1 00:00:00,180 --> 00:00:06,060 Gift biz unwrapped episode three hundred and fifty nine one and 2 00:00:06,060 --> 00:00:10,020 build a business on the back of it. 3 00:00:10,020 --> 00:00:11,610 Attention gifters bakers, 4 00:00:11,610 --> 00:00:14,700 crafters, and makers pursuing your dream can be fun. 5 00:00:14,700 --> 00:00:18,390 Whether you have an established business or looking to start one. 6 00:00:18,390 --> 00:00:21,180 Now you are in the right place. 7 00:00:21,210 --> 00:00:23,850 This is gift to biz unwrapped, 8 00:00:23,880 --> 00:00:27,390 helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business. 9 00:00:26,820 --> 00:00:27,390 Join us for an episode, 10 00:00:27,390 --> 00:00:29,610 packed full of invaluable guidance, 11 00:00:29,730 --> 00:00:32,580 resources, and the support you need to grow. 12 00:00:32,580 --> 00:00:33,750 Your gift biz. 13 00:00:33,990 --> 00:00:37,830 Here is your host gift biz gal Sue moon Heights. 14 00:00:39,420 --> 00:00:39,840 Hi there. 15 00:00:40,080 --> 00:00:40,770 It's Sue. 16 00:00:41,010 --> 00:00:42,510 Thanks for joining me here today. 17 00:00:43,200 --> 00:00:46,290 If you're listening to this right as it's gone live. 18 00:00:46,500 --> 00:00:48,360 So today being Saturday, 19 00:00:48,360 --> 00:00:50,790 February 26th, 20 00:00:50,790 --> 00:00:54,600 tonight is the night that maker's MBA closes for this next 21 00:00:53,880 --> 00:00:58,440 class. I'm actually out in Colorado spending time with the family 22 00:00:58,440 --> 00:00:59,250 this weekend, 23 00:00:59,520 --> 00:01:02,940 but I am accessible if you have any last minute questions 24 00:01:02,940 --> 00:01:05,520 on the program and whether it's right for you, 25 00:01:06,180 --> 00:01:08,310 probably the best way to reach out to me right now 26 00:01:08,310 --> 00:01:11,730 is by email sue@sumoheight.com. 27 00:01:12,420 --> 00:01:14,130 Leave a message if I don't answer. 28 00:01:14,190 --> 00:01:16,560 And I promise to get back to you right away, 29 00:01:17,040 --> 00:01:21,450 as always wondering about maker's MBA for next time, 30 00:01:21,900 --> 00:01:24,450 then you can get on the wait list over at gift 31 00:01:24,450 --> 00:01:25,890 biz, unwrapped.com 32 00:01:26,070 --> 00:01:29,430 forward slash M M B a waitlist. 33 00:01:29,790 --> 00:01:31,650 And then I'll let you know when the course opens for 34 00:01:31,650 --> 00:01:32,550 enrollment. Again, 35 00:01:33,480 --> 00:01:37,800 today's conversation is about the headquarters of your business, 36 00:01:38,160 --> 00:01:40,800 especially if you don't have a brick and mortar shop, 37 00:01:41,040 --> 00:01:43,230 but even so I say, 38 00:01:43,290 --> 00:01:45,300 this is your home base, 39 00:01:45,720 --> 00:01:49,380 the Cod off of which everything else for your business connects 40 00:01:49,470 --> 00:01:50,550 and expands. 41 00:01:51,360 --> 00:01:53,310 It wasn't like this in years past, 42 00:01:53,340 --> 00:01:58,650 but now an online presence is essential and make no mistake 43 00:01:58,650 --> 00:01:59,160 about it. 44 00:01:59,610 --> 00:02:03,240 Your own website is what you want to be striving for. 45 00:02:03,810 --> 00:02:06,480 It's great to have a shop on Etsy or sell through 46 00:02:06,480 --> 00:02:11,520 Amazon, but long-term you want your own self controlled site for 47 00:02:11,520 --> 00:02:13,710 the most stable business structure. 48 00:02:14,760 --> 00:02:17,040 My guest today is a Shopify expert. 49 00:02:17,070 --> 00:02:19,950 So you're going to hear a lot about that platform, 50 00:02:20,340 --> 00:02:21,300 my preferred one, 51 00:02:21,300 --> 00:02:21,960 by the way, 52 00:02:22,710 --> 00:02:25,290 but don't click out if you've got a site somewhere else, 53 00:02:25,290 --> 00:02:29,010 because we're talking in depth about websites overall, 54 00:02:29,550 --> 00:02:35,280 including the most important first question to ask before you even 55 00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:42,570 go one step further Today, 56 00:02:42,750 --> 00:02:45,660 let's talk with chase climber chases. 57 00:02:45,660 --> 00:02:47,700 The co-founder at electric eye, 58 00:02:47,730 --> 00:02:52,320 where he and his team create Shopify powered sales machines from 59 00:02:52,320 --> 00:02:55,890 strategic design development and marketing decisions. 60 00:02:56,160 --> 00:02:57,960 He's also the host of honest, 61 00:02:57,960 --> 00:03:02,950 e-commerce a weekly podcast that provides online store owners with honest, 62 00:03:03,070 --> 00:03:07,180 actionable advice to increase their sales and grow their business. 63 00:03:07,540 --> 00:03:10,090 Chase. Welcome to the gift is unwrapped podcast. 64 00:03:10,570 --> 00:03:11,290 Thanks for having me. 65 00:03:11,290 --> 00:03:11,860 I'm excited. 66 00:03:12,190 --> 00:03:14,830 I am really looking forward to this conversation too. 67 00:03:14,830 --> 00:03:15,940 I was telling you earlier, 68 00:03:15,940 --> 00:03:20,470 I am a huge Shopify fan and you're connected intimately with 69 00:03:20,470 --> 00:03:21,160 that platform. 70 00:03:21,160 --> 00:03:23,290 So that's going to be a good conversation, 71 00:03:23,320 --> 00:03:25,000 plus just e-commerce overall, 72 00:03:25,000 --> 00:03:26,710 regardless of what platform you're on. 73 00:03:26,800 --> 00:03:28,210 So looking forward to that, 74 00:03:28,450 --> 00:03:29,890 but before we get started, 75 00:03:29,950 --> 00:03:33,580 I have a question for you that I ask everybody. 76 00:03:33,940 --> 00:03:37,930 And that is to have you describe yourself as a motivational 77 00:03:37,930 --> 00:03:38,890 candle. When, 78 00:03:38,890 --> 00:03:41,530 if there was something that really would resonate with you in 79 00:03:41,530 --> 00:03:44,980 terms of a color and quote that turned into a candle, 80 00:03:45,310 --> 00:03:46,660 what would that look like for you? 81 00:03:47,260 --> 00:03:48,490 Ooh, a motivational candle. 82 00:03:48,490 --> 00:03:50,650 So as far as color goes, 83 00:03:50,650 --> 00:03:54,760 I would go with like a light blue ish for two 84 00:03:54,760 --> 00:03:56,200 reasons, one, 85 00:03:56,260 --> 00:03:58,120 it would match my eyes and my mom would be excited 86 00:03:58,120 --> 00:03:58,570 about that. 87 00:03:58,600 --> 00:03:59,230 But two, 88 00:03:59,290 --> 00:04:01,600 I would say that it kind of goes with the smell 89 00:04:01,630 --> 00:04:02,440 that I'm going after, 90 00:04:02,440 --> 00:04:05,650 which would be like a sea breeze or a Bahama breeze 91 00:04:05,680 --> 00:04:08,110 type oceany smell and ocean, 92 00:04:08,110 --> 00:04:09,520 and the beautiful sky that's blue as well. 93 00:04:09,790 --> 00:04:10,510 So there's all that. 94 00:04:10,510 --> 00:04:12,370 And then the motivational quote would be, 95 00:04:12,430 --> 00:04:13,630 imagine yourself here, 96 00:04:13,690 --> 00:04:14,560 something like that. 97 00:04:14,830 --> 00:04:17,470 Honestly, one of my life goals is to buy a house 98 00:04:17,470 --> 00:04:19,450 on the water and that's kind of why I work so 99 00:04:19,450 --> 00:04:21,790 hard and try to help other entrepreneurs is to try to 100 00:04:21,790 --> 00:04:22,060 get there. 101 00:04:22,060 --> 00:04:23,680 I literally have a mini painting on my desk. 102 00:04:23,680 --> 00:04:24,610 I'm looking at it right now. 103 00:04:24,610 --> 00:04:25,570 It's off to the right of me, 104 00:04:25,630 --> 00:04:28,180 which is an island up in I'm from Columbus, 105 00:04:28,180 --> 00:04:29,290 Ohio, and lake. 106 00:04:29,290 --> 00:04:29,980 Erie's above us. 107 00:04:29,980 --> 00:04:31,360 And there's an island there called put-in bay. 108 00:04:31,660 --> 00:04:33,970 And my family friends have a lake house up there and 109 00:04:34,030 --> 00:04:35,680 it's just like inspiration to kind of work harder. 110 00:04:36,100 --> 00:04:36,730 I love that. 111 00:04:36,730 --> 00:04:40,240 And I really liked the idea also that we're not just 112 00:04:40,270 --> 00:04:43,150 in our business to make money, 113 00:04:43,270 --> 00:04:46,120 have more followers sell all of our product. 114 00:04:46,150 --> 00:04:47,710 There's another reason we're there, 115 00:04:47,770 --> 00:04:49,030 right? Like something else, 116 00:04:49,030 --> 00:04:50,560 that's lifestyle enhancing. 117 00:04:50,560 --> 00:04:53,140 And this is your vision to have a place that where 118 00:04:53,140 --> 00:04:54,400 you can imagine yourself, 119 00:04:54,430 --> 00:04:56,080 the island or on the water, 120 00:04:56,110 --> 00:04:57,460 whatever. Absolutely. 121 00:04:57,730 --> 00:05:00,700 I think that's really important because I don't know about you 122 00:05:00,700 --> 00:05:02,470 chase, but when times get tough, 123 00:05:02,590 --> 00:05:05,740 it can't just be all about the numbers and getting more 124 00:05:05,740 --> 00:05:09,340 sales. There has to be another reason why you're dedicating your 125 00:05:09,340 --> 00:05:11,080 life to whatever your business is. 126 00:05:11,410 --> 00:05:13,750 I am pretty sure at this point, 127 00:05:13,750 --> 00:05:14,320 I could maybe, 128 00:05:14,320 --> 00:05:14,620 I don't know. 129 00:05:14,890 --> 00:05:16,720 I could probably go make money if I sold out like 130 00:05:16,750 --> 00:05:18,970 worked for a bigger company and not to toot my own 131 00:05:18,970 --> 00:05:20,830 horn, I'm pretty smart when it comes to e-commerce. 132 00:05:20,830 --> 00:05:22,570 So I'm sure that someone would want to hire me if 133 00:05:22,570 --> 00:05:24,400 I just wanted to clock out and not do it, 134 00:05:24,400 --> 00:05:25,150 but that's not me. 135 00:05:25,150 --> 00:05:26,230 I love entrepreneurship. 136 00:05:26,230 --> 00:05:28,780 I've got an amazing team that were supporting me and my 137 00:05:28,780 --> 00:05:30,910 partner have a bunch of families that depend on us. 138 00:05:30,910 --> 00:05:31,330 So, you know, 139 00:05:31,330 --> 00:05:32,260 I'm not giving up on this. 140 00:05:32,260 --> 00:05:32,980 This thing's awesome. 141 00:05:33,310 --> 00:05:34,510 Wonderful, perfect. 142 00:05:34,510 --> 00:05:37,120 And I can't wait to tap into all of that genius. 143 00:05:37,180 --> 00:05:40,270 Give us a little background of how you decided e-commerce was 144 00:05:40,270 --> 00:05:41,500 the place where you want it to be. 145 00:05:41,920 --> 00:05:42,190 You know what? 146 00:05:42,190 --> 00:05:44,470 I would probably give all that credit to my business partner. 147 00:05:44,590 --> 00:05:45,820 So many moons ago, 148 00:05:45,820 --> 00:05:48,040 I was in a band and traveling the country. 149 00:05:48,040 --> 00:05:49,360 I didn't pay the bills at all, 150 00:05:49,360 --> 00:05:50,500 but I saw a lot of cool stuff. 151 00:05:51,010 --> 00:05:52,450 And the whole time I was doing that, 152 00:05:52,450 --> 00:05:53,530 I was like freelancing. 153 00:05:53,530 --> 00:05:54,610 And just learning a little bit of this, 154 00:05:54,610 --> 00:05:56,110 a little bit of that things that I could do from 155 00:05:56,110 --> 00:05:57,160 the road remotely, 156 00:05:57,200 --> 00:05:59,600 which kind of is funny because I still do everything remotely 157 00:05:59,600 --> 00:05:59,960 these days. 158 00:05:59,960 --> 00:06:00,410 But anyways, 159 00:06:00,710 --> 00:06:01,850 as I was doing that, 160 00:06:01,850 --> 00:06:03,410 I actually met my business partner, 161 00:06:03,830 --> 00:06:07,130 him and I designed the album artwork for my band together. 162 00:06:07,130 --> 00:06:08,930 And that's like how we first met 12, 163 00:06:08,930 --> 00:06:09,860 13 years ago. 164 00:06:10,160 --> 00:06:12,170 And through that friendship was born. 165 00:06:12,470 --> 00:06:16,340 And then when he left his company that he was working 166 00:06:16,340 --> 00:06:19,400 at, he was like the third hire at a pretty notable 167 00:06:19,400 --> 00:06:21,860 direct to consumer like vintage apparel brand out of Columbus, 168 00:06:21,860 --> 00:06:22,610 Ohio here. 169 00:06:22,970 --> 00:06:26,060 And he had a lot of experience in e-commerce and in 170 00:06:26,090 --> 00:06:28,430 kind of design and a little bit of Shopify stuff. 171 00:06:28,430 --> 00:06:29,180 So when he left there, 172 00:06:29,180 --> 00:06:32,060 he was like freelancing and making every mistake in the world. 173 00:06:32,360 --> 00:06:34,580 I was just trying to help him out originally just because 174 00:06:34,580 --> 00:06:34,850 it was like, 175 00:06:34,880 --> 00:06:35,990 oh, I've made all these mistakes before. 176 00:06:35,990 --> 00:06:37,010 Cause I've been doing this since, 177 00:06:37,010 --> 00:06:37,880 before I was 18. 178 00:06:37,880 --> 00:06:38,840 Like, don't do this. 179 00:06:38,840 --> 00:06:40,580 This is how to position yourself this way and all this 180 00:06:40,580 --> 00:06:42,650 stuff. And kind of just threw me trying to teach him 181 00:06:42,650 --> 00:06:45,260 the entrepreneurship ropes and we're tag teaming, 182 00:06:45,260 --> 00:06:46,970 these Shopify projects together. 