Let’s talk for a minute and assume there’s always more than one perspective on almost any topic there is. Perspectives can be polarizing and the fact of the matter is, your perspective is 100% of your reality. We all wear different shoes and have different routes home. Our stories are all unique and the forces that drive our personal life decisions are never parallel. Something, be it a life event, a current circumstance or upbringing has a play in what forms your personal perspective.
Speaking of perspective, the 2016 election was possibly the most polarizing election in American history. You were either red or blue and there was no gray area about it. Something was different about this year, however, that may not have been present in other election years. When asking someone why they voted, the most typical answer is “this candidate shared my values and beliefs most closely”. Occasionally the answer is “I’m voting for the lesser of two evils”. This year I personally heard more people say “I voted for X to ensure Y wouldn’t end up in office”. For some it was less about the values their candidate shared with their own, and more about making sure someone they truly despised never sat in the oval office.
Let’s pretend for a minute that we’re holding an election for e-commerce platform. You have your typical situation – the incumbent, and the vying opponents from each major party. They all have their unique campaign. It starts out nice and cordial until the first one starts slinging mud at the other. By the end of the mudslinging you’re down to your final two candidates. The question is, how will you choose? Are you voting one into the office simply because you despise the other, or are you truly reading the value proposition that each candidate offers and weighing the cold hard facts? In the case of e-commerce the incumbent, for better or worse, often wins for several obvious reasons:
It’s familiar
It’s too painful to move your site / the cost is too overwhelming to tolerate.
You’re concerned with hidden obstacles that will present themselves with a new system
With this in mind, let’s plan a campaign platform, right here, right now. How do we start? We can start by asking the question, “What message do we need to get across that our platform will, in effect, make e-commerce great again?” We could start by cutting our competition off at the knees with harsh words and erroneous accusations. No? What if we built our entire campaign around negatively framing our competitions’ platform? Still no? Maybe it all works better if we establish our campaign around what we do great, truly provide a better platform and let the competition worry about themselves? That sounds like a sound way to start. Negative press almost never paints you in a positive light and it shines unintended light on your competition. We find it best if we work together and compete in an amicable way.
E-commerce isn’t just a single frame of mind. It comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes now and is available on almost every electronic device. It is now literally in the hands of anyone with a smartphone, a smart watch, a tablet or personal computer. We can’t establish a platform around saying we’re the best. It sounds like great marketing, but one, you have to deliver on that promise, two, it’s cliché and, three, it depends on what your needs are. In some cases a platform like Magento or WordPress may be the best fit for a project, whereas Liftoff may excel in another category. The truth is, what is best is up to you and your situation.
Now that you’ve read beyond the period closing out the last paragraph you’re asking “if you’re not saying you’re the best, you’re not pointing out flaws in your competitor’s workflow, what then would lead me to cast my vote in your direction?” We’re super glad you asked. Hold tight and we’ll explain.
To illustrate and place an exclamation mark on our campaign, we offer the following no-frills facts about who we are and what we offer:
We offer a very pure form of e-commerce. No BS, no fat, no precipitous learning curve.
Our platform makes it easy to start with nothing and finish with something amazing.
We’re honest about our legacy, our position and our future direction
The user experience our platform provides is intuitive, forward thinking and free and clean of un-necessary debris.
We can fit almost any application of e-commerce, from secured company stores to highly transactional retail websites.
We listen to our users daily, and strive to make our platform a more perfect solution for any business
We have a growing community of users sharing content, ideas and strategy
We’re a young company that continues to hire bright minds that are always looking forward to new innovations and ensuring the best possible user experience is present.
Our team is prepared to work with you, one-on-one to help you on your journey
That may be a short list that we’re using to outline our campaign, but we believe that even with its brevity, it’s all we need to say. If you want to test drive our platform, we offer a “no credit card required” 15-day free trial. If you don’t like what you see, you can move on. The proof is in the product, our method and your willingness to see how powerful our platform can truly be.
We believe that e-commerce should be accessible and easy for any business to own and operate. It should never be outside your reach and you should be able to implement it even if you're not the most technical savvy business on the block. E-commerce is now an almost foundational component of a business, even when your primary setup is brick and mortar. It's 2017 and the time is way overdue for a platform like Liftoff.
In closing, we hope that before you do cast your vote, you’ll take a hard look at what we can offer you. Liftoff is an excellent platform that fits almost every e-commerce scenario, and, when it doesn’t, we can extend it so that it does. We’re confident that you’ll fall in love with the architecture, the culture and the framework of Liftoff. It’s not up to us alone. To make this statement true, when we are working with you, TOGETHER we can make e-commerce great again.