Speaker: 00:00:04

So welcome to the eCommerce Podcast.

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My name is Matt Edmundson and it is great to be with you this fine fettle of a day.

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It's always fun to be with you actually.

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I really quite enjoy doing these shows and today is no exception.

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We've got a great guest coming up but before we talk to Max, let me just give a quick

shout out and a warm welcome to you.

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If this is your first time with us on the eCommerce Podcast.

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It's great.

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We just talk about all things eCommerce from every angle that we can possibly

think about because like you, I'm also in eCommerce.

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I run my own eCommerce business.

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Well, businesses actually.

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And I just love these shows because we get to find out all kinds of weird, wonderful

things from our guests.

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So Max, welcome to the show.

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It's good to have you on.

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Yeah, it's lovely to be here.

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Thanks so much for having me.

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Been a long time listener, so it's lovely to be here with you.

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Good, very good.

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For those of the listeners that might not know who Max Beech is, why don't you give us the

quick 20 second low down.

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Yeah, so I'm currently running my own startup, which is basically on the grounds

that most eCommerce brands know a lot about their customers, but communicate with them

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like they know nothing.

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And so the goal of Athenic, which is the startup, is to close the gap. It builds a profile

of every customer over time, and it uses that to make every message feel personal.

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And before that, I was working at a couple of startups in product management, working at

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Revolut and Yahoo in their various app and website teams respectively.

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I love how you called Revolut a startup and Yahoo a startup.

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That was great.

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Yeah, at one point it was a startup, right?

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We've all had to start somewhere.

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So why not?

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Let's go for that.

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Well, welcome to the show.

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Now we're going to be talking a little bit about personalisation, which is your area of

expertise from these various ventures, from your own to the things that you have done.

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Obviously you've set up

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your software because you see a gap in the market, right?

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You see some possibilities, but I'm curious Max, if there's one thing, right?

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If you could wave your proverbial eCommerce magic wand, as I like to say, and solve the

one key thing that we all seem to be suffering from, what would that one thing be?

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For me, I think it would be just to give every founder five minutes inside the

head of the most recently churned customer and not the data about them.

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So I think eCommerce founders are brilliant about knowing their CAC, their

LTV, their repeat customer rate, but actually the experience, what did that

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customer feel when their first email arrived from the brand?

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What did they feel like when no one followed up potentially?

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What would have made them stay?

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Because I think most founders

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probably actually know what they'd see.

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And that's the problem.

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They know that their communications are often a little bit too generic.

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It's one of those things that might feel like a nice to have, but they just either

don't feel like they've got the time or the tools to do anything about it.

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But it's something that really makes the difference.

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And so you might look at your churn rate or your lack of retention and you see

that dropping, but by then it's already too late and you really have to work back and look

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at that experience.

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That's a really interesting idea, to get inside the head for five minutes of the

customer who last churned.

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What sort of things would we discover if we could do that?

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I think it would be a lot of the basics.

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A key moment here is the first 14 days after someone's purchased.

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A lot of brands might treat that period either as dead air before the next sale.

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They might also think, okay, maybe we're a one-time purchase product.

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There's no huge value in really communicating with that customer other than dealing with

them if they've got a problem.

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But this is the moment of highest trust.

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Very often,

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these brands waste that opportunity.

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But if they do tap in, they might be thinking, right, we'll send them an email, maybe

with a 10% off code to get their next purchase.

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But the key is, don't try and sell them anything.

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I think everyone's been in that experience where they've been inside a store and that

salesperson is just nagging them trying to be too salesy.

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And it's exactly the same experience that a lot of customers

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feel when they're online. They've purchased something from a brand and the

first message they get is a 10% off code on day three, for example.

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But it doesn't need to be that way.

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You can build the rapport and think about the lifetime value of the customer, whether the

goal is to sell them something again, whether to keep them as a subscription or whether to

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leverage them to then recommend that product to the next three, five

people.

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It's a really interesting point, isn't it?

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I think I've mentioned this before on the eCommerce Podcast and what you're making

me think of is my favourite coffee shop, right?

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In the sense that when I go into, there's a coffee shop in Liverpool and if you're in

Liverpool, go to Bean, it's in town, it's in Liverpool One, it's a great coffee shop.

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I don't drink coffee, but I really like the teas and stuff.

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Anyway, I go to this coffee shop, and I go at least probably two, three times a month when

I'm in town and I just want to go sit and work.

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I'll go work and the guys that own it are great.

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And I've known them for years.

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You go in the coffee shop, right?

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It's beautiful.

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You've got very good coffee shop vibes.

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They care very deeply about coffee.

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And so they attract the coffee lovers, which is good.

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And you walk up to the counter and you walk past a drinks dispenser, where you can get your can of Coke or whatever it is.

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They've got this beautiful glass presentation case with all the pastries and

things that I could buy until my heart's content.

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I've got a beautifully designed price board above me and the lady or gentleman

behind the till who takes my order is usually quite chirpy, very pleasant and lovely.

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I place my order.

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Because at this point, I'm happy.

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I'm enjoying the experience, right?

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I'm quite a happy chap.

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And then everything changes in an instant.

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And it's not just Bean, it's every coffee shop I've been into.

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It's like, right, we've got your money.

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Now go stand over there in a queue, which has no sense of order about it.

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It's just like, and you'll stand there until somebody shouts your name.

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Now, if you're bored, do something on your phone, but there's no decor, there's no chairs,

there's no...

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way of engaging me.

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There's no onboarding.

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There's nothing.

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It's just like sit and wait.

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And then eventually I get my coffee at some point, never quite sure if it's

mine or I went up, my tea or whatever.

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I suppose that's one of the benefits of not drinking coffee.

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I know when my drink gets called, I'm not going to confuse it, but it's a really

interesting analogy for me.