183 00:06:47,180 --> 00:06:48,800 He was kind of doing a little bit of the design 184 00:06:48,800 --> 00:06:49,460 dev stuff. 185 00:06:49,460 --> 00:06:52,520 And I was coming in with the marketing and really kind 186 00:06:52,520 --> 00:06:53,300 of struck a chord there. 187 00:06:53,300 --> 00:06:55,460 We got a bunch of clients really fast and we realized 188 00:06:55,460 --> 00:06:55,700 that, you know, 189 00:06:55,700 --> 00:06:56,540 we were onto something. 190 00:06:56,540 --> 00:06:57,260 And next thing we know, 191 00:06:57,260 --> 00:06:59,210 we kind of had an agency as far as getting into 192 00:06:59,240 --> 00:07:00,440 e-commerce specifically. 193 00:07:00,440 --> 00:07:01,640 I'd give a lot of that to my partner, 194 00:07:01,640 --> 00:07:04,610 Sean, but I'd been in digital marketing and kind of like 195 00:07:04,610 --> 00:07:07,760 strategy and paid ads for the last 10 years. 196 00:07:08,780 --> 00:07:13,430 See about Shopify specifically that made it your platform of expertise. 197 00:07:13,730 --> 00:07:14,690 Yeah, that's a great question. 198 00:07:14,690 --> 00:07:15,980 So when we got started, 199 00:07:16,010 --> 00:07:18,470 we kind of always knew we wanted to do e-commerce, 200 00:07:18,470 --> 00:07:18,950 which is funny. 201 00:07:18,950 --> 00:07:20,930 Cause I was kind of scared of e-commerce before. 202 00:07:20,960 --> 00:07:21,680 Like, cause it was, 203 00:07:21,680 --> 00:07:24,710 people are allowing me to make improvements to their website. 204 00:07:24,830 --> 00:07:26,690 What if my improvement I make is wrong or what if 205 00:07:26,690 --> 00:07:27,680 I ruin their website? 206 00:07:27,680 --> 00:07:29,630 And then they lose all their sales and their livelihoods over. 207 00:07:29,870 --> 00:07:31,880 Those were things terrors that I had in my mind. 208 00:07:31,970 --> 00:07:33,770 And then we started to use Shopify and I was like, 209 00:07:33,770 --> 00:07:35,060 wait, you can't break. 210 00:07:35,060 --> 00:07:36,050 This just is so cool. 211 00:07:36,050 --> 00:07:38,210 Like all the hard things are already taken care of by 212 00:07:38,270 --> 00:07:39,860 Shopify because it's a hosted solution. 213 00:07:40,070 --> 00:07:41,900 Why don't you get the payment providers set up and you're 214 00:07:41,900 --> 00:07:42,410 good to go. 215 00:07:42,440 --> 00:07:43,760 It's pretty hard to break this thing. 216 00:07:43,940 --> 00:07:45,800 So it gave me a little more faith in kind of 217 00:07:45,800 --> 00:07:47,750 the strategies that we had and what we wanted to do 218 00:07:47,750 --> 00:07:48,500 for our clients. 219 00:07:48,770 --> 00:07:50,240 So technology wise, 220 00:07:50,240 --> 00:07:52,880 that was cool because it gave us the confidence as young 221 00:07:52,880 --> 00:07:55,490 entrepreneurs. So like really tackle this platform. 222 00:07:55,490 --> 00:07:56,270 But outside of that, 223 00:07:56,270 --> 00:08:00,040 they are honestly the best ecosystem to exist in from like 224 00:08:00,040 --> 00:08:01,250 a partner's perspective. 225 00:08:01,550 --> 00:08:05,210 I've got mentors and other agencies that I'm friends with in 226 00:08:05,210 --> 00:08:06,020 the community. 227 00:08:06,200 --> 00:08:08,330 And then there are people at Shopify that have championed us 228 00:08:08,330 --> 00:08:10,070 since, before we even started the agency, 229 00:08:10,070 --> 00:08:11,390 like giving us advice, 230 00:08:11,450 --> 00:08:14,840 introducing us to people that needed help doing beta programs with 231 00:08:14,920 --> 00:08:16,760 it was just something I'd never felt before. 232 00:08:16,940 --> 00:08:19,400 Historically, I kind of had some experience in the WordPress world 233 00:08:19,400 --> 00:08:22,220 and it was just the responses I was getting from people 234 00:08:22,220 --> 00:08:25,250 at Shopify and the stuff that was happening in the ecosystem. 235 00:08:25,250 --> 00:08:27,920 And the partnerships was just like on a whole other level 236 00:08:27,950 --> 00:08:29,750 than what I had experienced from like WordPress. 237 00:08:29,750 --> 00:08:30,260 So I was like, 238 00:08:30,290 --> 00:08:31,010 this is pretty cool. 239 00:08:31,010 --> 00:08:31,730 Let's try this. 240 00:08:32,030 --> 00:08:33,830 And then it got to a point where the majority of 241 00:08:33,830 --> 00:08:36,350 our clients were on Shopify within that first year. 242 00:08:36,350 --> 00:08:37,100 And we were just like, 243 00:08:37,130 --> 00:08:41,300 why even build out processes and systems for another platform when 244 00:08:41,300 --> 00:08:42,530 this one is clearly a winner. 245 00:08:42,830 --> 00:08:44,120 I totally agree with you. 246 00:08:44,120 --> 00:08:47,030 And I am a huge Shopify fan as well. 247 00:08:47,030 --> 00:08:47,930 My other business, 248 00:08:47,930 --> 00:08:50,630 the ribbon print company is a Shopify site. 249 00:08:50,750 --> 00:08:52,610 Gift is unwrapped as a WordPress site. 250 00:08:52,610 --> 00:08:54,770 So I can speak from both sides, 251 00:08:55,080 --> 00:08:59,370 but I would always recommend to our audience here to go 252 00:08:59,370 --> 00:09:00,300 with Shopify. 253 00:09:00,420 --> 00:09:03,570 Clearly the platform is choice for a product-based business, 254 00:09:03,780 --> 00:09:05,520 hands down without a question. 255 00:09:05,760 --> 00:09:08,580 And it sounds like you really found community there and then 256 00:09:08,580 --> 00:09:10,500 liked what you were seeing with everybody, 257 00:09:10,500 --> 00:09:12,930 the support and just the platform overall. 258 00:09:13,230 --> 00:09:14,340 Yeah. And honestly, 259 00:09:14,340 --> 00:09:17,910 when we started the business and like niche down into Shopify, 260 00:09:18,090 --> 00:09:19,620 it was not the Shopify of today. 261 00:09:19,980 --> 00:09:22,200 It was a little over six years ago, 262 00:09:22,260 --> 00:09:23,880 they hadn't even gone public yet. 263 00:09:24,150 --> 00:09:28,110 They didn't even have their marketing team doing brand awareness marketing 264 00:09:28,110 --> 00:09:29,970 yet. Right now you see their ads everywhere. 265 00:09:29,970 --> 00:09:31,230 But back then it was nothing. 266 00:09:31,230 --> 00:09:34,500 It was scrappy the team probably 10 X over there at 267 00:09:34,500 --> 00:09:37,440 Shopify between when we started and now maybe even more, 268 00:09:37,680 --> 00:09:42,150 the growth that they experienced was just like a happy coincidence 269 00:09:42,150 --> 00:09:42,600 with us. 270 00:09:42,630 --> 00:09:44,280 Kind of like hitching our wagon to them. 271 00:09:44,280 --> 00:09:44,790 We were just like, 272 00:09:44,790 --> 00:09:45,420 well, we like this. 273 00:09:45,420 --> 00:09:46,230 We're going to do this one. 274 00:09:46,530 --> 00:09:49,170 And then it exploded Timing was everything for you. 275 00:09:49,170 --> 00:09:50,850 Chase. That sounds amazing. 276 00:09:51,240 --> 00:09:55,230 It just worked out beautifully for someone who isn't sure that 277 00:09:55,230 --> 00:09:58,200 they'd like the platform they're on right now or knows about 278 00:09:58,200 --> 00:10:02,850 Shopify doesn't really understand what the differences are or how you 279 00:10:02,850 --> 00:10:03,780 would get started. 280 00:10:03,810 --> 00:10:06,180 I don't want this to be a whole conversation just about 281 00:10:06,180 --> 00:10:09,210 Shopify. I really want to talk about e-commerce specifically also, 282 00:10:09,480 --> 00:10:12,540 but I feel like it would be who've everybody to understand 283 00:10:12,540 --> 00:10:14,130 the platform a little bit better. 284 00:10:14,130 --> 00:10:16,650 So if someone was thinking of converting, 285 00:10:16,680 --> 00:10:19,110 just give a little spiel about Shopify for us. 286 00:10:19,470 --> 00:10:20,700 I would say if you, 287 00:10:20,700 --> 00:10:21,300 like you said, 288 00:10:21,300 --> 00:10:22,860 if you're selling a product based business, 289 00:10:22,860 --> 00:10:24,330 if you're selling an actual product physical, 290 00:10:24,330 --> 00:10:26,310 good, maybe you can get into digital too, 291 00:10:26,310 --> 00:10:26,610 if you want, 292 00:10:26,610 --> 00:10:27,450 but let's just stick with those. 293 00:10:27,540 --> 00:10:28,410 If you're selling a physical good, 294 00:10:28,410 --> 00:10:30,390 there's like no other platform out there that's going to do 295 00:10:30,390 --> 00:10:32,070 it better than Shopify. 296 00:10:32,370 --> 00:10:36,090 It takes a lot of the annoyance of a custom site 297 00:10:36,120 --> 00:10:36,990 out of your, 298 00:10:37,050 --> 00:10:38,640 kind of what you need to deal with. 299 00:10:38,640 --> 00:10:40,860 But also you can do anything you want on Shopify. 300 00:10:40,860 --> 00:10:42,210 It's fully customizable. 301 00:10:42,210 --> 00:10:43,020 If you can build it, 302 00:10:43,020 --> 00:10:43,590 we can dream it. 303 00:10:43,590 --> 00:10:44,850 Like don't worry about that. 304 00:10:45,150 --> 00:10:48,360 It takes some of the more technical nerdy aspects of it 305 00:10:48,420 --> 00:10:49,080 off your plate, 306 00:10:49,110 --> 00:10:51,180 which is actually a benefit, 307 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:52,170 but not a detriment. 308 00:10:52,170 --> 00:10:55,440 And I think that I literally just interviewed someone yesterday on 309 00:10:55,440 --> 00:10:58,200 my podcast and he said that one of their biggest mistakes 310 00:10:58,200 --> 00:11:00,870 starting their business was building a custom website when they first 311 00:11:00,870 --> 00:11:04,290 launched. And then they turned around and they had wasted money 312 00:11:04,290 --> 00:11:06,240 on it because they just turned around and set up a 313 00:11:06,240 --> 00:11:09,390 Shopify instead and kind of leaned more into best practices instead 314 00:11:09,390 --> 00:11:10,440 of trying to be a wild card, 315 00:11:10,470 --> 00:11:12,780 which is really saying something it's easier. 316 00:11:13,110 --> 00:11:15,270 Yeah. It sure it definitely is. 317 00:11:15,270 --> 00:11:15,540 I mean, 318 00:11:15,540 --> 00:11:18,570 and you can have someone else build your site on Shopify 319 00:11:18,570 --> 00:11:20,910 too. Like if you decided that that wasn't something that you 320 00:11:20,910 --> 00:11:23,130 wanted to focus your time and intention on, 321 00:11:23,130 --> 00:11:24,060 but I'll tell you chase. 322 00:11:24,090 --> 00:11:25,920 So for the ribbon print company, 323 00:11:26,070 --> 00:11:28,050 I think we changed over. 324 00:11:28,050 --> 00:11:29,310 We did exactly what you said. 325 00:11:29,580 --> 00:11:31,080 And I don't know if it was a mistake because I 326 00:11:31,080 --> 00:11:32,910 didn't know about Shopify before, 327 00:11:33,210 --> 00:11:34,650 but I'm going to say, 328 00:11:34,710 --> 00:11:35,970 do you know when Shopify started? 329 00:11:36,420 --> 00:11:39,570 I think they are coming up on 10 years. 330 00:11:39,570 --> 00:11:44,160 Maybe. I want to say like we changed our website eight 331 00:11:44,400 --> 00:11:46,830 or even almost 10 years ago, 332 00:11:47,250 --> 00:11:48,480 like right in the middle. 333 00:11:49,380 --> 00:11:52,950 That was like a Shopify like 0.01. 334 00:11:52,990 --> 00:11:54,130 It's definitely not the monster. 335 00:11:54,130 --> 00:11:54,670 It is now. 336 00:11:54,730 --> 00:11:56,950 It is so fully robust these days. 337 00:11:57,730 --> 00:11:58,300 Well, for sure, 338 00:11:58,300 --> 00:12:00,340 because we're obviously still in there making changes, 339 00:12:00,340 --> 00:12:01,090 adjusting things, 340 00:12:01,090 --> 00:12:02,050 doing different things, 341 00:12:02,050 --> 00:12:02,980 adding other apps, 342 00:12:03,010 --> 00:12:03,610 all of that. 343 00:12:03,880 --> 00:12:05,410 But what I was going to say is, 344 00:12:05,410 --> 00:12:07,120 so there must have been up for a couple years, 345 00:12:07,120 --> 00:12:09,130 so let's say eight years ago we switched over. 346 00:12:09,220 --> 00:12:11,020 I don't even remember for sure what year, 347 00:12:11,380 --> 00:12:15,940 but we saw an increase in sales almost right away. 348 00:12:16,030 --> 00:12:19,210 And I don't know if it's because of the reputation of 349 00:12:19,210 --> 00:12:24,460 the platform or what I went from a WordPress custom design 350 00:12:24,460 --> 00:12:27,730 site hosted by a well-known hosted and company. 351 00:12:27,730 --> 00:12:31,030 So it wasn't just like one of those private hosting groups 352 00:12:31,030 --> 00:12:33,070 that used to be around if they even are anymore, 353 00:12:33,100 --> 00:12:34,330 because there's so many options, 354 00:12:34,600 --> 00:12:37,720 but immediately we saw an increase in sales. 