#336 – The Evolution of Amazon & Building Brands Beyond: Lessons from Industry Legends.

#336 - The Evolution of Amazon & Building Brands Beyond: Lessons from Industry Legends Matt Clark & Mike McClary Speaker 1: Welcome to episode 336 of the AM PM podcast. Today I've got two of the legends of this space with us, Mike McClary and Matt Clark. And I'm going to be talking about how this game has changed, how you got to be thinking about more than just Amazon to build a true brand. I think you're going to really get a lot from this. Enjoy. Unknown Speaker: Welcome to the AM-PM Podcast. Welcome to the AM-PM Podcast, where we explore opportunities in e-commerce. We dream big and we discover what's working right now. Plus, this is the podcast where money never sleeps. Working around the clock in the AM and the PM. Are you ready for today's episode? I said, are you ready? Let's do this. Here's your host, Kevin King. Speaker 1: What's up everybody? Welcome Mike McClary and Matt Clark to the AM PM Podcast. How are you gentlemen doing? Speaker 2: Doing great. How about you, Kevin? Speaker 1: I'm alive and kicking, fighting a little bit of a cold over here, but doing great. How are you, Mike? Speaker 3: I'm doing awesome. I feel great. I hope that makes you not feel so bad. Speaker 1: I'm glad this is audio only because if people are watching this on a video, I don't look too good right now, but audio only, we can get by with this. Matt, I think you've actually been on the AM-PM Podcast before, right? Didn't you come on when Manny used to host it? Speaker 2: I think I may have been on with him and then maybe Bradley, but it's been a while. It's been years. Speaker 1: Bradley does the Serious Sellers podcast, which is the other podcast that he and Tim does. Mike, have you ever been on AM PM? Unknown Speaker: I sure have. Speaker 3: It must be six, seven years ago when I was on with Manny. Speaker 1: Awesome, awesome. Yeah, Manny actually, for those of you who don't know, he started this podcast in 2015 when he started his journey selling on Amazon. And he was documenting the journey of actually being a seller and then starting Helium 10. And what a lot of people may not know is, you know, we're just talking about you guys were five or six years ago, you've been doing this for quite some time. And in fact, you guys are probably responsible for this Entire ecosystem, if I had to say. Matt, for those of you who don't know, if you've been, just started in the Amazon space in the last few years, you might not know these names, but these are old legends. I mean, these are guys that have been around since the early days of selling as an FBA seller on Amazon, or even FBM. And Matt, I mean, you started this like, what, 2001? I'm sorry, 2011, 2012, something like that? Speaker 2: Yeah, around there. Yeah. So, so yeah, we started basically teaching people how to sell stuff on Amazon. Speaker 1: I think it was 2012. And that was back then it was called like, it wasn't called, it was called like Amazing Selling Machine or something like that. Or what was the original name? Speaker 2: Yeah, the first one was Amazon Money Machine. Speaker 1: That's right. Speaker 2: But then we realized we didn't want to for like long term use Amazon's trademark name and the product name. So we ended up changing it to Amazing Selling Machine the next year. Speaker 1: So then Mike, when did you actually come on board? I know when Matt started, he had a couple other partners and then you came on, started taking a, started doing some of the teachings and then now you have a much more active role. But when was, when was your, when did you guys hook up? Speaker 3: Yeah. So in 2013, I actually became just a member or student of Amazing Selling Machine, the very first Amazing Selling Machine after I did the rebranding. And I remember getting this email from, it was Matt and Jason at the time, and the program was called Amazing Selling Machine. And I was thinking, that's the dumbest name I've ever heard. Like he couldn't have a more hyped name possible, but yet I go out there, watch their videos and joined it and I was like, oh, it made sense. I had no idea what private label was back at that time and it kind of opened up a whole new world of possibilities to me. Speaker 1: I mean, so Matt, I mean, you, you're responsible for starting this like, like you said, in 2012. And I know you just recently, both you guys, I just saw you at the Prosper Show, which is one of the bigger shows in the space now. And I think that was y'all's first time to actually be there and just walking around seeing this whole ecosystem that's popped up as a result of what you did in 2011, 2012. How did that, how did that feel? Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a little surreal because I was telling Mike back in the day, it was like the Wild West on Amazon. Literally write reviews of your own products. And you were just so surprised this stuff actually worked. And if you included a single keyword in your title, all of a sudden you would rank better. If you included a single bonus, all of a sudden you would outsell everyone in a week. And then now, seeing some of those presentations that prosper, one guy, he's worked at Google for 17 years, lives in Boston. My guess is him or the people on his team went to MIT or Harvard. He's got 15 data scientists on his team. And I'm just like, holy crap, this whole space has gotten a lot more sophisticated than what we used to do. Speaker 1: It has but you had you guys had how many students actually went through the ASM? About 35,000. About 35,000 people were influenced to sell on Amazon through ASM. And I know a lot of people still to this day, you see people out there, I was ASM 1, I was ASM 3. It's still like a badge of honor out there. You see them at masterminds and stuff and the old school, the old G guys. I actually was, I never actually signed up for Amazing.com, but you guys have a big responsibility in me actually being in this space as well, because when ASM 4 came out, I think it was 20, Might have been 2015, because you guys kind of like did one about every year, every six months to a year, you would come out with like a new updated version. I remember you were doing like a four-part series and y'all had some, you had a formula to do this and you had like some of the biggest affiliates in the space, Jason Flatland and several others that were just like, just pumping this thing. And y'all did like a four-part series just to warm the audience up before you actually did your whole webinar to sell them on the class. And I watched that four-part series And I was like, I don't need to pay whatever it was at the time, five grand or something for this. I've been doing this stuff, bringing in stuff in from China and Korea and I've been developing products and I've already been selling on Amazon as a wholesale account for a while. I could just do this myself. And so I have to say thanks to you guys. It's one of the reasons that I'm actually in this space now, even though I didn't actually sign up for ASM. Speaker 2: Yeah, that's cool to hear. Speaker 1: So you were doing ASM at that time. Everything was about Amazon. How have you seen everything change over the last several years? I mean, it's Amazon is still an awesome opportunity out there. But a lot of people always say, don't keep all your eggs in one basket and