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And I've often stood there when I'm waiting on my drink and I smile every time it

happens.

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Because it happens in coffee shops all over.

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Everything is geared to getting your coffee order.

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And then of course they want to make you a good coffee.

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They do want to deliver.

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But at the end of the day, the experience while they deliver is rubbish.

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And so in eComm, there's a very similar vibe, right?

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In other words, we create these beautiful websites, these beautiful experiences.

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Everybody is all about getting that first order.

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Then once the order is placed,

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it's like crickets. There's no onboarding.

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And like you say, what I might get is thanks for your order.

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And some forward thinking eCommerce brands then send me an email saying, here's 10% off

your next order.

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I've not received, like you say, I've not received the first one yet.

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So down to your classic email.

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So I get what you're saying.

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It's about creating this experience, isn't it?

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Between, well, one of the things is about creating an experience between point of purchase

and point of delivery, I would have thought.

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100%.

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And I think it's such a good idea to look at other industries like you did with the

coffee shop.

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Maybe that's not the correct experience, but some industries, some products do

this actually really well.

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And when I was at Revolut, I saw this. Tech companies in general are so good at

retention and it does help that they perhaps don't feel they need to sell the next product

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straight away.

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But in fact,

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if I went into the next design review and pitched that

we were going to try to upsell a premium subscription to day five customers, I'd be

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laughed out of the room.

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So the goal in companies like that was to identify the magic

moment that will make this person sticky and then work out how can we get that person to

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that point as quickly as we can.

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And then

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identify the moment where they're most likely to feel happy enough with the product that

they're then willing to refer the next three people.

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And then how can we get that person to that point as quickly as possible?

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And so it's all about identifying what is the user journey.

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And that's not just getting the person into the product or, if it's eComm, it's

getting the person to buy the product.

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It's actually how can we take them through that experience and just

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So how would I think about that journey?

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What are some of the things that I need to think about as an eCommerce entrepreneur?

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I think you can look at your retention like this.

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I'm not saying don't look at the data because it might give you some good hints at where

people might be dropping off if it's a subscription product where you can get that sort of

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minutiae of data.

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But I think what a lot of people miss is just actually asking the customer.

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And I think for me, when I'm thinking about personalisation, we did a couple of really

interesting personalisation products

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at Yahoo, for example, and one we submitted for a patent, the other one we probably

should have done.

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And we spent a long time trying to collect all of these small little points of data,

which people were perhaps putting out there and we were trying to use that to build a

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picture.

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But I think one thing that was actually much more helpful than that was when we sent a

little form to them that was just like, tell us about the last seven days.

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Tell us about this product.

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And I think it's something that eComm founders don't do nearly enough is just ask them.

It could be in the post purchase email.

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Why did you buy this product?

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Just trying to be very straight up to understand who is this customer and what do they want.

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Because someone is buying running shoes.

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They could be doing that because they just need to walk their dog next week.

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So they've just bought a new dog or it might be because they're training for a marathon

next week.

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But if you're trying to segment,

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Mm.

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it needs to be a very different experience.

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And so you need to understand what are the typical user journeys for the type of people

buying your products and how can you then identify who those different people are

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as best you can, and then guide them through that user journey.

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That's a really valuable point, isn't it?

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Talk to your customers and find out why they're buying.

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And actually, by doing that, I guess you will find out what the user journeys are.

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We can all hypothesise, right?

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And we can all go, well, we think it's this.

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But I guess we don't actually know, do we?

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And we function a lot on assumption without clarifying sometimes.

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I guess my slight hesitation,

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Max, if I can put it this way, is...

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When we have historically asked customers questions, it is a little bit like trying to

pull teeth, right?

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So I get for Yahoo, for example, who will have millions of people, you can send out a

million surveys and you'll get 10,000 back or whatever it is.

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And that's actually quite a significant number.

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If I'm a small eComm business with, I don't know, a hundred or a thousand, maybe 10,000

customers, you can send out,

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these requests to ask why people buy.

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Getting people to fill that in is a trick in its own right, isn't it?

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I don't know if you've had any experience with that or how you get people to answer those

questions.

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Yeah, but it doesn't need to be something where you say, right, well, I need

to create this survey and find statistical significance.

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You can pick your top 10 customers and just send them a WhatsApp if

you've got permission for that or give them a call.

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And I think when you break through and be that much more personal, then the response rate

changes.

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We talk about open rates.

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Well, if you stick a handwritten letter in your next product delivery, then

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the open rate is going to be 100%.

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So there are ways to do it that aren't scalable and they don't need to be scalable to get

a good sense.

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The benchmark we used is, if you reach out to about 10 people,

that's probably enough where you're going to start to see some trend in just the

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answers that they give.

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Obviously depends on the scope you're asking.

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But I think another thing that's just very important for businesses to do and what I

see is

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eComm businesses are not the best at this is just trying to help them understand where is

all of their customer data.

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So if they're not reaching out to these people individually, let's just lay the groundwork

and just understand where do we have all of the customer data?

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Because at the moment, there might be data spread out across Mailchimp,

Shopify, maybe something like WordPress or Klaviyo and all of these different

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touch points where if the customer then comes to them or they want to go out to the

customer, they've got no chance at trying to have a cohesive understanding of who that

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customer is.

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And we think about segmentation as being one to many.

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Well, really what we want is to get to a point where it's more memory-like where

it's one to one.

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And we actually understand that that person, if they say that they're buying

running shoes, we can connect the dots to understand.

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That's a really interesting point, isn't it?

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And I guess with AI, with software like yours, with technology the way it is, this is

becoming easier and easier.

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Because Google Analytics definitely doesn't tell you that information.

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Well, at least I don't think it does.

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And if it does, someone needs to correct my thinking very quickly.

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But I think it's an interesting thing to track.

