How Cloosiv’s scrappy team of 5 acted fast to move hundreds of local cafes online
As businesses around the world adapt and pivot, we’ve been chatting with our customers who are doing amazing things despite it all. We recently sat down (virtually, of course) with Tim Griffin, the Founder & CEO of Cloosiv, to talk about how their industry has shifted rapidly and what it’s meant for their business.
Cloosiv is an online ordering platform that lets local businesses like coffee shops and cafes launch an online menu and accept orders for pickup using their app. In normal times, it helps these businesses increase their order volume by giving customers a simple way to order on the go and skip the line.
Providing a lifeline to cafes across the US
As the virus began sweeping the country, more and more of Cloosiv’s customers had to close their doors in order to promote social distancing and the health of employees and customers. “We knew right away that we had to do something,” says Tim, “and we knew we had to make the cost as close to zero as possible.”
They acted fast to waive all of their fees through May 2020, so the only cost to their merchants would be a small fee from the payment processor itself.
They’ve also made it possible for patrons to make direct donations to local coffee shops through their mobile app.
Adapting their onboarding process
The team at Cloosiv has seen steady growth since it launched in 2017, but they’ve never seen growth quite like they did in March.
In the past few weeks alone, they’ve doubled the merchants on their platform and orders have been growing 750% week-over-week.
This unprecedented demand has meant that their small, 5-person team had to shift how they onboard new customers. They typically have a 24-hour turnaround for their onboarding process, but with hundreds of new cafes transitioning online for the first time, they’ve had to make that more self-service. These cafes need to get online and start selling as quickly as possible, so “they don’t have time to wait a week” for Cloosiv’s team to get through the backlog.
Managing an avalanche of inbound leads
With the unexpected jump in business, Cloosiv relied heavily on Close to manage the influx of inbound leads and keep track of who they’re communicating with. As a small team that’s short on time, it’s been critical for them to have all lead communication logged and visible. This visibility means that Tim can collaborate seamlessly with Sales and Onboarding and make sure nothing slips through the cracks.
They’ve been using Smart Views to make quick lists of leads at every stage of the process and make sure they’re not wasting any time. When an inbound lead signals that they’re interested, the Cloosiv team flags them as such and sets a task to make sure they follow up.
No signs of slowing down
Although a lot of Cloosiv’s new business is from this influx of inbound leads, much of the demand came from leads they’ve had in Close for some time, but weren’t necessarily ready to buy — until now.
Having built previous connections with their leads made Cloosiv an obvious choice when the time came to make their transition to remote ordering. Although this shift was much sooner than any of us expected, Tim doesn’t think the demand will ever stop for mobile ordering and contactless payments. “We’re expecting to see another wave when the cafes are able to reopen,” says Tim, “and they’ll want to be prepared.”
For now, the team is focused on continuing to support as many cafes as possible to adapt their businesses to these challenging times. Their team understands that many of these cafe-owners have been building up their businesses for years and it’s their livelihood.
What’s touched them the most is the support of all the local communities. “People are out there supporting their local coffee shops,” says Tim, “and that’s great to see.”