don't don't just stay on Amazon. But when someone ventures off Amazon, they try Walmart or they try Shopify or something. A lot of times the results end in failure. Because they're different animals and you have to approach them differently. So what do you think is happening right now in the space as Amazon has matured, especially after what you just saw, you know, visiting the Prosper Show and talking to people and seeing what's going on there. How do you think this space has evolved? Speaker 2: I mean, I think there's good and there's bad. So I think the good is that Amazon, if you look at the sales data, it's double the size it was five years ago at this massive scale. So Amazon keeps growing, which is awesome. I think also if you were to backtrack like six years ago or so, I think people are a lot more concerned about Kind of some people doing shady stuff. But even if you weren't, even if you were just kind of like gray area, and then all of a sudden, you could wake up, your whole account is gone. Like, if that's a risk, then it's like, why the hell am I spending all this time trying to build my business on this platform? That seems to have become a lot more predictable. You could still have competitors doing weird things, which is kind of one of the downsides. There is a lot more competition, I think. And also, you know, ad costs have just kind of gone through the roof and become such a bigger factor in terms of doing anything on Amazon, which that ad platform didn't even exist when we first started teaching this stuff. So, I think those are some of the kind of positives and negatives. And the way that I see it, I don't know if we want to get into all this right now, but the way I kind of see it is like, You should ideally be building a brand that can be sold anywhere. I know people. I talked with a guy yesterday that has $60 million a year selling on Amazon. It's something like 80% of his sales. That's great. To me, it's also a little bit risky, but I'd much prefer to own a brand like I do where 80% of sales are happening on my own website, 20% are Amazon, and we still want to double our Amazon sales. It's a big goal of ours. But I don't want my whole business being dependent on Amazon's policies, on a competitor not doing something weird with my listing, I don't get the customer data, all that kind of stuff. So that's where I see it's like a piece of the bigger pie rather than building your whole business on Amazon. Speaker 1: But you could argue that in the big, especially a few years ago, this is changing now, that launching on Amazon was probably the easiest place to launch. I mean, to do a Shopify site, you gotta know a lot, you gotta drive the traffic. You gotta do a lot more stuff than you gotta handle the fulfillment or oversee the fulfillment and a whole bunch of things that you just, Amazon just basically does for you. So, and it was easy. I mean, like when you started with Amazing Selling Machine, it was basically go to Alibaba, find a product, find an opportunity. Even in the beginning there wasn't a lot of software tools like there are now and slap a logo on it and sell it and then go to the beach and just listen to your phone chime all day long as sales came in. Speaker 3: You know if you look at any of our webinars we did maybe even two to three years ago, What you just said was one of our sales pitches. So we talked about exactly, you know, why this model of selling on Amazon is the best one. You know, like you said, can find a good product that has an underserved market, find a supplier. I still find some suppliers in Alibaba. They're still a great legitimate source, you know. Then, you know, for the people worried about storing, shipping, fulfilling their products, Amazon takes care of all that for you. And they still do today. Like, and I don't think There's still a fulfillment company out there that does a better job than Amazon. They may be more expensive than they used to be as all their costs went up, but they make it a really easy proposition to have as close to being as a hands-free business as possible. Where they take care of all that. And so, yeah, they still do that today. And so there's another layer you have to add on in order to overcome that when you're selling on your own website as Matt's been teaching me now for the past year, which is kind of eye-opening for me. There was a time where I thought I was doing great when I made $5,000 my own Shopify store one month. And then Matt humbled me by pulling up his Shopify store that he hadn't told me about even the previous year. Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with what Matt said. You've got to be more omnichannel now. I think Amazon is still a great place to start, especially if this is your first time into e-commerce and to get your feet wet. And what I often tell people is they say, when should I open up a Shopify store? When should I expand to Walmart? And I'm like, if you're new at this, master one first before you start getting sidetracked and you start spreading resources too thin. And once you've mastered Amazon, maybe you've gone into Amazon Canada as a next step, then start looking at Walmart and Shopify. You should set up a Shopify site from the beginning. I mean, every Amazon seller should have a Shopify site just for people that want validation or just want to see if you actually exist. And you might get a few sales from there, but I wouldn't put a lot of effort into that initially if If you're new to this, now if you've got experience in e-commerce and you have a bit of a bigger budget to actually come at this, I would go after multiple marketplaces that want to build a true brand like what Matt said is a good statement. It's like you want to be able to sell your company across to anybody, whether that's an aggregator that specializes in Amazon stuff or whether that's a packaged goods company like a Procter & Gamble or somebody that may even pay a bigger multiple. You want to have that true brand and that's where there's been a big shift right now. And people just don't understand, you know, a lot of times they think a brand is just a logo and it's not, it's a lot more than that. And you can do that a lot better off of Amazon. I mean, Matt, you've done that, you know, you were doing, y'all were doing the courses and then you kind of disappeared for a couple of years from the courses. And that's because you were focused on like building out this Shopify thing. I think you had great success building this like, what was it, coffee company, right? Can you talk a little bit about that? Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean, whenever, you know, I started off just doing e-commerce. Then at one point, I was like, I always had this idea. It's like I kind of wanted to like help people, teach business. I kind of like that idea of kind of sharing my knowledge. So, then I ended up meeting Jason. We launched Amazing Selling Machine and then got so busy with that. I mean, we went from nothing to tens of thousands of customers, 60 employees, like all that within like a few years. And so, I didn't have time to do anything else. I was barely sort of keeping my mind sane just doing that. So I didn't have time to do any e-commerce stuff. We built up all this sort of thing and then people are kind of like, oh, you know, like they don't even do e-commerce anymore. It's like, yeah, because I don't have any freaking time. But then at some point, I did have some extra time. So I was like, I kind of want to see if I could still do this thing. So I ended up partnering up with a friend, January of 2019. He already had a coffee business. I was kind of sitting there, really good, high quality product, very healthy coffee, as clean as possible. I like the product, but it was kind of just coasting Because his real specialty is like customer service, product development, that kind of thing, not necessarily what I'm better at, which is like the customer acquisition side. And so I partnered with him January of 2019. I was like, hey, if we can get the business to this point, I'll own this percent of the business. If we can get to this point, I'll own this percent of the business. So we kind of made more or less like a handshake deal. We blew through all those targets. So we went from about $17,000 a month in January of that year, to about $600,000 a month by the end of the year. And then today we do about $3 million a month with 80% Shopify, 20% Amazon. So we're able to scale that business up very quickly and really trying to build a brand. And we didn't actually launch on Amazon for the first year and a half. It's just we were having so much traffic bleeding over from Shopify that I was like, I don't want other people to get these sales. I want to build this brand. So I was like, we might as well sell on Amazon. So we started capturing a lot of that traffic and now we're trying to build it Kind of as its own channel, not just kind of capturing brand traffic. Speaker 1: So is it a subscription service or is it a one-off and people are just coming and buying stuff or is it a combination? Speaker 2: Subscription is about half of our sales. So our model has been, we don't want to like force people into just like a coffee subscription. Like we want to build an actual brand, you know, like a Coca-Cola or something like that, where we want to make it easier for people to buy from us. So it's like they, most all of our customers, I would say like 90 plus percent buy their first bags just one-off. I want to try it. I'll buy some, you know, medium roast, dark roast, maybe some flavored coffee. And then we try to do everything possible we can post-purchase through email, SMS, package inserts, retargeting ads, to convert them into subscription. It's like, hey, you've given this a try, now get it delivered automatically, save money, that kind of thing. And so with all that considered, we get about 17% of our one-time customers converting into subscription. And that ends up now, because it's kind of compounded over time, it's about half of our sales. Speaker 1: So what are some of the big differences? I mean, you came from the Amazon space and teaching everybody how to do it on Amazon. And then when you go out and you do it on, I mean, your background's e-commerce, so you can wear hats in different spaces because you know what you're doing. But for someone that's newer or less experienced, what are the big differences or pitfalls they got to watch out for when trying to launch something on your own and drive your own traffic versus leveraging something that already exists, whether it's Amazon or Walmart or something else? Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the biggest difference is in most cases, if you're scaling up big on Shopify, people aren't looking for your product. You're interrupting them with display advertising on the big social media platforms, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, potentially YouTube. And so, there are some people that have taken more of like the Amazon approach. Like if you sell some very specific products, like Mike actually sells some very specific kind of batteries for flashlights that people are looking for. And you can run Google search ads, but the traffic is very finite. But we scaled up the Shopify store because we interrupted a bunch of people using Facebook ads and said, hey, you know, like 64% of people drink coffee. So we know a lot of people will drink coffee. And so we're like, hey, we've got a better kind of product for you and did a lot of work to try to grab their attention, convert them and all that sort of stuff. Versus on Amazon, you can advertise some obscure product. And as long as there's a decent amount of search volume, all you have to do is say, hey, this is a better deal for what you're already looking for. So it's like interruption marketing versus Giving people what they're already looking for is the biggest difference and those require two completely different kind of skill sets. Speaker 1: So what about all the changes? Like you started the coffee company in 2019. Things were different on Facebook and social media then. With all the new privacy things with Apple and Google and everything, it's become much more difficult, you know, to follow people around, to cookie them, to do all the pixel them, to do everything that you used to be able to do that you could really hone in. So how has that affected what you guys do? Speaker 2: Yeah, I think online marketers got a little spoiled over the past. I don't know, six, five, six years, something like that, where these massive platforms came in like Facebook and Instagram and that sort of thing. And you had this highly accurate data, where if you think about it, it's like if you just throw a bunch of crap against the wall, even if you're terrible at marketing, but if you have enough money, you can throw enough stuff against the wall, you know, eventually you'll come up with something that works. And then you just spend more money there because all the data is like perfect. Now the data is not so perfect. And so I think that It's not quite that straightforward to scale up. However, we now look at things on a more macro basis where we're trying to do the best because the data is still somewhat there in terms of like, I spend this amount of money on Facebook, it tells me how many sales I got, that kind of thing. It's just like you can't trust it quite as much as you used to be able to. So we look at that data, but we take it with a grain of salt. But then we're comparing it to how is this whole thing performing. Like we know we spent X amount on ads across all channels. How many new customers did we get, which is black and white data available in Shopify. It tells you the number of first-time customers you got over whatever time period you want to look. And so we're looking like, okay, are we getting new customers? Is the overall customer acquisition cost based on all of our ad spend, does it look reasonable? If so, then we keep spending more money and we just try to do the best job we can about honing in like what areas do we think are performing the best, knowing that the data is never going to be completely perfect, but it's at least like I think usually directionally accurate. Like some ad channels, you may spend 30 grand, it'll say no sales. That doesn't make me super confident. But if I see an ad channel that I spend the same amount of money, but it shows me I got, you know, 200 sales, I'm probably going to spend more money there, even if I'm not 100% confident in the data. So it's like looking at it on a bigger basis while doing the best job you can on a more micro level. Speaker 1: So when you're doing Shopify, you got to have different, you have to think