Robinsons Blog

We all love the web, don’t we? The fact you’re even reading this blog means that you’re probably quite a seasoned surfer. By and large, we’d all agree that the internet has brought so many fantastic aspects to our daily life. How many people would have thought even five years ago how sites like Google Earth, BBC iPlayer and Wikipedia would seem like such vital day-to-day tools?

Today, we feel cheated if we can only get the grainy level of satellite imagery of our holiday hotel on Google Earth when not that long ago, we had maybe only two pictures from the brochure as our guide. A decade ago, if you forgot to ‘tape’ something on TV, it was just tough luck. Now, the BBC give you seven days to watch most shows on demand. There was a time when only schoolkids and people with perhaps a little too much time on their hands actively read an encyclopaedia. Now, any pub quiz question can probably be answered on a Wiki site. Our expectations about the availability of information have risen enormously and as a result, we’re all much less tolerant of not having access to the information we need right now.

It leads one to wonder what today’s equivalents are. What I wonder is there that we don’t really have access to today that in a few years’ time, we’ll feel disappointed or even angry if it’s denied to us? While I don’t have the answer to that one, I’m sure that whoever does will be living very comfortably by then. If you can predict the future, you can become very successful as a result.

That’s why we have to keep an eye on developments. The problem we sometimes face is not uncertainty about the future, it’s uncertainty about how to prepare for it. What do I mean by that? Well, let me rewind right back to the dawn of the web as a means for companies to promote themselves, the mid to late 90’s. Back then, you didn’t really need to be a genius to predict that this technological revolution was eventually going to change the face of consumer buying behaviour. Most people knew that. What they didn’t know was how quickly and how far the consumer would want to browse and buy this way. In the dot.com boom and subsequent crash, lots of people lost a lot of money trying to see how the new online world could work for them.

In our own corner of the business world, we faced a slightly different challenge: it was all well and good to see how these new companies like amazon.com and the late boo.com could spend millions in driving the online revolution with a new generation of wired shoppers. Back then, we had survey data telling us that only 30% of customers had a PC at home. We knew we had to watch from the sidelines, try to learn from the expensive mistakes of others and wait until the time was right for us.

The biggest problems were always demographic and practical. Our customer base has always had far more women than men. Back then though, the typical web user was male. Dial-up modems and modest processing speed meant that going online could be a time-consuming business – If you could call it ‘surfing’, it was more like surfing on a mill pond. We all know that spare time is not something that most horse owners have in abundance. There was also a much greater reluctance to trust sites with personal data. The world of online shopping seemed, quite frankly, a world away.

And yet we couldn’t afford not to be online, so we began to play a game that we still play today: keeping one eye on the future and another on the expectations of our customers as they stand today. It means, as it has always meant, that we are likely to disappoint some people for asking them to use a technology that they’re not yet comfortable with while annoying others by appearing to adopt too slowly the technology available. To paraphrase something that Abraham Lincoln is supposed to have said, it seems we can please some, but not all of the people all of the time.

Here’s the rub: it’s getting harder, not easier. With the advent of Web 2.0, a techie term for the huge amount of new technology coming onto the web, there are more areas in which we have to exercise our judgement of timing. “Is it too soon to have such-and-such on our website?” “Isn’t it about time we updated this-and-that?” So many questions with not so many obvious answers. Some features, like video clips of products were quite easy to support. Others, like the suggestion of a Robinsons forum have created a huge internal debate. At the moment, we’re still unsure that we could moderate it effectively, which is why it’s not there.

The reason I raise this point is not to attempt to demonstrate that we don’t know what we’re doing – far from it. It’s more to illustrate that while we realise there are many more things we could do with our website, we have to be sensible about adding the right ones in the right order. Believe me, we’ve had loads of ideas (although I’m sure you can appreciate why I’m not going to list them here on a public forum), ranging from the slightly madcap to the potentially revolutionary. As we always say, the day we run out of ideas is the day we should really think about chucking the towel in. Thankfully, that day seems to be quite a long way off!

