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So, David, welcome to the show. 
How are you? 

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Thanks, happy to be here. 
It's a new year, so a new pod 

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and I'm excited to be here. 
I'm doing pretty well, maybe a 

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little tired, maybe a little 
jazz, who knows? 

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Well, it has been Christmas. 
Everyone's supposed to have 

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relaxed over Christmas, but we 
know what it's like. 

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People like you and I who run 
businesses, brain never switches

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off. 
It just goes awesome capacity. 

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Let's think where are the clouds
right now and how do I reach 

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them? 
But yeah, yeah, Philip, for 

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anyone that's not tuned in 
before, David, tell us a bit 

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about your business, your 
background, what you guys sell 

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and then we'll dive into some of
the more deeper marketing and 

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kind of businessy questions 
after that. 

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But give us a bit of an 
overview. 

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How did you get into this? 
Yeah, totally. 

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I kind of just stumbled into it.
Basically, I run a little 

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mountain inspired apparel brand 
based in the Pacific Northwest 

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of the USA and there's a local 
landmark that's the coolest 

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thing ever. 
It's called Mount Rainier, Mount

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Tahoma. 
And there's times when it's out,

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quote UN quote, invisible on the
horizon. 

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And that just image of that and 
how amazing it is kind of 

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sparked this interest of mine. 
And I started basically tweeting

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when the mountain was out, quote
UN quote, which is kind of this 

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local catch phrase. 
And then started designing and 

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selling products and merchandise
inspired by the mountain. 

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And it's all just been a roller 
coaster since then. 

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OK, so I, I don't read too much 
into guests, as I said to you 

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earlier, and my listeners will 
know, like I don't read too much

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into guests for the common 
because I like to ask questions 

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if I know nothing. 
One thing I did glance at was 

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and I didn't look at the about 
Us page itself or the story 

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page, but I saw you just had 
that thing. 

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Like it all started with one 
fateful tweet. 

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Was that the tweet? 
You going like the mountain's 

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there, the mountain's not there 
and just telling people what was

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going on. 
That was it. 

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That was the start of the whole 
thing. 

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Amazing. 
And how long ago was that? 

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Like how many years have you 
been you've been going for? 

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Yeah, the tweet itself was 2013,
so 10 plus years. 

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And it's kind of been the shop 
didn't start till many years 

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later, the apparel side of 
things. 

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And so it's been off and on 
throughout the years, something 

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that I was tweeting on my way 
into work and taking time off 

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and then getting back into it. 
And then the last couple years 

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it's really just snowballed and 
grown like crazy. 

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Wow, and it's so cool. 
I think that seeing where people

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use technology to connect people
that aren't in a place to a 

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place. 
I, I absolutely love the 

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railways here. 
Like I'm really into trains, 

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which sounds like a little 5 
year old talking, but I, I Love 

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Actually tuning into like 
there's loads of cameras around 

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the UK railway network and you 
can just tune into a camera and 

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go. 
That's my favorite beach, the 

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railway lines going by and every
time the train goes fast and my 

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team are like, this is the most 
boring thing I've ever seen when

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a train goes by. 
It's all the nostalgia of like, 

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I used to go there as a kid. 
And so I I really connected 

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actually when I saw just even 
the homepage of your brand and 

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saw how that was. 
But there must have been like a 

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real challenge when you go from 
like you say, a tweet. 

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It's not even called that 
anymore. 

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Obviously Elon's renamed it X. 
You know, he used to have gone 

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for a full letter rather than a 
word. 

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And there must have been a 
challenge to actually go from 

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like, OK, I've got an audience 
of people that just like hearing

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if the mountains there are not 
and kind of what's going on to 

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suddenly like, Hey, come buy 
this product. 

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Like what were the early days 
like? 

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How did you and how did you get 
out of kind of that early 

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mentality into win our business 
that's trading? 

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Oh man, so, so many challenges. 
It was definitely been a 

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learning process. 
I don't really have a background

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in e-commerce or graphic design 
or apparel or like any of these 

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things. 
Basically, my career was 

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actually in a different place 
when I started that tweeting 10 

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years ago, I was in financial 
services. 

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Now I'm a web developer. 
I've been coding websites for 

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seven plus years and so just 
learned everything along the 

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way. 
But there was there's definitely

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many challenges. 
Some of the early T-shirts, 

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stickers, designs, that's kind 
of what I started with and a 

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couple hats were really not 
great. 

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I don't know who bought them. 
Shout out to mom. 

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Thanks mom for buying them all. 
But they're pretty terrible 

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looking back. 
And now it's been pretty cool to

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see that path and that like just
journey from day zero to day 

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now. 
Like I started in our spare 

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bedroom when we're in an 
apartment with my family. 

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And so we moved to a house and 
they ran it still out of a spare

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bedroom, built a backyard office
shed, which is where I'm in now.

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Outgrew that like the boxes were
spilling onto the onto the grass

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on the side. 
And then ended up in a warehouse

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like a year or two ago. 
Local warehouse that I ship 

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borders out of now. 
Wow. 

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And it's, it's such a cool, cool
journey. 

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And I think certainly with the 
product quality, we've had a lot

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of guests on that have said 
like, yeah, we need, we wanted 

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to start this product. 
So we did like a Kickstarter and

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there's like 10,000 people 
who've ordered the products and 

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then their first run of products
arrived and they were all like 

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terrible. 
And it was like, right, we we 

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don't know what we thought we 
knew about products. 

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These are bad. 
Like you say, who's going to buy

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them? 
I guess if the business grows 

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enough, they almost become the 
retro range, like, you know, an 

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original Harry Potter book or 
something, which is quite cool. 

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But obviously, I mean, what a 
journey from, I mean, literally 

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from flat to house to warehouse,
Like there's quite quite a cool,

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quite a cool kind of evolution. 
And I mean, do you, do you have 

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many staff now? 
Like has it become quite a big 

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operation or have you kept it 
really lean and sort of 

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outsource like these guys do the
warehouse, these guys do this 

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bit? 
Yeah, it's super lean. 

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It's basically just me doing 
most of the things. 

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I started about a year and a 
half ago with a shipping person 

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to ship the orders for me 
because it basically got to the 

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point where I dreaded going in 
and shipping orders. 

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And I've heard that's kind of 
like the point where you want to

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flip the switch and hire someone
else to do it. 

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And that I saw instantly that 
change where I was really 

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motivated to get more orders in 
versus the polar opposite before

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that person started doing it for
me, where I was dreading, even 

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though it was great to see the 
revenue come in, in the sales. 

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I was dreading that that act of 
it, even though I enjoyed 

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shipping out orders, is really 
fun, but it's just kind of like 

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hanging in the back of my head. 
Oh, I got to go ship out another

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couple dozen orders, but it's 
basically me, the shipping 

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person that handles a lot of 
things. 

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I've got Ava that I've been 
working with over the last 

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couple months and that's been 
really useful to do a lot of the

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so many like little menial tasks
or little repeatable things. 

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And there's just so, so much 
especially I mean, I run an eco 

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friendly apparel brand, so it's 
kind of like a pill battle niche

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Geo specific, like let's just 
make it as hard as possible. 

