Interview with co-owner of the eTorg group of companies, Boris Preobrazhensky
My acquaintance with Boris , co-owner of the eTorg group of companies, took place in the community of “ online retailers ” on Ya.ru.
A successful person with a wealth of experience in doing business and using the Internet as a sales channel with huge opportunities. For 7 years, the company, under the leadership of Boris, has created many successful projects that occupy leading positions in Internet sales in their niches.
The eTorg path is fundamentally different from the thousands of other companies that have not mastered online commerce. Each company-project works in its narrow niche, relying on the quality of customer service and active promotion through Internet marketing.
')
Boris readily agreed to talk about how the company began, what major problems had to be overcome, how they developed their projects. I answered the questions related to logistics, the promotion of my projects and why all of them are aimed at narrow niches (by the way, this question personally interested me very much).
I ask readers who will begin to draw short conclusions, read to the end or read the ending.
ON. (Anton Neznamov)
What is your position at eTorg? What questions do you have to face every day, and what work plans do you set for yourself for a long time?
B.P. (Boris Preobrazhensky)
My position is CEO. Everyday issues that have to be resolved every day, I can call control over the implementation of long-term projects, participation in meetings on current issues and communication with everyone who has suggestions on the work of projects or any interesting new ideas.
ON.
How did the company start when it was formed? Was it a single online store, or did eTorg appear right away, and from the first days did it expect to launch new stores at regular intervals? Which store was the first?
B.P.
The company, which is now called eTorg, was born back in the 90s and was engaged in the supply of computers to corporate clients. Since 2000, I began to work in various positions, but when the project in which I participated was closed, I had the idea to open an online store. As a matter of fact, then it all started. Now I am a co-owner of a group of companies, which relatively recently it was decided to assign the name etorg, since it became necessary to assemble all our projects under one sign. The first store has long been sunk into oblivion and ForOffice.ru has long been the main project. But gradually he began to overgrow with projects that are now largely independent companies.
ON.
Are online stores a self-sufficient business, or are they represented on the Internet by offline companies?
B.P.
The first store was created from scratch, and in the future all new projects were based on an offline platform created by the first store. Now the positioning of the companies listed by you, as online stores, I consider radically wrong. These are professional companies that work offline, actively using the Internet to attract customers. Offline companies in our case grow on the basis of online.
ON.
What is eTorg now? Does the company engage in other types of business, besides directing controlled online stores?
B.P.
As I mentioned earlier, eTorg is not just online shopping. We are also engaged in production - printing house ZiPrint.ru, a forestry company Lesorubka.ru, which does not really pull on the title of an online store, as well as other types of business, far from the Internet. By the way, another “production” project will be announced soon.
ON.
What are the biggest problems in the way of the company? How to solve them?
B.P.
Initially, about 7 years ago, the biggest problems were suppliers, because agreeing with them about good conditions, without being able to show something that might interest them, is very difficult. After the first store was launched, it became much easier to talk with suppliers - it was enough to show a serious project and they had no more questions.
Over the long years of working with suppliers, we have adopted something from retail chains, and now, in order to work with us, it is necessary to show us that the product suits us and the delivery conditions will be interesting for us.
Also, these were greatly increased costs for the necessary infrastructure, the problem with the selection of vehicles for the delivery department and many, many other problems about which you can write a separate article. I had to solve all the problems on my own ... periodically I attack various rakes.
ON.
Some major online stores have entered the offline market. Did you create an offline business under the brands of online stores? What is the success?
B.P.
The project of offline stores was actively worked out before the crisis, and while it was decided to slow down - let's see what will happen with the market. So far we have only one store, which some time ago was transferred to the category of points for self-pickup because of the large influx of customers and the inability to properly service customers arriving in the store.
ON.
The influx of buyers, it's great! So, the point worked, and it would be worth trying to arrange the pick-up point either in another place or in “other doors”. What exactly was the problem?
B.P.
