Satchel & Page recently started using our GoSocial Store app to power their Facebook Store. They craft beautiful waxed canvas messenger bags and travel accessories. All of their products are handmade in Austin, Texas. We caught up with Satchel & Page owner Daniel Ralsky, who answered a few questions for us.

How did Satchel & Page come to be?

While I was exploring the streets of Tokyo on a recent trip, the strap on his newly purchased bag snapped. I can’t divulge the brand of the bag, but let’s just say it was one of those with “New York” in its brand name. After some quick investigation, I discovered the bag was actually produced overseas (Maybe New York, China?). Needless to say, I felt misled, deceived, and hurt.. I had always been interested in fashion / functionality, and my biggest passion is travel. So I decided to solve my own problem: I set out to create a unique, functional, durable bag with style and character, and share it with the world. A finely crafted bag that expressed my passion for travel and the freedom that comes with it. After months of hard work and the help of a great team, Satchel & Page was born.

Do you sell exclusively online? Or do you have retail stores/distribution also?

Yes, we are currently exclusively online. We may go into a few, select stores in 2012.

Which social media channels have you been using to promote your store, and how have you been using these?

We are currently using Facebook and Twitter.We use both platforms to share stories, pictures, blog entries, and to get to know our customers better. We hope to establish a presence on YouTube in 2012.

How are you measuring the success of your investment in social media?

We look at a few different metrics:

• Facebook “Likes” and Twitters “Follows”
• Audience engagement to our posts
• Website traffic from these social networks
• Conversions from these social networks

 

Do you have any particular social media success stories that you can share?

Our web traffic and sales from Facebook have steadily increased since we opened the Facebook store.

What made you decide that you wanted to have a Facebook store?

Our social media strategy is not to ‘sell’ our customers. As strange as it sounds, that’s why we wanted to have a Facebook store. Continually posting our products with links to our site would intrusive and annoying to our followers. Rather, having a set place on our Facebook page, where our followers can see our current product line, would be more of a resource. They are free to browse when they want, and don’t have to leave the Facebook site if they are in the middle of posting their own pictures or chatting.

How did you come across our GoSocial Store application?

We were just browsing the Shopify App Store. It was a breeze to set up so we went for it.

What have you found most useful about the GoSocial Store so far?

The layout looks clean and professional and it updates whenever we update our product line without any action on our part. In 5 minutes we were up and running.

Anything else you would like to add?

Thanks for building such a user-friendly, functional app! It will be a great resource for us as we continue to grow our customer base. You can find Satchel & Page’s beautiful bags and travel accessories at www.satchel-page.com, or in their Facebook store (powered by GoSocial Store of course). You can also follow them on twitter and Facebook.