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And so I have too many skews. 
That's a work in progress, but 

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like managing all of that, doing
inventory, all the things is 

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really difficult. 
I've also started using my 

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friend's ChatGPT over the last 
like month or two and now it's 

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kind of the hot topic on the 
street, at least has been the 

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last year or two. 
But I found that to be really 

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useful and to kind of have a Co 
founder type person almost to 

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bounce ideas off of thoughts off
of. 

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And it's, it's so hard when 
you're so preneur because you, 

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I'm a perfectionist and that is 
good and bad, but wanting things

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to be absolutely perfect before 
they go to market is not the 

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best and wanting everything 
absolutely perfect. 

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So I kind of have to focus on 
getting things done rather than 

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perfect. 
And that's kind of been my, my 

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motto over the last year to 
actually, it's been focus on the

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essentials, cut out the fluff. 
Still working on that, but 

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that's where I'm at right now. 
Yeah, absolutely. 

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And I was reminiscing, I don't 
know how many of you guys 

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listening follow me on LinkedIn.
I put a really ranty tweet out 

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on, it'd be Monday the 6th of 
Jan moaning about the UK 

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government mostly. 
The first one was about like tax

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increases they've done which 
have just screwed over the 

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retail industry. 
Spoke a bit about ChatGPT and 

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other stuff and I think I, I, I 
made a parallel in there, which 

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you just reminded me of exactly 
with that kind of that lean 

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operation you're running now 
when the Internet first came out

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was the parallel of actually 
what AI I think is doing now is,

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is that second wave of we don't 
need as many people. 

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We don't need as many people. 
We can do more without people. 

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And, and there's always this 
nervousness, isn't there, right?

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There's always the socialist in 
the room. 

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He's like, but what jobs are we 
all going to do? 

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And the capitalist goes, if 
there were loads of money and 

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none of us work, that's a good 
thing. 

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And it's like, but we need to be
fulfilled and it's a balance, 

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right? 
We need a bit of both, but I 

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think it's, it's really 
interesting as you say, like 

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having a Co founder called 
ChatGPT. 

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I've never heard anyone call it 
a Co founder, but I do think 

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there is a really good room for 
that. 

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And especially if you're using 
the like the paid version that's

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got Internet access. 
We use it all the time. 

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Like I literally before 
recording this episode, we're on

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right now, before this goes 
live, we will go and ChatGPT and

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go right these 3 or 4 topics. 
What is the most watched 

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podcast, YouTube videos, Spotify
episode. 

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Therefore, what should we call 
it? 

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And all we're doing is we're 
using a bit of AI to just do a 

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ton of research seconds. 
And I'm sure you use it for very

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00:09:29,760 --> 00:09:32,560
similar tasks. 
So it's funny is to pull back 

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the curtain a little bit. 
Some of the questions that you 

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emailed over, I answered them 
with catchy PT to prepare myself

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and then also. 
Asked. 

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My Co founder, what questions 
you should ask me that would be 

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interesting. 
And it was able to basically 

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because I've trained it on just 
thousands of documents and 

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content and my voice and brand 
and it's just questions every 

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00:09:52,600 --> 00:09:54,280
single day. 
So it's like more knowledgeable 

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00:09:54,280 --> 00:09:56,280
and has a better memory than I 
do at this point. 

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00:09:57,120 --> 00:10:00,160
So super useful as a sort of a 
force multiplier I see it as. 

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00:10:00,960 --> 00:10:03,280
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. 
And I, I just couldn't believe 

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00:10:03,280 --> 00:10:05,240
that when you ask it any even 
some of the questions that we're

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00:10:05,240 --> 00:10:08,760
talking about today, asking it 
like what is the most popular or

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00:10:08,760 --> 00:10:11,520
the most viewed or saying it can
go on YouTube and like do some 

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00:10:11,520 --> 00:10:14,480
searches and fight and filter or
look in its own database and go,

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00:10:14,600 --> 00:10:16,760
I know this, this and this. 
So I'm going to share that 

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00:10:16,760 --> 00:10:19,120
information. 
It is so powerful. 

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00:10:19,160 --> 00:10:23,440
And I think I've always lived by
the motto that like text, great 

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00:10:23,440 --> 00:10:25,560
if it speeds up something you're
already good at. 

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00:10:26,120 --> 00:10:29,000
I think the challenge for me 
always is if you ask, if you 

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00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:31,800
said to ChatGPT, not like you're
a web developer, you know 

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00:10:31,800 --> 00:10:34,400
nothing about web development 
and you ask ChatGPT, how do I 

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00:10:34,400 --> 00:10:36,680
edit this piece of code? 
It's only going to answer you 

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00:10:36,680 --> 00:10:38,880
that question. 
This is how you edit or change 

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00:10:38,880 --> 00:10:40,120
that piece of code to do what 
you want. 

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00:10:40,280 --> 00:10:42,320
What it won't tell you is that's
about to interfere with a 

214
00:10:42,320 --> 00:10:44,560
JavaScript file, stop the whole 
thing from working and crash the

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00:10:44,560 --> 00:10:46,480
server. 
And now you're in a bit of a 

216
00:10:46,480 --> 00:10:48,760
pickle. 
So I think that that's certainly

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00:10:48,760 --> 00:10:50,800
training it. 
We did a lot with ChatGPT when 

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00:10:50,800 --> 00:10:53,160
we're doing any content stuff 
like we have a tone of voice for

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00:10:53,160 --> 00:10:55,440
each client where we give it the
tone of voice document. 

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00:10:55,440 --> 00:10:57,480
Please read this, this and take 
this into account whenever 

221
00:10:57,480 --> 00:11:00,040
answering any future questions. 
And then you say like, right, 

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00:11:00,040 --> 00:11:03,320
we've got 5 furniture trends and
what title should we put on this

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00:11:03,520 --> 00:11:04,880
using our tone of voice 
document? 

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00:11:04,880 --> 00:11:06,800
It knows. 
And I'm sure, again, I'm sure 

225
00:11:06,800 --> 00:11:09,240
you use it for similar things, 
but it's, it's really smart and 

226
00:11:09,240 --> 00:11:11,440
it, but the tool's only as good 
as the person using it. 

227
00:11:11,440 --> 00:11:14,240
If you just, if I just log in 
fresh to ChatGPT and start a new

228
00:11:14,240 --> 00:11:16,680
chat every day and go like, what
title should I put on this? 

229
00:11:16,680 --> 00:11:19,400
It would just go, I don't know, 
here's some random titles that 

230
00:11:19,400 --> 00:11:21,720
look kind of cool, but it's got 
no context that you're trying to

231
00:11:21,720 --> 00:11:23,560
optimize for SEO for your 
audience tone of voice. 

232
00:11:24,160 --> 00:11:28,280
If you specifically as you are 
Geo located, it'll know to go, 

233
00:11:28,280 --> 00:11:29,800
well, we need to talk about the 
mountain, don't we? 

234
00:11:29,960 --> 00:11:31,320
We can't not talk about the 
mountain. 

235
00:11:31,320 --> 00:11:33,480
It's so-called to brand. 
So I'm going to mention that 

236
00:11:33,480 --> 00:11:35,440
without you even asking me to. 
And she says it's got an 

237
00:11:35,440 --> 00:11:37,880
infinite memory, which is quite,
quite convenient. 