355 00:12:38,050 --> 00:12:41,140 I would guess little bit of an educated guess here is 356 00:12:41,440 --> 00:12:43,180 that happened to a lot of our clients that switched over 357 00:12:43,180 --> 00:12:44,800 from legacy platforms to Shopify. 358 00:12:44,800 --> 00:12:47,470 And the two things that we noticed is a, 359 00:12:47,620 --> 00:12:51,100 the Shopify sites were faster and the faster your website is, 360 00:12:51,250 --> 00:12:53,500 the higher conversion rate is that's a fact, 361 00:12:53,740 --> 00:12:54,550 that's not an opinion. 362 00:12:54,550 --> 00:12:56,560 You can Google that there has been millions of studies on 363 00:12:56,560 --> 00:12:59,020 that. But the other thing is this was Shopify his claim 364 00:12:59,020 --> 00:13:00,190 to fame for the longest time, 365 00:13:00,190 --> 00:13:02,410 which was that they had split, 366 00:13:02,410 --> 00:13:05,740 tested that checkout flow to the millionth degree. 367 00:13:05,740 --> 00:13:09,340 And it was like the most highly optimized checkout experience on 368 00:13:09,340 --> 00:13:09,910 the market. 369 00:13:10,210 --> 00:13:14,080 And people were familiar with it and comfortable with it and 370 00:13:14,140 --> 00:13:16,360 it would kind of help lead to higher conversions because it 371 00:13:16,360 --> 00:13:17,890 was like a trusted checkout flow. 372 00:13:18,190 --> 00:13:21,130 These days you can get a little more custom with the 373 00:13:21,130 --> 00:13:23,380 checkout and they have opened it up a little bit more. 374 00:13:23,620 --> 00:13:25,510 And I don't think they're harping on it in their marketing 375 00:13:25,510 --> 00:13:26,380 as much as they used to. 376 00:13:26,650 --> 00:13:29,140 But those two things definitely I think, 377 00:13:29,140 --> 00:13:32,080 were some of the advantages to see that increase in sales 378 00:13:32,080 --> 00:13:32,860 kind of right off the rip. 379 00:13:33,280 --> 00:13:33,520 Got it. 380 00:13:33,790 --> 00:13:34,390 Okay. All right. 381 00:13:34,390 --> 00:13:36,430 So we can get off the Shopify bandwagon, 382 00:13:36,430 --> 00:13:39,100 but you and I could sit on this point forever because 383 00:13:39,100 --> 00:13:43,510 I'm totally an advocate and always recommend this platform Job to 384 00:13:43,510 --> 00:13:45,820 talk about Shopify and talk about e-commerce. 385 00:13:45,820 --> 00:13:46,690 I do this every day. 386 00:13:46,750 --> 00:13:46,930 All right. 387 00:13:47,050 --> 00:13:49,090 But so there's always the opportunity. 388 00:13:49,090 --> 00:13:51,550 You can always change over if you're not happy with where 389 00:13:51,550 --> 00:13:52,480 you are right now, 390 00:13:52,660 --> 00:13:55,840 but let's talk now about e-commerce overall, 391 00:13:56,080 --> 00:13:57,610 apart from the platform, 392 00:13:57,640 --> 00:14:01,450 what would you say is the biggest challenge people are having 393 00:14:01,450 --> 00:14:02,320 when it comes to econ? 394 00:14:03,040 --> 00:14:03,490 Oh yeah. 395 00:14:03,490 --> 00:14:04,420 This one's easy. 396 00:14:04,420 --> 00:14:05,830 It's finding product market fit. 397 00:14:07,090 --> 00:14:08,140 That's the hardest thing in the world. 398 00:14:08,140 --> 00:14:10,660 I think that some people have, 399 00:14:10,720 --> 00:14:13,750 it's a misunderstanding that if I build a website and I 400 00:14:13,750 --> 00:14:14,770 put a product on it, 401 00:14:14,770 --> 00:14:17,020 I have a business and that's not true. 402 00:14:17,350 --> 00:14:20,590 You have a business when that product is selling and paying 403 00:14:20,590 --> 00:14:21,100 your bills. 404 00:14:21,400 --> 00:14:24,760 There's a big Delta between those two kind of statements. 405 00:14:25,000 --> 00:14:27,520 Finding product market fit is extremely hard. 406 00:14:27,850 --> 00:14:32,890 I honestly say consultant or freelancer or agency for that matter 407 00:14:32,950 --> 00:14:35,020 can help you find product market fit. 408 00:14:35,470 --> 00:14:37,540 And for those that don't know a product market fit is 409 00:14:37,840 --> 00:14:39,310 it's oddly hard to define, 410 00:14:39,490 --> 00:14:40,600 but it's basically like, 411 00:14:40,840 --> 00:14:42,880 does the market want to buy your product? 412 00:14:43,000 --> 00:14:45,430 Is your product solving a problem? 413 00:14:45,550 --> 00:14:49,060 And that your market people are actually buying that product. 414 00:14:49,720 --> 00:14:52,100 And it's one of those things it's kind of hard to 415 00:14:52,100 --> 00:14:53,870 like, know if someone has it or not, 416 00:14:53,870 --> 00:14:55,190 but founders kind of figure it out. 417 00:14:55,190 --> 00:14:55,490 And they're like, 418 00:14:55,490 --> 00:14:56,270 yeah, we have it now. 419 00:14:56,270 --> 00:14:59,750 But it's basically like when you're organically getting sales and you're 420 00:14:59,750 --> 00:15:02,750 actually seeing conversions from trying to sell your product. 421 00:15:03,200 --> 00:15:05,930 But that whole challenge is kind of like an uphill battle. 422 00:15:05,930 --> 00:15:08,090 And a lot of founders don't realize how much work it 423 00:15:08,090 --> 00:15:11,030 is. And if you want to be an entrepreneur and you 424 00:15:11,030 --> 00:15:11,690 want to build a business, 425 00:15:11,690 --> 00:15:13,280 but you just want to hand somebody a fist full of 426 00:15:13,280 --> 00:15:13,760 money and say, 427 00:15:13,790 --> 00:15:14,960 make me a business. 428 00:15:15,170 --> 00:15:16,100 That's never going to work out. 429 00:15:16,790 --> 00:15:19,370 Right. And I talk about this a lot in the handmade 430 00:15:19,370 --> 00:15:20,990 product industry already, 431 00:15:21,020 --> 00:15:22,940 I call it validating your product. 432 00:15:23,090 --> 00:15:24,260 So we'll go out. 433 00:15:24,320 --> 00:15:27,680 I suggest people like before you even name your company almost 434 00:15:27,710 --> 00:15:29,210 is go out to craft shows, 435 00:15:29,270 --> 00:15:31,340 get interaction from the community, 436 00:15:31,370 --> 00:15:32,660 get feedback from them. 437 00:15:32,990 --> 00:15:35,060 See what products that you are making. 438 00:15:35,150 --> 00:15:36,320 If that's your area, 439 00:15:36,410 --> 00:15:39,890 what they're gravitating to and what they're buying to see that 440 00:15:39,890 --> 00:15:43,040 there's actually people who want to not just say your products 441 00:15:43,040 --> 00:15:46,340 beautiful, but actually exchange money to get your product. 442 00:15:46,640 --> 00:15:47,630 That's the key right there. 443 00:15:47,630 --> 00:15:50,300 You got to get paid just because your friends think it's 444 00:15:50,300 --> 00:15:52,310 a good idea or your significant other, 445 00:15:52,670 --> 00:15:55,280 if a stranger isn't willing to give you money for it. 446 00:15:55,340 --> 00:15:56,720 I don't think he validated it yet. 447 00:15:57,530 --> 00:15:59,120 Exactly. A hundred percent. 448 00:15:59,120 --> 00:16:00,770 And I agree with you also, 449 00:16:00,770 --> 00:16:01,520 and I see this, 450 00:16:01,520 --> 00:16:02,570 not just in products, 451 00:16:02,570 --> 00:16:03,080 but in, 452 00:16:03,170 --> 00:16:04,760 well, I'm going to say virtual products, 453 00:16:04,760 --> 00:16:06,170 but that doesn't as much apply here. 454 00:16:06,170 --> 00:16:07,310 I don't know that I want to go there, 455 00:16:07,310 --> 00:16:09,800 but when you click into the right thing, 456 00:16:09,950 --> 00:16:13,700 you see automatic results and you're not having to like push 457 00:16:13,700 --> 00:16:13,940 it out, 458 00:16:13,940 --> 00:16:14,360 push it out, 459 00:16:14,360 --> 00:16:17,660 push it out and like try to convince people that it's 460 00:16:17,660 --> 00:16:19,640 valuable when it's the right fit. 461 00:16:19,670 --> 00:16:21,890 That just starts to flow your way easily. 462 00:16:22,550 --> 00:16:27,440 It makes everything easier when your product resignates with your audience. 463 00:16:27,710 --> 00:16:28,370 Right. All right. 464 00:16:28,370 --> 00:16:31,340 So let's say someone who's been out to shows, 465 00:16:31,430 --> 00:16:34,520 sticking with what my audience can relate to the best they 466 00:16:34,520 --> 00:16:35,870 have validated the product. 467 00:16:35,900 --> 00:16:39,290 They go out to craft shows and they create products and 468 00:16:39,290 --> 00:16:40,730 people are buying them at shows, 469 00:16:40,730 --> 00:16:43,220 but they recognize that they need an online presence as well. 470 00:16:43,520 --> 00:16:44,990 And this wasn't even going to be my question, 471 00:16:44,990 --> 00:16:46,790 but I think I have a new question for women, 472 00:16:46,970 --> 00:16:49,010 but are we've flown with this conversation. 473 00:16:49,250 --> 00:16:53,600 Why would an e-commerce presence in this situation be important for 474 00:16:54,440 --> 00:16:55,580 Absolutely. I mean, 475 00:16:55,580 --> 00:17:00,110 the, your local market is only so big and the world 476 00:17:00,110 --> 00:17:01,250 is huge. 477 00:17:01,550 --> 00:17:04,580 And just the market share that you could get from putting 478 00:17:04,610 --> 00:17:08,210 a product that has some kind of validation online is massive. 479 00:17:08,210 --> 00:17:10,970 And I would actually say that another thing you could do, 480 00:17:10,970 --> 00:17:13,310 maybe your talent is smaller or you kind of live a 481 00:17:13,310 --> 00:17:14,870 little bit further away from people, 482 00:17:14,880 --> 00:17:17,570 whatever you can kind of do almost like a virtual ask 483 00:17:17,630 --> 00:17:18,470 kind of craft show, 484 00:17:18,470 --> 00:17:19,190 which is like, 485 00:17:19,220 --> 00:17:22,820 I've seen people stand up like dummy products on marketplaces, 486 00:17:22,820 --> 00:17:25,250 such as like Etsy or eBay or Amazon. 487 00:17:25,460 --> 00:17:26,990 And they validate it that way. 488 00:17:27,470 --> 00:17:30,140 And that'd be a great way to get feedback and to 489 00:17:30,140 --> 00:17:31,820 kind of iterate upon your product at the beginning, 490 00:17:31,820 --> 00:17:32,360 but also, 491 00:17:32,360 --> 00:17:32,570 you know, 492 00:17:32,570 --> 00:17:35,450 there's nothing wrong with continuing on those channels. 493 00:17:35,750 --> 00:17:40,040 There's pros and cons to marketplaces over like an owned website, 494 00:17:40,040 --> 00:17:40,850 like a Shopify. 495 00:17:41,120 --> 00:17:44,480 If it allows you to get products out the door faster 496 00:17:44,480 --> 00:17:46,640 and you kind of hit those economies of scale and you 497 00:17:46,640 --> 00:17:50,460 can get cheaper resources to produce your sometimes it's worthwhile. 498 00:17:50,700 --> 00:17:52,110 Absolutely. First of all, 499 00:17:52,170 --> 00:17:55,020 I would call your own hosted website, 500 00:17:55,050 --> 00:17:55,920 your home base. 501 00:17:55,950 --> 00:17:59,190 That's the headquarters really of all your business online, 502 00:17:59,640 --> 00:18:02,670 but having an Etsy shop as you're talking about has a 503 00:18:02,670 --> 00:18:03,960 whole different audience. 504 00:18:04,050 --> 00:18:05,640 Perhaps there'll be some overlap, 505 00:18:05,670 --> 00:18:07,980 but a different audience than those people who you're going to 506 00:18:07,980 --> 00:18:10,110 attract and bring to your website. 507 00:18:10,380 --> 00:18:13,530 So it's kind of like you sell your product direct to 508 00:18:13,530 --> 00:18:15,870 consumer, and then you also have your product in a local 509 00:18:15,870 --> 00:18:17,040 boutique to sell. 510 00:18:17,070 --> 00:18:21,450 It's just different avenues where you can intercept with a potential 511 00:18:21,450 --> 00:18:23,250 customer who could then buy your product. 512 00:18:23,700 --> 00:18:27,360 Yeah. And if every time you order all your products, 513 00:18:27,360 --> 00:18:30,660 like you can produce a hundred units on your own website. 514 00:18:30,660 --> 00:18:33,390 It takes you forever to move through those hundred units. 515 00:18:33,420 --> 00:18:37,260 Whereas you could like benefit from the traffic that these marketplaces 516 00:18:37,260 --> 00:18:39,870 get and move through those faster and reorder. 517 00:18:39,870 --> 00:18:40,440 And that's just, 518 00:18:40,440 --> 00:18:42,870 all that's doing is growing your brand exponentially faster. 519 00:18:43,440 --> 00:18:47,130 Absolutely. And selling on Amazon is a different strategy than selling 520 00:18:47,130 --> 00:18:48,030 on Etsy, 521 00:18:48,060 --> 00:18:51,270 which is a different strategy than selling on your own hosted 522 00:18:51,270 --> 00:18:52,530 website. Absolutely. 523 00:18:52,830 --> 00:18:53,730 All totally different. 