Throughout the month of November we will be running our “SMB blog series.” While SMB traditionally refers to “Small/Medium Business,” here at Volusion it has come to mean something else: “Small Made Big.” This month we will be sharing resources, tips, stats, and inspirations to help you turn your small ecommerce endeavor into something greater- something BIG!

If you’re a regular reader you’ve probably noticed that we run a Volusion success story about once a month. Each success story features a Volusion client that has made it big with their business. If you haven’t read them, here’s a quick summary of our most recent success stories, as well as the business lesson to take away from each story:

• HockeyShot
  In two years, JP Brun managed to create one of the busiest hockey training sites on the web. His clientele ranges from beginners to international hockey stars and his markets include the US, Canada, and all of Europe. Moving to Volusion’s platform gave his company the boost in efficiency that they needed to be able to grow the business by more than 300% last year.
  Business Lesson: Choosing the right tools can have a huge impact on the future of your business!
• AceTool
  In the three years that Maria Polidoro has had her online store with Volusion, it has climbed the search engine ranks and now is surpassing most of its competitors in the highly competitive industry of hand and power tools. Their SEO investments have paid off significantly!
  Business Lesson: Invest in your future! (more…)
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About once a month we sit down and decide which company we’d like to feature in a success story for our blog. This month one company stood out to us, because well… they’re standing out for pretty much everyone right now.

AceTool.com is a nationally known online retailer of hand and power tools and accessories and have been with Volusion since 2006. We spoke with Maria Polidoro, owner of AceTool.com, about her thriving business. Here is what we learned:

Volusion: Can you briefly describe your business for our readers?
Maria: Ace Tool is a leader in retail tool sales. We also do repairs and carry a huge array of accessories and parts.

Volusion: I understand that you have a retail store, tell us a little bit more about that.
Maria: I founded Ace Tool in 1983 in Wantagh, NY. It grew out of the desire to bring the best quality products and service to this community. We don’t just sell the best tools, we host demonstrations in our store, and repair everything on site. Our online business flourished from there with the help of some great partners like Volusion.

Volusion: Did you start out with Volusion or were you using another ecommerce provider previously?
Maria: Ace Tool actually went live in 2005, so we did move our online store to Volusion from another provider. We made this decision due to the fact that our previous provider charged us a percentage of every sale that we made through them.

Volusion: What role would you say Volusion has played in your success?
Maria: Volusion has made it easier to run our store with the ease of product uploads, the simple search engine optimization, and the abundance of features that make it quick and simple to get our products as visible as possible to our customers. (more…)

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In 2005 Rick and Gela Oros opened their online generator store www.APelectric.com using AspDotNetStorefront, but the lack of communication between the AspDotNetStorefront and the hosting company was getting very costly as the site would be down for hours without response when technical problems arose. Rick and Gela finally moved the store over to Volusion in October of 2008, and the difference was immediately noticeable! While they were using AspDotNetStorefront their monthly sales for www.APelectric.com never exceeded more than $600,000 but in their first full month online with Volusion www.APelectric.com brought in over $1,000,000 in sales. Rick and Gela are benefiting from (more…)

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Off the beaten path in Marietta, Georgia, is John Drummond’s 3,200 square-foot banjo store, with more than 600 banjos in stock. John has banjos for every type of bluegrass fan, from first-timers to professionals. His vast inventory and true love for the music has drawn visitors from all over the world.  Launched online in 2003, Banjo.com quickly became a recognized leader in the bluegrass music industry.  John was able to expand his product line to serve the needs of all bluegrass musicians.  “We discovered that most banjo players also play other instruments,” John explains, “so we added the full line of bluegrass instruments (banjos, fiddles, bass fiddles, dulcimers, dobros, guitars, mandolins and harmonicas) as well as related accessories and training materials.”

Initially, Banjo.com was hosted by Crystaltech, using the Australian-based shopping cart VP-ASP.  Eventually technical issues plagued the site causing them to lose business and in 2008, John began searching for another provider. “I shopped around,” he said, “and Volusion had the most credible, and most affordable, solution.  They were able to migrate us to their platform faster than anyone else could.”  John did not have the time to move his site over himself, so he hired Volusion’s Professional Services Team. He recalls, “I was delighted with the outcome. We desperately needed to move away from our old site, and it was completed with focus and precision. It all worked when we went live. I couldn’t have asked for more.”

Since coming to Volusion, Banjo.com has enjoyed greater reliability and success than ever before. John tells us, “Compared to what we came from, Volusion is a major leap into leading-edge technology.  It offers new functionality that we just didn’t have a year ago.  I used to submit a request to our developer, and if it was critical, he’d drop everything to get it fixed.  If it was a standard to-do item, he would complete it as he could. The list grew and things weren’t getting done. When I asked Volusion for help with small projects, they were each completed a couple of days after I submitted them. Wow!  I was not used to that level of service.”

Ready to get started with Volusion? Try it today for free!

-Kate Pierce eCommerce Specialist

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In March of 2007 Kelly Paster launched her online store www.SuburbanDogHouse.com with Volusion, selling high-quality dog accessories aimed at bridging the gap between practicality and aesthetics. Her site also contains an exclusive “Made in the USA” section.

In the last two years Kelly has found incredible success selling online. However, all of her success did not come overnight. When she started her website with Volusion Kelly took the necessary time to develop her site- getting the design just right, adding and tweaking all of her products, and streamlining the consumer buying process by making sure her navigation was intuitive and easy for customers to use. All of her hard work and dedication to her customers is evident in her loyal customer base. Kelly explains, “Customers like the clean design of each product page and the easy navigation built into the site. They also like the one page checkout- because they don’t need to go through multiple screens to complete their order. I personally think the photo zoom feature gives us an advantage with online shoppers because internet shopping is so visual. Customers can see the details of the products before they buy.”

With about 2000 SKUs it would be easy to lose track of an individual product but as Kelly explains, “We’re knowledgeable about our broad selection and can respond to customer questions within 24 hours.” The ability to manage so many products with ease is a huge competitive advantage for www.SuburbanDogHouse.com because Kelly does not have to worry about getting bogged down each time products need to be updated. She can focus more time on customer satisfaction. She elaborates, “A big consideration for  choosing Volusion was the ease of adding products and our ability to quickly update the site. It’s easy to move around the product detail page. I can load new products and set up inventory tracking from one page.”

Kelly also takes full advantage of Volusion’s SEO features to make sure consumers can find her products and keeps tabs on all of her outside marketing efforts with the ROI tracker. She notes, “The product template within Volusion is very comprehensive. I can load a product with complete description and SEO very quickly. I use the ROI tracker to see which marketing is generating sales and the Order Details report to take a closer look at the orders coming from the marketing I’m doing.”

Kelly told us, “I honestly consider Volusion my partner. They provide the cyber ‘bricks and mortar’ I need to be in business.” But Kelly also has some other important partners as well- Kelly spends a good deal of time in the Volusion forums getting feedback from other Volusion users.

Ready to try Volusion today? Get started now!

-Kate Pierce eCommerce Specialist

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