238
00:11:38,160 --> 00:11:40,440
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 
It's definitely like only as 

239
00:11:40,440 --> 00:11:41,800
good as the training that you 
provide it. 

240
00:11:41,800 --> 00:11:46,720
And I will say that it's very 
overconfident in a lot of the 

241
00:11:46,720 --> 00:11:47,800
answers. 
So you definitely have to be 

242
00:11:47,800 --> 00:11:49,440
careful, especially as a web 
developer like that. 

243
00:11:50,040 --> 00:11:52,680
I've seen a lot of things where 
I'm like, that's not really, 

244
00:11:52,720 --> 00:11:54,480
yeah. 
But anyways, we don't have to 

245
00:11:54,480 --> 00:11:57,080
get from the AI rabbit hole. 
We're not even talking about. 

246
00:11:57,080 --> 00:12:00,400
That yeah, I'm waiting for Apple
to put one on a Mac so I can 

247
00:12:00,400 --> 00:12:04,720
just click like do my job for 
the day and see what happens and

248
00:12:04,760 --> 00:12:07,400
it'll be carnage. 
Anyway, we're going into this 

249
00:12:07,400 --> 00:12:09,840
year, we're talking about some 
pretty good like current and 

250
00:12:09,840 --> 00:12:11,640
kind of also like near future 
stuff. 

251
00:12:12,240 --> 00:12:14,520
What are some big focuses for 
you guys in 2025 like you 

252
00:12:14,520 --> 00:12:17,760
mentioned straight away, like 
New Year and and it is what, 

253
00:12:17,800 --> 00:12:20,560
what got you out of bed in the 
1st of January or 2nd of January

254
00:12:20,560 --> 00:12:22,360
once the New Year's hangover had
finished? 

255
00:12:22,960 --> 00:12:25,080
If you're anything like me and 
you know, when you got out of 

256
00:12:25,120 --> 00:12:26,760
bed, what's the thing that's got
you up this year? 

257
00:12:26,760 --> 00:12:28,240
What are you focusing on? 
What do you think's coming? 

258
00:12:28,240 --> 00:12:29,800
Where do you think some of the 
wins are going to are going to 

259
00:12:29,800 --> 00:12:31,640
be? 
Yeah, this. 

260
00:12:31,640 --> 00:12:33,560
Year, my biggest focus is 
profit. 

261
00:12:33,560 --> 00:12:37,360
So the last couple years I've 
made a lot of mistakes and I 

262
00:12:37,360 --> 00:12:41,960
have like basically it's hard 
because apparel is tricky. 

263
00:12:41,960 --> 00:12:44,000
You're not sure what's going to 
stick until you kind of do it. 

264
00:12:44,240 --> 00:12:46,440
And so kind of throwing stuff at
the wall to see what sticks. 

265
00:12:46,680 --> 00:12:48,080
More so than I should have for 
sure. 

266
00:12:48,080 --> 00:12:51,200
But that has given me a good 
sort of baseline because that's 

267
00:12:51,280 --> 00:12:53,640
also been the challenge last two
years is not having a baseline. 

268
00:12:53,640 --> 00:12:55,600
Like I have no idea what Black 
Friday should look like for the 

269
00:12:55,600 --> 00:12:57,960
brand. 
Because a couple years ago the 

270
00:12:57,960 --> 00:13:01,240
brand was making like 45 KA 
year, which is, you know, a good

271
00:13:01,240 --> 00:13:03,480
for a side hustle, but not like 
an actual brand. 

272
00:13:04,320 --> 00:13:07,760
And then having that go up like 
a couple 100% over the last two 

273
00:13:07,760 --> 00:13:10,000
years has been phenomenal. 
But now I kind of have a little 

274
00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:13,360
bit more of a baseline. 
And so I'm focused a lot on 

275
00:13:13,520 --> 00:13:16,760
curating my catalogue to really 
focus on the winners and focus 

276
00:13:16,760 --> 00:13:18,560
on profitability. 
Because that's been a struggle 

277
00:13:18,560 --> 00:13:22,920
for myself for the brand, just 
not knowing the numbers as well 

278
00:13:22,920 --> 00:13:27,160
as I should, not being involved 
in the financial numbers and 

279
00:13:27,160 --> 00:13:29,520
like that sort of nitty gritty 
stuff as much as I should. 

280
00:13:29,800 --> 00:13:33,720
I found that I'm very much like 
a product person. 

281
00:13:33,720 --> 00:13:35,480
I love designing and making new 
products. 

282
00:13:35,480 --> 00:13:37,480
And so like, if it was my 
choice, that's what I would do 

283
00:13:37,960 --> 00:13:39,880
all the time. 
But I'm having to be very 

284
00:13:39,880 --> 00:13:43,720
careful to curate my time 
because everything comes through

285
00:13:43,720 --> 00:13:48,160
me and is kind of run by me. 
And so I have to be very careful

286
00:13:48,160 --> 00:13:52,040
and not and order like, so like 
a tangible take away from that 

287
00:13:52,040 --> 00:13:55,000
is order Moqs unless I know that
something's going to do super 

288
00:13:55,000 --> 00:13:58,320
well or to the MLQ, because 
things are very seasonal, things

289
00:13:58,320 --> 00:14:00,840
can change. 
It's it's fashion, like fashion 

290
00:14:01,000 --> 00:14:02,960
trends kind of change. 
And so I have to be very careful

291
00:14:02,960 --> 00:14:06,280
because in the past I've gotten 
trigger happy, let's say, and, 

292
00:14:06,280 --> 00:14:10,320
and like overloaded on certain 
product categories and then paid

293
00:14:10,320 --> 00:14:12,000
for that for months and months 
on end. 

294
00:14:12,680 --> 00:14:16,240
And so like curating the catalog
is a big focus. 

295
00:14:16,560 --> 00:14:21,000
Focus is a big focus, removing 
fluff, focusing on winners, 

296
00:14:21,520 --> 00:14:25,360
profitability margins of made a 
lot of improvements on those of 

297
00:14:25,360 --> 00:14:26,880
the last year too. 
But I still want to focus on 

298
00:14:26,880 --> 00:14:28,880
that into this year and going 
forward. 

299
00:14:28,880 --> 00:14:32,160
And we'll see like I feel like 
the trajectory of the brand is 

300
00:14:32,280 --> 00:14:34,640
is kind of crazy. 
Like it's, it's a rocket ship at

301
00:14:34,640 --> 00:14:40,280
this point in some ways, but I 
want to be careful and do do 

302
00:14:40,280 --> 00:14:42,720
good by the brand and not like 
get too crazy with things 

303
00:14:42,720 --> 00:14:45,480
basically and get I get in 
trouble, which I've gotten in 

304
00:14:45,480 --> 00:14:47,560
trouble in the past. 
Yeah, yeah. 

305
00:14:47,600 --> 00:14:49,200
And I can. 
Yeah, I can relate. 

306
00:14:49,200 --> 00:14:52,160
I started a sunglasses. 
Everyone who listens regularly 

307
00:14:52,160 --> 00:14:54,040
knows this. 
I started a bamboo sunglasses 

308
00:14:54,040 --> 00:14:58,080
brand years ago and I just spent
$5000 in Alibaba one night after

309
00:14:58,080 --> 00:14:59,720
a few beers at a Shopify meet 
up. 