about your margins a little bit differently. I mean, in some cases, are you just hoping to break even on that first sale because of the cost of ads? And then hopefully that they're going to come back and join, like you said, a certain percentage during the subscription and that lifetime value. So that's a different way of approaching it than if you're just trying to make a sale on Amazon. Speaker 2: Now, I think you should almost be thinking like that on Amazon too. But to first talk about like the Shopify piece, yeah, I mean, basically, our goal from the very beginning was – because we never really put our money into it, extra money. We never raised money. We never did anything. We never took any debt. And so, it was all funded on the cash flow of the business. So, we kind of basically were like, we're willing to spend enough to acquire customers. So, we're basically breaking even in month two. And then anything beyond month two is profit from those customers. And that was on like a profit basis. So we knew about how much revenue those customers would drive in the first couple months. And we got a new customer, we knew about 50% of that was profit. And so as long as we spent that amount, we're okay. And so now, nowadays, Because we're a little bit more scaled up that because you know, I've been sort of public about the brand people know I sell coffee and this and that. So there's always people looking at you. Oh, I got a great idea. I'm gonna sell coffee also. And so nowadays, we spend about a million dollars a month on advertising for that business. We're willing to go out a year. Before we make any money on new customers. Cause we've got a big subscription base and everything. So it kind of funds the business, but that just gives us a better kind of moat. So other people can't jump in, you know, with a brilliant idea of selling the same product. They're going to be hard to compete. Cause we spend a million dollars a month building the brand. We do great customer service, all that kind of stuff. So originally the short answer is like, yeah, we're looking to break even either upfront or in month two, but now on new customers, we're willing to go out about a year. Speaker 1: So is it just coffee or are you branching off into accessories like coffee machines or mugs or anything like that? Speaker 2: We thought about it but then we kind of toyed around with the idea. We did a few things here and there but then what really clarified it for me is there's a book out there that's a little bit old school. I don't want to say it's from like the 80s or something. It's called Positioning. It's a good one and so he kind of, the author, I think it's maybe two of them, but they make the argument that if you take a brand that stands for something like ours, like it stands for healthy coffee. And then now if it also stands for French presses, then all of a sudden, it standing for coffee has been diluted somewhat. Because people are like, is it a coffee or is it a coffee accessory brand? Is it French presses or is it like beans and ground coffee? And so at that point, we kind of made the decision like, let's stay within our lane. If we want to sell some of these other products, we'll create sub-brands. But we want, the brand is Lifeboost Coffee. We want Lifeboost Coffee to stand for the cleanest, healthiest coffee possible. Period. Now for us, adding coffee pods fits perfectly within their Nespresso pods, fits perfectly. Ground beans, flavors, all those kinds of things is all the same thing. But if we were to add, like we have a alkaline water pitcher because one of our kind of value propositions is that it's low acid, but that's under a separate brand because we don't want to confuse the core brand. So that's kind of how we thought about it. Speaker 1: Oh, that's actually a good point to actually offer something but put it under a separate brand. So that's actually I like that actually sell those that's really good. So Mike, you're still selling on Amazon, right? And now you just said you're making this transition under Matt's tutelage to actually get into the off Amazon stuff. So how's that going for you? Can you talk about that a little bit? Speaker 3: It's going really well, and it is a completely different mindset. Because, you know, as Kevin, as you know, and you're one of the premier masters of this, Amazon right now is all about search, you know, about people looking for your product and you showing up so you're there when they're looking for it. And it's moving more towards advertising, which we kind of all saw happening, you know, as when they announced the first time that their advertising revenue was, you know, outpacing everything else, we knew where they're going to go that way. So now it's forcing me to become a better marketer. So I have to now talk more about why my product is better than everyone else's product. Not that you don't do that on Amazon, but you need to do that even more so when you're interrupting someone on Facebook or wherever you're reaching them to show them your product, because they may not even be looking for your product right now. I've learned a lot of things. I mean, you know, Matt would even like, you know, help me go through the stats so I could figure out where I didn't even need, you know, couldn't even figure it out before. What is my average order value in Shopify? They tell you that, it's pretty simple, but show them the right place to find those things. So we worked on the basics of increasing average order value, making sure that we're constantly emailing customers. I used to have this fear that I was always annoying customers, but realizing that, you know, people that are on your email list are probably looking for a coupon and you want to be there with that coupon when they're ready for it. And then also making sure that you always, you know, focus on what the customers, you Find the right angle for every customer. Like one of the things we talk about all the time is think of the five best angles for your product and test them. You know, just test them out because you really don't know what's going to work and what's going to resonate. And I think to a T, every time that I thought the one that was going to win would win, it didn't. It was, you know, I may think I know my customers, but when you sell on your own website, you really learn your customers more because they're on your email list. You get emails back from them. You have communication with them and you learn a lot more about your products. And so I think the first year my sales on Shopify 5x, you know, like 500%, still nothing, nothing, nowhere near what Matt's doing. And I mean, I still do 90% of my sales on Amazon. But my goal is to get that more towards 50-50 in the next 12 to 24 months. And then I'll feel a lot better about where my business is at being, you know, spread across multiple channels. Speaker 1: So how important do you guys think it is to be on a bunch of channels? I mean, we're talking about Shopify and Amazon right now, but what about Walmart and several of these others? Because don't you want to kind of be where the customer has their shopping cart of choice? Amazon might be their shopping cart of choice or Shopify, you know, going direct might be. Where do you think the limit is? Should you be trying to expand to as many as possible or should you just focus on the few that actually