How did Sportega achieve year‑on‑year growth of more than 100% in several European markets?

Already years ago, the operators of the Czech e‑shop Sportega decided to expand into foreign markets and thus gain new customers from various European countries. After successfully launching their first e‑shops in several European countries, they were looking for a partner for customer support in new markets. Outsourcing customer support from NK Expand helped the Sportega brand ensure the quality of customer support and achieve record results in new markets in France, Italy and Poland.

The client

Sportega is a major Czech e‑shop and chain of stores specializing in sports clothing and equipment. It was founded in 2002 under the brand Sportobchod.

In more than 20 years on the market, Sportega has earned the trust of more than 1.5 million customers. Its e‑shops attract the attention of 750,000 visitors every month. This contributes to an annual turnover of over 500 Million CZK and more than 200,000 orders per year.

The challenge

Sportega needed to establish local customer support in the newly opened market in France. Therefore they were looking for someone who would secure fast, high‑quality and reliable communication with customers of their foreign‑language versions of foreign e‑shops.

The main goal was to provide professional and fast customer support to ensure consumer satisfaction and communication in the local language.

Sportega also expected flexibility in adapting customer support to their internal needs, the ability to efficiently resolve customer requirements in their native language, and at the same time to act in accordance with the corporate culture and values of the Sportega brand.

When expanding into European markets, Sportega faced these key challenges:

Language barriers in customer support

Sportega required that customer support in selected European countries be provided by native speakers who would support the trustworthiness of the e‑shop. At the same time, the company also required the ability to communicate with these operators in Czech. Therefore, it was necessary to carefully select an operator for each country that would fulfil these requirements and high expectations.

Perfect customer experience

Rapid training and launch of customer support, including availability on local phone numbers, were essential to ensure successful entry into new markets.

Customer support solutions abroad

NK Expand's customer support specialists prepared and implemented (in cooperation with the internal team of the Sportega e-shop) an effective and localized solution for foreign language customer support.

Localization and native speakers

To ensure continuity and customer support in France, Sportega initially temporarily handled customer support internally.
After completing the training, the NK Expand's operator took over the open agenda and began to resolve customer inquiries herself. This fulfilled the requirement for a native French speaker with the ability to communicate with internal team of Sportega in Czech.
It was thanks to the high‑quality functioning customer support in French, that NK Expand provided support also in other European countries (Italy, Poland, Slovenia) immediately after the e‑shops were launched there.
For the needs of the Polish language version of the e‑shop, an operator without knowledge of Czech has been chosen after a consultation with Sportega. Her qualities consisted mainly of a strong customer orientation and the ability to provide quality assistance with purchases and motivate visitors to complete orders. After this experience, the requirement to communicate in Czech proved to be redundant. The main emphasis for future customer support operators of the Sportega e‑shop will be put primarily on communication, customer orientation, and business skills.

Results

SPORTEGA FRANCE (1/2024–10/2024) – The busiest period of the year – November

SPORTEGA ITALY (7/2024–10/2024) – The busiest period of the year – November

SPORTEGA POLAND (5/2024–10/2024) – The busiest period of the year – July

SPORTEGA SLOVENIA (10/2024)

Customers often appreciate the speed of response, the willingness to resolve their requests and the professional attitudes across all countries.

Sportega is successfully entering other foreign markets benefiting from NK Expand's customer support.

Year‑on‑year sales growth of Sportega e‑shop

Sales growth of 105% in France and tremendous satisfaction of French customers.

In Italy, year‑on‑year sales growth of more than 314% is among Sportega's highest year‑on‑year sales growth.

New markets for further expansion abroad

Poland - After a very successful launch and first year of operation, the Polish version of the e‑shop is in 5th position in terms of total sales.

Slovenia - The first month after the launch of the e‑shop brought very promising results.

The cooperation

The cooperation between Sportega and NK Expand demonstrates how quality customer support can enhance the success of an e‑shop when expanding into new foreign markets. In addition, NK Expand brings competitive advantages over other localization agencies, such as rapid implementation of solutions tailored to the specifics of each market and high flexibility of customer support in adapting to the requirements of the e‑shop.

Thanks to cooperation with NK Expand, the Sportega e‑shop has successfully expanded its operations to France, Italy, Poland and Slovenia. Following this positive experience, the company is now planning to expand to other European countries. NK Expand's specialists are of course ready to assist with this.

Nikol Slezáková, Head of Customer Care at the Sportega e-shop, summarized the benefits of cooperation with NK Expand in the following words:

“NK Expand provides excellent customer support for our foreign clients. Cooperation with NK Expand is a great benefit to us, as thanks to their expert team and quality of their services we are sure that our foreign customers are taken care of with the utmost attention.

I recommend NK Expand to anyone looking for a reliable and experienced partner to provide international customer support. Their services clearly exceed the usual standards, which makes cooperation with them very valuable.”

This case study demonstrates that Czech companies can achieve great success in expanding into international e‑commerce markets with a well‑thought‑out strategy and an effective approach of foreign customer support specialists.

Do you also want to successfully expand abroad with your e‑shop? Contact us! With NK Expand you can handle foreign expansion with confidence and without worries.