310
00:14:59,720 --> 00:15:01,800
And that was the first time I'd 
ever heard about Shopify. 

311
00:15:01,800 --> 00:15:04,880
And that would have been over a 
decade ago now, I think. 

312
00:15:04,880 --> 00:15:07,400
So, yeah, probably similar time 
to when you started tweeting. 

313
00:15:08,160 --> 00:15:10,640
But yeah, we did that. 
And then I was like, wow, these 

314
00:15:10,640 --> 00:15:13,880
are more premiums, like let's 
get $10,000 worth of these and 

315
00:15:13,880 --> 00:15:15,600
like loads of skews and one 
worked. 

316
00:15:15,880 --> 00:15:18,440
So initially I only ordered 2 
skews and when they arrived, 

317
00:15:18,440 --> 00:15:21,040
it's like I'm going to need a 
bigger range than two maybe. 

318
00:15:21,040 --> 00:15:22,800
But I haven't got any money left
so I'm going to have to just 

319
00:15:22,800 --> 00:15:24,160
sell those. 
I was running the agency on the 

320
00:15:24,160 --> 00:15:25,600
side. 
So like I bankrolled it with the

321
00:15:25,600 --> 00:15:26,720
agency. 
But yeah. 

322
00:15:26,720 --> 00:15:28,400
And then eventually you talk 
about financials. 

323
00:15:28,400 --> 00:15:31,720
I did the sums one day and went 
right, I need to sell like 800 

324
00:15:31,720 --> 00:15:35,320
units a day and have an entire 
warehouse and three staff to 

325
00:15:35,320 --> 00:15:38,760
earn £25,000 a year. 
And I was like, this is a non 

326
00:15:38,760 --> 00:15:41,840
starter. 
I can make that in a year if I 

327
00:15:41,840 --> 00:15:45,560
signed like 12:45 decent client.
That was the like. 

328
00:15:45,880 --> 00:15:48,440
And that was that was like 10 
years ago, bearing in mind how 

329
00:15:48,440 --> 00:15:50,160
much the agencies grown fees 
have gone up. 

330
00:15:50,160 --> 00:15:53,000
Like they just, it was that kind
of model of me going. 

331
00:15:53,000 --> 00:15:53,920
And she wasn't my wife at the 
time. 

332
00:15:53,920 --> 00:15:55,520
She was my girlfriend, my now 
wife. 

333
00:15:55,760 --> 00:15:59,200
She was like, does this add up? 
I'm like, no, she goes, So what 

334
00:15:59,200 --> 00:16:00,600
are you going to do? 
I was like, it's going to be on 

335
00:16:00,600 --> 00:16:03,800
eBay by 5:00 PM. 
And I just sold the stock, the 

336
00:16:03,800 --> 00:16:06,880
website all gone. 
And I got I made, I made my 

337
00:16:06,880 --> 00:16:08,960
money back. 
But how much time did I lost? 

338
00:16:09,080 --> 00:16:11,440
Yeah. 
And I think, yeah, I think, I 

339
00:16:11,440 --> 00:16:12,960
think you're focusing on exactly
the right things. 

340
00:16:13,360 --> 00:16:15,480
But at the same time, like the, 
I mean, there's a really, I 

341
00:16:15,480 --> 00:16:18,520
can't remember the author of 
apologies, but there, there's a 

342
00:16:18,520 --> 00:16:20,640
book called Fail Fast that I 
absolutely love. 

343
00:16:20,760 --> 00:16:23,280
And I, I would constantly 
reference bits in that of like, 

344
00:16:23,480 --> 00:16:25,640
you just need to make mistakes. 
Like in your business, it's 

345
00:16:25,640 --> 00:16:27,320
product in my business, it's 
people. 

346
00:16:28,080 --> 00:16:30,000
And I would say like, you know, 
I've had some lovely people that

347
00:16:30,000 --> 00:16:32,200
have worked for us. 
I've had some lovely people that

348
00:16:32,200 --> 00:16:34,760
weren't right that have worked 
for us, and it's just not worked

349
00:16:34,760 --> 00:16:36,520
out. 
And I think you've been good in 

350
00:16:36,520 --> 00:16:37,880
the sense of kind of going 
slowly with that. 

351
00:16:37,880 --> 00:16:40,320
But it is exciting, isn't it, 
when you're like, Oh my gosh, 

352
00:16:40,320 --> 00:16:42,960
shiny object, let's buy 1000 of 
those and shut them on the shelf

353
00:16:42,960 --> 00:16:44,960
and no one buys them. 
And you're like, I should have 

354
00:16:44,960 --> 00:16:45,880
seen this coming. 
Really. 

355
00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:47,880
Yeah. 
I'm trying to end the squirrel 

356
00:16:48,120 --> 00:16:49,800
shiny object syndrome. 
That's my goal. 

357
00:16:49,800 --> 00:16:52,880
One of my goals for this year. 
25 No more squirrel, no more 

358
00:16:52,880 --> 00:16:55,200
radical like. 
Oh, that looks really fun and 

359
00:16:55,200 --> 00:16:58,400
sexy like that is for a nine 
figure business stop, David. 

360
00:16:58,400 --> 00:16:59,720
Bad, bad, David. 
Yeah. 

361
00:17:00,960 --> 00:17:03,040
Or a CEO, he's got a billion 
dollars to spare. 

362
00:17:03,040 --> 00:17:05,480
Like, yeah, that's the kind of 
like I'm going to buy a beach. 

363
00:17:05,599 --> 00:17:07,560
Like that's how I'm going to 
sell more hats. 

364
00:17:07,560 --> 00:17:08,960
I'm going to buy a Peach. 
And then it doesn't work. 

365
00:17:09,359 --> 00:17:12,800
I think there's a really good 
rule I heard on a podcast a 

366
00:17:12,960 --> 00:17:14,640
couple of years ago, and I do 
this a lot. 

367
00:17:14,880 --> 00:17:16,720
If I'm doing something that's 
completely new that we've never 

368
00:17:16,720 --> 00:17:19,640
done before and it's a test, I 
literally on my iPhone, I just 

369
00:17:19,640 --> 00:17:23,520
set a timer for 30 minutes. 
At 30 minutes, I close, whatever

370
00:17:23,520 --> 00:17:26,800
it is, I close. 
And then if, if a week later, 

371
00:17:26,800 --> 00:17:30,840
I'm still thinking about it 
another 30 minutes, if not in 30

372
00:17:30,840 --> 00:17:32,720
minutes, I've killed the 
sidetrack that would have 

373
00:17:32,720 --> 00:17:35,120
distracted me for months. 
And like, and that's been a 

374
00:17:35,120 --> 00:17:36,760
really good kind of discipline 
for me. 

375
00:17:37,200 --> 00:17:39,480
The other, the other rule I've 
got now as well, which I'm sure 

376
00:17:39,480 --> 00:17:43,400
you can relate to this is I try 
to only do things that link into

377
00:17:43,400 --> 00:17:46,480
my main agency. 
So this podcast links into, it's

378
00:17:46,480 --> 00:17:47,960
powered by and it's all 
marketing. 

379
00:17:48,080 --> 00:17:50,320
It links in really nicely to the
main agency. 