drive most of the sales? Speaker 2: I mean, I think like you said early on here, each one still takes focus. Like for us, we were already probably spending at least a few hundred grand a month in ad spend on Facebook and so we were getting a lot of traffic bleeding off onto Amazon. So literally on Amazon at that point, all we had to do was add products and we immediately were doing over a hundred grand a month in sales. Speaker 1: So when you say bleeding off, you mean people seeing your Facebook ad instead of going to your site, they just go find it on Amazon? Speaker 2: We're like, I want free two-day shipping or I don't trust buying from the site I've never heard of before. Let me go check out reviews. And so because of all that, we immediately shot up to like 100 grand plus on Amazon. So that's kind of an easy win. But for example, we have not had the same success on walmart.com. It's like we need to put more focus there. Like we do such a tiny amount. Like I literally think of like a few hundred bucks a month. Mike's business, which is smaller than ours, outsells us on walmart.com by like 5x, I think. Speaker 3: We'll play that one more time that I outsell Matt Clark's business on Walmart. Speaker 2: Yes, I think each channel takes focus. I think your goal should be to sell in as many as possible, but in most cases, unless you have some situation like us, just throwing products on there isn't going to be enough. You got to put some extra time there. And I think it kind of depends on the products too. It's like I have a friend who exited his business like peak of the market, like 2021, like amazing exit, like life-changing amount of money by anybody's standards. And he sold a pet sort of treats business. And so, one of his big channels I think was like 30% of his sales with Chewy.com. So, if you got something like that, like maybe that's more important to you. For us right now, We're really thinking about like how do we get our product into retail. Not because I think retail is like a great answer for everybody, but because like we've surveyed our customers and like two-thirds of them still buy their groceries in retail stores, which ours is like technically a grocery product. So if they're sitting there shopping for their weekly groceries, ours isn't there, they're gonna throw somebody else's in their bag and all of a sudden we potentially lose a customer forever. So I think you kind of got to pick the channels that make the most sense for your business, but I think at bare minimum you should be selling on Shopify and Amazon. Speaker 1: How is TikTok affecting everything? I just saw something the other day that 46% of Gen Z, I think it is, actually do their product searching first on TikTok, not on Amazon, not other places. How are you seeing that affecting what you're doing in the coffee business or does it? Speaker 2: It's something we're trying to crack. I've had more success with Matt Clark as a mini-influencer on TikTok than I have with our e-commerce brand so far. But we see videos and a lot of different physical product things go viral, so we're still trying to crack that code. But to me, it's crazy because you can take the same vertical video and put it on TikTok, you can put it on Instagram Reels, you can put it on Facebook. Facebook Reels, you can put it on YouTube Shorts. That to me, it's kind of crazy for any small business, e-commerce especially, to not be doing at least one or two of these videos a day and putting them on each one of the channels. Because you take the same video and put them on all of them because it's the same vertical video format and you never know. One could kind of blow up. Is it like something that unless you're really into it, I think you should be spending like half of your day on? Probably not for like 99% of most people. But it's something to kind of be trying because I mean these things do blow up. And I know I mean, we've got a guy, we don't have to do like a pitch for SellerCon or whatever, but we've got a guy that like I took his course and he's all about using TikTok for e-commerce and other businesses. And I've learned a lot from him on how to kind of stack the odds in your favor. And one of them is what he calls the 10% strategy, which is literally just taking a viral video that's in your market that's ideally pitched a product similar to yours. And then essentially copying it, like not taking their content, but really modeling your own version as closely as possible because something in that thing has kind of gone viral and you never know what it is. Like I've done it for my own kind of personal brand thing and I've got a video that has over 3 million organic views on TikTok because I just modeled it after somebody's video that had already gone viral. And so that's what we've kind of informed or had people do for TikTok for e-commerce and sometimes it works and a lot of times it doesn't, but it's still kind of like, you could create one of those in like 20 minutes. So why not? Speaker 1: I think Gary Vanderchuk is, he just spoke at the Sailing Scale event, Helium 10's event back in September. And one of the things that he said on stage is like, anybody out there that's in e-commerce right now is missing the boat. If you're not taking advantage, there's a window here on social media, especially on TikTok and like what you said with all the reels and And YouTube shorts and everything. That's gonna close, but right now, he's like, you should be producing five to 10 videos per day and just throwing them out there. Most of them are gonna get a couple hundred views, 300, 400 views, but one of them is gonna hit somewhere. You're just throwing those odds, throwing enough darts against the board. And then if you can model it like what you just said, take a look at what other people are having success with and model it after that. I think that's a great strategy that could increase those odds dramatically. Speaker 2: Yeah, and you never know what it's going to make it hit. Like I tried to copy one for the coffee business. It didn't work. But I tried to copy this video that was like basically just making cold brew. And I literally went to Walmart, I bought all the crap and then I was like recording this with my like ghetto setup in my kitchen. I'm not good at video stuff. And I was doing it. I made the coffee in the exact same way that they made it. And then I published it and it didn't really work. But then I kind of like re-watched the other video and I started reading some of the comments and I was like, I think what actually made that video go viral was the freaking ice cubes that they used. Like people were just loving these little ice cubes and they were not like the ones that come out of your freezer or whatever. They were like some – like I don't know if they use an ice machine but they're like these tiny little square ice cubes that are like – I don't even know how they made them. So I think that's what made people go nuts. So it's like almost like you never really know what's going to make it happen. It's tricky, but when it works, it's great. It's free traffic and can drive a lot of sales. Speaker 1: So Mike, you're driving the ship a lot now. Matt's really busy with the coffee stuff and everything. You're driving the ship a lot on Amazing.com. So what's the shift been and what's Amazing.com focusing on right now? Speaker 3: So the big