524 00:18:53,730 --> 00:18:56,370 And we've gone into some of that detail in some of 525 00:18:56,370 --> 00:18:58,500 the other podcasts episodes here. 526 00:18:58,770 --> 00:19:02,730 Okay. So that's the importance of e-commerce now some people, 527 00:19:02,790 --> 00:19:05,460 and I'm speaking from experience with my audience, 528 00:19:05,550 --> 00:19:06,960 understand all of this. 529 00:19:07,110 --> 00:19:11,490 They go through all the effort of getting their website up. 530 00:19:11,850 --> 00:19:12,660 It's working, 531 00:19:12,840 --> 00:19:13,950 it's loading fast. 532 00:19:14,010 --> 00:19:15,210 They have a checkout, 533 00:19:15,330 --> 00:19:16,500 they have their about page. 534 00:19:16,680 --> 00:19:18,990 Some of these elements that are really important for them to 535 00:19:18,990 --> 00:19:22,830 have, but they're not getting any sales nothing's coming because they 536 00:19:22,830 --> 00:19:24,990 think like what you were talking about before, 537 00:19:24,990 --> 00:19:27,270 if I just build it and put a website up, 538 00:19:27,360 --> 00:19:29,220 people are going to come to my site and they're going 539 00:19:29,220 --> 00:19:30,240 to buy from me. 540 00:19:30,930 --> 00:19:32,070 It doesn't work like that. 541 00:19:32,460 --> 00:19:33,330 It doesn't does it. 542 00:19:34,170 --> 00:19:36,060 No. My question to those people would be like, 543 00:19:36,060 --> 00:19:37,740 cool. Did you tell anybody about it? 544 00:19:38,550 --> 00:19:39,360 Right. Well, 545 00:19:39,360 --> 00:19:40,140 but it's online. 546 00:19:40,140 --> 00:19:42,630 So aren't people just going to find it because now I 547 00:19:42,630 --> 00:19:43,830 have an online presence. 548 00:19:44,340 --> 00:19:48,240 That is something that is a hard pill to swallow. 549 00:19:48,360 --> 00:19:50,580 Especially if they're seeing success on a marketplace, 550 00:19:50,580 --> 00:19:50,910 they're like, 551 00:19:50,910 --> 00:19:52,140 shouldn't it just be the same thing. 552 00:19:52,140 --> 00:19:52,470 And shouldn't, 553 00:19:52,470 --> 00:19:53,250 I get a better margin. 554 00:19:53,250 --> 00:19:53,580 It's like, 555 00:19:53,580 --> 00:19:54,300 well, you know, 556 00:19:54,300 --> 00:19:56,760 the reason that you're seeing those sales on a marketplace is 557 00:19:56,760 --> 00:19:58,980 because the marketplace has worked so hard to acquire all those 558 00:19:58,980 --> 00:19:59,940 customers. And by the way, 559 00:19:59,940 --> 00:20:00,960 those aren't your customers. 560 00:20:00,960 --> 00:20:02,610 Those are the marketplaces customers. 561 00:20:02,700 --> 00:20:05,280 You're just a vendor and you're selling your wares on their, 562 00:20:05,280 --> 00:20:08,640 in their marketplace while acquiring a customer is expensive. 563 00:20:08,700 --> 00:20:10,410 And it's hard to do at the beginning. 564 00:20:10,710 --> 00:20:13,320 But I asked this question a lot on my podcast. 565 00:20:13,320 --> 00:20:13,710 It's like, 566 00:20:13,740 --> 00:20:15,600 Hey, how did you get your first couple of customers? 567 00:20:15,600 --> 00:20:16,470 Like, what were you doing? 568 00:20:16,470 --> 00:20:17,790 Like what was your go to market strategy? 569 00:20:18,150 --> 00:20:20,550 And a lot of the answers are kind of the same. 570 00:20:20,550 --> 00:20:21,420 And they were a little bit of work. 571 00:20:21,420 --> 00:20:21,780 They were like, 572 00:20:21,780 --> 00:20:23,100 do the things that don't scale. 573 00:20:23,130 --> 00:20:23,520 They were like, 574 00:20:23,520 --> 00:20:26,850 we were going to marketplaces like in-person we were going to 575 00:20:26,850 --> 00:20:28,020 fairs and et cetera. 576 00:20:28,290 --> 00:20:30,660 I was hanging out in mommy forums and talking about my 577 00:20:30,660 --> 00:20:31,560 new baby products. 578 00:20:31,830 --> 00:20:35,160 We were in Facebook groups and like just communicating with potential 579 00:20:35,160 --> 00:20:38,280 customers and learning how to talk about the value proposition of 580 00:20:38,280 --> 00:20:40,260 their product and the features and benefits and the way that 581 00:20:40,260 --> 00:20:41,220 resonated with our audience. 582 00:20:41,220 --> 00:20:43,770 And just really getting the word out there in a more 583 00:20:43,770 --> 00:20:46,500 organic fashion at the beginning five years ago, 584 00:20:46,560 --> 00:20:47,320 seven years ago, 585 00:20:47,320 --> 00:20:49,660 maybe you could possibly build a business on the back of 586 00:20:49,660 --> 00:20:50,110 paid ads, 587 00:20:50,140 --> 00:20:50,890 but you can't do that. 588 00:20:50,890 --> 00:20:54,100 Now, if your plan to grow your business is I'm going 589 00:20:54,100 --> 00:20:56,800 to dump a lot of money into Facebook or Google or 590 00:20:56,800 --> 00:20:57,280 Tik TOK, 591 00:20:57,280 --> 00:20:57,850 et cetera. 592 00:20:57,940 --> 00:20:58,810 You're going to go bankrupt. 593 00:20:59,080 --> 00:21:00,850 That's not a growth strategy to like, 594 00:21:00,880 --> 00:21:03,910 if you're trying to acquire your first customers that way and 595 00:21:03,910 --> 00:21:04,750 then grow from it. 596 00:21:04,750 --> 00:21:06,670 Like it's not a sustainable strategy. 597 00:21:07,030 --> 00:21:10,210 Well, and I'm going to suggest that most people aren't even 598 00:21:10,210 --> 00:21:11,380 looking at ads, 599 00:21:11,380 --> 00:21:12,910 they're just feeling like it should be up. 600 00:21:12,940 --> 00:21:15,430 And so then they're just going and posting on social. 601 00:21:15,490 --> 00:21:18,340 And we know the organic reach with social these days. 602 00:21:18,910 --> 00:21:19,630 It's nil. 603 00:21:19,660 --> 00:21:20,620 I mean like if, 604 00:21:20,710 --> 00:21:22,960 okay, you have a website with no traffic and then you 605 00:21:22,960 --> 00:21:25,780 have a new Instagram account with four followers, 606 00:21:25,840 --> 00:21:26,590 do you can do the math, 607 00:21:26,830 --> 00:21:29,740 right? You need to get the word out about your product, 608 00:21:29,860 --> 00:21:31,540 get it in front of more people in a way that's 609 00:21:31,540 --> 00:21:33,220 a little more scalable, 610 00:21:33,490 --> 00:21:34,540 paid ads is one way. 611 00:21:34,540 --> 00:21:35,590 But I think that, 612 00:21:35,740 --> 00:21:38,830 especially when you're launching a business and I'm assuming a lot 613 00:21:38,830 --> 00:21:40,090 of your listeners might be a bit more scrappy, 614 00:21:40,360 --> 00:21:42,970 the ways to do that would be like influencer is still 615 00:21:42,970 --> 00:21:43,510 an option. 616 00:21:43,510 --> 00:21:47,530 These days do some product sampling with people that have audiences 617 00:21:47,530 --> 00:21:50,020 that you think are made up of people that are potentially 618 00:21:50,020 --> 00:21:50,710 your customers. 619 00:21:51,010 --> 00:21:52,990 And then kind of some of those non-scale things I just 620 00:21:53,110 --> 00:21:53,620 talked about, 621 00:21:53,620 --> 00:21:56,260 like the Facebook groups and going to actual craft fairs, 622 00:21:56,290 --> 00:21:56,740 et cetera, 623 00:21:56,980 --> 00:21:58,330 there's a million strategies out there. 624 00:21:58,360 --> 00:22:00,730 And honestly it can be overwhelming. 625 00:22:01,150 --> 00:22:03,130 And I really like to tell people that when they're first 626 00:22:03,130 --> 00:22:06,640 getting started is just like pick one and build a business 627 00:22:06,640 --> 00:22:07,240 on the back of it. 628 00:22:07,540 --> 00:22:10,090 And then once you kind of see that traction and things 629 00:22:10,090 --> 00:22:10,720 are working, 630 00:22:10,750 --> 00:22:13,330 then explore some other avenues for marketing. 631 00:22:13,480 --> 00:22:15,430 So a you don't have all your eggs in one basket 632 00:22:15,520 --> 00:22:18,130 and be certain avenues are better for certain steps of the 633 00:22:18,130 --> 00:22:19,660 funnel. Absolutely. 634 00:22:19,750 --> 00:22:21,670 A hundred percent agree with you there. 635 00:22:21,760 --> 00:22:23,170 And so here's the thing. 636 00:22:23,200 --> 00:22:25,870 And I'm talking to everyone who's listening right now is I 637 00:22:25,870 --> 00:22:28,720 think so many times building a website looks like, 638 00:22:28,720 --> 00:22:30,700 and feels like such a big project. 639 00:22:30,970 --> 00:22:33,940 But once that website up and running, 640 00:22:34,000 --> 00:22:34,720 that was like, 641 00:22:34,720 --> 00:22:35,380 step one. 642 00:22:35,380 --> 00:22:37,570 Now you have that home base for yourself. 643 00:22:37,870 --> 00:22:41,050 Now you've got to tell everybody about it and you merge 644 00:22:41,050 --> 00:22:41,950 them together. 645 00:22:41,950 --> 00:22:43,840 So if you're at a craft show, 646 00:22:43,840 --> 00:22:45,700 make sure people know about the website. 647 00:22:45,700 --> 00:22:48,670 So you can go and you can reorder from the website 648 00:22:48,760 --> 00:22:51,940 or there's different sense of the candles that you sell on 649 00:22:51,940 --> 00:22:52,540 the website. 650 00:22:52,540 --> 00:22:55,120 You've only brought a portion of them to the show, 651 00:22:55,420 --> 00:22:56,080 things like that. 652 00:22:56,080 --> 00:22:58,630 So that's where I start to talk about the website is 653 00:22:58,630 --> 00:23:00,970 your home base or your headquarters. 654 00:23:01,030 --> 00:23:03,970 And so you want to drive everybody there at some point. 655 00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:08,410 Yeah. And that's almost a strategy that's similar to how you 656 00:23:08,410 --> 00:23:11,140 can utilize the marketplaces to drive traffic to your website. 657 00:23:11,410 --> 00:23:13,210 I see that people at a certain point, 658 00:23:13,240 --> 00:23:17,770 they'll pivot their products and have a lot more exclusive product 659 00:23:17,770 --> 00:23:19,240 on their home base, 660 00:23:19,300 --> 00:23:20,110 as you would say, 661 00:23:20,170 --> 00:23:21,850 versus their marketplaces. 662 00:23:21,850 --> 00:23:23,440 So maybe like on Amazon, 663 00:23:23,440 --> 00:23:25,330 you're only selling like a bundle. 664 00:23:25,360 --> 00:23:28,240 That's bigger because that makes more sense for your margins there 665 00:23:28,270 --> 00:23:29,320 or on Etsy. 666 00:23:29,320 --> 00:23:30,670 It's a certain color way. 667 00:23:30,670 --> 00:23:32,710 But then like all the other ones live on your website 668 00:23:32,710 --> 00:23:35,410 to make it unique and to try to drive that traffic 669 00:23:35,440 --> 00:23:36,400 to a different channel. 670 00:23:36,670 --> 00:23:37,930 That's a really good point. 671 00:23:37,930 --> 00:23:41,410 And I could see for people who have an exclusive line, 672 00:23:41,440 --> 00:23:43,690 maybe you have a more generic line. 673 00:23:43,690 --> 00:23:46,010 You have a lot of people working in helping you with 674 00:23:46,010 --> 00:23:46,760 that line, 675 00:23:46,790 --> 00:23:50,630 but there's a specific line that you are making yourself and 676 00:23:50,630 --> 00:23:52,700 it's maybe even branded a little bit differently, 677 00:23:52,700 --> 00:23:55,070 but it's still under your umbrella of your business. 678 00:23:55,100 --> 00:23:57,170 Like that only sits on your website. 679 00:23:57,170 --> 00:23:59,210 So you will drive people over for a purpose. 680 00:23:59,210 --> 00:24:02,510 It's not a repeat of what you have and everywhere else, 681 00:24:02,510 --> 00:24:03,170 right? Jace. 682 00:24:03,350 --> 00:24:04,730 Exactly. Got it. 683 00:24:04,760 --> 00:24:06,020 Okay. Because you have to have a reason. 684 00:24:06,020 --> 00:24:07,760 If someone's can see everything on Etsy, 685 00:24:07,760 --> 00:24:09,680 what's the point of going to your website? 686 00:24:10,250 --> 00:24:11,300 And also some people, 687 00:24:11,330 --> 00:24:11,990 not, some people, 688 00:24:12,050 --> 00:24:14,060 all people are lazy and they're going to buy things the 689 00:24:14,060 --> 00:24:16,250 way that is the path of least resistance. 690 00:24:16,250 --> 00:24:19,340 And if they're a native Etsy shopper or an Amazon shopper, 691 00:24:19,340 --> 00:24:20,870 they're just going to kind of check out that way. 692 00:24:20,870 --> 00:24:23,450 But if your goal is to increase your sales on your 693 00:24:23,540 --> 00:24:24,170 home base, 694 00:24:24,170 --> 00:24:26,090 you need to make a reason for people to go over 695 00:24:26,090 --> 00:24:26,900 there, right? 696 00:24:27,050 --> 00:24:28,760 And you want to be able to talk to them too. 697 00:24:28,790 --> 00:24:30,500 So I see a lot of times, 698 00:24:30,500 --> 00:24:32,120 especially with product based businesses, 699 00:24:32,180 --> 00:24:36,980 they'll give a first time customer discount or they'll enter people 700 00:24:36,980 --> 00:24:39,320 into a sweepstakes or all these different types of things in 701 00:24:39,320 --> 00:24:42,950 exchange for their email so that they can continue a relationship 702 00:24:42,950 --> 00:24:45,800 with them versus just hoping they land. 703 00:24:45,800 --> 00:24:46,250 Once again, 704 00:24:46,250 --> 00:24:47,090 in the Etsy store, 705 00:24:47,420 --> 00:24:49,730 Just getting an email or a phone number in general is 706 00:24:49,730 --> 00:24:51,530 like valuable to a business, 707 00:24:51,560 --> 00:24:52,550 especially at scale. 