Industry: Automotive // Manufacturing // Retail Consumer Products | Distribution Type: B2B // DTC | Time Period: 2016-2022

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Overview

Assault Industries is a brand dedicated to the UTV Off-Road enthusiast lifestyle. UTVs, for those who don’t know, are rear-engined buggy-like motor vehicles that come in various flavors from utilitarian to ultra-high performance. The southwest is a hotspot for outdoor enthusiasts, with off-roading being a hugely popular activity. Owners learn quickly how fragile UTVs can be, particularly when driven aggressively.

Assault Industries’ owners are off-road enthusiasts who also happened to own and operate a successful engineering and machining business. After hours, they would develop replacement parts for their vehicles and test them in the Glamis dunes or other recreational riding spots. These parts were meant to improve the performance and the durability of the vehicles, but because aesthetics matter, they were made to look great. It didn’t take long for others to take notice. In late 2013, Assault Industries launched its products for the enthusiast community. Interest was immediate and business grew significantly faster than they were equipped to build products for.

The team set aside some space in the warehouse for Assault product and offices. The products quickly began to dominate the market, but a lack of dedicated professionals to keep the company moving forward became a serious issue.

How I Got Involved

In early 2016, I was looking for a machine shop to manufacture some parts for me for Night Optics USA. An associate recommended that I meet with the guys at Innovative Metals (Assault Industries) to see if they could help. When I arrived at the meeting, I did not expect that it would become my next big adventure. Initially, the discussions were to oversee day-to-day operations and grow the business, but I was not prepared to leave Night Optics. Instead we worked out a deal where I could offer part-time marketing consulting services via Rosodigital. The company had a marketing guy that was not working out, I immediately let him go and began working on projects to address reputation issues and improve sales performance.

Observations

It was easy to see the business was in a state of disarray and not likely making much money if any at all. The current team was not well equipped to manage the inner workings of a well-organized retail products business, so I had my work cut out for me.

There were many customer service challenges to address, as well as a Shopify-powered E-commerce website using a very basic template that left a lot to be desired. Not all products were available, the product pages lacked valuable information, product descriptions were poorly written with spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors, and images were poor quality, often taken with a mobile phone and not edited.

Objectives

My initial goals were to understand the customer service challenges, and improve sales performance on the Shopify website. I took the following steps to address each issue.

Customer Service

• Build a survey with SurveyMonkey to send to all past customers in the company database.
• The survey included an incentive for customers to return answers.
• Create a detailed report based on the survey findings.
• Establish a meaningful course of action to address the concerns of angry customers.
• Designated staff members to assist with the process of reaching out to customers to rectify their concerns and reestablish confidence and brand loyalty.

Website

• Purchase studio equipment to take good product photos.
• Reorganize product display and categorization.
• Revised pricing model $X.99 rather than flat or $X.95
• Load all available products to the website.
• Create results-driven product pages that offered features, well-written product descriptions, spec tables, instructional downloads, related product upsells, and a highly visible add to cart button.
• The home page will be updated to reflect a sales-centric layout with new product highlights, high-value slider graphics, and focused attention to important company related information.
• A revised customer service policy, shipping policy, and returns policy designed to instill confidence in the online shopping experience.
• Update all other areas of the website to represent a more professional appearance.
• At a later time, introduce an updated, feature-rich layout (UI) to improve the user experience (UX).
• Set up incentives to draw cart abandoners back into the site to complete the purchase process.
• Establish a process to capture new email subscriber signups during the checkout process.
• Add sales channels like eBay, Amazon, and Walmart.
• Add payment options and features that created an easier path for impulse buys like Affirm, Apple Pay, and Shop Pay.

Challenges

• Improving consumer sentiment and trust in the brand would take time.
• Changing the mindset of the team to focus on customer service and future scalability.
• Budgetary push-back on some initiatives related to the website.
• The level of work required to bring the website up to a higher standard of performance on a part-time basis.

Results

A strong unified effort to appeal to our customer service challenges helped tremendously with retention. We found that our customers were very active on message boards and social media and were very vocal about their experiences following my arrival at the company. It was helpful to have happy customers advocating for the brand and doing the work for the company in their own circles.

On the website – as new products, updates, and features were introduced, sales increased dramatically.

Our average monthly sales before I arrived were $0-$15,000. My first full month yielded nearly $17k in sales, and by May the survey takers were taking advantage of their promotional incentive codes, which bumped sales to nearly $24k.

Annual sales in 2015 were in the low 6-figures. In 2016, I added $60K in sales. After I joined the team full-time in January of 2017, online sales accelerated, and by the time the company sold in January 2022, annual retail online sales performance was approaching $1.5MM.

Note: Retail sales were a small part of the overall business strategy. Our primary focus as a company was creating a robust B2B sales network and supporting an environment where resellers held inventory. My purpose was to establish a way for our inside sales team to maximize success while capturing sales opportunities from those customers that wanted a direct interaction.

Assaultind.com | Author: Rolando Petit