{"id":37703,"date":"2023-10-20T14:51:51","date_gmt":"2023-10-20T14:51:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/startupsmart.test\/2023\/10\/20\/from-ballet-dancer-to-chief-executive-how-alexandra-mills-helped-grow-aussiecommerce-into-a-100-million-business-startupsmart-2\/"},"modified":"2023-10-20T14:51:51","modified_gmt":"2023-10-20T14:51:51","slug":"from-ballet-dancer-to-chief-executive-how-alexandra-mills-helped-grow-aussiecommerce-into-a-100-million-business-startupsmart-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/uncategorized\/from-ballet-dancer-to-chief-executive-how-alexandra-mills-helped-grow-aussiecommerce-into-a-100-million-business-startupsmart-2\/","title":{"rendered":"From ballet dancer to chief executive: How Alexandra Mills helped grow AussieCommerce into a $100 million business – StartupSmart"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Alexandra Mills was once a professional ballet dancer but is now the chief executive of a suite of brands owned by <\/em>e-commerce group AussieCommerce<\/em>, including The Home, Brands Exclusive and TheActive.<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/h5>\n
\u00a0<\/em>Last year, AussieCommerce recorded statutory revenue of more than $100 million<\/a>. <\/em>SmartCompany sat down with Mills to find out why she recommends hiring people who\u2019ve taken time off and how ballet and business have more in common than you think. <\/em><\/h5>\n

My first career was as a professional ballet dancer.<\/p>\n

I was with a company in Germany but by my mid-20s I decided I wanted a change and another challenge<\/a>. I knew I wanted to get into the startup world, so I started as a management consultant to gain experience.<\/p>\n

After a year I joined Rocket Internet in Australia when they first entered the market here.<\/p>\n

AussieCommerce bought one of the sites, which is how I joined them. I became chief executive a few months later.<\/p>\n

Did I ever think I would become a CEO? Definitely not.<\/p>\n

I first got into operations within startups but that was also by chance because it was the role available. I did everything \u2013 logistics, internal operations, customer service and managing the product team.<\/p>\n

But I never thought I would be running the whole thing.<\/p>\n

When I got the opportunity, I knew it would be hard, but I thought I\u2019d try it because I love a challenge. Now I can\u2019t imagine doing anything else.<\/p>\n

There are some skills from ballet that are very transferrable to business.<\/p>\n

The obvious one is self-discipline. To get into ballet and make it professionally, just like any sport, you have to be driven from a very early age and dedicate your life to it.<\/p>\n

You also stay very humble because you\u2019re getting feedback and criticism all the time, from morning to evening. You need that to survive because you\u2019ll never be perfect. And that helps in business because you manage to stay very grounded.<\/p>\n

Also, to lead a team you need a lot of outward confidence no matter how you feel inside. You need people to feel calm and motivated. I\u2019m very conscious of being able to turn that on no matter how I\u2019m feeling \u2013 just like on stage.<\/p>\n

You can so easily fall into the trap of hiring people who do similar things.<\/p>\n

I like to employ people who haven\u2019t done this sort of thing before because you\u2019re going to get a freshness. Even if it\u2019s just that they\u2019ve taken some time off to go sailing or volunteering for charity. It shows they\u2019re not scared to get their hands dirty.<\/p>\n

I think it\u2019s very important to look for different things and I\u2019m always willing to employ on personable attributes rather than previous experience.<\/p>\n

In our first year we had something like 400% growth and we were doing all that together. That\u2019s exciting, because everyone has to do everything.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t employ people who stick to their job description.<\/p>\n

But if you can\u2019t get those first seeds of growth, it\u2019s really hard to motivate people.<\/p>\n

The difference between us and our competitors, who still make large losses, is marketing spend. They\u2019re spending millions on marketing, and we\u2019re not.<\/p>\n

The key, basic principle of marketing is having the right product at the right price. People talk about it. Someone\u2019s going to tell someone if you\u2019ve got a good offering.<\/p>\n

We do a lot of content marketing to offer people a reason to come to our site other than sales. Be an expert; content is the way forward.<\/p>\n

Social media is also important to get your brand out there.<\/p>\n

But at the end of the day it\u2019s more about your product and the price than anything else.<\/p>\n

In the early days the thing that kept me awake at night was when a customer had a bad experience.<\/p>\n

People get very upset when they don\u2019t understand what went wrong and they can spread that everywhere in the age of the internet. At the beginning, we weren\u2019t set up for that. It was just me checking social media on the weekend and stressing out.<\/p>\n

But issues are going to happen. They\u2019re growing pains and you aren\u2019t going to have a smooth process from day one.<\/p>\n

It still pains me seeing refunds coming through but you have to learn from it and see why.<\/p>\n

Now fraud is becoming an issue which is very, very painful. You wouldn\u2019t think you would have to set aside money for fraud prevention [as a startup] but it\u2019s something you have to do now.<\/p>\n

In the early days I took a lot on myself and if you do that, you can risk burning out.<\/p>\n

In the last year I\u2019ve employed some key people to do more day-to-day stuff for me so I can think bigger picture. But before that, it was pretty tough.<\/p>\n

If it doesn\u2019t work, just change it.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Article originally published by SmartCompany. Follow SmartCompany on Facebook<\/a>, LinkedIn<\/a> and Twitter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Follow StartupSmart on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, LinkedIn<\/a> and Soundcloud<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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