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And this leads into your idea of dynamic customer knowledge bases.

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Yeah.

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And for me, when I'm building the product, I'm trying to build something that

is scalable and that essentially tries to build memories about each customer.

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And that works at scale, but it doesn't have to be at scale. Even if

someone doesn't have any technology, really just trying to have a framework so that when a

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customer reaches out to them, they can at least understand.

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Okay, right.

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Well, these are the places I need to go so that I'm not embarrassing myself

when they've been a customer for five years and I don't understand that

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loyalty.

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And another great industry example of this is a company, I don't know if

you're aware of Stitch Fix.

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But essentially they built a, they were in the UK actually, they've refocused

back into the US but they built a $1 billion business

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on the very simple premise that your personal stylist remembers you.

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So every time you fill in your profile, every time you keep an item, return an item, write

a note, they store it.

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And their algorithm wasn't really an algorithm at all.

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It was being incredibly organised on their backend with how they keep this data and

organise it.

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And so when they then go to next purchase or when the customer then goes to next purchase

a product, there's actually a human there that has that data to hand.

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And can utilise it to offer a personalised product.

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And whilst most people don't need to be on the scale of that to personalise their

products, the point still stands that even if you don't invest in software to automate

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this at scale, there are ways that you can still build a good understanding of each

customer just by being a little bit more organised with where you store data, where you

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know to look for data when someone does reach out and you want to.

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Well, let me ask you about that then because let's assume I'm just starting out and I'm selling

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I'm just looking randomly around my desk.

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Here we go.

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I've got Lego Iron Man.

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Why would you not have, I just need to.

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There you go.

222

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If you're watching on YouTube, you can see Lego Iron Man.

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So I've got Lego Iron Man on my desk.

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That's a question as to why a grown man has Lego on it.

225

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Anyway, I've started a business and I'm selling small plastic toys.

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I'm just starting out.

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So I'm being budget conscious.

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What...

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How would you tell me to start to organise this data?

230

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What are some of the things that I can do before I start subscribing to various

different things?

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But what are some of the basics that I can do to help myself?

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Max?

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Yeah.

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I think the one thing is just trying to understand where these different data points

are.

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If you're selling this product, just trying to know when someone reaches

out, how long have they been a customer?

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And so I think there's some basic data points that people don't necessarily have.

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If someone reaches out on a direct message on Instagram, is there a way that you can

easily

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get yourself in a position where you can look up their Shopify order history.

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And it might just be as simple as your personal flow of if you're the one doing it

or if you've got someone to help you reply to customer responses, how can you just make

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sure that you design yourself a system where you can tap into this information so that the

customer isn't having to repeat themselves?

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So as much as it's,

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It's really interesting, isn't it?

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And I guess I'm just thinking slightly, if I...

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If I'm listening to this and I've not done this before, I'm thinking, well, how

much data is enough data?

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Part of the problem I think we have in eCommerce is too much data and not knowing

what to do with it.

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If there's one thing I hear over and over again, it's like, I've got access to all this

data.

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I don't know what it's telling me.

248

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I don't know what I'm supposed to do as a result of it.

249

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And so I guess understanding

250

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how do I avoid that sense of data overwhelm?

251

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What are the key things I should be looking at?

252

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I appreciate I'm asking you how long is a piece of string, because it's obviously going to

depend on your industry.

253

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But what are some of the generic things that I should definitely be looking at maybe?

254

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And how do I avoid that sense of data overwhelm?

255

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I think you avoid it by just, it sounds a little bit cliche at this stage,

but just thinking back to the customer and who they are and who you believe they are and

256

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really trying to get into the head of what is their current experience.

257

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Obviously what type of products that you have and what type of retention you're hoping

to get from them is important for this, but what is the ideal journey that you've got for

258

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them?

259

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And then where

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are you currently having a, in the tech term, we call it a

leaky bucket, but essentially, where are people being dissatisfied?

261

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And that's where you can then focus on and just understand, okay, well, what data do we

have?

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For example, maybe it is that 14 day period after they've purchased a product.

263

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And maybe we're better off communicating how we can actually use the product.

264

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Maybe it's something as simple as, we identified that this

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product's got a high return rate and we just need to put an A4 piece of

paper printed with our next product, which just explains, maybe it's signed by the founder

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and it just says exactly how to use this product.

267

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And then they can take that and they can see, okay, well the brand has actually thought

a little bit about this experience and we can go from there.

268

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269

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Specific data points are hard to say, but I think it's really just about the brand

stepping back and not being overwhelmed by trying to look at all of these charts and

270

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understand where there might be a leaky bucket.

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That was something that we focused on a lot at Yahoo.

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I was in charge of their finance apps.

273

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Essentially, what we had was a huge amount of scope to try to

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improve the experience from when a user first understood that there was a finance app to

downloading it, to using it, and to actually try to build a picture of this user journey,

275

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incredibly difficult.

276

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We had pretty good data tools to our hand, still extremely difficult to actually

understand from this point, this customer is then doing this.

277

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And it really took us just speaking with customers,

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trying to step back and understand what are they likely doing as the best way of really

understanding what the journeys were and where we needed to spend our time.

279

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Yeah, I'd say that's fascinating.

280

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I mean, I love the fact you said "in tech, we call it a leaky bucket" like leaky

bucket is a tech term.

281

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282

00:23:03,403 --> 00:23:08,916

Yeah, there's a lot of cliche terms we take from elsewhere.

283

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Yeah, adopted perhaps.

284

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It's funny, isn't it?

285

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And I mean, I was always told you never fix a leaky bucket by adding more water.

286

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You've got to fix the leak.

287

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And so it's, yeah, I mean, that aside, I'm sorry, I've gone off on one in my

head now.

288

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I'm imagining code, the code brackets we like to use,

says leaky bucket.

