The British Heart Foundation has over a hundred Christmas cards in this year’s range. That’s a lot to choose from.
So, what people need, what they really really need, is a bot that can choose the perfect Christmas card for them. So, that’s what I did. I made my Interniser bot with a simple conversational flow that would select from the range of British Heart Foundation Christmas cards and suggest them to people chatting to the bot.
To make the bot do a bit more than just choose from a list of Christmas cards and to get a bit more engagement, the first few interactions are the bot asking some Christmas -related questions as a kind of personality test to help it determine the perfect Christmas card for the user. The bot then suggests a Christmas card and asks the human if they’d like to see another (just in case the suggestion wasn’t perfect).
From idea to implementation took less than three hours. One of my testers suggested that the questions could be used to select a persons choice of Christmas cards based upon useful questions that match the product filters on the website, such as “Do you want Christmas cards with glitter?”. Maybe that could be the next iteration.
“A pivot is a change in strategy without a change in vision.”
– Eric Ries
Pivoting is a lean start-up practice that helps a business iterate on their business model to find the best way to meet the needs of their customers. Eric Ries calls it ‘iterating from plan A to a plan that works’. It’s a great way to respond to changes that mean the current business model is no longer viable.
Our Plan A
Our plan A was a three tiered business model that gave us the means to increase our offering for customers with lower upfront costs and an increased delivery speed, to test opportunities and learn what works, and to scale the business and make more money for life saving research. Tier one was acting as an affiliate to market products and services that our customers might benefit from, and which they would want to use via the BHF as it would involve a contribution to life saving research at no cost to themselves. This affiliation model gave us a way of quickly testing a new service or product offering whilst keeping set-up costs to a minimum, and learning how to market the new offering to a potentially new customer group. Tier two was drop-shipping and allowed us to take the learnings from tier one and iterate the opportunities that were working into a more profitable model. This tier had slightly higher set-up costs but the increased margins made it a commercially viable option for increasing the product range without having to buy stock or handle distribution. Tier three is our stock-held option. It means greater upfront costs and longer set-up times but greater profits and more control over product development.
In identifying which model would work best for which opportunity we would first consider our customer segments. The products offered through an affiliate link could work for those customers that were further away from the cause as they wouldn’t feel short-changed by going to a third-party website to make the purchase. But those customers who were more closely aligned with the cause would be more likely to want a branded experience of ordering a new product as they would want to feel part of the BHF. Pretty much all our branded products would be in the stock-held model, so we wouldn’t necessarily start with a affiliate or drop-ship model for those products but would still test them by sourcing non-branded versions to learn how they sell.
Testing and learning to drive continuous improvements in everything that we do is something that we’ll always use in whatever plan we’re delivering.
Pivoting away from weaknesses
What we learned through implementing this strategy was that there were some pretty significant barriers that were preventing us from delivering at the speed we wanted. They were mostly internal barriers; not enough resources in the right areas, bottle-necks in departments that worked in different ways, misalignment of objectives.
And as we thought about the direction the ecommerce business would grow over the next five to ten years we realised that it was out of alignment with other parts of the business. As Ecommerce was developing increasingly complex models to meet increasingly diverse customer needs the rest of the business was working towards consolidating and simplifying itself.
Learning about the weaknesses in our plan A meant we could pivot to find a way that worked better.
Pivoting towards strengths
Meeting the needs of our customers is still our top priority. We’re still all about providing BHF supporters with the means to show their friends and family that they support the nation’s heart charity, be it through wearing a pin badge, a wrist band or a hoody. And we’re still all about raising funds for life saving research. Ecommerce is the part of the BHF that gives supporters a way to add value to their experience with the BHF, whether they are entering a fundraising event and want to wear a BHF t-shirt or having our pin badges as wedding favours at their wedding, in return for money. And 100% of our profits still fund life saving research.
So, we’re going to move to be better aligned with other parts of the charity, and leverage their strengths. 750 shops with millions of customers? Let’s tell them about the Online Shop. Tens of thousands of people entering fundraising events? Let’s develop clothing they’ll want to wear whilst they’re training. CPR training doubles the chances of surviving a cardiac arrest? Let’s provide CPR Training Kits at an affordable price so small businesses and families can learn how to save lives.
This new plan isn’t going to come without it’s challenges, but as we implement it we’ll learn even more about how to give every supporter an excellent experience of the BHF and raise more money for life saving research.
According to the Institute of Fundraising, two billion Christmas cards are sent every year, and 30% of those cards are charity Christmas cards. That’s 600,000,000 cards. To make the maths easier let’s say that Christmas cards are sold in packs of ten, which means 60,000,000 packs are sold each year, and that a pack costs £3, which makes charity Christmas cards a £120 million a year business. Sounds like buying charity Christmas cards is a great way to support charities. But interestingly, of that £120m spent on charity Christmas cards only a small percentage of cards are actually bought from charities.
The majority of ‘charity’ Christmas cards are sold by commercial retailers, not charities. Retailers know that many people are predisposed to buy charity Christmas cards and want to leverage people’s feelings to sell their Christmas cards. Retailers form agreements with charities where a percentage of income from the sales of their Christmas cards are contributed to the charity. This percentage is often as low as 10% of the Ex VAT sale price, meaning that for every pack of Christmas cards you buy for £2.99, the charity receives just 25p.
