Frank Ravanelli Shares Multichannel Marketing Tips FOREO Utilise

Benjamin Yong interviews Frank Ravanelli, a speaker at Affiliate World Asia in Bangkok as well as the head of affiliates, FOREO Asia and EMEA. Frank openly shares some tips on multichannel marketing strategies that FOREO has utilised.

This post, “Frank Ravanelli Shares Multichannel Marketing Tips FOREO Has Utilised” first appeared on the AWC Facebook Page.

AWasia Interview with Frank Ravanelli, Head of Affiliates at FOREO Asia & EMEA

Introduction

Frank Ravanelli:

Hello, I’m Frank Ravanelli, Italian-Canadian working for FOREO as Head of Affiliates for Asia and EMEA.

FOREO and Multichannel Marketing

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So, I heard that FOREO was selling one product every three seconds last year. Is that true or not true?

Frank Ravanelli:

Yes, correct. Last year, we sold one FOREO device every three seconds for over $1 billion in sales.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ $1 billion in sales? Wow. That is amazing. So do you mind to share with us some of the strategies that you have used in the past in order to achieve this kind of result?

Frank Ravanelli:

Sure. Some strategies are company-wide so I have to thank the rest of my colleagues for that. For example, multichannel strategy. FOREO is available online on its own website, on retailers, offline, at duty-free stores, other major retailers, and so on. When it comes to my specific field, affiliate marketing, we use several approaches. One is to have remote teams so it’s easier to scale up talents where affiliates are, instead of concentrating everyone in one location.

Customer Support, Returns, and Payment Gateways

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Okay, so how do you deal with customer support, returns, and payment gateway?

Frank Ravanelli:

Okay, sure. We have several e-processors integrated with foreo.com. Of course customers can ask for cancellation of an order. Customer support is available in all the languages we support on the website, anything from English to traditional Chinese, simplified Chinese, Turkish, and so on.

For refunds, from an affiliate point-of-view, if they happen before the order is issued then it’s a no-brainer. We just refund the customer and we of course void the transaction for the affliate. If it’s done after the product has shipped, the customer just has to return it.

Influencer Marketing

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Okay, that’s good to know. So what do you prefer, to connect directly with influencers or through agency?

Frank Ravanelli:

We prefer directly. The reason is we build the relationship in that way. We do use agencies, especially when we need to scale up really fast. So if you’re entering the market for the first time, we engage agencies and usually we keep them for the influencers they brought to us. But if you are already mature in one market, it’s more effective for us to engage influencers ourselves.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So like for newcomers, what would you recommend? Would you recommend them going directly to the influencer or do you recommend that they go to the agency or they use some sort of business online or middleman?

Frank Ravanelli:

 I suggest for sure to use some platforms to do some data mining, and also ranking influencers by geo, by audience, and so on. Agencies may be really, really helpful and they may even be a cost-effective way in terms of time to enter the market, but I think it depends on the size of the brand. For example for us, it’s okay to pay for the services. If a brand is even bigger then probably they use agencies even more than they do. But if a brand is a startup, they probably need to do all the work themselves because they would not be able to cover the agency’s overheads. At least that’s my take on it.

FOREO’s Competitive Advantage

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So a lot of people are wondering, how does FOREO stay ahead of the market, like competitors and everything, especially the trending products. How do you guys determine what would be the trending products next year and how do you make sure that your competitors are not copying you or are not able to achieve something similar as what you guys are doing right now?

Frank Ravanelli:

Sure. Organisational-wise, we have of course people who do market analysis, test groups, and so on. However FOREO is meant to revolutionise any sector it enters, so we never just take a product and make it a bit better because it doesn’t make sense. So FOREO releases a product only if that device is gonna change the game for that specific audience.

So it means that, yes, there is some research, but the founder of the company, who is a designer. My take on it, I think, he starts from scratch and he designs a device without thinking about what the competitors are doing.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So you mean you guys are going to be the market operator instead of following what others are doing?

Frank Ravanelli:

Exactly, yeah.

Product Testing

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So what’s the approach and how do you test before going to the market?

Frank Ravanelli:

Sure, there are some panel groups, of course. There are trade shows where we can test and feel the feedback of potential multichannel partners.

Asian Geos In 2019

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Okay, what geo, what country, or what continent, remains to be the biggest opportunity for ecommerce in the year 2019. And what has been holding them back this year and why is next year, 2019, going to be the year for ecommerce?

Frank Ravanelli:

Asia as a continent, not a specific country, is going to grow exponentially.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Any specific part in Asia?