289

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Forward slash close leaky bucket.

290

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Anyway, I'd love to understand what some of the things that you were surprised at

when you were working with Yahoo on this journey, what are some of the

291

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expectations or assumptions that you had that actually by the end of it, they'd got

reversed?

292

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Because I'm guessing, if we're going to integrate this well,

293

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this ideology well in our own eCommerce businesses.

294

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We actually have to start by making a reasonable assumption.

295

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Like we're going to make our best guess based on what we know.

296

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And then we're going to go and have a look at the data and what that tells us.

297

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I'm imagining on a regular basis and we're going to adjust our assumptions, right?

298

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We're going to, rather than waiting for everything, for all our ducks to be in a

line and then make an assumption.

299

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Maybe I'm wrong.

300

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I guess that would be how I would do it.

301

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I would make an assumption, best guess assumption, test that hypothesis, iterate it as I

go along as much as I hate the word iterate.

302

00:24:40,714 --> 00:24:41,505

Sorry, everybody.

303

00:24:41,505 --> 00:24:42,485

I shouldn't say that.

304

00:24:42,485 --> 00:24:48,287

In my head, iterate and ping are two words which should be banned from the English

language.

305

00:24:48,287 --> 00:24:50,468

But that's another story.

306

00:24:50,608 --> 00:24:54,259

Is that a good assumption to make or is that a good place to start, maybe?

307

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Yeah, I think it's good to have those and actually, a lot of the times, as much as

we'd like to say that we were looking at the data, looking for a problem and

308

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then trying to solve it.

309

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So hard to do that realistically with the amount of data that we have, but also trying to

really properly understand it.

310

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So a lot of the time it came from an assumption and then taking that, trying to look in

the data and then see if there was a case to try to solve it.

311

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And so I think it's something that

312

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is just as common in eComm where you can look at the data and try to understand,

okay, right.

313

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Well, these customers aren't coming back and trying to solve it that way.

314

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But, as we've both said, there's so much data that you can look at and it's

great that eComm owners are so good at keeping such a great eye on all of these data points

315

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in case they move.

316

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But I think it's also to the detriment of

317

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actually stepping back and just seeing what is going to annoy the customer. If

we do this, it's something that you see time and time again in tech.

318

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And certainly I experienced it as well, where you think, right, well, if we just move this

pop up further ahead in the flow or make it a little bit bigger and the same

319

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with eComm, if we send another 20% discount two days earlier, it's

going to boost our numbers.

320

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But what is that doing to the user journey and what's that doing to the customer's

experience?

321

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So it's easy to say you're repeating things, but it just doesn't hurt to just go back and

think, right, as a true customer, can I stand back and actually feel what would this be

322

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like if I received this pushy promotional code or promotional message?

323

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Or what would it be like if actually the brand didn't try to do that?

324

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Maybe they tried to send some information about the product, or maybe it was just as

simple as sending something human.

325

00:26:51,456 --> 00:26:57,190

I think there are a lot of examples where a company has just tried to be Innocent.

326

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I don't know how many international listeners will know the brand Innocent, but a really

great drinks company in the UK.

327

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What they became quite viral for early was just putting funny, quirky messages

on their bottles.

328

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329

00:27:20,496 --> 00:27:31,480

That was something which stuck with me when I read about that because it's something that

I think in the age of technology and obviously in AI, it's very easy just to be obsessed

330

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about the next metric.

331

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But just trying to make your brand feel a little bit more human is very undervalued.

332

00:27:38,784 --> 00:27:47,005

That's a really good point, because again, like you say, I think it's easy in some

respects to make an assumption about how a customer is going to function on our website

333

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and then forget we've made that assumption because we're so busy doing other things and

not improving it or testing that theory about the journey.

334

00:27:54,802 --> 00:27:55,422

Yeah.

335

00:27:55,422 --> 00:28:05,575

And it's something which when we moved to a new tech product,

the first two weeks, three weeks you've got where you can really be a

336

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customer of that product.

337

00:28:06,685 --> 00:28:10,966

And then after that, you understand too much about it that you're too in the weeds.

338

00:28:10,966 --> 00:28:21,650

You understand why there was this funny awkward user experience

decision because it made the backend three times more efficient.

339

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Or you understood why

340

00:28:23,730 --> 00:28:28,324

we hadn't done this big onboarding flow because we tried it three times and it hadn't

worked.

341

00:28:28,324 --> 00:28:36,061

And so it's really only those first few weeks where you can truly understand the

product as a user.

342

00:28:36,061 --> 00:28:43,807

And so we were always trying to work out ways to step back and appreciate the product as a

user again.

343

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And so it's absolutely the same in eComm that I'd recommend founders try and do that.

344

00:28:48,431 --> 00:28:52,594

Maybe it's as simple as ordering their own product to their own home and just.

345

00:28:57,998 --> 00:29:06,481

Yeah, that's a really good idea and actually also order your competitors' products and do

that on a regular basis would be my advice, just to see what their service is

346

00:29:06,481 --> 00:29:08,391

like, what they deliver like.

347

00:29:08,489 --> 00:29:10,050

What's it like when you try and return to them?

348

00:29:10,050 --> 00:29:14,974

I think you learn so much just from buying from your competitors.

349

00:29:15,715 --> 00:29:16,822

What are their landing pages like?

350

00:29:16,822 --> 00:29:17,527

What are their ads like?

351

00:29:17,527 --> 00:29:18,657

Just record all that information.

352

00:29:18,657 --> 00:29:22,480

Anyway, we're digressing, but I think you can learn a lot from that.

353

00:29:24,282 --> 00:29:28,976

I suppose another good place to look at what customers think is in the reviews, right?

354

00:29:28,976 --> 00:29:37,533

Because there's language that customers will use in that, both good and bad, about the

product.

