Company culture is a vital part of the way Travis Romine build his companies. Travis is the Founder of Sharp Commerce. His company is a group of e commerce ninja’s helping with customer engagement, retention and advanced marketing. He Took sales from $100/day to $15,000+/day over 10 year period at Paradise Fibers that he cofounded which grew to one of the top performing businesses in the needlecraft industry.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- [0:15] Jeremy’s introduction to Travis Romine, today’s guest.
- [9:01] How Travis got started in ecommerce alongside his Dad.
- [14:11] Why Travis moved to Magento.
- [17:00] People want deals but they also want entertainment, a careful balance.
- [21:00] Using software properly so you get the biggest use of it.
- [37:57] Staff growth over the years: how it happened and why.
- [50:10] How the company had an $80K day of sales.
- [53:20] Failures along the way.
- [58:31] The decisions Travis and company had to make about phone systems.
- [1:07:03] The support and skill of Travis’ wife in the growth of the businesses.
- [1:13:23] The big mistakes ecommerce businesses are making.
- [1:18:12] What you can do when your sales plateau.
- [1:21:21] The types of clients Travis works with.
- [1:30:25] Software that Travis finds essential for his e commerce businesses.
- [1:32:40] The things Travis looks for in his software decisions.
- [1:38:21] Why employees make your business.
- [1:39:15] How Travis gives ownership of the business to employees.
- [1:45:40] The software showdown: Travis’ comparisons of major platforms.
In this episode…
There has been a lot written and said in recent years about the importance of building a healthy company culture. And the larger the company gets the more difficult it is to establish and maintain. One of the most obvious takeaways from this conversation with Travis Romine is the huge success he’s had building successful companies that scale while at the same time keeping the company culture not only healthy, but incredibly strong.
All you need to see to believe it is to take a look employee and customer comments from the time frame when Travis was in charge of things. His name is mentioned repeatedly in glowing terms and the way people felt about working for him is obviously positive. Travis prefers not to think that employees are working for him, but alongside him – and that’s a huge reason why the culture of the companies he’s run has been so outstanding.
But company culture is not the only thing you’ll hear on this episode. Travis has so much experience and skill in the e commerce space that the interview would be incomplete without tapping into his know-how. Travis generously shares a significant amount of wisdom about what it takes to not only build a strong company culture but to also grow and e commerce business successfully, including the software and packages that make the most sense to keep an e commerce business profitable and running smoothly.
The conversation wraps up with what Jeremy calls “The Software Showdown” where he asks Travis to give his opinion about the big players in the e commerce software space, including their strong and weak points, areas where improvement is needed, and how each works in a practical, function way in real life scenarios. If you’ve been looking for the right e commerce solution and haven’t made up your mind yet, you need to listen to this conversation before you do.
Resources Mentioned on this episode
- www.Skubana.com
- www.SharpCommerce.com
- www.ParadiseFibers.com
- www.Volusion.com
- www.Magento.com
- www.Bronto.com
- www.DotMailer.com
- www.Kayako.com
- www.Shopify.com
- www.Asana.com
- www.ListTrack.com
- www.SweetTooth.com
- www.ZenDesk.com
- BOOK: Drive
- www.BigCommerce.com