shift we made just last year was omnichannel. You know, we've been Amazon centric for 10 plus years now where, I mean, pretty much, you know, amazing selling machine, amazing was synonymous with Amazon. Sometimes I type it and spell the wrong word because it's so similar to it. But, you know, last year we made this shift where based upon, you know, the success Matt was having on Shopify was showing us and already us seeing our own gains. We wanted to make sure that our members and people who've been, you know, through our courses before had that latest shift as well so that they were not longer just on Amazon, but they could expand or if they wanted to start on Shopify. So our big shift is omnichannel. And for me, it does include the big three pillars. It's still Amazon. And there's no reason not to be there when you have all the traffic in the world going there. And it's just an easy place to start. Shopify and Walmart as well. I think anyone who knows Walmart knows that they're slow. It's kind of like you look at the retail business, everything they do, they don't do anything quickly. But once they invest in something, they go all in. And from what I've seen already from the people that we've worked with at Walmart and talked to, they have big, big plans for e-commerce and their website. And so Walmart is probably that third pillar at Amazing that we'll be bringing members into where you need to be on all three platforms and one may work. Two may work, all three may work, none may work, but if you don't try them all out and get your product out there for everyone, you won't really know if one is better positioned for your product or not. We've seen people launch on Shopify, product doesn't take off, they throw it up on Amazon, not even fully optimized, and they start getting sales right away. So you never really fully know, you know, we know the basics of what the differences are in the platforms, but you don't really know necessarily which product is going to take off on which one of those channels. Speaker 1: What about like what Matt said, retail? I mean 80% of all sales still happen in retail stores, in retail. It's a whole different animal, it's a whole different cash flow, it's a whole different, you know, it's tough but it can also pay off huge. Are any plans to actually help people transition to that or do you recommend people first start on the e-commerce where there's a little bit, they have a little bit more control, they can go at a little bit different pace and then branch off into retail? Speaker 3: Yeah, 100%. I don't think I'd ever recommend anyone who's kind of new to the space, or maybe even been in the space for a little bit of time, a year or two, going towards retail. I've had conversations with retail before, and it scared the crap out of me. Because you talk about, you know, making sure that you always have to have a certain number of products available. The bigger you are, the bigger your cashflow problems are. If you want to be in retail in a big part of the country, you have to have a lot of inventory. They're not going to fund that for you. You're going to have to fund that yourself. They're going to want the best payment terms. They're going to want to really get the best payment terms going on and on. I'm not saying it's not a great market to finally get into. I just think for beginners, e-commerce still today, how can you beat it? You can start with a relatively small budget, Do it from your own home. You don't even gotta live in the market where you're selling. You can live pretty much anywhere. And then once you pick up traction, you know the e-commerce game, you start building up a brand, then I can see where going retail would be the next big move. Especially if you feel like you've tapped out to some point, whatever channels e-commerce wise you're in, retail can be the next big place. Like I said, 70 plus percent of sales still take place there. That's not gonna change anytime soon. Speaker 1: Well, someone like Matt, I mean, he's built a huge customer list. Like he said, they're looking at going into retail now. A lot of times these retailers are going to start with a test. They're going to say, we'll put you on, you know, Whole Foods will say, we're going to put you in 100 stores and see what happens. He's got a list and he knows which 100 stores those are. He can actually go out to his list and segment it by zip code and tell all those people that are They've been buying from, hey, now it's available at your local Whole Foods. Go drive them to actually start having that stuff fly off the shelf. The buyer at Whole Foods is like, holy crap, this stuff is selling like hotcakes. We're gonna expand this to 500 stores, 1,000 stores. It gives you that leverage and that power that you don't otherwise have. And that's something that's... When you own that customer, when you own that customer data, that's the most valuable asset of your company. It's not necessarily your logo, it's not necessarily your employees, the customer data is king, and Amazon knows that, that's why they don't give it to you. But Matt knows from what he's doing, without that customer data, he couldn't be reselling them again, he couldn't be going to them with new things, or having them recommend their friends. That's something that a lot of Amazon sellers just don't understand, and going back to the same customer, so many people try to sell a customer once, And that's it, I'm done, here's my flashlight or here's my garlic press or whatever and that's it. Versus what Matt's doing, he's gaining, like he said earlier, in some cases it's a year before they make a profit on a new customer. He knows that lifetime value, he knows what it takes to spend it and it's worth it and it builds that moat and so many people either They don't understand that, or in some cases, they don't have the financial means or the knowledge to actually pull that off, but it's an important thing, and that's where everything is shifting now. Even on the Amazon space, it's become more about brands. It's become more about, Amazon's giving a lot more data than they ever have, and that helps, but it's also, it's much more difficult to actually get going on Amazon if you're not thinking about it from a total brand omnichannel point of view. Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think, um, yeah, I mean, for us, that's where we're kind of like looking at Amazon. Like I, like I kind of alluded to earlier, it's like we're looking at Amazon starting to. The same way we look at Shopify where, you know, you probably know as well as anybody else, like we looked at like the subscribe and save report in Amazon. It kind of tells you, uh, what is the LTV of a subscribe and save customer? The 12 month LTV, it's basically lifetime value looking back the past 12 months. And then it tells you like, how does that compare to somebody not on subscription? So for us, our 12 month lifetime value of a subscription customer subscribe and save on Amazon is something like 120 bucks. And then for a non-subscribe and save person, it's like half of that. The interesting thing to me is that like, we've also analyzed some orders and stuff like that. And so we're kind of able to back into like, what is our lifetime value of a new customer on Amazon? And it seems to be about $64, $65 in a revenue basis. So, we're kind of calculating our overall profit and stuff. So, then we're like, okay, we know about how much profit we make in 12 months from a customer on Amazon. Now, we're able to start going into our PPC and stuff and saying like, okay, we can probably spend $30 or so to acquire a customer on Amazon and break even in 12 months. And that allows us on a lot of keywords. And our average order value, just coincidentally, is right about $30 too. We can spend 100% ACOS on a lot of these keywords and those should break even in about a year. I mean, that's the way that I don't hear that many people on Amazon thinking about it, but it's the same way we think about it on Shopify where it's like, what is the cost to acquire a customer and when is that customer going to break even? And like, how do we use that data to beat everyone else? So we're kind of like using the same approach on both channels. Speaker 1: I think some of that, the reason some of that happens on, on Amazon is that's not how people have been taught. People have been taught, you know, with all these Lamborghini, YouTube videos and everything that, uh, you get rich quick, quit your job overnight and, uh, you know, uh, start selling with a beautiful girls on a yacht around the world. And that's just not the case. You got to build a real, now those days are over. I mean, now you've got to build a real business, uh, and you get, and you got to approach it completely different for, for long-term success, especially If you're looking to exit it for a large amount at some time, Now you guys are doing something, I mean, back when you first started Amazing.com, I remember actually driving here in Austin and there were billboards along I-35 that said Amazing.com. I was like, damn, what is this? What is this thing? These guys are like just going crazy. And then you were doing shows like in Vegas with like some ridiculous number of people, 4,000, 5,000 people or something at a conference in Vegas. And you guys did those for a while and they were great. I mean, it was probably, it was bigger than the Prosper Show for a while there. And then you COVID came and that kind of interrupted everything. But now you guys are back. And it used to be called the Amazing.com show or something like that. Now you guys, you changed the name a few years ago to CellarCon to have it not just be just about Amazon. And now you've got another one coming here in Austin where I live in June. And you're doing this, it's not just an Amazon show. You're pulling some of it from the Amazon marketplace. Some of those guys are gonna be coming. There is Amazon content, but you're really focusing on a lot of omnichannel stuff like what we've been talking about. Is that correct? You got some really good speakers coming. Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, so we're kind of designing this event, which is CellarCon June 1st through 3rd in Austin, and we're kind of designing this based on the conversation we've been having here. We don't know 100% where everyone's at that's going to be coming. You could be just picking your first product, you could have already exited a business for $10 million and you're starting a new one, or you could be somewhere in the middle like most people will be. And so in that case, we're like, okay, here is the model we think makes the most sense for e-commerce today, which is like, Maximize the Amazon channel, but don't make it your whole business. So, we've got people in there that'll kind of teach you all the best stuff about maximizing sales on Amazon today from PPC, conversion optimization, and everything else. We're also including people like myself and some other people that'll help you really figure out like, how do I scale up big on Shopify? We've got Ezra, who's a good friend, who's one of the top Shopify sort of people. We've got other people, we're kind of designing it so that like you should be hitting all of these channels as best as possible. And then additionally, you know, bringing people in like the TikTok guy and stuff like that to say that like, I mean, you could send that same TikTok traffic to Shopify, to Amazon, We're kind of helping people design like a full omnichannel approach to their business so that they're not dependent on any one channel, on any one product, on any one ad platform. Like you're building kind of a real brand. And so we're designing that whole experience into SellerCon based on the speakers that we choose, how we organize the event, how we coach the speakers on what content to share and everything else. Speaker 1: So how many speakers are there? Something like around 20 or so speakers? Speaker 2: So far, confirmed. We'll be adding more between now and then. Speaker 1: And it's over three days, correct? Speaker 2: Yep. June 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Speaker 1: And why did you choose Austin? I know you used to live here, but then you moved away to beautiful Colorado. Why did you choose Austin for this event? Speaker 2: Well, now I'm back in Austin. Speaker 1: Are you? Okay. I didn't know that. Okay. Speaker 2: Well, we're all over the place and we'll probably end up. Yeah. I mean, still love the mountains and everything, but all of our friends and family are here. Like all of, you know, it's a great place for business. I think right now it's got to be like, I don't know, probably the top place in the US if not the world for, um, business, uh, you know, especially technology, e-commerce, Silicon Valley of, uh, e-commerce or digital marketing, basically. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So because of all that, and we're very familiar with the city, and so we've done events here before. So that's kind of why we chose Austin. And it's, you know, fairly affordable compared to doing an event in like, you know, say New York or something, or Miami is a little like confined and that sort of thing. So it's a great spot for everybody wants to come to Austin. Speaker 1: I mean, it's become it's, you know, it's one of the top destinations now for like bachelorette and bachelorette parties and everything else, you know, it's Vegas, Nashville and Austin, I think is where everybody wants to go. So it's, yeah, Austin, I've been here 30 something years, and it's changed a lot. But it's, it's definitely a cool place. And I know, There's actually some other events that are almost, I don't know if they're just piggybacking off of you guys, like Klaviyo is doing something actually right before you guys. Speaker 2: I wish I could say they're piggybacking off us, but I'm pretty sure they're like a billion dollar company now, so they probably think the other way around. Speaker 1: And then I think someone else is doing something, Perpetua or somebody else is actually doing something right before you guys. I'm actually hosting a party on June 1st for anybody that's going to CellarCon. It's going to be limited, probably only going to have space for a couple hundred people, but we're doing like a mystical circus. So it's not just going to be come and have a drink and walk around and network. It's going to be networking, but we're actually doing this really cool event. The guy that produces my Billion Dollar Cellar Summit is doing it for me. And we're going to have performers, you know, fire jugglers and fire breathers and all kinds of stuff walking around. It's a very interactive type of party. So I think that's gonna be pretty cool as well. So how many people, this is a pretty big event. This is not like some small little mastermind that you guys are doing. You're expecting quite a crowd. What do you expect to do? Speaker 2: We got 2,000 seats available and the plan is to fill every single one of them. Speaker 1: So if someone is interested in that, it's at the Hyatt or Hilton? Speaker 2: The Hilton Austin right there in downtown. Speaker 1: And how would they actually find out more like who's speaking? And I know the tickets are really affordable as well. How would they go about securing a seat? Speaker 2: Yeah, easiest way is just go to sellercon.com. S-E-L-L-E-R-C-O-N.com. But also if you go to amazing.com, you'll see, you know, links all over there. But sellercon.com is the direct event website. Speaker 1: Awesome. So, omnichannel is the new way to go, huh? Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so. I think it all kind of fits together. I mean, like we've kind of seen, you know, the next step for us and in the coffee business is to kind of, because, you know, we're measuring our first time customers versus our total ad spend. So, we're like about how much are we spending to acquire customers. The step we're working on right now is how do we blend that with Amazon? How do we add our Amazon spend plus all of our other spend, Amazon first-time customers plus all of our first customers, so we're really seeing, I honestly don't care that much where they buy from us. If they want to buy on Amazon, great. If they want to buy on Shopify, great. I think that's going to allow us to build a much bigger brand than looking at any channel in isolation. I think they end up fitting together much more than people think and that's what the event's all about. Speaker 1: Awesome. Well, I hope to see everybody that's listening there at SellerCon, June 1st to the 3rd in Austin. Go to sellercon.com if you want more information, see who's speaking, secure a ticket. I know that tickets are just a few hundred bucks or something, right? It's not some crazy amount. It's definitely affordable and I think I've been to many of Matt and Mike's events and they're always first class. They're always top-notch speakers, top-notch networking, a lot of fun, definitely worth it. Gentlemen, I really appreciate you coming on the podcast today. Any final words before we head out? Speaker 2: I don't think so. I mean, I could just give my two cents of motivation for people. You know, there's a lot of crazy stuff happening in the world right now. And it's easy to kind of get caught in all of that, I think, and like forget that you're, you know, building a business that, you know, who knows what's going to happen. But what we do know is that if you keep chugging along, working at your business, building your brand, selling good products, serving customers, that I mean, that's how you're going to transform your life. So just kind of want to make sure people don't forget all that, regardless of what else is happening, because, you know, we've seen so many people's lives that have I'm completely transformed by building an e-commerce business. And despite anything else going on, the opportunity today is massive. I mean, the last year was the first year U.S. e-commerce hit like a trillion dollars in sales. So don't forget that despite anything else happening, you've still got a great opportunity in e-commerce, unlike anything that's kind of ever existed before. Speaker 1: Those are good words. Speaker 3: But I'll tell you, it won't be a blatant pitch for Silicon. It'll be a blatant pitch for any event. Everyone knows that when you're in this business that you can feel like you're on an island at times because most people don't work in a big office when you're doing this. Most people work out of their home, maybe a small office like that, but you might feel like you're in this on your own at times and getting around hundreds or thousands of people that are doing exactly what you want to do or want to have the same achievements that you want to have It can be unbelievably motivating. So sometimes you don't need the next tactic or trick. You just need some motivation from people that are doing exactly what you're doing. And that's what we try to do, not just with Amazing, but like with events like SellerCon. Prosper does a good job of it as well. And it's kind of that first time surprise we're there for the first time. But an event like SellerCon, it will give you the motivation that you need and you'll make the connections that you want to have in this business, which is why we brought it back live. We know people need that and we want to provide that in the best possible environment we can. Speaker 1: I agree with you, there's something just different and a lot of people just do virtual events, but it's different when you're in person. I mean, that human connection that, it's just totally different. And like you said, being around like-minded people, you know, you can't really sit and talk with your husband or your wife or your kids, you know, about what you do. They're like, okay, enough Amazon, enough e-commerce talk. I don't really care about Facebook ads, but when you're around other like-minded people, that's all they want to talk about all day long and you can, you feel that bond and a lot of times, Some of the best information doesn't always come from what you hear in a presentation. It's sitting around the bar, going to dinner with other people and making those connections and making those contacts that people can help you out when you have a problem. You might meet somebody that's really good at TikTok at having drinks one night. And when you start to do TikTok, you got someone you can call and say, hey, you know, who are you using for this? And how are you doing this? And you don't you're not going to make those connections virtually. You're just sitting at home in your underwear, you know, playing on the computer. So I agree with you. Get out. This is going to be one of the best events that you can go to. It's in Austin. It's good guys putting it on. So hopefully we'll see everybody there. Matt and Mike are two of the top guys in the e-commerce space and so it's always a pleasure to speak with them, always sharing really good information. Hopefully you can make it out to CellarCon and I will see you there. I live here in Austin so it's just right down the road from me and remember if you're coming to CellarCon on June 1st, look for an announcement soon on my social media about the Mystical Circus party that we're going to be doing. And also don't forget the Billion Dollar Seller Summit is coming up right after SellerCon, a couple weeks after on June 11th to the 15th in Puerto Rico. You can get more information on that at BillionDollarSellerSummit.com. Until next time, I hope you guys have a great week. Before I go, I'm gonna leave you with this week's words of wisdom. You know, a bottle of water can be 50 cents at a supermarket. Or maybe that same bottle of water is $2 if you buy it at the gym. If you go to the movies, it might cost you $3 or more. Or if you're on an airplane, that exact same bottle of water could cost $6. It's the same water. The only thing that changed in the value was the place. So the next time you feel your worth is nothing, maybe you're in the wrong place. We'll see you again next week. Speaker 3: Bye bye.