380
00:17:50,600 --> 00:17:52,840
We're launching a couple of new 
things this year in the agency, 

381
00:17:52,840 --> 00:17:55,680
a couple of new, well, one new 
service and we're going to, this

382
00:17:55,680 --> 00:17:56,920
is the first time I've ever 
mentioned this. 

383
00:17:56,920 --> 00:17:58,760
We're going to run our own 
e-commerce store and we're 

384
00:17:58,760 --> 00:18:01,160
working out what at the moment, 
and we're going to make loads of

385
00:18:01,160 --> 00:18:02,840
case studies. 
It's going to be super public. 

386
00:18:02,840 --> 00:18:05,480
We're going to do YouTube videos
about how we've set it up, theme

387
00:18:05,480 --> 00:18:06,720
updates. 
We're going to test apps. 

388
00:18:07,000 --> 00:18:08,760
That's the plan, but it might 
not work. 

389
00:18:08,760 --> 00:18:11,520
We're still in the testing 
phase, but I think it's like for

390
00:18:11,520 --> 00:18:13,760
me, everything's got a tie into 
that middle part of the agency. 

391
00:18:13,760 --> 00:18:17,080
If I feel like I'm pivoting too 
much or going like, oh, I run an

392
00:18:17,080 --> 00:18:21,600
agency and genuine idea last 
Christmas, why don't I start a a

393
00:18:21,600 --> 00:18:24,040
centre you can go to that's 
really warm and full of massage 

394
00:18:24,040 --> 00:18:26,680
chairs. 10 lbs for half an hour 
in a massage chair. 

395
00:18:26,920 --> 00:18:28,960
Genuine business idea, terrible 
idea. 

396
00:18:30,040 --> 00:18:31,560
Again, the financials didn't add
up. 

397
00:18:31,800 --> 00:18:33,400
That distracted me for about 3 
days. 

398
00:18:34,040 --> 00:18:35,480
But yeah, you've got to be 
disciplined. 

399
00:18:35,600 --> 00:18:37,080
OK. 
So going into this year then 

400
00:18:37,680 --> 00:18:40,360
you're looking at a number of 
different things, I guess a 

401
00:18:40,360 --> 00:18:42,080
massive thing for ecommerce 
brands. 

402
00:18:42,080 --> 00:18:44,960
If we switch into talking about 
this for a SEC, and I think a 

403
00:18:44,960 --> 00:18:46,600
lot of our clients get this 
wrong. 

404
00:18:47,240 --> 00:18:50,000
Talk to me about how you guys 
work with customer feedback. 

405
00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:51,960
How do you speak to customers? 
How do you get feedback from 

406
00:18:51,960 --> 00:18:52,760
them? 
What do you ask? 

407
00:18:53,040 --> 00:18:54,640
How does it work for you? 
Where have you been successful? 

408
00:18:54,640 --> 00:18:55,760
Where have you not been 
successful with? 

409
00:18:56,560 --> 00:18:59,160
It yeah, customer feedback's so 
important, especially for a 

410
00:18:59,160 --> 00:19:01,040
brand like mine. 
Being able to connect with the 

411
00:19:01,040 --> 00:19:04,400
customers directly, just kind of
the brand is very community 

412
00:19:04,400 --> 00:19:07,280
focused, community driven, 
obviously Geo specific, very 

413
00:19:07,280 --> 00:19:10,560
like location based. 
And so over the years I've done 

414
00:19:11,680 --> 00:19:15,080
dozens and dozens of pop ups at 
local farmers markets and other 

415
00:19:15,080 --> 00:19:19,560
sort of market venue situations.
And that's been super useful for

416
00:19:19,560 --> 00:19:21,840
customer feedback because then I
get to talk to people, I get to 

417
00:19:21,840 --> 00:19:24,760
see what they want to gravitate 
towards, what they want to 

418
00:19:24,760 --> 00:19:27,240
touch, what they want to pick up
and and ultimately walk away 

419
00:19:27,240 --> 00:19:29,080
with. 
That's been really useful. 

420
00:19:29,320 --> 00:19:31,800
I also try and do a yearly 
survey, which good reminder I 

421
00:19:31,800 --> 00:19:34,440
should send that out and get a 
lot of the feedback from folks, 

422
00:19:34,440 --> 00:19:37,720
But I try and just be in touch 
with them as much as possible. 

423
00:19:37,720 --> 00:19:40,000
I've got a private Facebook 
group with a lot of like the 

424
00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:42,120
Super fans, quote UN quote, that
have been following the brand 

425
00:19:42,120 --> 00:19:43,840
for years. 
And that's been super awesome to

426
00:19:43,840 --> 00:19:47,560
talk to people in there. 
I kind of run the brand as like 

427
00:19:47,560 --> 00:19:50,080
a very transparent, like it's 
kind of just me doing this 

428
00:19:50,080 --> 00:19:52,120
thing, figuring out as I'm 
going. 

429
00:19:52,120 --> 00:19:54,960
So I kind of try to leave it 
like an open door, so to speak, 

430
00:19:54,960 --> 00:19:58,040
for folks to kind of share their
ideas, their thoughts, their 

431
00:19:58,040 --> 00:20:00,920
feedback, which is good and bad.
You have to be very careful with

432
00:20:00,920 --> 00:20:05,000
that and curate it and know that
like ultimately I'm in charge. 

433
00:20:05,880 --> 00:20:08,240
Like the customer is always 
right, quote UN quote, but also 

434
00:20:08,280 --> 00:20:11,560
the customer can be wrong. 
And another thing I do is I read

435
00:20:11,560 --> 00:20:14,280
through all of the reviews that 
people leave and at this point 

436
00:20:14,280 --> 00:20:18,680
the brand has, I think over 605 
star reviews. 

437
00:20:19,880 --> 00:20:24,120
Which is pretty awesome and the 
review rates pretty high 6 to 8%

438
00:20:24,400 --> 00:20:26,760
that people leave reviews. 
And so people are like really 

439
00:20:26,760 --> 00:20:28,440
into the brand, which is awesome
to see. 

440
00:20:28,440 --> 00:20:33,000
And so kind of being as close to
that as possible helps give me 

441
00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:36,720
that close feedback loop into 
what to do going forward with 

442
00:20:36,800 --> 00:20:38,760
with everything. 
Yeah, yeah. 

443
00:20:38,800 --> 00:20:41,320
And I think you're in a good 
phase at the moment where you're

444
00:20:41,320 --> 00:20:43,760
small enough that you can read 
every review. 

445
00:20:43,760 --> 00:20:46,360
I think if I asked some of my 
clients to do that, I'd give 

446
00:20:46,360 --> 00:20:49,280
them an actual heart attack. 
And some of my other clients, I 

447
00:20:49,280 --> 00:20:51,320
should be asking them to do that
and we should or we should do it

448
00:20:51,320 --> 00:20:52,600
for them. 
And say, you do realize 

449
00:20:52,600 --> 00:20:55,120
everybody's moaning about your 
delivery, but still giving you 5

450
00:20:55,120 --> 00:20:56,920
stars. 
You should fix that. 

451
00:20:56,920 --> 00:20:59,960
That's probably a barrier to 2nd
order lifetime value. 

