Contributed by Bernie Brennan and Lori Schafer
Can you name a retailer that opens up its offices to the public for daily tours—and makes them entertaining, energizing, and just plain fun? We can. This same retailer prides itself on its ten core values, including creating “fun and a little weirdness.” It has managed to build an unbelievable loyal customer following—and an impressive billion-plus-dollar business in ten short years—by “WOWing” every customer through service. The company we are talking about is the one and only Zappos, the online retailer that started selling shoes and now describes itself as offering “the absolute best service and the best selection in online shopping from shoes, handbags, clothing and so much more.”
When we wrote Branded! How Retailers Engage Consumers with Social Media and Mobility, we first studied the leaders in social media and mobility and then began interviewing CEOs of these companies. Not that familiar with the Las Vegas-based Zappos, we did know that its CEO, Tony Hsieh, had nearly 2 million Twitter followers and that 500 of its employees regularly tweet about the brand. Appropriately, Zappos was our first interview, as it energized us to carry on passionately. The case study on Zappos in our book is fittingly called “Your Culture Is Your Brand!” because that philosophy, quoted by Hsieh, weaves through everything the company does. Zappos has built a unique culture based on unwavering customer service, using social media and now mobile applications to communicate that culture and engage tens of millions of consumers it otherwise may never have reached.
And with our new book just launching and Las Vegas the venue for the 2010 Premier Business Leadership Series, what better company to co-host our PBLS roundtable, “Is Your Company Anti-Social? How to Effectively Engage Consumers through Social Media and Mobility”? Clearly covering a topic on many people’s minds, the roundtable drew quite a crowd, not only from retailers but also from many other industries, including health care, consumer products, banking, travel, and entertainment. Zappos Senior Brand Marketing Manager Michelle Thomas and Product Manager Jaimee Newberry joined the two of us to share how the new channels of social media and mobility can be used to effectively communicate a company’s strategy, culture, and brand. Read more about the roundtable here.
Social media is ingrained into the Zappos culture. Zappos believes they don’t even need a social media strategy—after all, it is just another way of engaging with customers to share their culture. The employees constantly post videos, tweet, and blog about their culture—they don’t direct sell or market. Visit the Zappos.com Family Blogs, its YouTube channel, or its Facebook page and you will be entertained for hours watching videos of employees engaging in activities such as the “Crazy Fat Sandwich Eating Contest,” Halloween at Zappos, as well as more serious Fashion Culture and Cause videos.
So before our roundtable at PBLS, we wanted to take the tour ourselves. We signed up anonymously, not mentioning that we were in fact the authors of Branded! And, of course, we brought along an iPhone to capture the essence of what goes on inside Zappos on camera (see a slide show of photos here). We visited around Halloween, so every cubicle in the entire office had been decorated. Despite everyone being hard at work, as we walked by each department, employees rang cow bells, hooted, and yelled welcoming messages. Some employees were dressed in costume. We talked to one buyer who was wearing a bedroom “nightstand” piece around her body and a lampshade on her head; she informed us that she was dressed as a “one-night stand”! The entertainment continued for the duration of the tour.
Zappos prides itself on fostering an open, transparent culture, and our tour proved that absolutely true. Picture-taking is allowed in the offices, and although we were on a “tour,” we were able to engage in impromptu conversation with Zappos associates in various departments. There is nothing pretentious about their culture; it is absolutely genuine. What you see is what you get—a fun culture (with a little weirdness) and smiling employees all laser-focused on and passionate about great customer service. Can this very social culture with all this fun and a little weirdness produce business results? It has, and it continues to do so. The company has shown dramatic sales growth: from $2 million in sales in 2000 to over $1 billion. Not surprisingly, in 2009 Amazon.com, the number-one Web retailer in the world, acquired Zappos for over $1 billion.
So we’d like to thank our friends at Zappos for showing us such a great time on the tour, and if you are ever in the area, put the Zappos tour on your Las Vegas “to do” list. You will be glad you did!
Bernie Brennan and Lori Schafer are the authors of Branded! How Retailer Engage Consumers with Social Media & Mobility