There is such a problem as logistics. At the point you need to deliver inventory, keep a general account, etc. etc. Therefore, we decided not to move to another place for the time being and postpone it all until after the crisis. However, development in this direction continues, and we are still exploring certain options. If everything goes well, soon, perhaps, we will open a retail store in the center of Moscow.
ON.
Your online stores sell a wide variety of goods: storage equipment, players, sports complexes, vacuum cleaners, even sandwich panels and wood. How is the question of logistics being solved for such specific and diverse goods?
B.P.
Logistics for different projects are built in different ways. Forest, for example, we not only sell, but also procure and process - and there we need a completely different fleet.
ON.
That is, for different projects different logistics services? Is it not difficult to manage different departments in one direction?
B.P.
Exactly. Management of different departments involved in the leaders of the areas themselves. To control all this is rather fascinating than difficult :)
ON.
Why do you take narrowly targeted niches?
B.P.
We create companies with a narrow specialization, because this is the only way we can be sure of the professionalism of the company and the quality of work with clients. It was always my dream to make a big hypermarket, but in order to create it, you first need to sort out every suitable direction, which we actually do. Niches are selected based on the needs of the market and our capabilities. To embrace the immensity is very difficult, and it is necessary to go to this in finely adjusted small steps.
ON.
There is a well-known pattern: any more or less successful medium-sized company faces the machinations of competitors, bureaucratic corruption, and other kinds of “visits”. Have such problems happened?
B.P.
At what stage of development of the company did the first similar problem arise? Well, there are a few rules from which you can not depart. Firstly, it is important to behave honestly with competitors, because it makes life much easier. Secondly, we need to work not to grab as much as possible, throw everyone away and hide - we need to build a company every day, day after day, which in many years can be a leader in its market, show stable planned growth and bring it owners a stable income. And thirdly, it is necessary to work legally, and not as many online stores are doing now - delivering goods without checks, buying goods anywhere. Thus, selling often "gray" and "black" products, such stores risk at some point simply to close after the first serious check.
ON.
I myself know that it is rather difficult to launch a second store, not just as an aid, but as a serious parallel resource. What problems have you encountered?
B.P.
Anton, when you do something not for the first time, you rely not only on your ideas, but also on experience. I have never noticed any psychological difficulties when planning or launching a project. The only thing that is really important to consider is that as long as you prepare the perfect project for launching, perfecting the professional knowledge of consultants, licking a site, etc., you lose time. You can never get hung up on one thing, and you always have to go on schedule, without violating any deadlines. As for resources, they should always be calculated in order to know their real capabilities when planning a project. I consider it a huge plus that a very friendly team of professionals is working on projects - without them doing something new would be significantly more difficult. The main problem that I could not solve for a long time was that there were only 24 hours in a day, and I still had to spend time “to sleep”.
ON.
Regarding work with freelancers: I know that you had (have now) problems. What do you advise?
B.P.
Do not work with them. If you plan to seriously work on a serious project, then it is better to recruit the necessary people to the staff and not to get involved with freelancers. Although I will note - many have, on the contrary, only a positive experience working with employees on freelancing, and it all depends on the ability to choose a contractor. I can't do it well, unfortunately.
ON.
Are you the sole owner or is there a companion? How was the issue of separation of duties and rights resolved at the time of the creation of the company? How were joint ownership issues resolved over time?
B.P.
I am a co-owner. Initially, this issue was not raised, and later it was decided to be quite simple - who is close to what he does, and the other simply advises.
ON.
There is a saying: if you want to quarrel with friends and relatives, invite them to the business. Was this a practice, and how did it end?
B.P.
The practice was, and all ended in failure. Thank God, with the best friend, then they realized how fools they were and all the insults were forgotten. Several projects are working with relatives, and quite successfully.
ON.
Has your company encountered content theft? How to solve the problem? Did you try to estimate the losses from theft, or what damage did it cause?
B.P.
Of course faced! Many of their own articles and texts had to be rewritten, and the thieves themselves took off a huge amount of different materials from their sites after persistent demands to do it. At the moment we are developing several options for protecting copyright materials from copy-paste lovers.
ON.
