Introduction
Modern store brands (SB) or private labels (PL), which are now more commonly referred to as private brands, are typically owned and promoted by retailers, manufacturers and distributors. Customers have been purchasing Private-label products from mass merchants and supermarket stores. The consumer shift toward private labels benefits retailers as well, since private labels are typically more profitable for them. Will this trend continue? Only if stores create a compelling operational model and private-label strategy.
No Spicy No Life is a Direct To Consumer (DTC) private label that began at the peak of the pandemic with the objective of connecting local micro-food manufacturers in various states in Malaysia with home makers and food lovers, enabling new revenue streams for the manufacturers and easy access and know how to finding authentic local food.
No Spicy No Life is a private label developed by Commerceplus with the Ecommerce team managing all aspects of the business from research, product development, setup, warehousing, fulfilment to promotion and digital marketing via Multi-Channel, Content Marketing and smart marketplace tactics . The brand grew into a six-figure brand within the span of 12 months with a strong conversion rate and high repeat purchases of 20%.
About No Spicy No Life
No Spicy No Life (NSNL) is a Direct To Consumer (DTC) private label with a mission to spice up the kitchens and lives of passionate home cooks with easy to cook recipes and amazing tasting food. It has developed a series of premium instant noodles, frozen foods, and cooking pastes inspired by a dominant Malaysian Cookbook, from Nyonya flavours to Penang Hawker Fare and now expanding to include flavours from Thailand, Sichuan China as well.
The Penang Prawn Mee paste, also referred to as Hokkien Mee, was the first item to be introduced by No Spicy No Life. Within a month of the launch, No Spicy No Life went on to launch a series of Nyonya cooking pastes.
No Spicy No Life main goal is to provide their dedicated home cooks with delicious recipes that will spice up their kitchens and lives. They collaborated directly with manufacturers to develop a series of noodles with popular and also unique flavours to excite the market. The brand is built on Shopee, Lazada and subsequently launched on Grab Mart, AirAsia Fresh, Facebook Shop, Instagram shop and also its own website. To encourage people to try the pastes and noodles, they run various promotions, make recipe and cooking videos, leverage influencer marketing and also interact directly with consumers to share recipes, and more.
The Challenge
“Where do you see yourself in five years?” is a typical interview question. If you were to ask private label (PL) brands the same question, they’d likely say, “everywhere.”
The pandemic and stay-at-home orders accelerated online shopping. E-commerce needs to become a consideration rather than an afterthought. From packaging and design to advertising and social media ecommerce strategies, private label products should resonate and feel authentic to consumers.
The best way to ensure that your businesses actively engage customers throughout the evolving shopping journey is to adopt a 360-degree strategy that combines traditional and digital marketing and incorporates growing third-party intermediaries.
The Solution
Online businesses must constantly be aware of ways to keep their Brand and Products in front of the eyes of their customers. Commerceplus Ecommerce Solutions assisted with the development of end-to-end Ecommerce strategy and manage day-to-day operations which includes:
1. Brand Identity Design
- Commerceplus Ecommerce team conducted a thorough Brand Audit to determine where the product stand in the marketplace and to understand the customer.
- We closely collaborated with the management, stakeholders, and customers of our client to analyse and distil gathered intelligence into descriptive. Through this approach, we are able to capture the essence of the company and brand. To reflect the brand, we seek a distinctive and original voice.
Choice of colours, fonts, logo, and overall design will all reflects brand’s visual vocabulary. The next step we assisted on look, feel, and voice of the brand that was carried through all marketing channels – from the website, to social media (NSNL Facebook, NSNL Instagram & NSNL YouTube), advertisements, and packaging.
Created a content marketing strategy that tells the story the company wants to share with its target audience and implemented a social media presence to engage directly with the desired potential customers.
2. Warehouse Setup
Assisted them in identifying and managing a storage space that meets their needs, from inbound handling, optimizing storage space according to pastes and stock movements. Optimizing the area to minimize costs, manage inventory, and efficiently complete orders. Hired, trained and managed staff to meet order demand and Implemented technology to automate inventory tracking, fulfilment and shipping.
3. Store Setup and Customer support
- Optimizing the product page to give potential customers the best impression and provide them with all the information they require about No Spicy No Life.
- Commerceplus team of experts handled all of NSNL customer service inquiries—such as those coursed through direct messages, comments, and more.
- Our team also clarified via private message or public reviews any doubts that customers may have with NSNL products.
- Reviews management – encourage good reviews
4. Digital & Content Marketing
- Boosted products on Shopee every 4 hours to increase the item’s visibility
- To achieve seamless creative execution across all of the NSNL food brand’s platforms, including its online markets, social media accounts, and website, we worked closely with and alongside the brand’s digital agency.
The functional and category experts at Commerceplus handled the onboarding, launch, and marketing campaigns for NSNL as well as the regular management of the brand’s stores on Lazada and Shopee. They also succeeded in getting NSNL listed on Instant Commerce through GrabMart.
- Maximize organic presence and developed long term influencer partnerships to generate credibility.
- Develop brand and Product content from scratch to excite customers.
- Developed the product and campaign pricing strategies and bundling plans. This allowed the brand to stay away from price competition and offered a truly unique product focused on improving the cooking experiences of home cooks.
5. Operations and Promotion Planning
Implemented back-and-forth order and inventory synchronization for real-time visibility of product-specific stock availability across all of NSNL marketplaces.
Set different names for each item’s size, colours, and variety for seamless tagging of online and inventory management and also assisted NSNL suppliers migrate to the new naming system.
- Optimized Ads on a daily basis improve the buying process for the advertisers in Lazada platform.
- Assisted with Order Processing – includes picking inventory, sorting items, packing orders and shipping them.
As a proactive partner for e-commerce brands, Commerceplus not only sets up and operates online stores and marketplaces for brands, but also trains and upskills staff on e-commerce tools and practices. Employees were trained to be more adept with answering customer queries, developing a custom FAQ used across the marketplace and communications channel such as Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.
To maximize efficiencies, cross channel management platforms were used to automate the order processing, inventory management, picking and packing orders, among other things.
Processing Orders for Shopline to track all the information and processes, including order entry, inventory management, fulfilment and after-sales service. Assisted with Product Onboarding to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty, lower your customer acquisition costs (CAC) and to sell more products increasing to increased Lifetime Value (LTV).
The Results
- Within the first two months since its launch, NSNL landed a place within the Top 10 Brands of the Noodles and Pastes category of the country’s leading e-commerce platforms.
- Delivered RM 500K in Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) within first 12 months with 8x Return on investment (ROI).
- Achieved Preferred sellers within 6 months which led them to expand their channels.
- Within first 3 months NSNL gained more than 12k followers on Shopee and almost 10k followers on Lazada platforms.
- Delivered 98% Positive Seller Ratings in Lazada Platform and 4.9 Rating in Shopee platform and 5 in Grab food
Final Thoughts
To support business owners in realising their goals, Commerceplus was created. We offer a full, one-stop solution, from branding and content production to shipping, delivery, and customer service. Having developed businesses like No Spicy No Life, we take pride in being growth experts at every stage of the online sales process. Are you prepared to write the next success story? Let’s Work Together, Send us an email at contact@commerceplus.asia or get in touch with us to arrange a quick 30-minute audit.