Chinese boys sell shoes in the US for 800 million dollars a year

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In the United States, a Chinese boy opened the Network Shoe Shop fame, is called "household name", the 2007 sales of more than 800 million U.S. dollars, the U.S. Shoes network market value of 3 billion U.S. dollars in the One-fourth, known as "shoe-selling Amazon."

The Chinese young man named Hsieh, he opened the network shoe Shop is "Zappos."

A gifted teenager at Harvard University

Hsieh, a 33-Year-old founder of Zappos, is now the chief executive of the Internet marketing Empire. His parents came to the United States from Taiwan to settle in the early years and gave birth to Hsieh in Illinois State.

Hsieh is the eldest son of the family, from an early age to show a place of extraordinary talent, intelligent, quick thinking, which for him to create a network marketing empire to provide congenital conditions.

Hsieh's childhood was a smooth ride. He grew up in San Francisco and was easily admitted to Harvard as a computer major, and he got his diploma at the age of 19 and became a "celebrity" in the student circle. During his time at Harvard, Hsieh in professional excellence, repeatedly won the computer championship and opened a pizzeria in his spare hours. In spite of his business, he accumulated the first trade in his life.

Small programmers create big companies

When he was 21 years old, Hsieh gave up his hard-won opportunity to read a blog and became a regular programmer. The matter to the family and friends lamented, and quite puzzled. Hsieh with unique vision and excellent record, to dispel all doubts of relatives and friends, he founded the Small Network advertising company LinkExchange, only two years to develop into 200 employees of the big companies.

1998, LinkExchange to 265 million U.S. dollars worth of commitment to Microsoft, Hsieh dug into the first bucket of gold, to create a network of marketing empire to provide adequate financial protection.

1999, a very fortuitous opportunity, Hsieh met a younger, more unique insight entrepreneur Nick Swim. After a long talk, Swim an idea: selling shoes online. According to Swim learned that the network shopping market size of 40 billion U.S. dollars, only mail order to reach 2 billion U.S. dollars, do a network shoe shop, more than the mail order business is not a problem.

Hsieh, who quickly injected $1 million into Swim's online shoe company Shoesite. Since then, Shoesite changed its name to Zappos. 6 months later, Hsieh and Swim together to operate Zappos, and soon additional investment of 10 million U.S. dollars. Hsieh became chief executive of Zappos Company in 2000.

Hard and Soft Kung fu turn the Tide

Surprisingly, Zappos did not have a good start, but started badly. Zappos just opened the shop, not easy to get orders, every 10 orders but there is a failure to perform-either send the wrong goods, or shoes out of stock. Zappos has been living beyond his means and is at risk of bankruptcy.

However, Hsieh not let Zappos bankrupt, but let the young company gradually grow into the network marketing empire.

In the process, Hsieh under the "Hard".

In order to facilitate the selection of different styles and colors of shoes, Zappos for the inventory of each shoe from 8 different angles photographed. In the warehouse of Kentucky State, Zappos has 58,000 kinds of 1.3 million pairs of shoes, the task of photographing is extremely arduous, but Zappos finished.

In order to ensure timely delivery, Zappos home in the United Parcel Service Company (UPS) near the airport, warehouse 24-hour operation. Zappos not only to satisfy customers, but also to make them overjoyed-the company promised 4 days delivery, but in most cases, the customer will be able to get the goods the next day.

Then, Hsieh took out the housekeeping of the "soft Kung Fu": free return goods.

This may not sound new, but in the late 90, the Web shoe store did not do that much because it was not like the books sold by Amazon, and it was easy for customers to buy the wrong ones.

This work is really difficult, the key is that customers find that the shoes are not suitable, how can immediately replace the appropriate. On the one hand to ease the customer's irritability, on the other hand to control the cost of returns.

At this point, Hsieh's computer talent came in handy. With a set of software, he designed an e-mail system for Zappos to automatically respond to customer requests for replacement emails.

In operation, Zappos commitment to customers, if shoes do not fit, delivery, returns are free shipping. To this end, Zappos paid 100 million dollars for the cost of freight. Although the return rate of up to One-fourth, but the average amount of each order of 90 U.S. dollars, still left a sufficient margin for Zappos, after deducting shipping and return costs, the gross margin can still reach 35%.

Customer satisfaction and loyalty ultimately Zappos, and sales have soared over the past 7 years. At present, 60% of Zappos's 5 million customers are "repeat", and 25% constantly introduce new friends to buy shoes.

Zappos to attract the venture capital of 15 million of dollars, Zappos quickly increased the new products, such as sunglasses, purses and so on. In 2007, Zappos's first outlet store opened in Las Vegas, the casino city. Zappos's goal is to achieve annual sales of 1 billion dollars by 2010.

(Competitiveness Magazine)

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Zappos "encourages" new employees to resign

Zappos has a unique approach to finding a suitable employee.

Zappos has mastered the skills of telephone service, even the "art", which is still a blank for most internet sellers. Zappos has a free phone number on every page of the site, and its call center is an interesting, witty operator who can create a relaxed and enjoyable shopping atmosphere for customers.

The operator's work is very hard, then a customer's phone may have to talk for a few hours. Zappos's call center offers a 4-week training session to recruit new employees to immerse them in the company's strategy, culture and commitment to customers. The training began one weeks after the Zappos called "bid" time. The head of the company will say to the new employee: "If you resign today, we will pay your salary in full at your working hours, plus a bonus of 1000 dollars." "About 10% of new employees choose to take the money and leave.

On the surface, Zappos's approach is somewhat inconceivable, but to think carefully, it feels quite profound. For new employees, if they are willing to accept the company's "bid", it shows that the company does not have the necessary dedication. Zappos, by spending money to "encourage" the resignation of new employees, early recognition of the company's values and the compatibility of each new employee.