355

00:29:37,865 --> 00:29:40,157

That would be another great data source.

356

00:29:40,157 --> 00:29:42,810

But let me circle back to the question I asked.

357

00:29:42,810 --> 00:29:49,596

What were some of the things, some of the assumptions that you had at Yahoo that

surprised you?

358

00:29:49,596 --> 00:29:56,182

I'm curious, when you went through the process, those assumptions

were challenged and you're like, oh, I didn't predict that.

359

00:29:57,008 --> 00:30:09,865

Yeah, I think actually on reviews, it was quite an interesting assumption where we

had a team dedicated across all of the Yahoo apps to replying to reviews.

360

00:30:09,865 --> 00:30:13,588

My assumption going in was, okay, right.

361

00:30:13,588 --> 00:30:20,031

Well, if they're replying to every review, great, we've got a team dedicated to

it.

362

00:30:20,031 --> 00:30:21,932

We're maximising what we can on that.

363

00:30:21,932 --> 00:30:24,894

But to be frank,

364

00:30:24,894 --> 00:30:34,142

they did as good a job as they could, but they were covering a lot

of different products and to do it effectively at scale for them was a challenge.

365

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And so it was a problem that I spotted when I joined the team and the finance app at

the time was at, I think it was a 3.5 stars out of five on the Android Play Store.

366

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So really in a bad state in terms of

367

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the reviews.

368

00:30:55,035 --> 00:31:02,898

I just dove deep after that and tried to just understand why people were leaving these

poor reviews.

369

00:31:03,118 --> 00:31:13,272

It got to the stage where it wasn't just about reading the reviews, but I was going in and

spending at least an hour of every single day replying to every single review.

370

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You could imagine that it's all been well doing that for one product, but the scale that

the app was, Yahoo

371

00:31:21,185 --> 00:31:23,378

372

00:31:23,378 --> 00:31:27,790

you might like to say is a bit of a legacy brand, but it's still got a huge number of

users.

373

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And so to spend and reply to every single review took a huge amount of time.

374

00:31:32,803 --> 00:31:44,049

But I learned so much from just reading every review, replying to every review, and then

going away and actually taking that piece of information, trying to put it in our feedback

375

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and our roadmap.

376

00:31:45,210 --> 00:31:51,473

And then even going up and updating that review to say when we've deployed a fix or

made an improvement.

377

00:31:51,473 --> 00:31:53,514

And that was something that was

378

00:31:53,634 --> 00:31:54,735

not particularly scalable.

379

00:31:54,735 --> 00:31:59,217

I managed to do it for about a year until I handed it back over to the original team.

380

00:31:59,217 --> 00:32:12,692

But it was something where I learned how even at the stretches of not really doing

something at scale, you can learn a huge amount and really transform your assumptions

381

00:32:12,692 --> 00:32:15,483

and what the customer might assume that you might do.

382

00:32:15,483 --> 00:32:21,447

Because whether it is at the scale of that or whether it's the scale of a small eComm

store,

383

00:32:21,447 --> 00:32:31,089

customers aren't necessarily expecting you to break out of what they assume is

not really something that's scalable. And replying to every review, particularly if it's

384

00:32:31,089 --> 00:32:37,820

personalised, whatever store or scale you have doesn't necessarily seem that scalable

or that expected.

385

00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:47,922

And it's something that I think everyone needs to just step back into and just try not to be

too much like these big companies, because there's a reason why they

386

00:32:47,922 --> 00:32:53,305

can't reply to every single review as personalised as possible because they've just

got the scale of it.

387

00:32:53,305 --> 00:33:04,010

So I think it's where eComm businesses have such an opportunity to be more

personal and to try to find those opportunities that the bigger brands aren't able to

388

00:33:04,010 --> 00:33:04,900

fulfil.

389

00:33:05,345 --> 00:33:06,826

I think it's such a power...

390

00:33:06,826 --> 00:33:08,737

Mic drop moment right there.

391

00:33:08,737 --> 00:33:09,897

I think it's so true.

392

00:33:09,897 --> 00:33:13,709

We try and be like the big companies because that's what we've been conditioned to do.

393

00:33:13,709 --> 00:33:17,010

But I think actually our superpower is being like ourselves really.

394

00:33:17,171 --> 00:33:19,832

I think it's such a good point, Max.

395

00:33:20,652 --> 00:33:21,193

I guess...

396

00:33:21,193 --> 00:33:22,573

397

00:33:23,573 --> 00:33:35,101

As you're talking, one of the things I'm thinking is actually what tends to happen is as

your eComm business grows and you get busier, your team grows, right?

398

00:33:35,101 --> 00:33:38,193

So one of the things that you do is I'll go and get somebody to do the customer service.

399

00:33:38,193 --> 00:33:47,379

So they start doing the customer service responses, which is great because it is like you

say, it's a lot of admin work, but I...

400

00:33:47,379 --> 00:33:50,920

And this is where those TV shows come into play, isn't it?

401

00:33:50,920 --> 00:33:54,652

Where the massive companies, the CEO goes and works on the shop floor.

402

00:33:54,652 --> 00:34:00,114

I think there's something about answering the phone still as the CEO.

403

00:34:00,114 --> 00:34:04,056

I still think there's something about talking to customers.

404

00:34:04,056 --> 00:34:05,956

There's still something about...

405

00:34:05,956 --> 00:34:07,917

406

00:34:10,325 --> 00:34:19,905

sending them emails and doing the WhatsApp and not just trying to automate it just because

I've done it and can check it off my list but actually taking an active interest. I

407

00:34:19,905 --> 00:34:27,004

think that is almost one of your superpowers as a small eComm business and not neglecting that

seems to be quite an important thing.

408

00:34:27,004 --> 00:34:27,794

Yeah.