Frank Ravanelli:

I would say Asia of course as a whole, but if I have to point out specific markets, I would say China is still gonna be a major driver, especially in the luxury industry. There are many changes in the influencer marketing landscape there, in peoples’ consumption patterns. But still the economy is very, very vibrant, and also there are some overall geo-political initiatives, like the Belt and Road initiative, which is gonna create a tunnel of opportunities across many countries.

One country that is very interesting for me is Singapore, which, of course, the population size is somehow limited, but very, very demanding, very cutting edge. And of course, Korea. Korea is the trendsetter, again talking about luxury skin care products. So I would say, if you are a brand and you’re not investing in China and Korea, both in terms of size, and Singapore, in terms of conversion rates, you’re losing out big.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Yeah that’s true because I guess a lot of people they will skip targeting Singapore for the reason that it is very small and they are not able to scale, but in fact, according to you it’s not right, at all.

Frank Ravanelli:

It’s important, of course. It needs to be prioritised versus bigger markets. But in terms of payment methods, no language barriers, it may be a way for brands which are not big yet in Asia to test the market before going to more specific markets. So like a test bed with good returns, even if the scale is not substantial.

FOREO Affiliate Manager Profile

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So next question, what are the top three things you look out for when it comes to hiring a new affiliate manager?

Frank Ravanelli:

I would say one to one year and a half experience in ecommerce.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Ecommerce, right. Specifically ecommerce.

Frank Ravanelli:

It doesn’t need to be in our sector. It can be anything, like maybe selling sportswear. As long as it’s affiliate marketing through ecommerce. We do have some team members who come from the mobile field in terms of CPI and so on. They are doing very well. But the failure rate on people who come from a CPI background to ecommerce is very high.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ What is the reason?

Frank Ravanelli:

Because when you ask people to install an app and you pay affiliates for that versus asking people to open their wallet and fork out like $100, $200, $300 for a quality product, it requires a very different approach to affiliates.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ So in other words, you are trying to focus, you are trying to bring on guys that are focusing more on the quality side of the product instead of just one-time install.

Frank Ravanelli:

Exactly. And the other two points is, it’s more about the personal background of a person. Ideally, someone who has lived in several countries. It’s fine if someone is an expert in one country, but the mindset of a person who goes from a home country to our country then to a third country and a fourth country, not as a tourist but to establish himself there, you know, build a career. That’s what we need. We need people who learn fast, who are taking risks, who are accountable for it. I would say the third quality is language skills.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Is there any specific language that you are looking at?

Frank Ravanelli:

The working language, even if the country is Swedish, we communicate in English, so English needs to be on a professional level, then one or two local languages.

I would say right now, for Europe we are quite well-covered. North America is covered in English or Spanish. South America, the same. So I would say like specific Asian languages, which may be Korean, Vietnamese, Malay, Thai, plus proficiency of English, plus their experience that I mentioned before, one to one year and a half. That’s talent that is very important for us. But at the end of the day, it comes down to eagerness to learn and to test and to accept that not everything will work out but what works out pays back for all the efforts that were done before.

STM Forum, The Largest Premium Affiliate Marketing Community

STM Forum, the most reputable affiliate marketing community, where affiliates of all experience levels, product owners and traffic providers come together. Continue reading

Remote Teamwork

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Last question. Where do you find rock star team members? Can you talk more about remote teamwork?

Frank Ravanelli:

Where I find them, usually I headhunt on LinkedIn. Before we posted ads, and we still post a few for my teams, but we get tons of applications that are not necessarily relevant. So my new strategy, which has been going on for a while, is I do research. We have HR recruiters doing research based on keywords in their profile. It takes more time because the candidate maybe is still happy where they’re working so they don’t move on, but the ones who answer are very likely to be in line with what we need.

When you are remote, there is a major misconception to clarify. In remote working, you need to motivate yourself even more. So the way we do it is we have set working hours. It’s remote working, but not when you can. We tried that, it doesn’t work. So like, that’s the working time that we both agree, based on the market.

Regional meeting twice per day for all the team members. If someone needs to be away, which is like, sometimes you need to be away for two hours to go to the dentist, you just put it in the calendar. So basically we know when people are working and when people are not. Both are fine as long as there is transparency.

And the most important thing are the KPIs. We have KPIs as overall affiliate marketing efforts, we have KPIs per regions, we have KPIs per GEO, we have KPIs per person, which are both hybrid reach, and the sales. So people know what they are expected to deliver.

Benjamin Yong:

?️ Right, that’s absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for being here today with us. It’s a pleasure having you today.