452
00:21:32,360 --> 00:21:35,160
But that private group. 
Do you say it's private Facebook

453
00:21:35,160 --> 00:21:38,640
group you've you set up that 
that sounds like the most 

454
00:21:38,640 --> 00:21:41,200
powerful thing. 
And it still surprises me. 

455
00:21:41,200 --> 00:21:43,000
How many brands? 
I kind of felt like I'm 

456
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:44,720
surprised how many brands do 
have it and how many brands 

457
00:21:44,720 --> 00:21:47,480
don't have it. 
How did you set it up initially?

458
00:21:47,480 --> 00:21:50,120
Like, did you just message some 
random customers or was it the 

459
00:21:50,120 --> 00:21:51,480
ones you find yourself talking 
to a lot? 

460
00:21:51,480 --> 00:21:53,400
Anyway, yeah. 
That's a good question. 

461
00:21:53,400 --> 00:21:55,840
I think I was going to harken 
back it. 

462
00:21:56,080 --> 00:21:57,600
It might have been set up this 
year by me. 

463
00:21:58,240 --> 00:22:02,000
I I remember definitely at one 
point I set up a discord and set

464
00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:04,280
up all these different channels 
for different things like hiking

465
00:22:04,280 --> 00:22:07,240
and outdoors and everything that
like the different subject areas

466
00:22:07,240 --> 00:22:11,240
that the customer base is 
interested in and then scrapped 

467
00:22:11,240 --> 00:22:14,560
that because basically my target
audience is like, what is 

468
00:22:14,560 --> 00:22:17,800
Discord and no one's going to 
actually actually use it. 

469
00:22:17,800 --> 00:22:21,200
I have a personal beef with 
Facebook, meta, that sort of 

470
00:22:21,200 --> 00:22:23,440
thing, but I. 
So I do, yeah. 

471
00:22:23,680 --> 00:22:26,240
Yeah, I know. 
I let that get in the way a 

472
00:22:26,240 --> 00:22:28,520
little bit of my decision making
when it came to setting up a 

473
00:22:28,520 --> 00:22:31,840
private group and then 
eventually caved and set it up 

474
00:22:31,840 --> 00:22:33,560
on Facebook. 
That's what people are on, 

475
00:22:33,560 --> 00:22:35,720
that's what they're using, 
that's where they are at least 

476
00:22:35,720 --> 00:22:37,600
my customer base. 
And that's the most important 

477
00:22:37,600 --> 00:22:43,160
part is being there for them. 
I don't remember the actual 

478
00:22:43,160 --> 00:22:45,760
genesis of it, but it started 
small. 

479
00:22:45,760 --> 00:22:47,360
I think it's it's still pretty 
small. 

480
00:22:47,360 --> 00:22:52,680
It's only got 4 to 500 people in
it right now, but I try and 

481
00:22:52,680 --> 00:22:54,160
elevate it. 
Imagine them all in a room 

482
00:22:54,200 --> 00:22:56,040
that's still a good amount of 
people to talk to and get 

483
00:22:56,040 --> 00:22:57,160
feedback from. 
That's really cool. 

484
00:22:57,400 --> 00:23:00,160
That's true. 
I have imposter syndrome a lot 

485
00:23:00,160 --> 00:23:02,440
when I like compare myself to 
the huge brands and that sort of

486
00:23:02,440 --> 00:23:04,280
thing. 
One of my goals for this year is

487
00:23:04,280 --> 00:23:07,880
to be a little bit more low key 
about that, but I think so I do 

488
00:23:07,880 --> 00:23:09,920
elevate it in various ways like 
I will. 

489
00:23:09,920 --> 00:23:12,720
I think initially when I started
it, I promoted it on social 

490
00:23:12,720 --> 00:23:16,480
media, left links. 
And then I also have it inputted

491
00:23:16,480 --> 00:23:19,680
into a lot of the e-mail flows, 
post purchase flows. 

492
00:23:20,840 --> 00:23:23,520
I think I sometimes include a 
packing order insert that has it

493
00:23:23,520 --> 00:23:26,560
on there as well. 
And just being that the brand. 

494
00:23:26,560 --> 00:23:29,480
So community driven people for 
the longest time have asked 

495
00:23:29,480 --> 00:23:31,600
about different community 
aspects to it like hey, let's go

496
00:23:31,600 --> 00:23:33,040
and group hikes or something 
like that. 

497
00:23:33,040 --> 00:23:36,040
And I would like to do that. 
I have two kids under 4. 

498
00:23:36,040 --> 00:23:40,160
So that's kind of not possible 
right now, but that idea is 

499
00:23:40,160 --> 00:23:41,680
still there. 
And that's where I took that 

500
00:23:41,680 --> 00:23:44,360
idea and wanted to harness it a 
little bit into this group where

501
00:23:44,360 --> 00:23:47,280
it's, hey, we can get together 
online and talk about our shared

502
00:23:47,280 --> 00:23:48,000
love for the mountain. 
Yeah. 

503
00:23:48,320 --> 00:23:50,480
Yeah, yeah. 
I mean, you could even just get 

504
00:23:50,480 --> 00:23:52,440
the members themselves to 
organize stuff. 

505
00:23:52,440 --> 00:23:55,040
Like I, yeah, I've, I've always 
sort of thought like we don't 

506
00:23:55,040 --> 00:23:56,840
always need to. 
I run AI, run a local football 

507
00:23:56,840 --> 00:23:59,200
team and I used to have impostor
syndrome of like, I must be 

508
00:23:59,200 --> 00:24:00,520
there and be the captain kind of
thing. 

509
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:02,640
And it's sorry, it's soccer to 
you guys. 

510
00:24:03,000 --> 00:24:04,920
British football Football. 
I prefer football. 

511
00:24:05,720 --> 00:24:06,840
Oh, I love that. 
That's great. 

512
00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:09,400
I mean, it is the biggest sport 
in the world, unless you're in 

513
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:12,840
America. 
I called the NFL hand egg the 

514
00:24:13,040 --> 00:24:15,080
like American football hand egg.
That's more accurate. 

515
00:24:15,080 --> 00:24:17,040
Let's let's be. 
Honest, I no, I'm a huge. 

516
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:18,560
Fan so. 
Oh you. 

517
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:21,440
Oh no, I'm a so I grew up next 
to Chelsea training ground, so I

518
00:24:21,480 --> 00:24:24,120
met all the Chelsea players. 
Where's the and all button? 

519
00:24:24,120 --> 00:24:27,480
Well. 
I was going to say, I was about 

520
00:24:27,480 --> 00:24:30,240
to say I call American football 
fake football, which might get 

521
00:24:30,320 --> 00:24:31,560
get a lot of our Americans 
going. 

522
00:24:31,800 --> 00:24:33,600
I'm done with this guy. 
Yeah. 

523
00:24:34,280 --> 00:24:38,480
This is your job. 
But I, I think I'm an idiot. 

524
00:24:38,480 --> 00:24:39,960
I don't understand it. 
It's always my defense. 

525
00:24:40,640 --> 00:24:43,680
But yeah, I, I, I think with the
imposter syndrome, especially 

526
00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:46,440
like I, I actually did a, 
there's a website called Design 

527
00:24:46,440 --> 00:24:47,600
Rush and I wrote a big article 
on it. 

