Brazil - At Amcham Entrepreneurship Week, the President and founder of Polishop shared everything he learned throughout his journey as an entrepreneur
Today, his brand has an annual turnover of R$1 billion and João Appolinário is known as one of the most influential investors on the Shark Tank Brazil program, but people didn't always buy his ideas. Instead of taking the easy mobile phone number list way out and inheriting the family business, he decided to do something different and open a skating rink on the coast of São Paulo at the age of 18 .
The result, as his own father predicted, was not the best. Despite losing all the money he had invested in the business, Appolinário did not lose heart. After investing in some small businesses, the businessman decided to think outside the box – more specifically in Miami, in the United States – and bring the Seven Day Diet to Brazil .
The idea was not well received by marketing professionals hired by the businessman to evaluate the product. The price was high, the box was large and the logistics were difficult. Despite the risk, Appolinário believed in the product and the sales method – television and telephone – and decided to launch the Seven Day Diet in the Brazilian market. Contrary to what was expected, the venture was a great success and gave rise to Polishop .
It was at that moment that João learned a lesson that he still applies to his business today: a product has a price, but a benefit has value . In our Entrepreneurship Week , the businessman shared this and other lessons he learned throughout his journey as an entrepreneur.
SELLING BENEFITS HAS VALUE
From the beginning, Polishop decided to invest in a strategy focused on selling the benefits behind each of its products. “People want you to meet a specific need, whether conscious or unconscious. When you have exclusivity, benefits and innovation, the price ends up becoming irrelevant”, says João Appolinário.
However, simply selling innovation is not enough – it needs to be demonstrated . But to do this, the company needed more screen time for the salesperson to explain the features and benefits of what was being sold. Instead of creating traditional ads, which were limited to 30 seconds, Polishop decided to buy large advertising spaces on small television channels, whose schedules were not yet full, and create a 15-minute program.
It wasn't long before this wasn't enough either. Shortly after its creation, the company launched its own TV channel, where it aired its commercials 24 hours a day.
THE CUSTOMER IS THE FOCUS
The retail of the future is about being present wherever the customer is – and João Appolinário already knew this in the 2000s . “When I founded Polishop, even though the omnichannel concept didn’t exist , we created a truly multichannel structure that served the customer wherever they were,” says the entrepreneur. Online store, call center, catalog magazine, television program and physical stores: all channels sell the same product, at the same price and with identical conditions.
“The customer is the boss; they are the center of everything. If someone wants to validate what they saw online in a physical store, you need to give them that. After all, if you don’t know how to capture the consumer and create all the conditions to keep them around, your business has no future,” says the President and founder of Polishop. This complementary strategy has been successful, and the numbers reflect that. Today, 80% of people who buy from the store have already had contact with that product online.
BEING AN ENTREPRENEUR IS NOT ABOUT NOT HAVING A BOSS – IT IS ABOUT HAVING SEVERAL
Being an entrepreneur means facing challenges at every moment and questioning everything that already exists. You need to question what you do, what your employees and competitors do, and what you yourself should be doing . For João Appolinário, making mistakes and taking risks, learning quickly, not making mistakes again, and correcting what needs to be corrected are aspects that make up the day-to-day life of those who start their own business.