One of the beautiful things about shopping online is that geography becomes largely irrelevant- until you ask for something to be shipped to your home or business of course. No longer limited to what’s in our neighbourhood or our city, or the big mall down the street, we peruse with ease competitively designed T-shirts from Threadless (one of my very favorite eCommerce sites) a site where independently designed T-shirts are released in limited quantities fresh every month! And some seriously great graphics and hilarious creative content at that. Based out of Chicago this company ships all over. It’s relatively small and independent, but it can operate on a global level because of this internet thing we’re using right now, you and I.

With all the talk of WalMart, Lululemon, and other major retailers launching their new eCommerce platforms we sometimes overlook that it has also radically altered the playing field for smaller companies too. Here are some good examples of companies that capitalized on eCommerce and their web presence for local markets:

Frogbox, a startup from Vancouver BC offers an array of convenient, durable and reusable eco-friendly plastic containers for moving. They drop them off at your soon-to-be old place and pick them up at the new one when you’re done. No more breaking down and taping up flimsy cardboard boxes with the faint smell of Chinese grocers, stale alcohol or industrial paint. Their website is easy to navigate and prominently displays their eCommerce options for potential consumers on the mainpage - complete with a discount for ordering online. While the service is local to both Greater Vancouver and Seattle, they’ve utilized their site effectively being both a sponsored site on Google and ranking on the first page for “moving,Vancouver, boxes” as well as “Vancouver, boxes”.  Good work Frogbox, smart work.

Lululemon, while not a small company by any stretch (no pun intended) has engaged their local clientele through their site quite well. The key is CONTENT. Content that your clientele are interested in, can use, find valuable – not just what the staff are having for lunch that day. (Allthough once in a while something like that might be of curiousity to your clientele.) And one of the strengths of Lululemon’s content is diversity. Sometimes diversity can be a problem, sometimes your content can be too stretched out and broad. But it works in Lululemon’s favour to have such diverse topics as fitness trends, wanderlust, and design because their brand is as much about clothing as it is about lifestyle, community, and a healthy philosophy. So as long as they engage their clients with themes consistant with their overall lifestyle and philosophy, they have some room to work with.

Nanny In Seattle (www.nannyinseattle.com) is another great e-commerce site with a local aim. Firstly it’s a fantastic URL – clear and to the point, but the site is also laid out very simply and the page is clean and easy to navigate. It’s comprehensive and includes content; though not a whole lot.  I’d like to see them ad a blog or a user’s testamonial page for example, but their Nanny 101 tab and Choosing Seattle Nannies tab offer some very useful tips. It’s an excellent example of eCommerce being used to generate local specific business. Now they need maximize an SEO strategy to help them rank better. Seattlenanny.com ranks first on a Google search but they began nearly 15 years ago and have extensive connections to other services; receiving accolades along the way. Often times the way we type something into a search engine will also generate very different results; this is something to consider when choosing a URL, particularly if you have a regional or local focus. The strengths and weakenesses of “Nanny In Seattle” vs “Seattle Nanny” semantically could be a post all to its own; but we’ll save that for another time. For a strictly online eCommerce service I see potential in nannyinseattle.com and I think with some solid SEO and word of mouth support (CONTENT) they’ll be yet another eCommerce success story.

So if you own a local business in Vancouver, Seattle or any other city for that matter, don’t think that eCommerce is for big national and international players only. You can benefit from finding ways to connect to your local consumers and to build a larger client base through simple and strategic uses of your website.  Just like these companies above.