If retailers really wanted to support a charity they could sell the charity’s Christmas cards on behalf of the charity, but of course they are a commercial operation that exists to make money so instead they sell their own range of cards and make a donation of a percentage of the sale to the charity. Of course the charity still benefits, and in some cases benefit quite a bit as even a small percentage from the large volume of Christmas cards that a retailer sells can generate considerable income. But of course, these kinds of agreements excludes any of the smaller charities as they don’t have the resources to work with retailers in this way. I don’t blame the retailers for this, it’s just business, but there is a better way for you to buy charity Christmas cards. Have you guessed what it is yet?
Why do people buy charity Christmas cards?
People buy and send Christmas cards to their friends and family to wish them a happy Christmas and let them know that they are thinking of them at a time of year when being part of a family or social group is important. But charity Christmas cards add another layer to this, a deep and often emotional layer.
People buy charity Christmas cards to raise money for a charity, show support for the cause, show their friends and family that they care about the work of the charity, and for reasons far more emotionally complex than just wishing friends they haven’t spoken to for a while a merry Christmas. As many as they are personal reasons for people buying charity Christmas cards, one thing they’ll all have in common is the expectation that a charity will benefit from their purchase.
So, why do people buy charity Christmas cards from retailers instead of charities?
Probably because it’s convenient to add a pack to their weekly shop as they walk around the supermarket, and most likely because they don’t even know that the charity they want to support is even selling Christmas cards.
Christmas cards sales, for retailers and for charities, is a rush to get there first. They are all competing to be front of mind with potential customers because Christmas cards are the kind of product you only buy once a year, and once you’ve bought them you don’t buy again until next year. But charities don’t have the marketing budgets to compete with the retailers, so you may never know that your favourite charity sells Christmas cards that are just well made, and have equally beautiful/amusing/interesting designs, and contribute far more income to the charity.
Why you should buy your Christmas cards from a charity
Charities sell their Christmas in their shops and online, so before you buy your Christmas cards from your usual retailer, try googling the name of your favourite charity and ‘Christmas cards’. With a bit of persistence you’ll find some wonderful Christmas cards that your friends and family will appreciate. And if you don’t have a favourite charity, maybe now is the time to think about what causes are important to you and what charity you could support. The charity will get far more of the profits from the sale going directly to their cause and you’ll feel better about yourself knowing that at Christmas, you’ve done something good.
This is a better way for you to buy charity Christmas cards.
In case you didn’t know, I work for the British Heart Foundation where 100% of the profits from our Christmas cards fund life saving research. If you or someone you know has been affected by a heart condition you can show your support for the work of the British Heart Foundation by buying our Christmas cards and sending them to your friends and family.
Dessert MK is an interesting take on ice cream vans. Whereas most ice cream vans sell the usual branded ice lollies, Dessert MK offers their own range of ice cream creations.
The ice creams, whilst very tasty and luxurious looking, are all simple and cheap to create, using ice cream from a whippy machine, flavoured sauces and a selection of chocolates and sweets, meaning that the margin on one £5 tray is probably around 400%, far greater than the few percent of margin a usual ice cream would make from selling branded ice lollies.
Marketed exclusively on Facebook and relying on word of mouth to build a following, they let fans know where they’ll be that evening on Facebook. This completely different approach to the usual ice cream van approach of turning up where they hope there will be people who want an ice cream when they here the music, Dessert MK guarantees that their customers come to them, wherever they go.
Dessert MK is disrupting the product range and the marketing approach, it’s entrepreneurial Ice cream.
World Suicide Prevention Day is held each year on 10 September. It’s an annual awareness raising event organised by International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP) and the World Health Organisation (WHO).
This year’s theme is about connecting with others and letting people know that #ITSOKAYTOTALK.
Why is it important?
More than 800,000 people take their lives each year across the world. In the UK and ROI, more than 6,000 people die by suicide a year – an average of 18 a day.
Reaching out to people who are going through a difficult time can be a game changer. People who are feeling low or suicidal often feel worthless and think that no-one cares. Small things like hearing from friends or family, feeling listened to or just being told that ‘it’s ok to talk’ can make a huge difference.
I think communication about projects should be as clear, simple, and as easy to understand as possible.
But I hear Project Management is referred to as ‘Air Traffic Control’, with Project Leads called the ‘Pilots’ of their projects and them trying to ‘land’ their ‘in-flight’ projects.
Metaphors can be used effectively in communication to draw parallels with everyday experience and create familiarity but this relies on the metaphor that is used being something everyone is already familiar with. Referring to projects as planes, the person leading the project as a pilot, and the project control process as air traffic control doesn’t achieve this, it just adds a layer of confusing language. Using metaphors to mystify the process of project delivery adds no value to the projects.
If you tell me that the project is ‘in progress’ I have a clear idea of what that means. If you tell me that the project is ‘in-flight’ I have to filter the metaphor through my understanding of what it could mean to reach the conclusion that actually the project is ‘in progress’ but I’m still not sure that I have the correct conclusion.
Keep it simple and so obvious that no one has to think about what is meant by the language being used in order to understand what is being said.