What sales channels do you use?
B.P.
All possible :) But most of the sales go, of course, through our sites. For some projects, customer acquisition is based on active sales.
ON.
What promotion techniques do you use? Is it true that for non-standard niches you have to develop new promotion channels, since the standard ones do not bring the necessary sales volume ?
B.P.
As I said, experience is important here. A couple of times faced with problems due to the fact that standard methods do not give the desired result. So it was, for example, when they opened a printing house - we realized that the Internet is not so interesting for attracting customers as a variety of offline methods - BTL, active sales, offline advertising. The main thing in advance, just planning to do something, think about how to sell it later.
The project on the supply of interactive whiteboards InviTech.ru takes part in various specialized exhibitions, other projects regularly become information partners of the exhibition organizers. We are generally pleased with the results, but during the crisis, people stopped attending exhibitions, so for now we slowed down our participation in them.
ON.
Is there any specificity in organizing business processes or a store for narrow central Asian? In theory, direct marketing should be well suited for direct marketing, do you use it?
B.P.
There is no specificity as such. The main thing is to build everything correctly - after all, what to build a big ship, what a small boat - it is important to do it efficiently, because only it depends on how it will sail. Direct marketing is a fairly broad concept and we are now developing and calculating several options for working with it.
ON.
I know that your stores worked both on self-written engines and on Bitrix (ForOffice.ru). What is more convenient to use and develop? What other CMS used?
B.P.
"Yumi" and "NetCat". Neither one nor the other did not work. Whose fault was not understood in this, but the only thing that he learned from this experience for himself was that the “Beatrix” for an online store is the best solution. If we talk about small projects, then you can try other engines, but if we are talking about something more or less standardized, big and powerful, then I advise you to work with “Bitrix”.
I thank Boris, not only for the answers, but also for help in organizing the interview. With my questions I touched on a small fraction of what Boris could tell from his experience. Unfortunately, as he already noted, it was possible to write a book on each issue, if you dig deep and examine in detail. Therefore, if someone has any questions, write to me, write to Boris, they will either be included in the new interview (it will be), or Boris will respond personally.
A successful person with a wealth of experience in doing business and using the Internet as a sales channel with huge opportunities. For 7 years, the company, under the leadership of Boris, has created many successful projects that occupy leading positions in Internet sales in their niches.
The eTorg path is fundamentally different from the thousands of other companies that have not mastered online commerce. Each company-project works in its narrow niche, relying on the quality of customer service and active promotion through Internet marketing.
')
Boris readily agreed to talk about how the company began, what major problems had to be overcome, how they developed their projects. I answered the questions related to logistics, the promotion of my projects and why all of them are aimed at narrow niches (by the way, this question personally interested me very much).
I ask readers who will begin to draw short conclusions, read to the end or read the ending.
ON. (Anton Neznamov)
What is your position at eTorg? What questions do you have to face every day, and what work plans do you set for yourself for a long time?
B.P. (Boris Preobrazhensky)
My position is CEO. Everyday issues that have to be resolved every day, I can call control over the implementation of long-term projects, participation in meetings on current issues and communication with everyone who has suggestions on the work of projects or any interesting new ideas.
ON.
How did the company start when it was formed? Was it a single online store, or did eTorg appear right away, and from the first days did it expect to launch new stores at regular intervals? Which store was the first?
B.P.
The company, which is now called eTorg, was born back in the 90s and was engaged in the supply of computers to corporate clients. Since 2000, I began to work in various positions, but when the project in which I participated was closed, I had the idea to open an online store. As a matter of fact, then it all started. Now I am a co-owner of a group of companies, which relatively recently it was decided to assign the name etorg, since it became necessary to assemble all our projects under one sign. The first store has long been sunk into oblivion and ForOffice.ru has long been the main project. But gradually he began to overgrow with projects that are now largely independent companies.
ON.
Are online stores a self-sufficient business, or are they represented on the Internet by offline companies?
B.P.
