TimexWatching its direct-to-consumer business expand

Company Overview

Founded in 1854, Timex has established a tradition of creating high-quality, innovative watches to suit the needs of every customer. Timex combines high-end Italian designs with cutting-edge German engineering to offer customers quality products. In addition to its traditional brick-and-mortar business, the company now sells online through affiliate partners and on Timex.com.

The Situation

• Needed to develop a presence on marketplaces
• Sought a central hub to host its online inventory
• Wanted to expand its digital marketing efforts

When Woody Anderson joined Timex as its vice president of e-Business, the company wasn’t reaching its full potential online. “We had zero manufacturer-driven online presence in any of the major online marketplaces a year ago,” said Anderson.

The company knew opportunities existed on marketplaces and through various online advertising channels, so Timex began focusing on elevating its brand digitally and growing its direct-to-consumer strategy to reach more online consumers.

The Solution

• ChannelAdvisor Marketplaces to sell on sites like eBay and Newegg
• ChannelAdvisor Digital Marketing to drive awareness of its products and generate web traffic

Before joining Timex, Anderson had previously worked with ChannelAdvisor in a role that involved managing the marketplace business at an e-commerce company. There, he had experienced great success with ChannelAdvisor Marketplaces, and he wanted to reinvent that performance for Timex.

“ChannelAdvisor is a solution that I can put in place for all things that I want to power digitally, including our direct-to-consumer web business, as well as our sales on marketplaces and digital marketing sites through Flex Feeds,” said Anderson.

ChannelAdvisor’s Flex Feed technology helped Timex develop and manage its robust product data feed on multiple online advertising channels from a single user interface. This feature allowed Timex to customize its feed to meet the needs of each online destination where the company wanted to advertise.

“The Flex Feeds technology has been a powerful tool for us,” said Anderson. “It allows us to syndicate data to digital marketing partners with whom we work. It helps our products get discovered by being where customers are browsing and shopping.”

Timex started using ChannelAdvisor’s Inventory Juggler to list the same inventory on multiple marketplaces simultaneously. The Inventory Juggler automatically updates inventory quantities on each marketplace every time a Timex product is sold.

“The Inventory Juggler allows us to list our products on as many marketplaces as we can support,” said Anderson.

The Results

• Experiencing 70% year-over-year growth

After having zero presence on marketplaces just a year ago, Timex has used the ChannelAdvisor platform to quickly scale its online business. The results on marketplaces and digital marketing channels have been substantial. Timex’s sales recently experienced a significant upswing during a four-week period as it continued to optimize its online presence with ChannelAdvisor.

“We’re currently sitting at something north of 70% year-over-year growth,” said Anderson. “A lot of that has to do with the way we’ve been able to extend the ChannelAdvisor platform and leverage Flex Feeds for paid search. We’ve experienced phenomenal growth that we expect to continue.”