708 00:24:52,850 --> 00:24:55,400 And people even have metrics against it, 709 00:24:55,400 --> 00:24:56,860 like costs for acquisition. 710 00:24:56,890 --> 00:24:58,970 They might even just be talking about like getting new email 711 00:24:58,970 --> 00:25:01,310 signups, and some people can do the math to see what 712 00:25:01,310 --> 00:25:03,320 an email is worth to their business and see if that 713 00:25:03,320 --> 00:25:06,680 is like a profit generating activity from a paid perspective. 714 00:25:07,280 --> 00:25:08,120 But to your point. 715 00:25:08,120 --> 00:25:10,580 Yeah. And that's why having your own home base and having 716 00:25:10,580 --> 00:25:13,250 your own website is so important is once you get those 717 00:25:13,250 --> 00:25:15,980 things, like some people aren't ready to buy just yet. 718 00:25:16,400 --> 00:25:17,540 Basically it's like thinking about this. 719 00:25:17,540 --> 00:25:18,080 If you had a boutique, 720 00:25:18,080 --> 00:25:19,010 they walked in your door, 721 00:25:19,040 --> 00:25:21,380 they like were looking at things for quite a bit. 722 00:25:21,380 --> 00:25:23,330 And then you just watch them walk out the door. 723 00:25:23,390 --> 00:25:23,780 And you're like, 724 00:25:23,810 --> 00:25:25,010 oh, I could've got that. 725 00:25:25,010 --> 00:25:28,250 Person's email and told them more about our products and try 726 00:25:28,250 --> 00:25:29,930 to kind of walk them down the funnel. 727 00:25:29,930 --> 00:25:31,160 Like now they know about us. 728 00:25:31,160 --> 00:25:33,230 Like now let's get them to like us and talk about 729 00:25:33,260 --> 00:25:35,780 the benefits of our products and the features of our products. 730 00:25:35,780 --> 00:25:37,730 Now let's get them to trust us by sending them some 731 00:25:37,730 --> 00:25:39,260 social proof and some reviews. 732 00:25:39,530 --> 00:25:41,450 And you can do all of that through email marketing. 733 00:25:41,780 --> 00:25:42,290 But you know, 734 00:25:42,290 --> 00:25:44,060 if you just let people kind of come to your website 735 00:25:44,060 --> 00:25:44,540 and leave, 736 00:25:44,540 --> 00:25:46,760 and you're not getting their email or their phone number, 737 00:25:46,790 --> 00:25:48,080 you're leaving money on the table. 738 00:25:48,560 --> 00:25:50,690 Absolutely. And I think it's a good point that you bring 739 00:25:50,690 --> 00:25:51,110 up too, 740 00:25:51,110 --> 00:25:54,200 is that not everybody is in the market for your product 741 00:25:54,260 --> 00:25:56,150 at the time you intercept with them. 742 00:25:56,330 --> 00:26:00,230 And what happens if someone saw your product really, 743 00:26:00,230 --> 00:26:01,160 really like it, 744 00:26:01,190 --> 00:26:02,000 like in their mind, 745 00:26:02,000 --> 00:26:02,360 they're like, 746 00:26:02,390 --> 00:26:03,890 yeah, but I don't have any purpose for it. 747 00:26:03,890 --> 00:26:04,940 I don't need it yet. 748 00:26:04,940 --> 00:26:06,200 And then a month later, 749 00:26:06,230 --> 00:26:08,750 one of their girlfriends has a birthday and all of a 750 00:26:08,750 --> 00:26:09,170 sudden they're like, 751 00:26:09,200 --> 00:26:10,340 what was that company? 752 00:26:10,340 --> 00:26:12,590 Again? This would be the best gift. 753 00:26:12,650 --> 00:26:14,360 And they have no clue how to get to you. 754 00:26:14,630 --> 00:26:16,820 Yeah. But if you would have spent the time to write 755 00:26:16,820 --> 00:26:17,720 like a beautiful, 756 00:26:17,720 --> 00:26:18,710 welcome series, 757 00:26:18,710 --> 00:26:21,260 and you got that person onto your email list, 758 00:26:21,260 --> 00:26:24,260 because you had like an incentivized kind of email popup. 759 00:26:24,500 --> 00:26:26,630 Now they probably have gotten two or three emails from you. 760 00:26:26,630 --> 00:26:30,020 And they've learned about like the cool wood that your products 761 00:26:30,020 --> 00:26:32,960 made out of and like the cool technique that you use 762 00:26:32,960 --> 00:26:33,650 to create it. 763 00:26:33,920 --> 00:26:35,690 And they're like super jazzed about it. 764 00:26:35,690 --> 00:26:36,980 And now they have a reason to buy. 765 00:26:37,310 --> 00:26:38,000 Yep. Oh great. 766 00:26:38,060 --> 00:26:40,730 I would even say an email is more important than follow 767 00:26:40,730 --> 00:26:41,570 us on Facebook. 768 00:26:41,840 --> 00:26:43,190 First thing you want is the email. 769 00:26:43,470 --> 00:26:45,240 Yeah. I would a hundred percent say that. 770 00:26:45,510 --> 00:26:48,570 I think that email and the phone number are basically a 771 00:26:48,570 --> 00:26:49,200 kind of money. 772 00:26:49,410 --> 00:26:52,260 I would say social followers are definitely a secondary. 773 00:26:52,680 --> 00:26:55,110 Okay. So you've said this now twice. 774 00:26:55,200 --> 00:26:56,760 So I have to talk about it. 775 00:26:56,760 --> 00:26:59,820 Chase. I'm going to challenge you only because I know my 776 00:26:59,820 --> 00:27:01,230 listeners are thinking the same thing. 777 00:27:01,320 --> 00:27:04,440 Okay. You keep talking about this telephone number. 778 00:27:04,560 --> 00:27:06,780 I I'm talking to as if I'm a listener. 779 00:27:06,780 --> 00:27:10,860 Now I don't want to start spamming people by sending them 780 00:27:10,890 --> 00:27:12,060 text messages. 781 00:27:12,360 --> 00:27:13,740 What would you say to me about that? 782 00:27:16,680 --> 00:27:20,670 Stay tuned to hear Chase's answer to my question about text 783 00:27:20,670 --> 00:27:24,000 messages. We'll get to that right after a quick break to 784 00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:25,020 hear from our sponsor. 785 00:27:26,010 --> 00:27:27,600 Yes. It's possible. 786 00:27:27,750 --> 00:27:30,420 Increase your sales without adding a single customer. 787 00:27:30,630 --> 00:27:34,080 How you ask by offering personalization with your products, 788 00:27:34,350 --> 00:27:37,470 wrap a cake box with a ribbon saying happy 30th birthday, 789 00:27:37,470 --> 00:27:40,950 Annie, or at a special message and date to wedding or 790 00:27:40,950 --> 00:27:43,380 party favors for an extra meaningful touch. 791 00:27:43,500 --> 00:27:46,770 Where else can you get customization with a creatively spelled name 792 00:27:46,770 --> 00:27:47,700 or find packaging? 793 00:27:47,700 --> 00:27:50,190 That includes a saying whose meaning is known to a select 794 00:27:50,190 --> 00:27:52,860 to not only our customers willing to pay for these special 795 00:27:52,860 --> 00:27:56,070 touches. They'll tell their friends and word will spread about your 796 00:27:56,070 --> 00:27:57,360 company and products. 797 00:27:57,570 --> 00:28:00,930 You can create personalized ribbons and labels in seconds. 798 00:28:01,020 --> 00:28:04,320 Make just one or thousands without waiting weeks or having to 799 00:28:04,320 --> 00:28:07,590 spend money to order yards and yards print words in any 800 00:28:07,590 --> 00:28:08,610 language or font, 801 00:28:08,820 --> 00:28:09,540 add logos, 802 00:28:09,660 --> 00:28:11,430 images, even photos, 803 00:28:11,670 --> 00:28:14,640 perfect for branding or adding ingredient and flavor labels. 804 00:28:14,640 --> 00:28:16,350 To, for more information, 805 00:28:16,350 --> 00:28:18,450 go to the ribbon print company.com. 806 00:28:18,840 --> 00:28:19,440 I would say, 807 00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:20,550 you're making an assumption. 808 00:28:20,940 --> 00:28:23,250 You want to market to your customer and the way that 809 00:28:23,250 --> 00:28:24,270 they want to hear from you. 810 00:28:24,570 --> 00:28:26,790 And I guarantee that some of your customers do want to 811 00:28:26,790 --> 00:28:29,340 get those text messages and they do want to hear from 812 00:28:29,340 --> 00:28:29,940 you that way, 813 00:28:29,970 --> 00:28:33,480 because they actually like your brand more than the 10,000 814 00:28:33,480 --> 00:28:35,700 unread emails they have in their email inbox. 815 00:28:35,760 --> 00:28:38,340 And that is their preferred way of communication. 816 00:28:38,370 --> 00:28:40,500 So they would actually enjoy to hear from you that way. 817 00:28:40,800 --> 00:28:42,780 Some people even say the same thing about email marketing. 818 00:28:42,780 --> 00:28:43,050 They're like, 819 00:28:43,080 --> 00:28:44,250 I can't send more emails. 820 00:28:44,250 --> 00:28:45,390 People don't want to hear from us. 821 00:28:45,390 --> 00:28:45,870 And I'm like, 822 00:28:45,900 --> 00:28:47,430 Sue, what's your unsubscribe rate? 823 00:28:47,430 --> 00:28:48,540 Well, it's truly very low. 824 00:28:48,540 --> 00:28:48,870 And I'm like, 825 00:28:48,870 --> 00:28:50,280 yeah, because you're not sending any emails, 826 00:28:50,520 --> 00:28:52,920 it's marketing people and you need to get the word out 827 00:28:52,920 --> 00:28:55,290 there and your customers will tell you when you're doing it 828 00:28:55,290 --> 00:28:56,400 too much to the point though, 829 00:28:56,400 --> 00:28:57,900 of like email versus SMS, 830 00:28:57,900 --> 00:28:59,910 definitely send less texts than you're sending emails, 831 00:28:59,940 --> 00:29:01,710 but it's a huge channel. 832 00:29:01,980 --> 00:29:02,940 Okay. Perfect. 833 00:29:03,180 --> 00:29:05,940 Okay. So you don't even know that all your emails are 834 00:29:05,940 --> 00:29:09,450 actually been delivered to the inbox unless you're getting responses from 835 00:29:09,450 --> 00:29:11,010 people, unless they're your customer. 836 00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:12,600 So just like social media, 837 00:29:12,630 --> 00:29:17,340 but I think more in your control is the deliverability of 838 00:29:17,370 --> 00:29:19,350 email. But now let's talk. 839 00:29:19,350 --> 00:29:20,850 You were starting to get into this. 840 00:29:20,850 --> 00:29:22,230 So I have some questions for you about it, 841 00:29:22,230 --> 00:29:23,160 chase. Okay. 842 00:29:23,160 --> 00:29:26,100 So you get the email and you get the phone number 843 00:29:26,100 --> 00:29:26,850 from somebody. 844 00:29:26,880 --> 00:29:28,800 Okay? Cause we're trusting you chase. 845 00:29:28,830 --> 00:29:30,540 We believe what you're saying, 846 00:29:30,570 --> 00:29:33,510 and we want to get both of these now, 847 00:29:33,570 --> 00:29:36,720 do we send the same messages to both places? 848 00:29:37,020 --> 00:29:39,810 Do we do phone numbers more than emails? 849 00:29:39,870 --> 00:29:42,520 How would you advise someone to work with both those two 850 00:29:42,520 --> 00:29:44,500 ways of communicating with customers? 851 00:29:44,860 --> 00:29:46,840 Short answer is no, 852 00:29:46,840 --> 00:29:50,770 you should be very strategic about what you're saying. 853 00:29:50,800 --> 00:29:55,450 In what channel we find that with SMS it's things that 854 00:29:55,450 --> 00:29:56,590 are a little more urgent. 855 00:29:56,620 --> 00:30:01,780 So like a flash sale or a product drop where email 856 00:30:01,780 --> 00:30:03,790 is a little more casual. 857 00:30:04,060 --> 00:30:06,730 And the cadence on email can be a lot higher because 858 00:30:06,760 --> 00:30:08,710 people hit so many emails. 859 00:30:08,890 --> 00:30:11,530 You could have a customer that literally gets every single email 860 00:30:11,530 --> 00:30:12,190 that you send, 861 00:30:12,220 --> 00:30:14,470 but someone else is probably sending them more email and they 862 00:30:14,470 --> 00:30:17,920 don't even notice like how frequently your kind of reaching out 863 00:30:17,920 --> 00:30:19,900 to them and saying things in their inbox. 864 00:30:20,170 --> 00:30:21,100 But with text messages, 865 00:30:21,100 --> 00:30:23,170 it is a little more personal and it's a little more 866 00:30:23,170 --> 00:30:25,630 noticeable. So you'd probably want to keep the frequency a little 867 00:30:25,630 --> 00:30:27,070 bit lower on the SMS. 868 00:30:27,130 --> 00:30:29,110 And I think I sidestepped your question. 869 00:30:29,110 --> 00:30:30,550 So I want to make sure I answer it. 870 00:30:30,790 --> 00:30:33,550 No, I like that you say that the SMS is more 871 00:30:33,580 --> 00:30:36,490 urgent. So it's special and SMS, 872 00:30:36,490 --> 00:30:39,760 I feel is even a subset group of the emails. 873 00:30:40,060 --> 00:30:41,140 It's the people who really, 874 00:30:41,140 --> 00:30:42,310 really want to hear from you. 875 00:30:42,460 --> 00:30:45,550 You want to have respect for those people and send things 876 00:30:45,550 --> 00:30:47,200 that are only really valuable. 