Who doesn’t love a good story? As humans, we’ve relied on storytelling for entertainment, education, and preservation of culture since the beginning of time. Storytelling is also for marketers.   During my first sales job at a local radio station my boss sagely advised me that “facts tell, but stories sell.” I’ve never forgotten that lesson. In this episode, I chat with the charming Jaime Cross the founder of MIG Soap. From her kitchen table to now a multi-million dollar eCommerce business Jaime has grown largely based on great products and solid storytelling.  Here’s a taste of what we cover: What’s the psychology behind storytelling? How good storytelling can increase the perceived value of a product by 2x or more.   Common storytelling mistakes to avoid.  The process MIG uses to get their overall story right…and then to get the story right for each product.   How to turn customer testimonials into stories How do you deliver your story across email, product detail pages, and more.   Storytelling resources

Jeremiah Allen has been driving growth for small-to-medium-sized eCommerce companies since 1997 — before the internet was cool — and has helped hundreds of company founders grow. While he still enjoys client work, in 2017, he began acquiring and building his own eCommerce brands. In this episode, we get super TACTICAL. It’s a deluge of tips and tricks on how to improve your checkout process. There’s so much here you’ll probably want to listen to it a few times. Here’s a sneak peek at what we cover. Tips: How to use a cart slide outs after you hit add to cart and why it’s effective.  Simple works - larger fonts, larger buttons, larger thumbnails can all create big wins. What % of your shoppers should hit checkout and what % should complete checkout? If you’re below these numbers you have some work to do. How shipping options can increase checkout. 4 ways to drive post-purchase upsells - fast! What asks and offers should you put on your thank you page. How an email from the founder can be your secret weapon. How to handle payment options. Plus sooooo much more.

Sayan is a serial entrepreneur and the founder of InvigorateNOW Health Sciences, an innovative health supplement brand. He’s also the creator of Sark Media Direct, a direct marketing consultancy that specializes in helping entrepreneurs grow to seven figures and beyond in the health and e-commerce industries. Passionate about combining cutting edge online marketing strategies with traditional direct response marketing, Sayan has helped his clients scale to eight figures and beyond. He’s worked with some of the biggest names in the industry, including Martha Stewart, Organifi, Zenith Labs, and more. Sayan has a knack for finding the “low hanging fruit” in his clients’ businesses. Whether it’s newspaper or radio ads, affiliate marketing or direct mail - he quickly finds the needle movers that produce results, in some cases, helping scale companies to beyond $100 Million / year. Through his consulting, he has helped a handful of entrepreneurs scale from zero to six and seven figures in their first year. A savvy investor, Sayan has stakes in three health supplement brands in addition to businesses he started from scratch. Sayan lives in New York City and enjoys spending time with family, friends and his fiancee, Amy   In this episode, we discuss buying unsold inventory in newspapers and on radio plus how to combine traditional media with digital media for profitable growth.

For our 100th episode we wanted to do something different. Rather than one guest, we invited 6 of our most popular guests we’ve ever had on the show. Since we’re wrapping up 2019, we decided to ask these super smart eComm pros what their top predictions were for 2020. They did NOT disappoint. We cover some GREAT predictions including: How and why some merchants will shift some of their focus away from Amazon (we’re already seeing this with Nike). How merchants will shift their video strategy in 2020 (will we go short form or long form?) Why “profitability” may be the focus rather than scale in 2020 How SEO is shifting away from traditional keywords in 2020 How automation is working (and how it doesn’t replace everything) How new privacy laws and policies will make things harder (and easier) for marketers Plus more!

Molly Pittman is a bit of a legend in the digital marketing space.  Bartender turned marketing intern for Ryan Deiss, turned VP of Marketing for Digital Marketer, turned entrepreneur - Molly’s story is an inspiring one.  And she flat knows her stuff! In this episode, we dig into some real gems.  We do go pretty deep on what’s working now on Facebook, but we also talk about the benefits of building an in-house team vs. the benefits of an agency.  We talk about entrepreneurial lessons and what life is like in Amsterdam (where Molly currently lives). Here’s a look at what we cover: Why being fluid might be the most important entrepreneurial trait…and why it’s important for digital marketers Why curiosity and fascination are crucial in our current marketing landscape What is CBO and how it’s impacting Molly’s Facebook ad campaign and what you should do about it. What are the 3 facets of Facebook’s new Quality Ranking and how to optimize your ads How low quality rankings can dramatically drive up costs or get your ads shut down Plus more

Charles Livingston knows a thing or two about rapid growth.  He turned a supplement offer into a 12 million per year business. And now his Coffee Company - Lifeboost Coffee has grown 1,000% in less than 1 year.  What’s the secret to this kind of growth?  Good Marketing and becoming a “yes” company.   Charles is also known for having his picture displayed in every single Ezra Firestone presentation.  And this isn’t any old picture. It’s a shirtless pic of Charles all swole up wearing a stethoscope. Yes, there’s a story behind this that we dive into in the podcast.   More importantly, here’s a breakdown of the keys to rapid growth we breakdown on this episode: Become a “yes” company.  How saying yes more has led to a shockingly low 1.5% refund rate for Lifeboost Coffee. Why clarifying your message is key to scale. ‘ How to find your hook and your hone in on a powerful positioning statement How to engineer a great customer experience framework How to charge a premium and make customers gladly pay more How to encourage subscriptions and improve your “stick rate” What’s better - building a brand on Amazon or building a brand off Amazon?   Plus more!

