Expansion through a local-language website, acquiring a
complementary business or joining forces with an established
player in the market are three routes that online retailers can
deploy when looking to extend their reach overseas.
GetLenses, a UK-based online retailer of contact lenses, chose to
expand to Italy with the launch of an Italian website,
GetLenses.it. The Italian-language site is priced in euros,
offers a free local customer support telephone number, and
adheres to Italy’s ecommerce regulations-for example, unlike the
UK, Italian customers do not need to provide a prescription in
order to buy contact lenses online. To promote the new site,
GetLenses is running a pay-per-click campaign and is set to
embark on an affiliate marketing programme. The company is
fulfilling Italian orders from its main delivery hub in
York.
The move builds on the success of GetLenses in the UK and Ireland
where the business is growing at around 20 percent per year. It
has annual sales of £6 million and 100,000 active
customers.
To gain a foothold in the UK, Dublin-headquartered
WeddingsOnline, an online community and supplier directory of
wedding dresses, venues, photographers, bands and videos,
acquired a 25 percent stake in wedding-supplies website Confetti.
The deal sees WeddingsOnline directors Peter Bryans and Robert
Truesdale sit on the Confetti board and will allow the Irish
business to reach the UK wedding market-estimated to be ten times
larger than in Ireland. It will also see Confetti’s online shop
opened up to Irish customers and as a result will create 20 new
roles at Confetti, predominantly in sales.
At an even greater international level, secret-sales website
Vente-Privee has announced its entry into the US market through a
partnership with American Express. The joint venture opens up
Vente-Privee to Amex’s 40 million members and sees the French
company cross the Atlantic for the first time. Vente-Privee has
13 million members in seven European countries. In 2010 it had
sales of £823.6 million, a rise of 15 percent on the
previous year. The American site will launch by the end of
2011.
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