SOHO interviews Ali Asaria, CEO and Founder of Well.ca
Interview by Moe Somani, President/CEO, SOHO Business Group

“You have to do something daring and different” says Ali Asaria, Founder of Well.ca, winner of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award and creater of Brickbreaker (yes the game on Blackberry).

Tell us a little bit about your background.  Where did you go to school and what field did you study?
I studied Computer Engineering at the University of Waterloo. I gained a lot of experience at Research in Motion, and worked there before they began making phones. My background is in hardware engineering and microprocessor design, but at RIM and Microsoft I also got to work on things that impacted millions of people. I realized that I really liked having that kind of impact, which influenced my decision to create Well.ca.

How long were you at Research in Motion?
I worked there at first as a student, then full time from 2001 to 2006

Wow!  Did you really create Brickbreaker (the Blackberry game)? 
Yes, I really wrote Brickbreaker! It wasn't part of my day to day work at RIM, just a fun project that I worked on, on the side. Originally the storyline was about ninjas. At the time it was just a silly thing to play with, but now it is on millions of blackberries, worldwide.

What inspired you to leave RIM and take the entrepreneurial route?
I wanted a change from working at a big company. I learned a lot at the big companies that I worked at, but I was young and I wanted to get my hands dirty and try something on my own.

Do you come from an entrepreneur family?
My dad started a successful pharmacy business in downtown Guelph, so yes.

If so, what strengths do you feel you acquired?
Another hard one. Probably tenacity and daring, a thorough understanding of how the pharmacy business works in Canada, and an entrepreneurial spirit.

Is Well.ca your first entrepreneurial venture?
Yes.

How did you come up with the idea of Well.ca?
Hometown pharmacy + computer engineering experience + passion for the web and the "geek" world + an entrepreneurial family. It kind of just adds up.

Was it challenging raising money and attracting investors?
This is one of the biggest challenges that I faced, but it's also one of my biggest strengths. Being able to impress people who invest in small companies for a living and have seen it all is difficult. It's like being on Dragon's Den every single day. I like understanding the metrics, and talking about the business's strengths.

How did you win the confidence of investors?  What did they want to see from you?   Was it hard to be taken seriously considering your age?
Of course it was hard to be taken seriously. Especially at first when no one had ever heard of Well.ca and I would talk about the idea of building the biggest ecommerce site in Canada and they would just laugh. I had to have the hard numbers in place to get them to take me seriously and be confident in me. So I did things like free shipping and personalized notes on each order, which got me numbers and also got Well.ca noticed. Now because we have more traction, I get taken much more seriously.

What type of qualities do you look for in the people that work for you? Can you describe the people that work for you?
We hire independent thinkers and learners.  At the same time, we need people who are humble enough to take direction from someone who has done it before. We have a great team of really really smart, innovative, and extremely hard-working  people, who are willing to put a lot of effort into making Well.ca the best it can be.

Canadians are known as big online social networkers but lagging in online purchasing compared to the U.S.  although this is growing.  How do you create confidence and trust on your website with clients to make purchases online?
The biggest thing we do is take phone calls. A real person answers when you call, which is extremely reassuring for people who have never purchased from an online store before. We are also registered as a real pharmacy, which reassures people that there are some standards in place for how we do business. We don't send unsolicited emails, we are strict about sharing customer information, and we have lots of secure payment options. I think the most important thing we can do is do a great job of keeping our promises about privacy and security. If other people can reassure our customers that shopping at Well.ca is safe, then we've really done it right.

Have you engaged in social media marketing (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, etc) and how do you feel using social media as a marketing tool?
Of course. We tweet frequently, maintain a Facebook account, and publicize contests, new products and newsletters. We have a blog, and the social networking sites direct traffic to the both the blog and the web site.

Are there any other marketing tools that you recommend for online marketers to get the word out on their company and more importantly, drive customers and revenue?
Obviously SEO and SEM. These are simply necessities for any successful e-commerce business. We put a lot of time and effort to making sure we do SEO right. We also put a lot of work into making it easy for customers to tell our story. Word of mouth is a huge driver of sales, in ways we can't even measure. So we actually see our Customer Care team as marketers, too. We honestly believe that the best way to market any product or service is making sure that the service is the very very best that it can be. So our entire company is focused on making it so. Email marketing, cross-promotions, and affiliate programs are also great assets for online marketers .

What is your value proposition at Well.ca?  Why are customers buying from you?
This is the only online store of its kind in Canada. 1) We have the widest selection of any online health and beauty store in Canada. 2) We offer free shipping on every single order, with no minimums. 3) We make it extremely easy and safe to order online.


Has the economic climate that Canada has experienced over the last 12-18 months affected your business in a positive or negative way and why?
It's really hard to tell, because we didn't exist for very long before the downturn. But our suspicions are that it has actually helped us. We sell relatively inexpensive products, many of which are daily necessities that need to be replenished. In an economic downturn, we'd like to think that most people wouldn't postpone the purchase of shampoo or toothpaste the way they might a new car or laptop.

What would you say are the key fundamental factors of creating an online business?   What has attributed to your success to date?
You have to do something daring and different. You can't just move retail business online and expect things to sell. You have to be bold and unique, and provide something people can't get anywhere else. And you just have to understand all the nuances and details of doing business online. The security, the depersonalization, the fact that most people will find out about your business through a search engine. Taking those factors into consideration and responding in the actual way you do business is key.

Where do you see Well.ca in 5 years?  What is your vision for the company?
Well.ca is going to be the largest online store in Canada. It'll be a household name. But we will still provide excellent service and friendly customer care.

What do you feel you need to do as a CEO to continue growing Well.ca and take it to the next level of success?
We need to market harder, because there are a lot of people who won't hear about Well.ca in any other way. We need to let people know that we exist and that we are awesome. In the mean time, we need to ensure that the foundation that we have build to prepare for that growth is strong enough to scale, so that when we are 10 times our current size, we can still provide the same excellent service.

Do you have any mentors that you look up to?
Definitely. My dad is one, for running a small town pharmacy, remembering people's names, and building real relationships with consumers. We also look up to Zappos as a company and love the model that Tony Hsieh has built.

Who or what do you use as a sounding board?  Are you involved in any mentorship or advice groups?
I surround myself with a lot of knowledgeable and talented advisers, including our angel investors. People like Jordan Banks, Managing Director of Facebook Canada, and Dave Coelin, Managing Partner of Innovation Grade Capital, definitely act as a sounding board for me.

What keeps you up at night?  What if anything do you worry about?
As we scale the company we need to scale the team. We are so proud of the culture that we have here and the people here. It is great to come into work in the morning and genuinely like everyone you work with.But, how do we build a whole troupe of wonderful people? Recruiting them is difficult. Will we run out of wonderful? Scaling a team is a difficult problem. You become known for having these really smart, really wonderful people and you have to keep hiring that way. We keep upping the bar, and keeping it up is a challenge.