International Search Engines...
We had two orders overnight to Australia...very cool. These are certainly not the first, but it seems to be a pattern lately. I wonder if we are coming up prominently on search engines in Australia? How would I check that? I'm assuming that Google in Australia would cater to Australian businesses, right?
We don't ship internationally on a daily basis, and when we do, customers are supposed to choose international shipping, which they almost always DO NOT, so we have to contact them and let them know that we have to charge them for shipping. It's a hassle, except that when we do get those orders they almost always are nice big orders, so we don't have a reason to complain at all. There's an additional amount of paperwork required for these orders, and it's nice when the order is worth the extra effort.
I think the most exciting part of this kind of order is that we are developing in a new market, and who wouldn't get excited about that? New markets=new business, and that's fantastic.
Lee Ann and I started working together yesterday at one home. Up until now we've been working independently from our own homes, but the issues with that are obvious...we don't really have a feel for what the other one does. Now that our kids are in school full time, we are spending at least 3 hours working together, hopefully 3 or 4 days a week. I have to get the courage up to start answering the 1-800 phone, which is scary to me, because I don't love chatting on the phone with people I don't know. We are basically looking to cross-train each other in what we do. It's crucial to moving forward and having an understanding of the pressures that each of us deal with. I'm really looking forward to this because what we do is so completely different. I'm sure this is a big move for us.
That's it for now. I'm at Panera Bread sending out my SaleMail, enjoying my second coffee for the day..kids are in school, second full day...whew! I love my business.
This post is filed under By Merchants, For Merchants and has the following keyword tags: search engines, shipping & fulfillment.