528
00:24:47,600 --> 00:24:49,160
It was, they posted Christmas 
Day. 

529
00:24:49,160 --> 00:24:50,240
I was like, that's, that's 
commitment. 

530
00:24:50,960 --> 00:24:53,160
But I did a big article the 
other day and I spoke a little 

531
00:24:53,160 --> 00:24:55,720
bit in there actually about like
small brands versus big brands. 

532
00:24:56,200 --> 00:24:58,960
And I think it is the grass 
always looks greener. 

533
00:24:58,960 --> 00:25:01,800
And I think big brands, like you
look at a big brand and go, 

534
00:25:01,960 --> 00:25:03,560
well, they must have done 
something right to get to where 

535
00:25:03,560 --> 00:25:04,840
they are. 
And that's correct. 

536
00:25:05,120 --> 00:25:07,520
But they have all these internal
corporate problems like they 

537
00:25:07,520 --> 00:25:09,840
can't do anything quickly. 
Everyone's got an opinion. 

538
00:25:10,160 --> 00:25:12,600
You'd be amazed actually. 
And if any of my bigger 

539
00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:14,960
corporate clients are listening 
like you will a relate to this. 

540
00:25:14,960 --> 00:25:16,120
And please don't hate me for 
saying this. 

541
00:25:16,120 --> 00:25:18,360
I'm just being honest. 
In the more corporate 

542
00:25:18,360 --> 00:25:21,640
environments, the amount of 
personal opinions that still 

543
00:25:21,640 --> 00:25:25,480
drive what happens, it is both 
kind of shocking, but I'm used 

544
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:29,040
to it now and then when from the
big brands, what they see for 

545
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:31,320
Someone Like You, and I think 
this is where you're doing 

546
00:25:31,320 --> 00:25:33,760
really well and you're doing 
things actually they can't. 

547
00:25:33,880 --> 00:25:35,480
And that's a really powerful 
thing. 

548
00:25:35,760 --> 00:25:38,520
They couldn't run a 405 hundred 
person community. 

549
00:25:38,720 --> 00:25:41,160
They couldn't have that intimacy
with customers because 

550
00:25:41,160 --> 00:25:44,480
customers, your customers see 
you, whereas a corporate 

551
00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:47,200
customer see a name and they 
want as much money or as much 

552
00:25:47,200 --> 00:25:49,240
product for as little money as 
possible from that brand. 

553
00:25:49,520 --> 00:25:51,360
That's it's a very different 
transaction. 

554
00:25:51,640 --> 00:25:53,400
If you wanted to change your 
product range, you could 

555
00:25:53,400 --> 00:25:55,360
probably do that in a month. 
If they want to change their 

556
00:25:55,360 --> 00:25:58,440
product range, you're talking 
like some really big corporates.

557
00:25:58,640 --> 00:26:00,680
You're talking about having 
conversations with governments 

558
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:03,920
about importing and exporting a 
huge like say they went from 

559
00:26:03,920 --> 00:26:07,160
using polyester in something to 
using organic cotton. 

560
00:26:07,600 --> 00:26:09,960
That might actually involve a 
conversation with the government

561
00:26:09,960 --> 00:26:13,040
about import export. 
Like that is how big those guys 

562
00:26:13,040 --> 00:26:16,640
are compared to you. 
So I always use that as a bit of

563
00:26:16,640 --> 00:26:18,680
an example of going like the 
grass is always greener. 

564
00:26:18,680 --> 00:26:21,840
But I think your feedback groups
sound amazing, Like you must get

565
00:26:21,840 --> 00:26:23,480
so much, so much fruit from 
that. 

566
00:26:23,480 --> 00:26:26,920
And, and I guess people must 
start discussions without you 

567
00:26:26,920 --> 00:26:28,560
even being involved. 
There must be stuff that's not 

568
00:26:28,560 --> 00:26:32,680
even triggered by you. 
Sometimes that's actually one of

569
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:35,000
my goals for this year is to 
make it a little bit less about 

570
00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:39,400
me and more about them and focus
on like they don't have that 

571
00:26:39,400 --> 00:26:41,520
those conversations as much as 
I'd like them to like, hey, you 

572
00:26:41,520 --> 00:26:44,160
guys can just go for it, go do 
it without me. 

573
00:26:44,160 --> 00:26:47,160
Like it doesn't have to be LED 
trickle down or whatever from me

574
00:26:47,160 --> 00:26:49,760
or whatever. 
Like just just do it on your 

575
00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:50,960
own. 
Go forward. 

576
00:26:50,960 --> 00:26:53,240
That's community focus is 
another thing for this year. 

577
00:26:53,240 --> 00:26:55,440
We kind of talked about this 
year a lot, but like that's also

578
00:26:55,440 --> 00:26:58,440
something I want to get in a 
little bit more and it's hard to

579
00:26:58,440 --> 00:27:02,680
try and facilitate something 
without you being like the focal

580
00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:03,800
point of it or whatever kind of 
thing. 

581
00:27:03,800 --> 00:27:05,800
Like how do I start a 
conversation but not start a 

582
00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:09,280
conversation? 
Yeah, absolutely. 

583
00:27:09,320 --> 00:27:11,200
I guess there must be creative 
ways of doing it. 

584
00:27:11,200 --> 00:27:13,040
You could ask customers when 
they're asking a customer 

585
00:27:13,040 --> 00:27:16,320
feedback, like type question or 
saying like, oh, I've got this 

586
00:27:16,320 --> 00:27:18,200
new hat, but it's not doing this
as it's supposed to. 

587
00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:20,640
Whatever say you say like, oh, 
it's supposed to. 

588
00:27:20,640 --> 00:27:22,520
But actually if you go and join 
our Facebook group, I'd love it 

589
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:24,680
if you could post that in there 
because you're probably not the 

590
00:27:24,680 --> 00:27:26,160
only one with that. 
And I'd love to see what the 

591
00:27:26,160 --> 00:27:27,680
conversation is. 
But yeah, do you mind posting 

592
00:27:27,680 --> 00:27:30,160
it? 
And I mean, we run and here 

593
00:27:30,240 --> 00:27:31,640
becomes a shameless plug for 
Winning with Shopify. 

594
00:27:31,880 --> 00:27:33,760
We run the growth hub at Winning
with Shopify. 

595
00:27:33,760 --> 00:27:35,880
And I will, if anyone's 
listening to David and going, 

596
00:27:35,880 --> 00:27:37,520
I'd love to chat to you. 
I will send you an invite as 

597
00:27:37,520 --> 00:27:39,680
well, David, to come join in. 
It's merchants only. 

598
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:42,520
But certainly it took us 
probably the same as your group.

599
00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:44,960
It took us like three or four 
months of just grinding away 

600
00:27:44,960 --> 00:27:48,280
with the same like 20-30 people 
to get conversations started. 

601
00:27:48,680 --> 00:27:51,440
Now, like I, I put an 
announcement out once a week. 

602
00:27:51,440 --> 00:27:54,400
Apart from that, I don't really,
I, I try and answer everything 

603
00:27:54,400 --> 00:27:55,960
and chat with people and they're
asking questions about 

604
00:27:55,960 --> 00:27:57,840
marketing, but it's starting to 
become organic. 