The first store was created from scratch, and in the future all new projects were based on an offline platform created by the first store. Now the positioning of the companies listed by you, as online stores, I consider radically wrong. These are professional companies that work offline, actively using the Internet to attract customers. Offline companies in our case grow on the basis of online.
ON.
What is eTorg now? Does the company engage in other types of business, besides directing controlled online stores?
B.P.
As I mentioned earlier, eTorg is not just online shopping. We are also engaged in production - printing house ZiPrint.ru, a forestry company Lesorubka.ru, which does not really pull on the title of an online store, as well as other types of business, far from the Internet. By the way, another “production” project will be announced soon.
ON.
What are the biggest problems in the way of the company? How to solve them?
B.P.
Initially, about 7 years ago, the biggest problems were suppliers, because agreeing with them about good conditions, without being able to show something that might interest them, is very difficult. After the first store was launched, it became much easier to talk with suppliers - it was enough to show a serious project and they had no more questions.
Over the long years of working with suppliers, we have adopted something from retail chains, and now, in order to work with us, it is necessary to show us that the product suits us and the delivery conditions will be interesting for us.
Also, these were greatly increased costs for the necessary infrastructure, the problem with the selection of vehicles for the delivery department and many, many other problems about which you can write a separate article. I had to solve all the problems on my own ... periodically I attack various rakes.
ON.
Some major online stores have entered the offline market. Did you create an offline business under the brands of online stores? What is the success?
B.P.
The project of offline stores was actively worked out before the crisis, and while it was decided to slow down - let's see what will happen with the market. So far we have only one store, which some time ago was transferred to the category of points for self-pickup because of the large influx of customers and the inability to properly service customers arriving in the store.
ON.
The influx of buyers, it's great! So, the point worked, and it would be worth trying to arrange the pick-up point either in another place or in “other doors”. What exactly was the problem?
B.P.
There is such a problem as logistics. At the point you need to deliver inventory, keep a general account, etc. etc. Therefore, we decided not to move to another place for the time being and postpone it all until after the crisis. However, development in this direction continues, and we are still exploring certain options. If everything goes well, soon, perhaps, we will open a retail store in the center of Moscow.
ON.
Your online stores sell a wide variety of goods: storage equipment, players, sports complexes, vacuum cleaners, even sandwich panels and wood. How is the question of logistics being solved for such specific and diverse goods?
B.P.
Logistics for different projects are built in different ways. Forest, for example, we not only sell, but also procure and process - and there we need a completely different fleet.
ON.
That is, for different projects different logistics services? Is it not difficult to manage different departments in one direction?
B.P.
Exactly. Management of different departments involved in the leaders of the areas themselves. To control all this is rather fascinating than difficult :)
ON.
Why do you take narrowly targeted niches?
B.P.
We create companies with a narrow specialization, because this is the only way we can be sure of the professionalism of the company and the quality of work with clients. It was always my dream to make a big hypermarket, but in order to create it, you first need to sort out every suitable direction, which we actually do. Niches are selected based on the needs of the market and our capabilities. To embrace the immensity is very difficult, and it is necessary to go to this in finely adjusted small steps.
ON.
There is a well-known pattern: any more or less successful medium-sized company faces the machinations of competitors, bureaucratic corruption, and other kinds of “visits”. Have such problems happened?
B.P.
At what stage of development of the company did the first similar problem arise? Well, there are a few rules from which you can not depart. Firstly, it is important to behave honestly with competitors, because it makes life much easier. Secondly, we need to work not to grab as much as possible, throw everyone away and hide - we need to build a company every day, day after day, which in many years can be a leader in its market, show stable planned growth and bring it owners a stable income. And thirdly, it is necessary to work legally, and not as many online stores are doing now - delivering goods without checks, buying goods anywhere. Thus, selling often "gray" and "black" products, such stores risk at some point simply to close after the first serious check.
ON.
I myself know that it is rather difficult to launch a second store, not just as an aid, but as a serious parallel resource. What problems have you encountered?
B.P.
