PureFormulas: COVID-19 Customer SupportChannelAdvisor Positions PureFormulas to Meet Pandemic Demand

Company Overview

With fitness fanatics focused on health and wellness in recent years, online sales have exploded in the booming nutritional supplement market. PureFormulas, a ChannelAdvisor client since 2008, has kept pace with the growing demand, all while building a loyal consumer base through a seamless online shopping experience. From dietary supplements to organic foods, PureFormulas gives browsers more incentive to buy with free shipping on thousands of select products. This commitment to its customers has paid off, placing PureFormulas on the prestigious IR Top 500 list as well as earning the company recognition as the top health product/food supplement e-tailer among Newsweek’s 1,000 Best American Online Shops. 

PureFormulas credits its winning formula, in part, to ChannelAdvisor. To date, the online retailer leverages ChannelAdvisor’s comprehensive suite of solutions and digital marketing expertise to help manage marketplaces, boost product visibility, monitor its competitors and continually refine its e-commerce strategy for peak performance. Nevertheless, these successful collaborators could not have predicted how critical their longtime partnership would be as brands and retailers worldwide braced for the inevitable impact of a global pandemic — and an e-commerce disruption like no other.

The Situation

Stay-at-home orders worldwide seemed to shift consumer behavior overnight, forcing some brands and retailers to suddenly shutter their brick-and-mortar operations and make a hard pivot toward consumers who began shopping online. For PureFormulas and other online merchants, the dramatic change in the e-commerce landscape presented both challenges and unintended opportunities.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the warehouse team at PureFormulas processed up to 2,000 orders on any given day. After the mandated lockdown, however, consumer demand doubled across nearly all existing KPIs, according to Daniel Moure, Chief Marketing Officer at PureFormulas.

“Orders have doubled, revenue has doubled, receiving doubled, but if you’re not set up properly, it can also be a problem,” explained Moure, adding that his team was in a position to meet the increased demand head-on because of ChannelAdvisor’s analytic tools.

The Solution

Ahead of the pandemic’s impact, PureFormulas reports it used predictive analytics and relied on ChannelAdvisor’s expert guidance to help forecast demand and get its products in front of the right consumers at the right time.

“There was a little bit of anticipation because we’re always tracking volume,” explained Moure. “Working alongside ChannelAdvisor makes us that much better.” 

During the rush, Moure says ChannelAdvisor helped create time and resource efficiencies that allowed his entire team, including C-suite executives like himself, to roll up their sleeves and help with the influx of orders. The team could also focus on the needs of its employees as well as the online retailer’s reputation for excellent end-to-end customer service and experiences. 

“I’m able to spend 10 hours in the warehouse because I have the confidence that [ChannelAdvisor] is keeping a vigilant eye — as you always have — on our day-to-day performance,” commented Moure. He further explained that delivering on the company’s fulfillment promises was critical to earning (and hopefully keeping) new customer acquisitions that could help the business weather the economic fallout of the pandemic. 

“All this new volume is exciting [because] people are trying us [discovering us] for the first time. Having said that, if we don’t deliver excellent service on every occasion, then retention becomes that much harder,” said Moure. “So, we know how important every aspect of the customer journey is. That’s why we’re in e-commerce – it’s all about convenience and over-delivering on the customer’s demanding expectation and needs, even more so during uncertain times [COVID-19 pandemic].”

The Results

While consumers were adjusting to their “new normal,” PureFormulas reports its strategic approach to day-to-day operations remained relatively the same thanks to the reliability of ChannelAdvisor’s robust platform and team of experts. Before the pandemic, the online retailer achieved notable success with a strong digital marketing strategy, which helped it to:

• Increase revenue by 178% MoM (month over month)
• Improve ROAS by 33% MoM

Like most brands and retailers, PureFormulas is no stranger to fluctuations in the market. But when it comes to dramatic disruptions in the e-commerce landscape, Moure says, having a strong solution partner that can provide personalized support can make all the difference.

“As the coronavirus began to impact every aspect of our business, we were extremely fortunate to work alongside partners like ChannelAdvisor, who once again, rose to the challenge(s). Personally, I sleep much better at night, knowing they are always watching and adapting to our specific needs, as well as those that come without warning,” added Moure. “[ChannelAdvisor] continues to be there for us.”