Trade is booming across the virtual shop counter (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Trade is booming across the virtual shop counter

9:00am Wednesday 10th November 2010 in Business By Chris Holland

They used to say of old-fashioned general stores that you could buy everything from a pin to an elephant.

Although I’ve never seen a real elephant for sale in a shop, I expect it would be possible to acquire one online these days through the seemingly endless reach of what one of my relatives calls ‘the interclacker’.

Internet giant Google recently revealed that the internet had developed to the point where it now accounts for 7.2 per cent of the UK economy – making it more important than construction, transport or utilities.

For award-winning Bradford businesswoman Farnaz Khan, the internet was the raison d’etre of her company, although the business she runs was not the one she set out to establish.

Mother-of-four Farnaz started her direct marketing company eResponse Media Ltd in 2006 after struggling to find work that gave her the flexibility to care for her children.

The company survived the recession and achieved gross profits of more than £134,000 last year, and is on track for a £300,000 turnover in 2010.

The company won contracts from companies in Denmark, Norway and Sweden this year. Its innovative website PrizeBoom.com has become the UK’s leading free-to-enter competitions website with more than a million users – a figure set to double in the next 12 months.

The business generates validated marketing leads for top companies such as Eon, Talk Talk and Orange Farnaz, who originally set out to establish an online insurance brokerage business, this week returned from a Government-backed trade mission to New York, representing the UK’s digital sector.

Her business success has resulted in Farnaz, 31, being named this year’s Yorkshire Female Entrepreneur of the Year and being short-listed for numerous other national and regional awards.

Family commitments mean that she spends much of the time running her enterprise from home in Allerton, but has launched plans to go international by setting up an office in the United States.

Farnaz always planned to run an online business and has developed an operation that provides her clients with reliable data for marketing purposes as well as a speedier service.

She said: “Things are very exciting at the moment. I’m really proud of everything the company has achieved so far and we’re expecting a great 2011.”

At Bingley-based clothing specialist Damart, whose 1.3m customers are of a more mature age group, the internet is driving change.

Marketing director John Bottomley said many more people aged 50 and above were going online, and while catalogue sales remained the backbone of the business, online sales were growing.

The £98m business performed strongly throughout the recession and boosted turnover by 18 per cent in its most recent financial year to June, with profits rising to £4.3m.

John said: “Internet sales have grown by around 40 per cent, but from a low base. We’ve seen online orders from those in their 50s grow by around 25 per cent, while for the over-70s the growth has been marginal at around one to two per cent.

“The internet has brought significant changes to the way we do business, including how we market the products, our distribution and particularly speed of response. It’s also enabled us to adapt our product range to target internet shoppers and also introduce lines aimed at younger buyers.

“The internet empowers customers and we’ve had to adapt and cut lead times in bringing products to the market, and also in the way we respond to customer queries. It’s forced us to look at how we organise the business to meet the much more instant world of online shopping.”

Selling online has also transformed the operations of family-run Texere Yarns. Over the past decade, internet sales have gone from nil to around 60 per cent, enabling the firm to develop sales to the United States, Scandinavia, France and Ireland.

Managing director Robin Smith, who took over the company, in Little Germany, in 1992, said he was persuaded to develop a company website by younger colleagues.

He said: “Since we established the company website, online sales have rocketed and now account for about 60 per cent of the business.

“Although we maintain a traditional catalogue and the mill shop still attracts plenty of face-to-face customers, I expect the online trade to continue to grow.”

Texere stocks a wide range of yarns, mainly for hobbyists involved in hand-knitting, which has seen a revival, and embroidery, as well as for schools and further education fashion and design courses, including those at Bradford College and Leeds University.

Robin said that, due to the breadth of its stock, the Texere website was updated about every two weeks.

Meanwhile, an online training company founded by a former Bradford teacher is celebrating 15 years in business and has achieved an annual turnover of £3.5m.

The Virtual College, based in Ilkley, is registering an average of 3,000 new e-learners a month for its range of online courses, and now has 360,000 customers.

Operations director Lesley Ord said: “This increase reflects Virtual College’s ability to meet the changing demands of our clients, to respond quickly to economic pressure and to continue to develop new products for the e-learning industry.”

The Virtual College was established by chairman Bob Gomersall who, when he was head of physics at Bradford Grammar School, saw how he could improve training through the use of technology.

He said: “We set up Virtual College because we couldn’t find training providers who would adopt the use of new technology. It was a case of doing it yourself because nobody else would.”

Virtual College has developed a branded learning system known as E-nable which is used by organisations looking to provide staff with e-learning material for induction, mandatory and refresher training.

Virtual College has also developed a portfolio of e-academies in the housing, healthcare, safeguarding children, food and drink and trades sectors, which together offer more than 100 online courses. The organisation now has a 63-strong workforce and ten freelance consultants.

Chief executive Rod Knox said: “Despite the current economic climate, we continue to thrive as individuals, businesses and organisations across both the public and private sectors seek to access innovative, flexible and cost-effective training solutions.

“E-learning is an increasingly popular and proven alternative to traditional face-to-face training. Geographical restrictions are removed and learners can access their training at a pace, place and time to suit them.

“We are constantly looking to enhance our e-learning provision across all sectors through the development of both new academies and training courses, and are well equipped to respond to future challenges and opportunities.”

One local digital marketing expert says the next challenge to businesses will be whether or not to embrace ‘f-commerce’, an extension of the now established e-commerce (electronic trading) based on the social networking site Facebook, on which even the Queen now has a page.

Jason Kelly, digital PR director at AKA PR in Skipton, says with the explosion of social media, businesses have been presented with yet another dilemma of whether to ignore it or embrace it.

Some large commercial organisations had produced applications allowing them to link their Facebook ‘Like’ page with their e-commerce site – enabling customers to buy directly from the page.

Jason said: “Businesses need to understand the wider social networks that are available and how they, like f-commerce, can directly support their business in both the short-term and the long-term.

“Whereas f-commerce reflects the direct trading opportunities provided by Facebook, s-commerce (social commerce) reflects the complete picture, in terms of consumer engagement, brand perception and, ultimately, market positioning.”

Facebook has around 500 million users and other social networking sites another 250 million, so the potential commercial opportunities are enormous.

Jason said two-thirds of internet users visit social networks, which account for ten per cent of all internet time, with 37 per cent of users visiting social network sites daily.

He said: “Social media has and will continue to shape how consumers and producers engage with one another.

“If used correctly, social media can be a potent weapon in any company’s armoury. The trick is knowing: which, why, how and when social media should be used.”