Anton, when you do something not for the first time, you rely not only on your ideas, but also on experience. I have never noticed any psychological difficulties when planning or launching a project. The only thing that is really important to consider is that as long as you prepare the perfect project for launching, perfecting the professional knowledge of consultants, licking a site, etc., you lose time. You can never get hung up on one thing, and you always have to go on schedule, without violating any deadlines. As for resources, they should always be calculated in order to know their real capabilities when planning a project. I consider it a huge plus that a very friendly team of professionals is working on projects - without them doing something new would be significantly more difficult. The main problem that I could not solve for a long time was that there were only 24 hours in a day, and I still had to spend time “to sleep”.
ON.
Regarding work with freelancers: I know that you had (have now) problems. What do you advise?
B.P.
Do not work with them. If you plan to seriously work on a serious project, then it is better to recruit the necessary people to the staff and not to get involved with freelancers. Although I will note - many have, on the contrary, only a positive experience working with employees on freelancing, and it all depends on the ability to choose a contractor. I can't do it well, unfortunately.
ON.
Are you the sole owner or is there a companion? How was the issue of separation of duties and rights resolved at the time of the creation of the company? How were joint ownership issues resolved over time?
B.P.
I am a co-owner. Initially, this issue was not raised, and later it was decided to be quite simple - who is close to what he does, and the other simply advises.
ON.
There is a saying: if you want to quarrel with friends and relatives, invite them to the business. Was this a practice, and how did it end?
B.P.
The practice was, and all ended in failure. Thank God, with the best friend, then they realized how fools they were and all the insults were forgotten. Several projects are working with relatives, and quite successfully.
ON.
Has your company encountered content theft? How to solve the problem? Did you try to estimate the losses from theft, or what damage did it cause?
B.P.
Of course faced! Many of their own articles and texts had to be rewritten, and the thieves themselves took off a huge amount of different materials from their sites after persistent demands to do it. At the moment we are developing several options for protecting copyright materials from copy-paste lovers.
ON.
What sales channels do you use?
B.P.
All possible :) But most of the sales go, of course, through our sites. For some projects, customer acquisition is based on active sales.
ON.
What promotion techniques do you use? Is it true that for non-standard niches you have to develop new promotion channels, since the standard ones do not bring the necessary sales volume ?
B.P.
As I said, experience is important here. A couple of times faced with problems due to the fact that standard methods do not give the desired result. So it was, for example, when they opened a printing house - we realized that the Internet is not so interesting for attracting customers as a variety of offline methods - BTL, active sales, offline advertising. The main thing in advance, just planning to do something, think about how to sell it later.
The project on the supply of interactive whiteboards InviTech.ru takes part in various specialized exhibitions, other projects regularly become information partners of the exhibition organizers. We are generally pleased with the results, but during the crisis, people stopped attending exhibitions, so for now we slowed down our participation in them.
ON.
Is there any specificity in organizing business processes or a store for narrow central Asian? In theory, direct marketing should be well suited for direct marketing, do you use it?
B.P.
There is no specificity as such. The main thing is to build everything correctly - after all, what to build a big ship, what a small boat - it is important to do it efficiently, because only it depends on how it will sail. Direct marketing is a fairly broad concept and we are now developing and calculating several options for working with it.
ON.
I know that your stores worked both on self-written engines and on Bitrix (ForOffice.ru). What is more convenient to use and develop? What other CMS used?
B.P.
"Yumi" and "NetCat". Neither one nor the other did not work. Whose fault was not understood in this, but the only thing that he learned from this experience for himself was that the “Beatrix” for an online store is the best solution. If we talk about small projects, then you can try other engines, but if we are talking about something more or less standardized, big and powerful, then I advise you to work with “Bitrix”.
I thank Boris, not only for the answers, but also for help in organizing the interview. With my questions I touched on a small fraction of what Boris could tell from his experience. Unfortunately, as he already noted, it was possible to write a book on each issue, if you dig deep and examine in detail. Therefore, if someone has any questions, write to me, write to Boris, they will either be included in the new interview (it will be), or Boris will respond personally.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/64312/
All Articles