409

00:34:27,794 --> 00:34:31,055

And as you say, it doesn't need to be every single message.

410

00:34:31,055 --> 00:34:38,607

But I think it is also those opportunities where you can be that much more

human and something might just go viral.

411

00:34:38,607 --> 00:34:53,862

I mean, there are so many stories online of companies who have just given their

customer services team the breathing room to be human and to deal with problems that

412

00:34:53,862 --> 00:34:54,522

might come up.

413

00:34:54,522 --> 00:34:55,428

414

00:34:55,428 --> 00:34:58,319

And just respond in a human way.

415

00:34:58,759 --> 00:35:02,320

There's a good example, the Ritz-Carlton.

416

00:35:02,320 --> 00:35:13,083

Essentially, there was a family whose kid left a little stuffed giraffe, which the kid

absolutely loved.

417

00:35:13,083 --> 00:35:15,964

He forgot it, left it at the hotel.

418

00:35:15,964 --> 00:35:23,486

The staff found it and then they created, and essentially the parents told the kid the stuffed

giraffe had stayed behind.

419

00:35:25,082 --> 00:35:28,164

Joshi was its name, stayed behind for a holiday, right?

420

00:35:28,164 --> 00:35:36,150

And so the staff found the giraffe and they created a little dossier of

Joshi's extended vacation.

421

00:35:36,150 --> 00:35:49,359

They photographed him by the pool in a spa robe, driving a golf buggy, and they put

him on a lounge with sunglasses and they made this full album and they returned Joshi to

422

00:35:49,359 --> 00:35:51,560

this boy with the full album.

423

00:35:51,621 --> 00:35:53,622

And that was...

424

00:35:53,734 --> 00:35:55,315

so popular it didn't just go viral.

425

00:35:55,315 --> 00:35:58,577

I think it was a Harvard Business School case study.

426

00:35:58,577 --> 00:36:09,972

And it was an example, and there are lots more like this, where a company just allows

either themselves or their customer service team to be human and to break the rules with

427

00:36:09,972 --> 00:36:20,269

what seems like an efficient brand safe response and just go a little bit beyond what

the customer expects.

428

00:36:20,269 --> 00:36:22,300

And that's where you can just

429

00:36:22,300 --> 00:36:23,141

really change it.

430

00:36:23,141 --> 00:36:31,767

So whether it's for you as an eComm business, it's you as the founder picking up the

phone or whether it's trying to be a little bit more elaborate like that.

431

00:36:31,767 --> 00:36:43,795

It's trying to just be a little bit more unexpected, but come back to that thing of trying

to have a much more human connection with your customers.

432

00:36:43,795 --> 00:36:51,070

And that's really where I've been trying to focus my time is how can we try to bring

back that human connection.

433

00:36:51,070 --> 00:36:58,710

Because it was there a hundred, 150 years ago where you had customers coming into stores.

434

00:36:58,710 --> 00:37:01,782

But these days it's much more of a challenge.

435

00:37:03,442 --> 00:37:07,503

Such a powerful point. I love that story of the giraffe.

436

00:37:07,503 --> 00:37:14,386

Like you say, there's lots of stories where you're not measuring ROI,

but ironically, it creates one.

437

00:37:14,386 --> 00:37:17,407

It's not your standard textbook play.

438

00:37:18,188 --> 00:37:24,451

But it is quite fascinating how those things demonstrate culture and they

demonstrate values.

439

00:37:24,451 --> 00:37:28,352

And this is interesting because, again, I come back to the point you made earlier.

440

00:37:28,352 --> 00:37:29,973

If I try and be like Amazon,

441

00:37:29,973 --> 00:37:34,493

I'm going to treat all my products like a commodity and I'm going to treat all my

customers like a number.

442

00:37:34,493 --> 00:37:37,333

And it's not that Amazon's bad, but they don't know me.

443

00:37:37,333 --> 00:37:38,873

They don't know who I am.

444

00:37:38,873 --> 00:37:41,153

Their algorithm knows what I like, but that's about it.

445

00:37:41,153 --> 00:37:42,713

But I know what I get with Amazon.

446

00:37:42,713 --> 00:37:44,133

I'm going to go on there.

447

00:37:44,133 --> 00:37:48,913

There are certain things that I'll go to Amazon and buy and I go, bish, bash, bosh, job's

a good 'un.

448

00:37:48,913 --> 00:37:51,273

And they sell on convenience, which is great.

449

00:37:51,293 --> 00:37:59,193

For a small business, it's like the small corner shop where you get to know your

customers, right?

450

00:37:59,253 --> 00:38:10,993

Old TV show, you're probably too young Max, but there's a TV show called Cheers which had

the theme tune where everybody knows your name about a pub and you go, that's

451

00:38:10,993 --> 00:38:19,453

brilliant if you can create that because that creates that sense of community, that

creates that sense of belonging, that sense of connection, it differentiates you in so

452

00:38:19,453 --> 00:38:21,913

many ways from bigger brands.

453

00:38:21,913 --> 00:38:23,753

I think it's really, really powerful.

454

00:38:24,454 --> 00:38:25,434

It is.

455

00:38:25,474 --> 00:38:27,725

The brands are slowly getting better at it.

456

00:38:27,725 --> 00:38:33,008

And I think there's an opportunity with AI to try to catch up.

457

00:38:33,008 --> 00:38:35,439

I think, to use your Amazon example.

458

00:38:35,439 --> 00:38:42,582

I think that they're starting slowly to get there, trying to build a picture of this

customer's loyalty.

459

00:38:42,582 --> 00:38:53,040

And so it's just as important as ever that we make sure that as smaller

businesses, we are doubling down on that experience and

460

00:38:53,040 --> 00:39:06,479

recognising the loyalty because there will come a time, I do feel, with the way that AI

is developing where businesses that are much larger are able to get at least a little bit

461

00:39:06,479 --> 00:39:10,682

closer to the same experience that we can deliver.