877 00:30:47,200 --> 00:30:49,630 And I think they're almost direct to sales things. 878 00:30:49,630 --> 00:30:50,740 Really. Yeah. 879 00:30:50,740 --> 00:30:51,940 It's very direct response, 880 00:30:51,940 --> 00:30:54,730 but here's another thing that I think people need to realize 881 00:30:54,760 --> 00:30:56,920 it's not email or SMS. 882 00:30:56,950 --> 00:30:58,840 It's email and SMS. 883 00:30:58,840 --> 00:31:02,350 Your campaign is your campaign about your product release. 884 00:31:02,380 --> 00:31:03,250 But then you are like, 885 00:31:03,250 --> 00:31:05,380 okay, we're going to say this on SMS at this time, 886 00:31:05,380 --> 00:31:06,910 we're going to say this on email at this time, 887 00:31:07,270 --> 00:31:11,020 you'll write the strategy and then drop in the channels and 888 00:31:11,020 --> 00:31:13,000 the touch points and what you want to say kind of 889 00:31:13,120 --> 00:31:13,810 after that, 890 00:31:13,810 --> 00:31:14,410 it isn't like, 891 00:31:14,440 --> 00:31:16,510 well, we're only going to release this on SM while you 892 00:31:16,510 --> 00:31:16,990 could do that, 893 00:31:16,990 --> 00:31:18,550 but that's a more advanced strategy, 894 00:31:18,850 --> 00:31:19,540 but it's like, 895 00:31:19,570 --> 00:31:20,620 they work together. 896 00:31:20,830 --> 00:31:23,110 You could even send the things to the same people, 897 00:31:23,140 --> 00:31:24,370 but maybe at different times. 898 00:31:24,370 --> 00:31:28,360 So it's maybe like the product announcement is through email and 899 00:31:28,360 --> 00:31:28,810 then like, 900 00:31:28,930 --> 00:31:30,190 oh, the sale ends. 901 00:31:30,220 --> 00:31:31,780 You're going to say that through SMS. 902 00:31:31,780 --> 00:31:32,890 Cause that's a little more urgent. 903 00:31:33,370 --> 00:31:35,950 Okay. So really what you're saying is you need a strategy. 904 00:31:35,950 --> 00:31:38,650 You need to put yourself in the recipient's shoes. 905 00:31:38,650 --> 00:31:41,320 If they've given you both their email and their phone number, 906 00:31:41,320 --> 00:31:42,310 some people won't. 907 00:31:43,050 --> 00:31:43,900 Let me tell you this. 908 00:31:44,170 --> 00:31:45,070 It's mind boggling. 909 00:31:45,070 --> 00:31:47,890 The amount of businesses that have just like this plethora of 910 00:31:47,890 --> 00:31:48,640 user data. 911 00:31:48,790 --> 00:31:51,040 And they just don't use it because there's no strategy behind 912 00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:53,350 it. It's like you're sitting on money. 913 00:31:53,350 --> 00:31:54,730 You could be printing money. 914 00:31:54,730 --> 00:31:56,140 Your sales could go through the roof. 915 00:31:56,140 --> 00:31:56,560 It's like, 916 00:31:56,590 --> 00:31:58,270 just cause you're collecting the stuff you got to send the 917 00:31:58,270 --> 00:31:59,290 emails. You gotta send the texts. 918 00:31:59,290 --> 00:32:00,340 You gotta be saying something. 919 00:32:00,340 --> 00:32:01,300 You gotta have a communication. 920 00:32:01,300 --> 00:32:02,680 You gotta talk For sure. 921 00:32:02,710 --> 00:32:03,910 When you say customer data, 922 00:32:03,910 --> 00:32:04,780 what are you talking about? 923 00:32:05,050 --> 00:32:06,070 The contact information, 924 00:32:06,100 --> 00:32:07,600 emails, Email, 925 00:32:07,600 --> 00:32:09,370 SMS, a little more advanced. 926 00:32:09,370 --> 00:32:13,150 You have people pixeled in whatever kind of ad platform that 927 00:32:13,150 --> 00:32:13,750 you're using. 928 00:32:13,990 --> 00:32:14,920 People set everything up. 929 00:32:14,920 --> 00:32:15,940 And then they kind of just like, 930 00:32:15,940 --> 00:32:19,300 well, we don't use that channel or they have these hesitations 931 00:32:19,300 --> 00:32:19,900 to talk to people. 932 00:32:19,900 --> 00:32:22,210 That's I think another thing is just in the email, 933 00:32:22,300 --> 00:32:23,680 it doesn't have to be perfect. 934 00:32:23,710 --> 00:32:27,730 Like sending the email is better than not every time. 935 00:32:28,480 --> 00:32:28,690 All right. 936 00:32:28,720 --> 00:32:31,240 So email phone numbers, 937 00:32:31,240 --> 00:32:32,710 you need a strategy. 938 00:32:32,740 --> 00:32:34,510 It might be a similar message. 939 00:32:34,780 --> 00:32:37,450 It's also the content of the message because email can be 940 00:32:37,450 --> 00:32:39,890 a lot longer than a text message is going to Be. 941 00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:42,620 Yeah, you definitely want the text to be to the point 942 00:32:42,680 --> 00:32:44,030 and easy to understand. 943 00:32:44,090 --> 00:32:47,210 And that goes almost to your offers to make sure that 944 00:32:47,210 --> 00:32:51,980 your sales are straightforward and like easy to comprehend. 945 00:32:52,020 --> 00:32:53,330 And they explain to somebody like, 946 00:32:53,330 --> 00:32:55,730 imagine that your customer is drunk and in a hurry is 947 00:32:55,760 --> 00:32:56,240 just like, 948 00:32:56,240 --> 00:32:57,530 you need to be able to explain to them what your 949 00:32:57,530 --> 00:32:59,090 sale is and they need to be able to get it 950 00:32:59,090 --> 00:33:00,140 quickly. Right. 951 00:33:00,140 --> 00:33:02,600 And do you have a platform that you use for delivering 952 00:33:02,600 --> 00:33:03,650 your text messages? 953 00:33:04,130 --> 00:33:06,680 We are Klaviyo gold partners, 954 00:33:06,740 --> 00:33:08,300 or even maybe higher than that, 955 00:33:08,330 --> 00:33:08,560 where you, 956 00:33:08,560 --> 00:33:09,380 we love Klaviyo. 957 00:33:09,470 --> 00:33:11,570 Okay. I am not a Klayvio user. 958 00:33:11,600 --> 00:33:14,270 Will you tell everybody what Klaviyo's Cool? 959 00:33:14,300 --> 00:33:17,570 I would say the 800 pound gorilla is MailChimp from like 960 00:33:17,600 --> 00:33:18,950 a email perspective. 961 00:33:19,010 --> 00:33:19,940 And then from SMS, 962 00:33:19,940 --> 00:33:21,440 there's a few other contenders out there, 963 00:33:21,500 --> 00:33:24,710 but the easiest way to describe is that MailChimp is a 964 00:33:24,740 --> 00:33:28,730 Toyota Corolla and Klayvio is a Ferrari Enzo. 965 00:33:29,060 --> 00:33:30,890 And which one would you rather drive if you want to 966 00:33:30,890 --> 00:33:31,550 win the race? 967 00:33:33,020 --> 00:33:36,110 Okay. But what if there is somebody who is using MailChimp, 968 00:33:36,170 --> 00:33:38,570 doesn't want to leave it because at least they're getting those 969 00:33:38,570 --> 00:33:40,370 emails out to your point earlier. 970 00:33:40,430 --> 00:33:44,810 Is there another text delivery system that you can use that 971 00:33:44,840 --> 00:33:48,200 is in conjunction with email or a standalone? 972 00:33:48,870 --> 00:33:50,420 It doesn't have to be the same one. 973 00:33:50,420 --> 00:33:52,910 We're just kind of fans of the simplicity for our clients, 974 00:33:52,910 --> 00:33:55,520 but some of our clients do have competing platforms. 975 00:33:55,580 --> 00:33:56,570 It is not competition, 976 00:33:56,570 --> 00:33:58,670 but they have different platforms to serve different purposes. 977 00:33:58,880 --> 00:34:01,280 Postscript is another great SMS platform, 978 00:34:01,370 --> 00:34:02,540 especially for Shopify stores. 979 00:34:02,780 --> 00:34:04,340 And there's a few other alternatives out there, 980 00:34:04,340 --> 00:34:05,630 but those two are the best. 981 00:34:05,930 --> 00:34:11,210 But the cool thing about Klaviyo versus MailChimp is Klayvio was 982 00:34:11,240 --> 00:34:13,640 tailor made for e-commerce. 983 00:34:13,940 --> 00:34:16,700 So not only is it like a campaign, 984 00:34:16,910 --> 00:34:19,750 email sending engine or whatever you want to call it, 985 00:34:19,750 --> 00:34:22,250 it also has the automation arm of it. 986 00:34:22,670 --> 00:34:26,660 And automations are crucial in e-commerce. 987 00:34:26,690 --> 00:34:30,920 So you can send your customer tailored messages specific to their 988 00:34:30,920 --> 00:34:32,270 unique customer journey. 989 00:34:32,540 --> 00:34:34,970 So like an easy example is abandoned cart, 990 00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:37,340 but like a more advanced example would be like, 991 00:34:37,340 --> 00:34:39,920 you can send someone a gift card on their birthday, 992 00:34:39,950 --> 00:34:41,660 or you can say, 993 00:34:41,690 --> 00:34:43,700 Hey, like a replenishment email will be like, 994 00:34:43,700 --> 00:34:46,460 you bought this product six months ago. 995 00:34:46,460 --> 00:34:47,390 It's probably empty. 996 00:34:47,390 --> 00:34:48,410 Do you want another one? 997 00:34:48,710 --> 00:34:51,740 And the power of those automations is they're just always happening 998 00:34:51,740 --> 00:34:52,430 in the background. 999 00:34:52,430 --> 00:34:56,120 And that message is so much more targeted to the customer 1000 00:34:56,180 --> 00:34:58,730 than a kind of like campaign, 1001 00:34:58,730 --> 00:34:59,600 which is a little more, 1002 00:34:59,960 --> 00:35:01,370 not like a shotgun approach, 1003 00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:03,110 but it's a little more blasty of like, 1004 00:35:03,110 --> 00:35:04,400 everyone's getting the same message, 1005 00:35:04,670 --> 00:35:05,930 Right? You can really, 1006 00:35:05,930 --> 00:35:09,920 really super segment your list is what you're saying down to 1007 00:35:09,920 --> 00:35:11,300 one, if it's your birthday. 1008 00:35:11,840 --> 00:35:14,540 Yeah. You can do some really cool stuff with the segmentation 1009 00:35:14,600 --> 00:35:15,470 and a platform like that. 1010 00:35:15,710 --> 00:35:16,400 Yeah. I mean, 1011 00:35:16,400 --> 00:35:20,360 even think of this is the anniversary of the first time 1012 00:35:20,420 --> 00:35:24,230 I was able to send you my product First purchase anniversary. 1013 00:35:24,230 --> 00:35:26,240 Yep. And you do like a first purchase. 1014 00:35:26,240 --> 00:35:26,690 Thank you. 1015 00:35:26,690 --> 00:35:27,620 You do a second purchase. 1016 00:35:27,620 --> 00:35:28,310 Thank you. 1017 00:35:28,310 --> 00:35:30,110 You can do like a VIP type series. 1018 00:35:30,110 --> 00:35:32,060 If they buy X amount of dollars of your product. 1019 00:35:32,180 --> 00:35:34,040 If you can tie it to a binary attribute, 1020 00:35:34,040 --> 00:35:35,300 you can probably send an automation. 1021 00:35:35,660 --> 00:35:36,440 Yeah. All right. 1022 00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:40,050 Well it sounds Klaviyo is a whole separate podcast topic in 1023 00:35:40,050 --> 00:35:41,100 terms of how you do it, 1024 00:35:41,100 --> 00:35:42,000 how you get into it. 1025 00:35:42,000 --> 00:35:42,630 All of that. 1026 00:35:42,870 --> 00:35:43,710 It is cool. 1027 00:35:44,010 --> 00:35:48,720 Let's Dive a little bit more into your website and just 1028 00:35:48,750 --> 00:35:51,720 setting up and having an e-commerce presence. 1029 00:35:52,020 --> 00:35:54,270 And I want to kind of back it up for people 1030 00:35:54,300 --> 00:35:56,880 so that they can kind of in their mind be checking 1031 00:35:56,880 --> 00:35:58,080 off the list, 1032 00:35:58,260 --> 00:36:01,620 what they have now versus what is optimal. 1033 00:36:01,680 --> 00:36:04,200 Let's talk about what your site should consist of. 1034 00:36:04,410 --> 00:36:06,420 Like what types of pages should we have? 1035 00:36:06,450 --> 00:36:07,080 Things like that. 1036 00:36:07,470 --> 00:36:08,160 Absolutely. Well, 1037 00:36:08,160 --> 00:36:10,140 the cool thing about Shopify is it kind of, 1038 00:36:10,170 --> 00:36:12,990 doesn't allow you to build a website that doesn't have the 1039 00:36:12,990 --> 00:36:13,860 pages you need. 1040 00:36:13,890 --> 00:36:14,610 So that again, 1041 00:36:14,610 --> 00:36:16,200 it's just making it easier for you. 1042 00:36:16,200 --> 00:36:18,810 But the website in general is I get to think about 1043 00:36:18,810 --> 00:36:20,250 the kind of the purchase flow. 1044 00:36:20,490 --> 00:36:22,890 So you're gonna obviously have a homepage and then you're going 1045 00:36:22,890 --> 00:36:23,880 to have a collection page. 1046 00:36:23,880 --> 00:36:26,610 And this is where it gets a little bit interesting per 1047 00:36:26,760 --> 00:36:28,050 kind of like product line or brand, 1048 00:36:28,050 --> 00:36:28,470 et cetera. 1049 00:36:28,470 --> 00:36:28,920 It's like, 1050 00:36:28,950 --> 00:36:31,170 do you have a high SKU count store with like multiple 1051 00:36:31,170 --> 00:36:32,880 things? Or do you have a low skew count store? 1052 00:36:32,880 --> 00:36:35,230 And maybe you can actually just circumvent a collection page as 1053 00:36:35,230 --> 00:36:36,390 you can just go right to a product page. 1054 00:36:36,420 --> 00:36:37,290 Cause you only sell one thing. 