Komsan Chiyadis
GrabFood delivery-partner, Thailand
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How gift shop Sweet Spring stands out on GrabMart with savvy marketing strategies
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April 19, 2024
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Singapore
Sweet Spring was a fresh flower supplier for big events, but had to pivot its business when the Covid-19 crisis hit in early 2020. Weddings and other social events were on hold, demand for their services dried up almost overnight. Daniel Saw, founder and business owner of Sweet Spring, said this drove them to the quick decision to pivot from a business-to-business (B2B) strategy, to serving retail customers directly (B2C).
“That’s when we decided to get on GrabMart,” says Saw. Up until that point, Saw wasn’t even aware of GrabMart—the Grab service that lets retail shops sell all kinds of goods and groceries through the Grab app. “I thought Grab was mostly food merchants,” he admits.
Sweet Spring hasn’t looked back since. Four years on, Saw said that they’ve “learnt a lot about marketing” and their growing sales on GrabMart can attest to that.
Making the most of GrabMart
Getting started was easy for Saw. New merchants joining Grab can access the Grab Merchant Centre for training sessions, 1-on-1 business reviews, and other on-demand support.
“The Grab Merchant Centre guided us step by step on how to upload products, which product titles to choose, and how to create product descriptions,” says Saw.
The shop soon drew in a sizable amount of online visitors. Sweet Spring later also opened a physical storefront. Saw estimates that today, 40 per cent of sales comes from the physical store, with the other 60 per cent from GrabMart.
With its new B2C strategy, the company diversified its product categories beyond bouquets and floral arrangements. Skincare products, snacks, pastries, or toys: Customers can mix and match a wide selection of gifts to suit the occasion.
“We now have around 200 to 300 unique products, and the types of orders we get vary every day,” says Saw.
Shorter fulfilment time was another teething issue that Sweet Spring grappled with. “On Grab, customers expect their orders to be delivered in an hour or so,” Saw explains. “It took us a while to adapt, but we succeeded by working with GrabExpress’s on-demand delivery drivers on top of our in-house delivery team.”
In addition, the company plans manpower strength in advance by tapping the power of data. Grab analytics enables Saw to perform data analysis on sales numbers, allowing him to predict the volume of orders and manpower he will need during various festive occasions.
Building a GrabMart business with smart marketing tactics
Sweet Spring has mastered various marketing strategies to stand out from the crowd.
One tried-and-tested strategy is creating limited-time bundles of popular items. During this year’s Lunar New Year, for instance, Sweet Spring put together hampers of goodies with festive potted plants. Customers who bought two or more bundles would get a significant discount.
(Read more: Grab celebrates Southeast Asian F&B icons on Times Square billboard ahead of travel season)
For Valentine’s Day, the company executed a similar strategy by running promotions on gift bundles of flower bouquets and plushies. This spurred a 30 per cent boost in sales revenue compared to the previous year’s Valentine’s Day, says Saw.
He emphasised that the real work of customer engagement happens beyond the festive season. The brand uses Grab’s marketing tools to drive consistent engagement and grow a regular customer base, including ad placements and monthly campaigns.
By investing in Grab banner ads, Sweet Spring can strengthen brand awareness among its target audience over the long term. “It helps us build a long-term relationship with our customers. We see our regular customer base growing, and we now have repeat customers who buy our flowers every month.”
(Read more: The evolution of Grab’s merchant app: from order management system to digital toolkit for MSME growth)
Sweet Spring also takes advantage of fresh marketing campaign ideas that Grab suggests to merchant-partners. They can opt to join these campaigns and promote their deals through the Grab app.
“At first, we were sceptical about the return-on-investment (ROI) of such campaigns,” says Saw. “But after trying them out, we see that it actually encourages our customers to increase their basket size. Joining these regular campaigns helps us consistently engage customers.”
Blooming in new directions
Saw is keen to explore new campaign mechanics to drive growth. “For the next festive season, we hope to do something even more interesting, like a free gift for every purchase.”
Saw is also looking into ways to develop an online-to-offline (O2O) strategy, converting online customers from Grab into customers who visit his physical store. “For instance, we could offer them a course on how to make floral arrangements,” he explains. “Having that human-to-human interaction is so important.”
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Komsan Chiyadis
GrabFood delivery-partner, Thailand
COVID-19 has dealt an unprecedented blow to the tourism industry, affecting the livelihoods of millions of workers. One of them was Komsan, an assistant chef in a luxury hotel based in the Srinakarin area.
As the number of tourists at the hotel plunged, he decided to sign up as a GrabFood delivery-partner to earn an alternative income. Soon after, the hotel ceased operations.
Komsan has viewed this change through an optimistic lens, calling it the perfect opportunity for him to embark on a fresh journey after his previous job. Aside from GrabFood deliveries, he now also picks up GrabExpress jobs. It can get tiring, having to shuttle between different locations, but Komsan finds it exciting. And mostly, he’s glad to get his income back on track.