I recently saw Rachel speak at an agency event in New York City.  I was blown away. Rachel has quite the resume. Forbes listed Rachel as one of its “30 under 30 Who Are Changing The World”, Fast Company named her one of "The Most Creative People in Business", AdAge named her one of "The Most Creative People of The Year," Entrepreneur named her one of the "50 Most Daring Entrepreneurs," Inc named her to the “Female Founders 100,” and the list goes on and on.  After being the Global Director of Digital and Social Media at Gap Rachel traveled the world for 100 days and then founded MikMak, the first native commerce platform for the social video generation.  Here’s a look at what we cover: Why big companies like Facebook and Google and Amazon are at war for first party data.  Why Rachel believes in the philosophy that if you give up your first party data, you give up your brand. Rachel believes that today’s funnel starts at the consideration level first and that true brand building and loyalty start after the first purchase.   Lessons from Kylie Jenner and Native Deodorant Rachel’s thoughts on Twitch and how it might be a glimpse into the future  Social is the world's largest mall and point of end checkout...are you treating it that way? Plus much more!

Matt Clark is the Chairman and Co-founder of Amazing.  Amazing is the company behind the most successful info product/training course of all time - Amazing Selling Machines.   He and his partner Jason Katzenback also run SellerCon - one of the leading events for Amazon Sellers.   In this episode we take a quick look into what’s new on Amazon and then we dive deep into a subject I’m quite passionate about - making better decisions.  I’m not sure of another skill more valuable than this one. This doesn’t need you need to always be right...you just need to get it right. We share a great Steve Jobs story in the podcast to illustrate this point.   Here’s a look at a few of the topics we cover: Confirmation Bias - and getting it right vs. being right Mitigating Risks - with lessons from Sarah Blakely and Richard Branson.  Here Matt shares how he wasted $1million in Ad Spend when he could have tested with only $20,000.  Also we discuss the the Fire bullets, then cannonballs framework from Jim Collins.   Diderot Effect - This deals with how to handle success and how success can lead to bankruptcy.  We also discuss 2nd and 3rd order consequences.   Keep a decision log - Why and how and what this looks like for Matt.  Some of Matt’s favorite books on the subject Plus more!

If you’re currently running ads to cold audiences - whether that’s on Facebook, YouTube, Google Display Network or anywhere else - you need to consider where you’re sending that cold traffic.  Do you send it to your home page? Product detail page? Those options can work, but you need to test sending traffic to pre-sale content.   What is pre-sale content?  To explain, I brought in one of the foremost experts on the subject, Lindsay Marder.   Lindsay Marder is a self-proclaimed content marketing nerd.  She served as Managing Editor for Digital marketer for 4 years.  Now she’s working with brands to spread their missions and engage with customers.  She’s also the Co-founder of Digital Strategy Bootcamps with Molly Pittman and John Grimshaw.   Here’s what we cover on the show: What is pre-sale content?   Why pre-sale engagement content is PERFECT for cold traffic, especially paid cold traffic.   Real-world examples including the legendary 5 make up tips for older women - page used by Ezra Firestone and Boom by Cindy Joseph.   How Third Love used pre-sale content to show women everywhere that they were putting on their bra all wrong.   How do you identify topics using free Google tools and some simple online research? How to let customers write your ad headlines and content headlines for you.  What can you learn from 5-star and 1-star reviews from your competitor’s products (this is so brilliant).   Dos and Don’ts for the page itself Plus more!

What’s the ultimate metric you should measure to grow your business?  Smart direct response marketers might say Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) or Return on Ad Spend (ROAS).  Advanced direct response marketers might say Lifetime Customer Value. But what does John Grimshaw say?  Well, you’ll have to tune in, but I’ll give you a hint? It’s CVV. John Grimshaw is traffic Marketing Director at Smart Marketer.  He runs a consulting business called Data Centric Marketing. More importantly than any of that, he’s wicked smart.   I LOVE this episode.  Here’s a quick look at what we cover: What is lifetime customer value (LCV)?  Why it’s important and why it’s so tough to calculate. How should you calculate LCV and why it’s such a head-scratcher for most entrepreneurs.   Why LCV is often a flawed or imperfect metric and why Customer Value Velocity (CVV)  is a better metric for scaling your business.   Real world example of how to use CVV to scale? Why you should ignore the canned Lifetime value metric in Google Analytics (but we got nothin’ but love for GA in general.  Just not this metric.). John’s favorite tools and resources for measuring CVV. Plus more!