Using “real women” as models and asking inbound callers to carol for trinkets are among the ways women's sporting apparel cataloger Title 9 gets consumers to “join their brand.”
All the models used are friends and teammates, said founder and president Missy Park, speaking at the New England Mail Order Association's fall conference last month.
The copy supports the real-world approach by including biographical snippets about the models, such as their favorite food or dream car.
“The copy lets consumers know the models are real women with real jobs and real families,” she said. “They're not Madison Avenue's idea of perfection.”
Customers see the models as people they might consider potential friends.
For example, one person called to inquire about whether a pregnant model's baby was a boy or a girl, while another wanted the address of an innkeeper who modeled, so she could stay at the inn.
In keeping with that personal approach, Park's own Southern-accented recorded voice greets callers to the customer service center, asking for their patience until a rep is available.
“It's not important that it's me but [it is important] that it's not that ‘voice-mail lady,’” Park noted.
Sometimes this backfires. Occasionally, Park will answer calls live if it's a busy period, and in one such instance the exasperated caller said, “Thank God it's not that annoying voice on your message.”
Park also caters to customers in ways that can annoy her operations staff. For example, she insists that when a caller contacts the service center, they are first asked for their item numbers rather than their credit card and address information. The other way may be good for name capture, “but it's not in the customer's best interest,” she said, especially if they go through all that trouble and their requested item is out of stock.
But not everyone is perfect. Park recently checked to see if this practice was being carried out by calling in anonymously. She was immediately asked for her key code by two different reps she called. When she said she didn't have a catalog, they asked for her name as it appeared on her credit card.
“We're in the process of re-centering people now” to get the process back to where it should be,” Park reported.
Another thing that drives the operations team crazy is promotions like the one in which people were asked to sing their favorite holiday tune when they called in. Their reward: A little gift, like a Wonder Woman Pez dispenser.
“It's bad for call times, but it's very entertaining to be in our call center around the holidays,” said Park.
Title 9 was founded in 1989, with Park's home garage serving as the “international corporate headquarters.” At age 26, Park had wanted to create a business targeting post-collegiate female athletes — a great idea, she told her dad, because no one else was doing it.
Her dad was quiet for a minute. Then he said, “Well, there might be a good reason for that.”
Undaunted, Park created and mailed 15,000 copies of a 16-page, digest-size catalog. She received only four orders — only one of them from someone she didn't know.
“Smarter people would have quit,” she said.
Still, Park saw a common thread in the four orders: All bought sports bras, an item for which many women have trouble finding a proper size. She then mailed a one-page flier, upping the number of bras offered, and gradually expanded the company, hiring her first employee in 1991 and “bumbling along” to profitability in 1993.
The company now mails 26 million catalogs annually, reaching prospects and customers, including 70,000 last-three-month buyers. It also sells through retail stores.
Today, Title 9 has 115 employees, including 23 former collegiate athletes, six of whom have won national championships. How many MBAs does that include? Zero.