I’m always amazed at how many readers our blog entries attract, so perhaps I should turn the question to you. If you have any suggestions for the future direction of our website, please let me know by email or by adding a comment. You may just give us the reassurance we’re looking for that it is time to unleash the next wave of features that online riders are looking for!

Sometimes, it’s easy to be cynical in this job. One of the fundamentals of Marketing is ‘segmenting’, the practice of splitting up the big list of customers you have into smaller, more precise types, so you can better understand the requirements of each group. Of course, where horses are concerned, these segments are often defined by the various equestrian disciplines that many riders tend to define themselves by.

In some ways, this can make life much more interesting for me, as it helps enormously to know which customers are dressage riders if you’re looking to make offers on a range of dressage equipment. What would be the point of annoying eveyone else with an email about dressage markers? The more we know about our customers, the more useful we hope we can become.

The frustration this can bring is a sense from time to time that we don’t actually have a clear idea who our ‘normal’ customer is. The many types we know about can then quickly become stereotypes which, if you’re not careful, leads to all sorts of presumptions.

It can become accepted that Eventers seem to have little in common with Showing types, Dressage riders will apparently sneer at Western riders, Showjumpers think they are more important than everyone else and almost everybody seems to be very dismissive of the so-called ‘happy hacker’. And another thing: don’t even get me started on the Racing crowd!

Before I go any further, let me just clarify that we don’t subscribe to any of the above, but we know these impressions can and do exist in the wider world. I’ve heard them voiced before and I’m sure at one time or other, you’ve probably encountered something similar over the years. The effect it has is to make you think that aside from the involvement of a horse in each of these different groups, this is a collection of people who seem to have absolutely nothing in common. It’s like trying to bridge the gap between the Spanish Riding School and the donkeys on the seafront at Blackpool. How on earth can we call ourselves a community?

I always used to think that the answer to that question was the humble grooming kit. If you have a horse, whatever it is that you do (even if it is nothing), you’d always need a grooming kit of some sort. Ownership of a grooming kit was, I thought, the most accurate indicator that that person is a member of the horse world.

After the Amersham neglect case came to prominence in recent weeks, I would have to conclude that my earlier answer is wrong. Not just because a case of neglect reminds us all that some horses are owned that may not be groomed – or unfortunately, cared for in any way. More than that, it became clear that the reaction to the story was one under which the horse world could truly unite.

Within days, the effects were beginning to be felt. A momentum had been generated, particularly on the forum of horseandhound.co.uk and people were keen to become involved. Almost from nowhere, ‘Operation Esther‘ was formed and the appeal had the focal point it needed.

Within a couple of days, we’d been inundated with requests for help and we knew it was an issue we couldn’t afford to ignore. We decided on a course of action and made it available as a story in the News section of our website.

Now, I’m happy to be able to confirm just how much these activities were able to generate.

We’re pleased to report that all our fundraising activities on and around 18th January from our staff and our customers raised a total of £343. We decided that we would more than match that commitment and to top-up the fund to £750. This will be distributed equally among the three charities we felt are most closely involved with the care and rehabilitation of these equines, therefore we will be sending a cheque for £250 each to the ILPH, the Horse Trust and Redwings.

Thanks to all our customers for their generous support and thanks also to our staff for getting involved (especially John Kelly at our Superstore – I’ll post the pictures!)

It may have taken a tragedy to show it, but it’s reassuring to know that we really can call ourselves a single community, unified by horses.

Pictures from our ‘non-uniform day’ to raise funds for the Amersham rescue effort:

Steve Thomas, Design Department

Suzie Wilson, Buying & Merchandising Department

Jeanette Ratcliffe, Goods In Department

Keith Rigby, Stable & Trailer Sales

Sharon Warland, Call Centre Manager

Rebecca Greenhalgh, Call Centre Customer Service Team

And finally…

John Kelly, Superstore. By going to this, er, extra effort, John raised over £80 himself. Well done and thanks!