customer participation, we hired a local guy named Norm Scott, who did a terrific job. The entries were great. It is really fun to see how we touch people’s lives and play a part in their practice of an organic herbal lifestyle. (The delightful winning entry came from Catherine Wing and Bill Buckendorf who created a rapping rodent, Chives the Mouse).

Looked at your Twitter feed. Seems to be a combination of news tweets and coupon offers?
The key is having someone on your staff who has the time to keep on top of it. I’m definitely not that guy. Our marketing department handles it. Overall, Twitter helps keep our name present in any discussions relating to the herbal industry. From my perspective as a Mountain Rose employee and as a musician, I think it is a really good tool.

Where do you go to learn more about ecommerce innovations? What are some of the resources?
We work with a database programmer, Will Emmerson. He does a lot of our custom backend development for our ERP system. For example, he wrote the back end between Miva and our system. I work with him collaboratively. I’ll take an idea for a program or problem we need to solve. We’ll talk about options and possible solutions and then develop whatever we think is the best fix. Between Shawn, Will and I, we follow advances in technology and reason about how it could fit into our shop.

For a new retailer just starting out, what are a couple of things you would recommend they do?
First, I’d invest in IT and use it. Don’t go cheap and scrimp unnecessarily. Allocate whatever is necessary (time and/or money) to do a good job. It really can help you grow efficiently.

Finally, what is one thing that people probably don’t know about Mountain Rose Herbs?
Our corporate IT policy dictates that everything we buy is EPEAT Certified Gold. Everything we buy for our staff of 80 plus people, from desktops and monitors, to networking equipment, needs to meet this standard.

(Ed Note: EPEAT is a system that helps purchasers evaluate, compare and select electronic products based on their environmental attributes.)

Thanks Nate for your time. If you want to hear Nate’s other love, visit his band’s website. He manages it, of course.

Can you give us quick summary of your company, operations and markets.
Mountain Rose Herbs was founded in 1987. We’re located in Eugene, OR, and sell a wide range of natural botanical products, including organic herbs, spices, teas, and oils. We carry approximately 2,000 product SKUs. We have a head office in Eugene and operate several warehouses around the city. We do some manufacturing to produce our own finished products. Our business, however, is primary selling bulk ingredients to people who want to make their own herbal or aromatherapy products. You can order 4 oz or 200 lbs of nettles from us.

MountainRoseHerbs.com-Nettles

Our customer base is people into organic agriculture, herbs, aromatherapy, herbal and alternative healing, sustainable business practices, and botany. They take what they source from us and make their own products for retail and personal use.

Which products are your favorites?
I use a lot of the products we sell, especially the herbal teas. Once you start working around herbalists, you quickly learn that there are lots and lots of cool products and uses for them. For example, I’ve got a friend who burned himself while camping. He didn’t have health insurance so I spoke with some of the herbalists at work about a solution. They gave me a recipe for a salve which helped him completely recover without any scarring.

If you weren’t running the back end of an ecommerce outfit, what would you be doing?
Playing music or working in IT. I love music and I love IT!

Does your business have seasonality?
Getting involved with herbs and the products we sell is a lifestyle. We’re pretty steady all year long, although we do see some fourth quarter spikes from people who do bulk orders to make products for one-of-a-kind holiday sales and fairs, or who are planning to give them as Christmas gifts.

How has your customer base been affected by the economic downturn?
As I said, we sell to people who are enthusiastic about the herbal lifestyle. Buying from us forms part of their healthcare. When the economy is tough and health care increasingly expensive, people take more responsibility for their own health.

What do you do to stand out to in the marketplace?
We have an awesome marketing department that is very in tune with the movement. They focus on the fact that we are a company worth supporting, we value our employees, our loose culture and, of course, our high quality.

Thanks for your time, Nate. We’ll be back in a couple of days with part two.

An Internet Retailer Top 500 retailer, ToolFetch replaced its Google Mini site search engine earlier this year with Nextopia’s eComm|Search and the results have been anything but…mini. ToolFetch CEO and co-founder Andrew Brown reports that since integrating our technology, his company’s sales have jumped approximately 20%. Customers are returning to the site more often and purchasing a broader range of products.