462

00:39:11,305 --> 00:39:13,047

Yeah, that's such a good point.

463

00:39:13,047 --> 00:39:24,487

I think one of the quick wins here, obviously I don't want to detract from what you guys

do with your company, but I appreciate one of the quick wins that you can do, that we've

464

00:39:24,487 --> 00:39:29,251

tried quite successfully, is to create a board of customers.

465

00:39:29,251 --> 00:39:37,427

So you pick like three or four different customer personas that you've got

that you know exist in your business and you put them into AI.

466

00:39:38,953 --> 00:39:40,324

And we use Claude a lot.

467

00:39:40,324 --> 00:39:42,316

I use Claude Code all the time.

468

00:39:42,316 --> 00:39:44,597

And it's amazing.

469

00:39:45,138 --> 00:39:51,822

And so you can put stuff into that and go, right, I need you to push back as a customer,

right?

470

00:39:52,163 --> 00:39:55,345

And it will help you understand the customer journey and what they think.

471

00:39:55,345 --> 00:39:57,306

And again, it's all very hypothetical.

472

00:39:57,306 --> 00:39:59,168

You've genuinely got to find out.

473

00:39:59,168 --> 00:40:02,710

But if you're not sure, that's a good place to start.

474

00:40:03,571 --> 00:40:06,213

And it will start to give you, I think, some of these

475

00:40:06,889 --> 00:40:09,483

ways to think through some of these insights.

476

00:40:09,483 --> 00:40:16,023

Like I say, we've used that with great success, not as a finisher, but as a good starter

to get you to start thinking.

477

00:40:16,092 --> 00:40:16,742

Yeah.

478

00:40:16,742 --> 00:40:18,423

And you can absolutely do that.

479

00:40:18,423 --> 00:40:28,906

And I think I love that you use Claude as an example, because I think it's particularly good

at being able to put in a lot of data, but also it has quite a large output token

480

00:40:28,906 --> 00:40:29,766

max.

481

00:40:29,766 --> 00:40:34,587

So it means you can stick in a lot, but also it'll put out quite a lot as well.

482

00:40:34,587 --> 00:40:37,308

And I've done that quite a lot.

483

00:40:37,308 --> 00:40:39,309

You can do it with your own data.

484

00:40:39,309 --> 00:40:44,870

You can use your competitors' public data and just collect

485

00:40:44,918 --> 00:40:49,002

all of that information, put it in there and you can get all sorts of good information

out.

486

00:40:49,002 --> 00:40:54,367

Going back to your earlier point of what sort of data could we have about our

customer?

487

00:40:54,367 --> 00:40:56,769

Well, it doesn't need to be these days.

488

00:40:56,769 --> 00:41:06,078

It doesn't need to be a closed style quiz that you're sending your customers

to understand how they're finding their product.

489

00:41:06,078 --> 00:41:09,701

Because now you can just ask a free form, why did you buy this?

490

00:41:09,701 --> 00:41:11,402

And then

491

00:41:11,624 --> 00:41:18,578

a couple months later, you can stick all of that information into something like Claude and

you can get some really interesting insights.

492

00:41:18,578 --> 00:41:30,705

It's not hugely scalable, but it doesn't necessarily need to be if you're just

trying to break out of your rhythm of going about your day to day and just try to

493

00:41:30,705 --> 00:41:33,796

understand your customers from a slightly different angle.

494

00:41:34,125 --> 00:41:37,706

Yeah, that's a really powerful point.

495

00:41:37,966 --> 00:41:47,049

Just even going into Claude and saying, help me define my customer journeys as

a starting point, and getting that pushback and then figuring out and testing and proving

496

00:41:47,049 --> 00:41:48,883

those things is a good idea.

497

00:41:48,883 --> 00:41:52,678

Max, listen, I am aware of time, my good friend.

498

00:41:53,140 --> 00:41:54,602

How do people reach you?

499

00:41:54,602 --> 00:41:56,685

How do they connect with you if they want to do that?

500

00:41:57,126 --> 00:41:58,087

Yeah.

501

00:41:58,087 --> 00:42:00,208

So you can find me on LinkedIn.

502

00:42:00,208 --> 00:42:05,310

You could also find me through my website, which is getathenic.com.

503

00:42:05,310 --> 00:42:07,672

And there are links to connect to me through that.

504

00:42:07,672 --> 00:42:12,184

And yeah, very happy to chat and keep the conversation going.

505

00:42:12,509 --> 00:42:14,493

And how are you spelling Athenic?

506

00:42:14,891 --> 00:42:16,176

Yeah, that's a good question.

507

00:42:16,176 --> 00:42:20,269

That is A-T-H-E-N-I-C.

508

00:42:22,101 --> 00:42:30,161

getathenic.com, we will of course link to that in the show notes, which will be

on the show notes page.

509

00:42:30,161 --> 00:42:33,161

If you're on the podcast player, just scroll down to the description, it will show you

them.

510

00:42:33,161 --> 00:42:35,541

If you're on YouTube, go to the description, they'll be there.

511

00:42:35,541 --> 00:42:37,961

All of Max's links will be in there.

512

00:42:37,961 --> 00:42:41,681

And of course, if you're subscribed to the newsletter, it'll be in the newsletter.

513

00:42:41,681 --> 00:42:50,381

And if you're subscribed to the newsletter, I feel like I've gone on about this quite a

bit now, but the newsletter is available at ecommercepodcast.net.

514

00:42:50,501 --> 00:42:52,662

And we just email you the show notes every week.

515

00:42:52,662 --> 00:42:53,463

It's all we do.

