This map shows the delivery points of online sales from the last few months for a Victorian based newsagency related business. The average sale value is in excess of sixty five dollars, not including shipping, which is charged for at cost.
The map does not show click and collect customers, and there are plenty of them.
All of the customers are not local to the business, not regular shoppers of the business. They have all been won through direct online engagement, direct to the website as well as through Facebook marketing.
I share the image to reflect the reach this business sees it has. Whereas a coupe of years ago it saw itself as a local business serving people who walk past or live within, say, ten kilometres. Today, the business reaches way beyond, it reaches to all of Australia.
I appreciate there are newsagent who say online is not a big deal and that social media is not useful for driving traffic and revenue. Data do not support those arguments. The opposite is true, and especially true for tech engaged small business retailers including businesses that identify or have identified as newsagencies.
This is how we can grow our businesses, by reaching shoppers located far beyond our four walls, by being accessible 24/7, by selling what people want and fulfilling through a appreciated timely service.
Footnote: I call this a newsagency related business as it is related. But it is not a newsagency as many would see it, not any more.