1055 00:36:37,680 --> 00:36:39,270 And then the next step of the funnel is obviously the 1056 00:36:39,270 --> 00:36:40,650 product page from there. 1057 00:36:40,650 --> 00:36:42,600 You're getting to the cart and then you're checking out, 1058 00:36:42,600 --> 00:36:45,180 right? So that's like your typical customer journey, 1059 00:36:45,550 --> 00:36:48,390 few things within that journey that are going to help with 1060 00:36:48,390 --> 00:36:50,820 your conversion rate is people are curious, 1061 00:36:50,820 --> 00:36:52,290 who's making these products. 1062 00:36:52,290 --> 00:36:54,210 So you definitely want an about page that tells your story 1063 00:36:54,210 --> 00:36:56,190 and why you're unique and the cool stuff about you. 1064 00:36:56,490 --> 00:36:59,850 And then another thing is like on that product page and 1065 00:36:59,850 --> 00:37:02,490 kind of sometimes the checkout page is now they're curious about 1066 00:37:02,490 --> 00:37:03,900 your shipping and return policy. 1067 00:37:03,960 --> 00:37:05,730 So it should definitely have a page built out for that. 1068 00:37:05,790 --> 00:37:08,040 And then from a customer journey perspective, 1069 00:37:08,070 --> 00:37:09,180 that's like brass tacks, 1070 00:37:09,210 --> 00:37:11,520 the minimum that you need to kind of get started and 1071 00:37:11,520 --> 00:37:12,060 get going. 1072 00:37:12,330 --> 00:37:14,010 But then there's all sorts of other stuff that you can 1073 00:37:14,010 --> 00:37:14,730 start building out. 1074 00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:16,680 You're selling a food product. 1075 00:37:16,680 --> 00:37:17,790 That's in a certain category. 1076 00:37:17,790 --> 00:37:19,770 You can build out a bunch of pages about recipes on 1077 00:37:19,770 --> 00:37:20,940 how to use your product. 1078 00:37:20,940 --> 00:37:22,920 And all those are doing is trying to help sell your 1079 00:37:22,920 --> 00:37:24,600 product. But honestly, 1080 00:37:24,600 --> 00:37:25,530 on Shopify, 1081 00:37:25,560 --> 00:37:27,600 once you kind of build it out, 1082 00:37:27,690 --> 00:37:29,670 it's going to stand up the pages that you need. 1083 00:37:29,760 --> 00:37:31,530 And then you kind of need that journey to make sense. 1084 00:37:31,560 --> 00:37:33,330 But to that journey in to that point, 1085 00:37:33,360 --> 00:37:35,880 I see a lot of people putting a lot more stuff 1086 00:37:35,880 --> 00:37:38,850 in their top line navigation than they really need to. 1087 00:37:38,940 --> 00:37:40,170 Everything is an important, 1088 00:37:40,560 --> 00:37:42,240 the only things that are important are things that are gonna 1089 00:37:42,240 --> 00:37:42,840 make you money. 1090 00:37:42,900 --> 00:37:46,170 So be very cognizant on like what is going to end 1091 00:37:46,170 --> 00:37:48,840 up in that top line navigation on your website and then 1092 00:37:48,990 --> 00:37:53,250 to a store that has a high skew count where filtering 1093 00:37:53,250 --> 00:37:54,630 and sorting would matter. 1094 00:37:54,690 --> 00:37:57,090 You absolutely need to build that into your site the right 1095 00:37:57,090 --> 00:37:59,970 way. If your site doesn't allow me to get to the 1096 00:37:59,970 --> 00:38:02,880 product that I need as fast as I want to I'm 1097 00:38:02,880 --> 00:38:05,940 on your site and I want the size large black t-shirt 1098 00:38:06,030 --> 00:38:07,890 and I can't drill down into that. 1099 00:38:08,220 --> 00:38:09,810 I'm going to go to an experience. 1100 00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:10,980 I'm going to go a website. 1101 00:38:10,980 --> 00:38:12,510 It allows me to get to what I want faster, 1102 00:38:13,770 --> 00:38:16,740 Which also falls in line with the loading of the site. 1103 00:38:17,160 --> 00:38:19,830 Yeah, I definitely just looked over performance, 1104 00:38:19,830 --> 00:38:22,140 but like performance is crucial. 1105 00:38:22,350 --> 00:38:24,420 That's something that I see a lot of people having issues 1106 00:38:24,420 --> 00:38:27,750 with on Shopify is because they are very good at promoting 1107 00:38:27,750 --> 00:38:29,280 the Shopify app ecosystem, 1108 00:38:29,280 --> 00:38:31,620 but something that isn't really as widely known. 1109 00:38:31,620 --> 00:38:34,440 And I'm try to tell everybody is every time you install 1110 00:38:34,440 --> 00:38:36,070 an app on your Shopify store, 1111 00:38:36,190 --> 00:38:38,590 it's installing code into your theme. 1112 00:38:38,740 --> 00:38:41,230 It's also installing another JavaScript call, 1113 00:38:41,230 --> 00:38:43,720 which means it's loading an external file as well. 1114 00:38:43,780 --> 00:38:45,700 And when you press on install, 1115 00:38:45,820 --> 00:38:49,540 that app loses the ability to interact with your store and 1116 00:38:49,540 --> 00:38:50,230 your theme. 1117 00:38:50,320 --> 00:38:51,850 So that code's still there. 1118 00:38:52,180 --> 00:38:54,400 Now, if you repeat that a dozen times, 1119 00:38:54,430 --> 00:38:56,140 you've slowed your website down, 1120 00:38:56,260 --> 00:38:57,490 like probably not noticeably, 1121 00:38:57,490 --> 00:38:59,200 but like really have you slowed it down. 1122 00:39:00,730 --> 00:39:02,410 So when you're testing apps, 1123 00:39:02,440 --> 00:39:03,670 there's like a way to do it the right way in 1124 00:39:03,670 --> 00:39:04,360 a way to do the wrong way, 1125 00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:06,250 which the wrong ways with 99% of people do, 1126 00:39:06,280 --> 00:39:07,930 because they don't realize what this does. 1127 00:39:08,290 --> 00:39:12,160 And so what happens is people kind of just end up 1128 00:39:12,160 --> 00:39:15,010 with this code base that's full of spaghetti and depending on 1129 00:39:15,070 --> 00:39:17,650 the size of your business and kind of your sales and 1130 00:39:17,650 --> 00:39:19,570 whatnot, there are ways to fix it. 1131 00:39:19,840 --> 00:39:20,740 But nine times out of 10, 1132 00:39:20,740 --> 00:39:23,320 it's probably like start over on a new theme and just 1133 00:39:23,320 --> 00:39:24,580 like rebuild what you have, 1134 00:39:24,640 --> 00:39:27,070 because that's just going to be infinitely faster than like pulling 1135 00:39:27,100 --> 00:39:28,210 the string on a sweater. 1136 00:39:28,300 --> 00:39:29,140 I E your code base. 1137 00:39:29,140 --> 00:39:31,690 And like it just unraveling to a project that no one 1138 00:39:31,690 --> 00:39:32,260 wants to deal with. 1139 00:39:32,620 --> 00:39:35,680 That's really interesting that the code stays There. 1140 00:39:35,980 --> 00:39:37,990 Yeah. They don't really tell anybody about that, 1141 00:39:37,990 --> 00:39:39,160 but I'm out here saying it. 1142 00:39:39,160 --> 00:39:41,020 And I got my friends in the industry saying it too 1143 00:39:41,020 --> 00:39:41,830 and telling everybody, 1144 00:39:41,860 --> 00:39:42,820 but that's a really common thing. 1145 00:39:42,820 --> 00:39:43,060 They're like, 1146 00:39:43,060 --> 00:39:43,840 my website's slow. 1147 00:39:43,840 --> 00:39:44,200 And I'm like, 1148 00:39:44,230 --> 00:39:45,280 how long have you had this theme? 1149 00:39:45,280 --> 00:39:46,090 They're like three years. 1150 00:39:46,090 --> 00:39:46,600 And I was like, 1151 00:39:46,630 --> 00:39:47,890 okay, well a, 1152 00:39:47,980 --> 00:39:50,980 there are more modern technologies to build Shopify themes now. 1153 00:39:51,280 --> 00:39:52,750 So that is a check. 1154 00:39:52,750 --> 00:39:53,140 And they're like, 1155 00:39:53,170 --> 00:39:54,100 this is a detriment. 1156 00:39:54,100 --> 00:39:55,180 This is probably why it's slow. 1157 00:39:55,180 --> 00:39:55,660 And it's like, 1158 00:39:55,690 --> 00:39:56,620 let me check out your apps. 1159 00:39:56,620 --> 00:39:58,690 And they've got 60 apps installed. 1160 00:39:58,810 --> 00:39:59,050 I'm like, 1161 00:39:59,050 --> 00:40:00,640 well, that's way too many to begin with. 1162 00:40:00,640 --> 00:40:00,970 And I'm like, 1163 00:40:00,970 --> 00:40:01,600 if I see that, 1164 00:40:01,600 --> 00:40:03,190 I know you've tested another 60, 1165 00:40:03,190 --> 00:40:03,880 probably I was like, 1166 00:40:03,880 --> 00:40:06,610 your code base probably looks like Swiss cheese and it won't 1167 00:40:06,610 --> 00:40:07,270 make any sense. 1168 00:40:07,270 --> 00:40:08,590 And we won't be able to make any sense from it 1169 00:40:08,590 --> 00:40:08,830 to like, 1170 00:40:08,830 --> 00:40:09,850 make any improvements. 1171 00:40:10,120 --> 00:40:12,340 We might tell you that you probably need a new theme. 1172 00:40:12,850 --> 00:40:15,460 So explain what a theme is for people who are totally 1173 00:40:15,460 --> 00:40:16,720 unfamiliar. Cool. 1174 00:40:16,720 --> 00:40:19,930 So basically Shopify is the backend of your e-commerce business. 1175 00:40:20,200 --> 00:40:23,200 It's basically runs all the e-commerce functionality of your store. 1176 00:40:23,410 --> 00:40:25,810 And then the theme is basically the front end of your 1177 00:40:25,810 --> 00:40:28,270 store. And it's the look and feel and the functionality it's 1178 00:40:28,270 --> 00:40:30,040 like the website in most people's eyes, 1179 00:40:30,070 --> 00:40:31,240 but the design, 1180 00:40:31,300 --> 00:40:31,990 the look, 1181 00:40:32,020 --> 00:40:34,390 the feel kind of like what it looks on mobile versus 1182 00:40:34,390 --> 00:40:35,530 desktop, all that lives in your theme. 1183 00:40:35,620 --> 00:40:37,690 And if you keep injecting a bunch of code into your 1184 00:40:37,690 --> 00:40:38,920 theme, it's going to be slow, 1185 00:40:38,920 --> 00:40:39,880 especially on mobile. 1186 00:40:40,000 --> 00:40:41,830 That's something to kind of keep in mind. 1187 00:40:42,400 --> 00:40:43,900 We're starting a Shopify. 1188 00:40:43,900 --> 00:40:46,300 Let's say you're starting from scratch and you're building a Shopify 1189 00:40:46,300 --> 00:40:49,240 account. The very first thing you'll do is select a theme. 1190 00:40:49,540 --> 00:40:52,120 So then you see like the flow of the homepage and 1191 00:40:52,120 --> 00:40:55,870 some things come with the theme and these themes are all 1192 00:40:55,870 --> 00:40:57,250 third-party created, 1193 00:40:57,280 --> 00:40:58,990 right? No, 1194 00:40:58,990 --> 00:41:01,090 actually, so there's a few things I can say there. 1195 00:41:01,090 --> 00:41:01,810 So one, 1196 00:41:01,840 --> 00:41:04,960 there is like a Shopify theme store and there are free 1197 00:41:04,960 --> 00:41:07,120 options. And then there are paid options, 1198 00:41:07,150 --> 00:41:09,010 but all of them are kind of like off the shelf 1199 00:41:09,040 --> 00:41:11,950 and they're all a little bit generic and they are kind 1200 00:41:11,950 --> 00:41:15,760 of built for the general public and nothing is super tailored 1201 00:41:15,760 --> 00:41:19,750 to your business or your customer or your unique customer journey. 1202 00:41:20,080 --> 00:41:21,460 With that being said, 1203 00:41:21,520 --> 00:41:23,410 if you're not making a million dollars a year, 1204 00:41:23,530 --> 00:41:28,030 use something off the shelf because the performance enhancements that you'd 1205 00:41:28,030 --> 00:41:32,140 get from going with a custom designed theme from like a 1206 00:41:32,140 --> 00:41:36,980 reputable agency or whatever is nil kind of like sub $1 1207 00:41:37,340 --> 00:41:40,040 million. But if your business is doing great now you're kind 1208 00:41:40,070 --> 00:41:41,120 of out of that startup phase, 1209 00:41:41,120 --> 00:41:42,200 I call it zero to $1 million, 1210 00:41:42,200 --> 00:41:43,100 probably like the startup phase. 1211 00:41:43,100 --> 00:41:44,990 And then like one to 10 in e-commerce is like, 1212 00:41:45,020 --> 00:41:45,280 you know, 1213 00:41:45,320 --> 00:41:48,170 you're scaling once you kind of turn that corner around seven 1214 00:41:48,170 --> 00:41:51,620 figures, it's the advantages that you'd get, 1215 00:41:51,650 --> 00:41:55,520 which are fractional increases like percentage increases from going to a 1216 00:41:55,520 --> 00:41:58,820 more performance theme that's custom and tailor made to your customer 1217 00:41:58,820 --> 00:41:59,780 journey and your products, 1218 00:41:59,780 --> 00:42:00,260 et cetera. 1219 00:42:00,500 --> 00:42:03,470 Those like relate to like thousands and tens of thousands of 1220 00:42:03,470 --> 00:42:04,460 dollars in margin. 1221 00:42:05,630 --> 00:42:09,650 Perfect. I thought that each of the themes was third-party created 1222 00:42:09,650 --> 00:42:13,010 and then approved by Shopify to be in the selection base. 1223 00:42:13,520 --> 00:42:15,230 Some are some aren't, 1224 00:42:15,260 --> 00:42:16,670 but if it's in the Shopify theme store, 1225 00:42:16,670 --> 00:42:19,070 it has been through a rigorous kind of process. 