516

00:42:53,463 --> 00:42:58,545

They're all in there with takeaways and actually links to other episodes as well and

connecting topics together.

517

00:42:58,566 --> 00:43:00,076

So quite a lot of work goes into that newsletter.

518

00:43:00,076 --> 00:43:01,244

So do go check it out.

519

00:43:01,244 --> 00:43:12,303

It's very worthwhile subscribing to. Max, two questions for you before we close out

the show. Question number one, a question I've started to ask my guests is what's your

520

00:43:12,303 --> 00:43:12,994

question for me?

521

00:43:12,994 --> 00:43:17,176

This is where you give me a question and I will go away and answer on social media.

522

00:43:17,176 --> 00:43:19,397

So what's your question for me?

523

00:43:19,422 --> 00:43:20,082

Yeah.

524

00:43:20,082 --> 00:43:26,762

Well, I'd love for you to think of the last brand you bought from that you actually told

someone else about afterwards.

525

00:43:26,762 --> 00:43:32,702

And not because they asked you to, not because you had a discount code, just because you

wanted to tell them.

526

00:43:32,702 --> 00:43:36,054

And what did they do to make you feel and do that?

527

00:43:36,366 --> 00:43:38,086

That's a really good question.

528

00:43:38,086 --> 00:43:40,527

I would love to answer that and I know the answer already.

529

00:43:40,527 --> 00:43:42,927

So we are going to be doing that on social media.

530

00:43:42,927 --> 00:43:46,708

If you'd like to see me answer that question, come find me on LinkedIn at Matt Edmundson.

531

00:43:46,708 --> 00:43:49,023

All the stuff will be there at some point in the

532

00:43:49,023 --> 00:43:50,033

future.

533

00:43:50,333 --> 00:43:53,354

I keep saying that but they genuinely are coming.

534

00:43:53,354 --> 00:43:55,525

Max, saving the best till last.

535

00:43:55,525 --> 00:44:04,757

This is where I like to hand over the mic to the guest for the last two minutes of the

show to give us your top tips, top value for those that have stayed till the end, who are

536

00:44:04,757 --> 00:44:06,998

listening to the end.

537

00:44:07,638 --> 00:44:12,259

Everything that you've said, which I think is really good, really powerful, really

challenging.

538

00:44:12,519 --> 00:44:15,160

What's the best way to supercharge that?

539

00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:18,761

What's your top tip for everyone that stayed here?

540

00:44:18,761 --> 00:44:21,852

This far to really supercharge what you've told us today.

541

00:44:21,852 --> 00:44:23,763

The microphone is yours my friend.

542

00:44:23,763 --> 00:44:24,273

Over to you.

543

00:44:24,273 --> 00:44:26,221

Yeah.

544

00:44:26,221 --> 00:44:36,978

As we've touched on, there are plenty of ways, whether tools like mine or tools like

Klaviyo, where you can try different ways to personalise at scale.

545

00:44:36,978 --> 00:44:46,545

But I think there are plenty of ways, and we've talked about a few of them, where anyone

here can do something that's not at scale, but still potentially very valuable.

546

00:44:46,785 --> 00:44:53,610

Going back to what we said at the start, really thinking through that customer journey

and really deeply thinking about

547

00:44:53,830 --> 00:44:58,714

your customer. It's one of the main pillars at Revolut, which was to think deeper.

548

00:44:58,714 --> 00:45:02,336

And it really did resonate with me, that one.

549

00:45:02,336 --> 00:45:13,894

So what I would recommend is go into your email platform, look at the last five messages

you sent to customers and for each one ask, is this about what I want as a brand or about

550

00:45:13,894 --> 00:45:15,225

what they need right now?

551

00:45:15,225 --> 00:45:21,904

And if the answer is mostly what I want, and it probably is, then you've got a really

clear brief

552

00:45:21,904 --> 00:45:23,025

of what to fix first.

553

00:45:23,025 --> 00:45:25,117

It takes probably 20 minutes.

554

00:45:25,117 --> 00:45:36,769

Most brands will never do it, but it's one of the most effective ways you can try to just change your thinking from how to grow the

555

00:45:36,769 --> 00:45:45,668

brand to trying to work out how to make that customer feel closer to my brand and

recommend me, buy from me more in the future.

556

00:45:46,212 --> 00:45:47,152

Very good.

557

00:45:47,152 --> 00:45:48,173

I love that.

558

00:45:48,173 --> 00:45:50,214

I love that little exercise.

559

00:45:50,215 --> 00:45:50,955

Now that's great.

560

00:45:50,955 --> 00:45:53,607

Max, listen, thank you so much for coming on the show, man.

561

00:45:53,607 --> 00:45:55,459

Genuinely appreciate it.

562

00:45:55,459 --> 00:45:58,300

Really great to hear your thoughts and your stories.

563

00:45:58,765 --> 00:46:00,266

And just bringing some great value.

564

00:46:00,266 --> 00:46:01,988

Genuinely appreciate it.

565

00:46:01,988 --> 00:46:03,214

Thanks for coming on.

566

00:46:03,214 --> 00:46:04,225

Well, there you go.

567

00:46:04,225 --> 00:46:10,980

Another fantastic conversation on the wonderful eCommerce Podcast, even if I do say so

myself.

568

00:46:10,980 --> 00:46:12,501

I've just realised what I've said.

569

00:46:13,842 --> 00:46:15,484

Thank you so much for joining us.

570

00:46:15,484 --> 00:46:18,546

Have a phenomenal week wherever you are in the world.

571

00:46:18,586 --> 00:46:19,737

But I will see you next time.

572

00:46:19,737 --> 00:46:20,368

That's it for me.

573

00:46:20,368 --> 00:46:21,728

That's it for Max.

574

00:46:21,749 --> 00:46:22,209

Bye for now.