The article does a great job of detailing how eComm|Search helps site visitors find what they need, and why it delivers such a huge ROI to online retailers. Worth reading, of course!

1. What are the three most important metrics that you track?

2. For a new retailer just starting out, what are three things you would recommend they do?

3. Benefitting from hindsight, what are some things that you did that you wished you hadn’t?

4. What single thing that you’ve done has had the greatest impact on your business?

5. The proverbial magic wand…If you could wave one and invent some technology that would make your days easier, what would it do?

Thanks Maria for your time. Good luck finding an integration wand.

While we’re proud to be a Toronto-based company, this week we’re a little prouder than usual due to that recent nail biter in Vancouver. More than a few Nextopians arrived at our office the next day with voices raspy from having exhorted our national heroes 2,500 miles away as they battled for the men’s Olympic ice hockey gold medal. The result also generated more than a few congratulatory emails from Nextopia customers, some of whom were fans of Team USA. Regardless of which team you were pulling for, even those who don’t like hockey (I think Canada has fewer than 100 people who’d fit this description) would have to admit that it was an incredible game. Let’s hope that the National Hockey League agrees to contribute its players to the 2014 Games in Russia.

(Thumbs-up, too, for the hockey-playing Canadian women who went undefeated and earned their own medals in that same gilded shade).

What does this have to do with our usual posts about ecommerce excellence? Gold medals beget merchandizing opportunities. And ice hockey gold medal victories by Team Canada mean lots of merchandizing opportunities for Nextopia customer IceJerseys.com, which is headquartered in Montreal.

We fired off a few questions to Anthony Wolfe, the company’s VP of of Ecommerce. Anthony didn’t have much time, given that Olympic gold medals in Canada’s favorite sport aren’t as common as we’d like.

First, general comments on the Olympic Hockey tournament?

I think the tournament was great all around. Fans were treated to seeing the best players in the world competing for their country with everything on the line – it really doesn’t get much better than that!

Did you see a jump in sales (and search queries) coincide with the Olympics? If so, when did sales start to go up?

We started to sell Olympic merchandise at the beginning of Q4 2009, and sales gained momentum throughout the holiday shopping season. In fact, we’ve carried jerseys and apparel for most participating countries from the beginning and sold out of a lot by Christmas. Sales never really dropped off much after Christmas, picking up significantly as the Olympics approached. As a result, a huge chunk of our search queries have been focussed on Olympic teams and merchandise.

How much of an effect will Canada’s gold medal have on your sales this year?

The gold medal has resulted in a major sales boost over the past week, and we anticipate it will linger for a few more weeks.

What is the top selling “let’s celebrate the gold medal” item?

Right now we have two champs items that have been very hot:

• Team Canada IIHF 2010 Olympic Champions Swooshflex Locker Room Cap
• Team Canada Men’s IIHF 2010 Olympic Champions T-Shirt

In addition, the two official Team Canada jerseys continue to sell at an incredible clip:

• Team Canada 2010 Olympic Swift Replica White Hockey Jersey
• Team Canada 2010 Olympic Swift Replica Red Hockey Jersey

Canadian pride aside, what was your favorite jersey (mens or womens) among teams in the Olympics?

Honestly, I think there were a number of really nice jerseys in addition to Canada’s. The USA alternate jersey, Germany, Norway, Finland and Russia were among my favourites. I especially liked how many of this year’s Olympic jerseys worked a sublimated ‘patriotic’ pattern into the jersey fabric – or in Canada’s case, the crest. Very subtle, but nice attention to detail.

Lastly, what are some of the countries from which people have bought Canada jerseys?

In addition to Canada and the USA, we have shipped Canadian jerseys to pretty much everywhere around the world, including: Australia, Bermuda, France, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Thailand and the United Kingdom.

A hockey jersey and Bermuda shorts must certainly be a strange sight on the island. Anyway, with the Closing Ceremonies fading into history, we’d like to thank Anthony for taking the time to talk to us. We’d love to talk to him more later in the year about his site operations, as well as the mystery why Slapshot remains so popular.

In the meantime, enjoy fulfilling those orders.

- Team Nextopia (who are big fans of Team Canada)