1226 00:42:19,190 --> 00:42:21,320 Anything that isn't in the Shopify theme store? 1227 00:42:21,440 --> 00:42:22,730 No, You just don't do it. 1228 00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:23,390 That's it? 1229 00:42:23,420 --> 00:42:25,460 Because there's so much selection there you don't need, 1230 00:42:26,360 --> 00:42:27,950 And there's no Shopify. 1231 00:42:27,950 --> 00:42:30,830 Isn't like looking at the code or looking at how it's 1232 00:42:30,830 --> 00:42:31,820 built and like, 1233 00:42:31,880 --> 00:42:33,920 it could be slow or it could be a lie, 1234 00:42:33,950 --> 00:42:35,540 whatever, like just don't trust anything. 1235 00:42:35,540 --> 00:42:36,770 That's not on the Shopify team store. 1236 00:42:37,070 --> 00:42:37,610 Yep. Okay. 1237 00:42:37,620 --> 00:42:39,200 We won't go down that rabbit hole. 1238 00:42:39,680 --> 00:42:41,030 Some things are older than others. 1239 00:42:41,030 --> 00:42:42,620 Some are less supported than others. 1240 00:42:42,620 --> 00:42:43,760 Don't be afraid of that. 1241 00:42:43,760 --> 00:42:45,290 Cause you can also change your theme. 1242 00:42:45,680 --> 00:42:47,990 You can change your theme and then any theme you can 1243 00:42:47,990 --> 00:42:51,230 customize, if you hire a designer and developer that know what 1244 00:42:51,230 --> 00:42:51,770 they're doing, 1245 00:42:52,070 --> 00:42:53,870 so you can always start one place. 1246 00:42:54,440 --> 00:42:54,920 That's the thing. 1247 00:42:54,920 --> 00:42:57,890 I think people get too bogged down in like the design 1248 00:42:57,890 --> 00:42:59,720 of their website before they started marketing it. 1249 00:42:59,720 --> 00:43:00,170 And it's like, 1250 00:43:00,170 --> 00:43:02,180 that's not really like as big of a deal as you 1251 00:43:02,180 --> 00:43:04,160 think, especially at the beginning again, 1252 00:43:04,190 --> 00:43:05,240 you got to get product market fit, 1253 00:43:05,240 --> 00:43:06,320 you got to get customer feedback, 1254 00:43:06,320 --> 00:43:08,510 like just start selling and trust me, 1255 00:43:08,510 --> 00:43:10,310 there'll be time later on to redesign the website. 1256 00:43:10,670 --> 00:43:11,870 Yes, absolutely. 1257 00:43:11,930 --> 00:43:15,770 Okay. And so tell me a little bit then about electric. 1258 00:43:15,770 --> 00:43:18,890 I, do you help build the sites for people then or 1259 00:43:18,890 --> 00:43:21,140 share with me the services that you provide there? 1260 00:43:21,470 --> 00:43:26,030 Absolutely. So most people come to us for custom designed websites. 1261 00:43:26,030 --> 00:43:29,180 So we're doing a whole design process with them and then 1262 00:43:29,180 --> 00:43:30,680 developing it out on our framework. 1263 00:43:30,710 --> 00:43:31,910 That's lightening fast. 1264 00:43:32,360 --> 00:43:33,890 It's All connected with Shopify. 1265 00:43:34,250 --> 00:43:36,380 Yeah. We're building you a custom Shopify theme at the end 1266 00:43:36,380 --> 00:43:36,680 of the day, 1267 00:43:36,680 --> 00:43:38,000 if we're going through that process. 1268 00:43:38,030 --> 00:43:41,720 Okay. But it's unique to your business and to your branding 1269 00:43:41,720 --> 00:43:42,530 and all that stuff. 1270 00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:46,160 And our framework is like constantly updated to be like as 1271 00:43:46,160 --> 00:43:48,860 nimble as it can be with the current Shopify releases and 1272 00:43:48,860 --> 00:43:50,180 all the cool stuff that we can do there. 1273 00:43:50,480 --> 00:43:52,460 And then the other kind of offerings that we have, 1274 00:43:52,460 --> 00:43:55,400 people come to us for like CRO or email and SMS 1275 00:43:55,400 --> 00:43:57,170 marketing, a lot of Klaviyo stuff. 1276 00:43:57,440 --> 00:43:59,930 What's CRO conversion rate optimization. 1277 00:44:00,380 --> 00:44:03,410 So what that basically means is you've got a website it's 1278 00:44:03,410 --> 00:44:06,020 fantastic. There's always room for improvement. 1279 00:44:06,020 --> 00:44:07,550 Your website's never done. 1280 00:44:07,880 --> 00:44:10,430 And so conversion rate optimization is kind of like using the 1281 00:44:10,430 --> 00:44:12,650 scientific method to make hypotheses around. 1282 00:44:12,680 --> 00:44:14,810 If we move this button here, 1283 00:44:14,840 --> 00:44:16,550 we think it's going to increase conversion. 1284 00:44:16,640 --> 00:44:19,100 And then you do an AB test and you send a 1285 00:44:19,100 --> 00:44:21,530 bunch of traffic to it and then you get a result 1286 00:44:21,530 --> 00:44:23,180 and there'll be a significant difference. 1287 00:44:23,480 --> 00:44:24,680 Once you hit a certain number, 1288 00:44:24,680 --> 00:44:26,330 it's a statistical difference. 1289 00:44:26,330 --> 00:44:26,900 That is like, 1290 00:44:26,900 --> 00:44:27,740 well, that one wins. 1291 00:44:28,010 --> 00:44:29,150 But in reality, 1292 00:44:29,510 --> 00:44:31,100 seven times out of 10, 1293 00:44:31,140 --> 00:44:33,060 your hypothesis won't matter. 1294 00:44:33,120 --> 00:44:34,590 And that's just part of the game. 1295 00:44:34,620 --> 00:44:36,450 But the one time out of 10 where it's a home 1296 00:44:36,450 --> 00:44:37,890 run is going to change the business. 1297 00:44:38,340 --> 00:44:40,470 So coming into it with like a testing mentality, 1298 00:44:40,530 --> 00:44:41,130 something to do, 1299 00:44:41,130 --> 00:44:43,320 but brands that are kind of sub a million dollars a 1300 00:44:43,320 --> 00:44:46,260 year probably don't have the traffic of velocity of orders to 1301 00:44:46,650 --> 00:44:47,640 do those tests. 1302 00:44:47,670 --> 00:44:50,460 It's definitely a little more up market to do conversion rate 1303 00:44:50,460 --> 00:44:51,780 optimization. Okay. 1304 00:44:52,020 --> 00:44:52,320 All right. 1305 00:44:52,560 --> 00:44:55,560 And what will we learn if we listen to the honest 1306 00:44:55,560 --> 00:44:56,610 e-commerce podcasts? 1307 00:44:57,030 --> 00:44:59,550 So what I've really started to focus on these days is 1308 00:44:59,550 --> 00:45:04,350 interviewing brands and getting their journey in their words and asking 1309 00:45:04,350 --> 00:45:05,760 them questions about like, 1310 00:45:05,820 --> 00:45:07,650 how did you come up with the idea? 1311 00:45:07,920 --> 00:45:10,380 Where did you get your first couple customers? 1312 00:45:10,410 --> 00:45:13,740 What advice would you tell your younger self was very heavily 1313 00:45:13,740 --> 00:45:15,600 inspired by how I built this. 1314 00:45:15,910 --> 00:45:17,760 It's kind of like how I built this for Shopify brands. 1315 00:45:18,210 --> 00:45:18,690 Perfect. Well, 1316 00:45:18,690 --> 00:45:21,000 I think that's definitely a show that we should be listening 1317 00:45:21,000 --> 00:45:22,920 to. So it's called honesty, 1318 00:45:22,920 --> 00:45:24,750 commerce, probably everywhere. 1319 00:45:24,780 --> 00:45:28,080 Podcasts Are everywhere that podcasts hang out. 1320 00:45:28,350 --> 00:45:30,000 Have you put your podcast on Facebook yet? 1321 00:45:30,330 --> 00:45:30,900 You can do that. 1322 00:45:30,930 --> 00:45:31,800 Yeah, I have not. 1323 00:45:32,250 --> 00:45:34,980 Yeah. You put it on your Facebook page and it's a 1324 00:45:34,980 --> 00:45:37,620 tablet to drop down so people can just go to Facebook, 1325 00:45:37,680 --> 00:45:38,580 click on the podcast, 1326 00:45:38,580 --> 00:45:40,740 drop down and then get any of the episodes full. 1327 00:45:40,800 --> 00:45:42,960 You don't load them in it automatically goes There. 1328 00:45:43,670 --> 00:45:44,250 Look into that. 1329 00:45:44,460 --> 00:45:45,660 Yeah. Chase. 1330 00:45:45,660 --> 00:45:48,300 This has been incredibly informative. 1331 00:45:48,330 --> 00:45:49,320 Thank you so much. 1332 00:45:49,380 --> 00:45:53,340 I really appreciate taking a look into the expertise of e-commerce 1333 00:45:53,340 --> 00:45:55,170 overall and specifically shopping. 1334 00:45:55,710 --> 00:45:57,180 Absolutely. Thanks so much for having me. 1335 00:46:00,270 --> 00:46:03,780 Hm. What's your opinion of messaging? 1336 00:46:04,590 --> 00:46:08,280 Chase's comments have me rethinking my position and I'd love to 1337 00:46:08,280 --> 00:46:09,300 hear your opinion. 1338 00:46:10,170 --> 00:46:12,690 How do you feel about messaging your customers? 1339 00:46:13,140 --> 00:46:14,760 Do you have a system already set up? 1340 00:46:15,570 --> 00:46:20,250 Do you like receiving messages from businesses you deal with direct 1341 00:46:20,250 --> 00:46:23,040 message me with your thoughts or comment on any of the 1342 00:46:23,040 --> 00:46:26,130 social posts connected with this podcast episode? 1343 00:46:26,940 --> 00:46:30,420 It's an interesting point to consider since messaging is being used 1344 00:46:30,480 --> 00:46:32,280 more and more these days, 1345 00:46:33,330 --> 00:46:36,420 I can't wait for us to dive into next Saturday's show 1346 00:46:36,690 --> 00:46:40,260 where we talk with a business owner whose physical product is 1347 00:46:40,260 --> 00:46:42,900 only half of the mission of her company. 1348 00:46:43,620 --> 00:46:46,320 If you have a cause that you hold dear and have 1349 00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:49,440 been thinking about how your business could bring more attention or 1350 00:46:49,440 --> 00:46:50,790 dollars to the effort, 1351 00:46:51,210 --> 00:46:53,100 this is one you don't want to miss. 1352 00:46:53,850 --> 00:46:54,600 And don't forget. 1353 00:46:54,630 --> 00:46:57,840 I'm also here each Wednesday for a shorter episode, 1354 00:46:58,020 --> 00:47:00,510 where you hear about something I'm seeing in the world of 1355 00:47:00,510 --> 00:47:03,990 handmade. Thanks so much for spending time with me today. 1356 00:47:04,290 --> 00:47:06,360 If you'd like to show support for the podcast, 1357 00:47:06,660 --> 00:47:08,010 let me know how it's helped you. 1358 00:47:08,250 --> 00:47:11,760 Something new you've learned or suggest a topic you'd like to 1359 00:47:11,760 --> 00:47:16,230 know more about just added as a review on iTunes or 1360 00:47:16,290 --> 00:47:17,670 any other review site. 1361 00:47:18,240 --> 00:47:20,250 I read every single one personally, 1362 00:47:20,280 --> 00:47:25,200 and absolutely use suggestions as guidance for new guests and topics. 1363 00:47:25,890 --> 00:47:28,560 There are other ways to show support for the podcast to 1364 00:47:29,050 --> 00:47:32,440 visit our merch shop for a wide variety of gift biz 1365 00:47:32,470 --> 00:47:34,450 paraphernalia like mugs, 1366 00:47:34,630 --> 00:47:39,730 t-shirts water bottles and more featuring logos and quotes to inspire 1367 00:47:39,730 --> 00:47:40,870 you throughout your day. 1368 00:47:41,560 --> 00:47:43,720 You can take a look at all the options over at 1369 00:47:43,720 --> 00:47:44,350 gift biz, 1370 00:47:44,350 --> 00:47:46,960 unwrapped.com forward slash shop. 1371 00:47:47,830 --> 00:47:48,820 All the proceeds, 1372 00:47:48,910 --> 00:47:53,770 help offset the cost of producing this podcast and now be 1373 00:47:53,770 --> 00:47:54,580 safe and well. 1374 00:47:54,910 --> 00:47:55,720 And I'll see you again. 1375 00:47:55,720 --> 00:47:58,720 Next time on the gift biz on wrapped podcast. 1376 00:47:59,740 --> 00:48:02,410 I want to make sure you're familiar with my free Facebook 1377 00:48:02,410 --> 00:48:04,600 group called gift is free. 1378 00:48:05,320 --> 00:48:09,130 It's a place where we all gather and our community to 1379 00:48:09,130 --> 00:48:10,360 support each other. 1380 00:48:10,810 --> 00:48:13,930 Got a really fun post in there that's my favorite of 1381 00:48:13,930 --> 00:48:14,320 the week. 1382 00:48:14,320 --> 00:48:17,230 I have to say where I invite all of you to 1383 00:48:17,230 --> 00:48:20,320 share what you're doing to show pictures of your product, 1384 00:48:20,500 --> 00:48:23,740 to show what you're working on for the week to get 1385 00:48:23,740 --> 00:48:26,680 reactions from other people and just for fun, 1386 00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:30,310 because we all get to see the wonderful products that everybody 1387 00:48:30,310 --> 00:48:34,840 in the community is making my favorite posts every single week, 1388 00:48:34,870 --> 00:48:36,100 without doubt. 1389 00:48:36,940 --> 00:48:37,810 Wait, what, 1390 00:48:38,920 --> 00:48:40,510 aren't you part of the group already, 1391 00:48:41,200 --> 00:48:44,590 if not make sure to jump over to Facebook and search 1392 00:48:44,590 --> 00:48:48,040 for the group gift biz breeze don't delay. 1393 00:48:48,550 --> 00:48:51,700 Come join us in gift biz breeze today.