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CustomMade Makes One-Of-A-Kind Products More Accessible

Consumers rely on big box and department store retailers for quick and easy purchases. But certain products, such as engagement rings and furniture, can become more special and valuable when consumers are involved in the design.

CustomMade is an online marketplace created with the goal of making unique products more accessible for consumers. The company was founded to help bridge the gap art and commerce and encourage customers to think outside the brick-and-mortar box.

“We believe custom is a much better way to shop — it’s more fun and the value is much better,” said Mike Salguero, Co-Founder of CustomMade, in an interview with Retail TouchPoints. “You’re not only able to support your local economy, but also create and buy really meaningful products.”

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For many consumers, accessing and eventually purchasing custom products is “just too hard to do,” Salguero noted. “You don’t know who to go to, you’re not able to read reviews or see other projects they did. The whole idea behind CustomMade is to bring that marketplace to life and make buying custom work really easy.”

In fact, the executives at CustomMade hope that one-of-a-kind products will be so accessible that shoppers will find the process as easy as walking into a store.

“We believe in a day where you could decide to go to a big box retailer like a West Elm or Restoration Hardware, or you can get it custom-made just as easily as going to that store,” Salguero said. To get a jumpstart on this vision, CustomMade has focused on making the online browsing and consideration process as intuitive as possible.

Creating a fluid online experience is especially important in targeting consumers who are unfamiliar with CustomMade, and have never previously considered purchasing custom products.

Turning Conversations Into Sales Opportunities

The 32-year-old Salguero admitted that he buys “very little in stores. My generation just buys things online, whether it’s a $10 or $10,000 purchase. As my generation grows and the generation behind us grow up, we’re going to see more and more sales generated online. This is a great opportunity for us in terms of capturing more of that market.”

Although the CustomMade site looks similar to a typical e-Commerce site, the experience is different “because consumers are looking at projects that were already completed by a seller,” Salguero explained. “That image is used as inspiration for a customer to engage with a seller and get a product made.”

Once consumers engage with a seller, they go through a consultative process, so the product is made with all the elements and features that are expected. “It’s not an immediate sale,” Salguero said. “It’s more of a long-term sale.”

Shoppers who purchase products on CustomMade typically become long-term customers with higher lifetime values, according to Salguero. “As soon as someone completes a transaction, they become a buyer of custom-products for the next couple of years. We’ve seen customers come in and buy something relatively small, like a cutting board, and gradually move up to larger purchases, like a coffee table.”

Additionally, consumers who purchase from CustomMade typically become key promoters of the brand, making traditional marketing tactics less of a priority for the company.

“We found that customers are really talking about how great their experience was with our company and the creators of the products,” Salguero said. “Our Net Promoter Score is very high and our customers actually evangelize our brand. So now it’s just a question of getting more customers acquainted with who we are and what we do.”

To generate this awareness, CustomMade relies mostly on organic search, as most customers naturally stumble across the company while researching on search engines. These customers are “super engaged and have already looked on Google or Bing for custom making a specific product, like an engagement ring,” Salguero said. “We just have to give them the experience they want once they get to our site, so we can help them get what they’re looking for quickly.” 

Differentiating In The Marketplace

Although consumers who are unfamiliar with CustomMade may be quick to compare it to other online marketplaces, the eTailer has several key differentiators.

“We only work with professional makers — they are not hobbyists who have a job, go home and make something to sell online,” Salguero said. “This is their livelihood.”

Small businesses, artists and furniture makers who want to sell on CustomMade go through an initial vetting process to ensure “we have control on who’s coming in,” Salguero added. Through a 10-point verification process, CustomMade researches the web footprint of all sellers, analyzing their social presence, product ratings and reviews, and even conducts an interview with potential additions to the site.

Another notable differentiator is that CustomMade is entirely dedicated to connecting sellers with consumers. “You can’t buy anything on our site immediately,” Salguero said.  The overall transaction size is significantly larger. “We have an average transaction size of $700, with our median size being about $250. However, a lot of people buy $5,000 and even $10,000 products.”

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