From the 90s to now: Bob Group's incredible e-commerce legacy

The company

Bob Group is an ecommerce company based in South Africa, specifically designed for SMEs. The story began when the founder of Bidorbuy, Andy Higgins, teamed up with Jaco Roux, the founder of the online price comparison engine, Jump.co.za, and invested in Jump. Their shared passion for the potential of the internet led to the start of what is now known as Bob Go. Under the umbrella of Bob Group, there are other companies such as Bob Shop, Bob Pay, and Bob Box. Bob Go is a shipping solution, and its operations are managed by operations manager, Shaun Eksteen. (All statements within quotation marks are directly from Shaun himself)

The pandemic saw a boom in ecommerce, and the Bob Group's business has grown in the last few years. "The whole space is growing now, and we need to ensure that we are the quickest to provide solutions. We listen to our customers to ensure we provide solutions to their problems, not what we think are the problems.

The problem

"We have always been an agile company, constantly changing and striving to avoid red tape and excessive processes as much as we can. Initially, our marketing was based on what we thought was the best thing to do. As long as we knew we were doing the right thing for the client, we believed in doing what was right. It was driven by passion."

Over time, our marketing team has grown, and we had to implement some practices. However, as we expanded, we realized the need to communicate information to our clients more quickly and efficiently. We acknowledged that mistakes might become more challenging to handle when there are more eyes on the process. That's when we introduced Campaigns, which helped streamline some of the tasks we didn't have to worry about.

The solution

Eksteen believes what matters is not just the content but also the way people are consuming the content.

The support team of Bob Group began using Zoho Desk and soon moved into CRM and Bookings. As they got to know more about different Zoho products, they brought Campaigns on board.

Benefits & ROI

Once Bob Group implemented Zoho Campaigns, they were able to enjoy an omnichannel platform that allowed them to do everything they needed in one place. They made things easier by building an integration from their established CRM to Zoho for a seamless flow of information.

Several things stood out in Campaigns for Eksteen. "The first thing that caught our attention was the templates, which helped us convey the brand image. It has a streamlined look and feel where the templates are standardized but also easy to tweak, with many triggers in place. It has influenced our decision-making as well as helped us understand how people are working through it. The reports are quite powerful. I think we have utilized only 50-60% of the potential of Campaigns so far, but we are doing it bit by bit. Every time we solve a problem and are happy with the result, we move on to the next part.

Looking ahead

Bob Go aspires to be a smart shipping and order management solution with world-class technology and access to South Africa's best courier companies. "We want to be an agile company. As we are growing, the need for more communication also goes up. When work expands, so do the approval processes. But as a company, we want to ensure that all the boxes are ticked and no mistakes are made. Having a system like Campaigns in place helps us move in the right direction.

The team is working on multiple things. They recently launched a locker service. There are also plans to go international with their shipping solutions.

To learn more about the Bob Group, click here.