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Janine Bousquette eToys
Competitors bite. Still, eToys hangs tough-- thanks to Bousquette. She adds humanity to the e-tailer's brand. By Jennifer Saba S omething was afoot at eToys the Friday before Christmas. With the exception of a hurried receptionist doling out an 800 customer-service number, the online toy retailer's Santa Monica, Calif., headquarters remained placid. Employees appeared in a good mood, including Janine Bousquette, svp of marketing. Greeting me at the start of our meeting, she casually extended one hand while sipping from a Diet Pepsi in the other. It was all a little odd. Who's in a good mood the week before Christmas? That goes double if you work in the toy biz. One theory: By the 1999 holiday season, conducting millions of transactions a day was old hat for eToys. Three years on the Internet--with a focus on toys (as the name implies) gives the company a comfortable lead. But with increasing competition the online player can't sit back on cushy stock options. The company has to manage customer expectations as much as Wall Street's. Several e-commerce companies took a hit at the start of the new year, thanks to talk of bad customer experiences over the hectic holiday season. And eToys was not immune-at a healthy $42 before Christmas, its stock price dropped to $22 as of Jan. 7. Still, eToys, under Bousquette's guidance, has managed to build a strong identity, one that's helped it hang on to its first-mover advantage. Bousquette, a well-dressed and polished marketer, joined eToys in May 1999, one of a handful of Pepsi executives ditching the soft drink maker's Somers, N.Y., HQ for the West Coast. Her old-school marketing chops made her attractive to the e-commerce outfit. She nurtured the Pepsi brand, as vp of marketing, and spent 12 years at Procter & Gamble. Her experience in packaged goods shows in the superior way eToys marketing tugs at emotions. "The campaign is designed to establish eToys as a parent ally and establish an understanding of the importance of small, special moments between parent and child," Bousquette says. "It's not about trying to be a stick in the eye." "It's not about trying to be a stick in the eye ... but special moments between parent and child." Most other dotcoms seem to be only noisy bugs in consumers' ears. After all, eToys could have taken the easy way out, presenting the typical toy-shopping experience--crowded stores and bratty kids. Who wouldn't want to buy online? Bousquette also nixed targeting children. She didn't want to egg on kids to bug their parents. The current round of ads running on such national TV programs as The Today Show and Ally McBeal quietly conveys the eToys experience--from the target's (parents') point of view. One spot, created by San Francisco's Publicis & Hal Riney, shows a wide-eyed boy riding with his father through a car wash. Dad can't help but notice and, when he gets home, he searches for "car wash" on eToys. A listing pops up. The last shot shows dad and son playing with a Hot Wheels car wash. The tag: "Etoys, where great ideas come to you." The work shows how the Internet, specifically eToys, can improve consumers' lives. "The Internet is changing the way people live their lives, people are reconsidering their lifestyle choice. From a brand perspective this is good news because people are more open-minded," Bousquette says. "Normally it takes a long time for a brand to connect with consumers." The Internet, however, makes it harder to hang on to loyal customers. It's too easy to click over to a competitor. That dynamic is both a boon and a challenge to eToys. And eToys now has strong challengers eyeing the same chance for new business. Existing brick-and-mortar brands are seeing traffic gravitate to their online sites because of their more-established brand names, says Malcolm Maclachlan, an e-commerce analyst with IDC in Mountain View, Calif. By 1999 brick-and-mortar companies Toys R Us and KBKids launched e-commerce sites that nipped at eToys' heels. And other players, from Amazon to niche player Smarter-Kids.com, entered the toy market. In fact, Media Metrix reports Toys R Us was the No. 1 web site gainer by 277 percent in November. Granted, the site did have a wimpy start, and it's easier to make gains from small numbers. But a listing for the top 50 sites for November shows eToys (No. 38) with about 4.9 million unique visitors and Toys R Us (No. 40) close behind with a hair over 4.7 million. "Toys R Us got a wake-up call first quarter of last year and they have closed the gap considerably, though they still have a ways to go," says Scott Stirton, a manager for the Boston Consulting Group, Toronto. "Overall, I think the surprising thing about eToys is their ability to fend off the competition, the ability to maintain and their obsession with customer service and fulfillment." It takes more than great ads to sell products. And eToys follows through on the experience it touts--most of the time. Some press coverage has uncovered unhappy customers. The e-tailer may be an imperfect standard, but it's the standard for service, nonetheless. In a recent Forrester Research poll, consumers ranked the e-tailer No. 1 for delivery and customer service. Bousquette takes feedback seriously. She and her team respond to thousands of emails. "If we have one mom unhappy, it's a very hands-on process. We work one-on-one with each customer," she says. "We have highly trained technical support where it's equally important that they love the business and that they know they are talking to moms and dads using a human approach." Bousquette is infusing eToys with a quality all too rare on the Net: humanity. MC
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