605
00:27:57,840 --> 00:28:00,440
But it's just, it's like it's a 
snowball like you have, you have

606
00:28:00,440 --> 00:28:02,800
to kind of get, get it going to,
to, to get it going sort of 

607
00:28:02,800 --> 00:28:05,720
thing. 
But yeah, I, I want to, I want 

608
00:28:05,760 --> 00:28:07,520
to talk about something a bit 
different because this was in 

609
00:28:07,520 --> 00:28:09,160
the notes and I thought this is 
quite a good point. 

610
00:28:09,160 --> 00:28:10,960
And you mentioned some of this 
earlier about stock. 

611
00:28:11,640 --> 00:28:14,120
Obviously with you that you're a
small business. 

612
00:28:14,120 --> 00:28:16,480
If you make one, as you say, if 
you make a hard, learn a hard 

613
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:18,880
lesson, should we say ordering 
the wrong thing and bring it in.

614
00:28:18,880 --> 00:28:21,960
It's very expensive. 
How, how do you guys manage 

615
00:28:21,960 --> 00:28:24,880
forecasting now when you're, you
know, you don't have 50 staff to

616
00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:26,720
do it? 
You can't afford a $20,000 a 

617
00:28:26,720 --> 00:28:29,160
month system with AI to work it 
out. 

618
00:28:29,720 --> 00:28:31,800
How do you manage like your 
stock management and forecast 

619
00:28:31,800 --> 00:28:33,280
what you're going to need when 
you're going to need it? 

620
00:28:33,760 --> 00:28:37,720
Oh gosh, poorly is the one. 
We're OK. 

621
00:28:40,400 --> 00:28:42,000
It's been a learning process for
sure. 

622
00:28:42,240 --> 00:28:44,560
Learning, learning seasonality. 
It's one thing that's really 

623
00:28:44,560 --> 00:28:47,240
important to me with the brand 
is to, I don't want to be like 

624
00:28:47,240 --> 00:28:48,560
fast fashion. 
I don't want to be one of those 

625
00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:50,440
brands that pump and dumps every
season. 

626
00:28:50,440 --> 00:28:53,080
Like, hey, it's spring, we've 
got 300 new T-shirts. 

627
00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:55,800
Oh hey, it's two months later, 
we're discounting them all 50%. 

628
00:28:56,080 --> 00:28:58,200
It's really important to me to 
have quality and keep stuff out 

629
00:28:58,200 --> 00:29:00,840
of landfills. 
And there's various ways of 

630
00:29:00,840 --> 00:29:03,960
doing that. 
One way is to not make too much,

631
00:29:03,960 --> 00:29:10,680
of course, and forecast better. 
And so I don't, I'm, I'm bad. 

632
00:29:10,840 --> 00:29:13,800
I don't have like a good 
seasonal schedule yet for 

633
00:29:13,800 --> 00:29:16,240
launching different things. 
I'm getting a lot better at it. 

634
00:29:16,240 --> 00:29:19,040
There's been years in the past 
where I remember specifically on

635
00:29:19,040 --> 00:29:23,840
Thanksgiving designing a ugly 
Christmas mountain sweater that 

636
00:29:23,840 --> 00:29:27,400
was supposed to be launching 
like the next week so bad. 

637
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:30,720
Like literally like Thanksgiving
launching a week later. 

638
00:29:30,720 --> 00:29:33,720
You know, I've heard from REI is
one of my big partners and 

639
00:29:33,720 --> 00:29:37,320
they've told me that they their 
designers are working like 2 

640
00:29:37,320 --> 00:29:39,400
years ahead of time, seasonality
kind of thing. 

641
00:29:39,800 --> 00:29:42,360
And I have gotten a lot better 
at it. 

642
00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:45,760
I'm starting to work on summer 
products during winter and 

643
00:29:45,760 --> 00:29:49,240
winter products during summer 
more so lately. 

644
00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:54,400
But I to answer the question 
like forecasting is I'm trying 

645
00:29:54,400 --> 00:29:56,640
to stick to MLQ's and trying to 
stick lower unless I know 

646
00:29:56,640 --> 00:29:58,760
something's going to do really 
well like I mentioned earlier. 

647
00:29:59,120 --> 00:30:02,600
And then also try and hit get 
things out a little bit ahead of

648
00:30:02,600 --> 00:30:07,800
time before the season starts. 
But it's definitely a not 

649
00:30:08,280 --> 00:30:11,560
strong, strong point for My 
Portfolio. 

650
00:30:12,240 --> 00:30:13,840
It's got, it's got to be a 
challenge for someone like 

651
00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:16,120
yourself, especially because 
it's like you're busy in like 

652
00:30:16,120 --> 00:30:18,360
today and you've got enough 
things to fix today. 

653
00:30:18,360 --> 00:30:20,840
So trying to find room to think 
about tomorrow is difficult. 

654
00:30:21,080 --> 00:30:23,960
But at the same time, if you can
find that room, then you have 

655
00:30:23,960 --> 00:30:26,560
less of the Today issues 
tomorrow when you get there. 

656
00:30:27,240 --> 00:30:29,480
And we, I mean, we, it's January
right now. 

657
00:30:29,480 --> 00:30:32,000
We're doing Black Friday and 
Christmas wash ups with all of 

658
00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:34,760
our clients where we're 
reviewing like what sold, what 

659
00:30:34,760 --> 00:30:38,000
didn't, what SEO backlinks did 
we get, what pages we're 

660
00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:40,200
ranking, what news publications 
spoke about us. 

661
00:30:40,560 --> 00:30:42,920
And we're already talking to the
news public applications about 

662
00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:45,400
what we're going to be doing 
this coming Christmas. 

663
00:30:45,680 --> 00:30:48,200
Like can we book you in now? 
And they're like, yeah, great. 

664
00:30:48,200 --> 00:30:50,600
And it's like because of booking
us in now, it's like just take 

665
00:30:50,600 --> 00:30:52,480
the money. 
Like there's no negotiation. 

666
00:30:52,480 --> 00:30:54,520
There's no kind of, oh, that's 
not enough. 

667
00:30:54,560 --> 00:30:56,520
You know, you've got to pay us 
more if you want to be featured.

668
00:30:57,200 --> 00:30:59,000
The other thing we've done with 
a few clients as well as we've 

669
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:01,800
actually on Shopify built their 
like collection structures for 

670
00:31:01,800 --> 00:31:04,640
Black Friday, Christmas and I 
think a couple of that do 

671
00:31:04,640 --> 00:31:07,120
Thanksgiving sales. 
We've actually built all the 

672
00:31:07,120 --> 00:31:10,040
collections now they're just 
hidden and there's just a little

673
00:31:10,040 --> 00:31:13,560
map of like on, you know, it's 
7:00 AM on the day, turn them 

674
00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:15,720
all on and that's it. 
And like, it's really cool. 

675
00:31:15,720 --> 00:31:17,600
And we can still tweak them 
between now and then. 

676
00:31:17,840 --> 00:31:20,720
But it's another thing where and
there are, and if you're 

677
00:31:20,720 --> 00:31:21,720
listening to this, you know who 
you are. 

678
00:31:21,720 --> 00:31:25,240
There were three of you clients 
who messaged us like the morning

679
00:31:25,240 --> 00:31:26,920
of Black Friday, like we're 
doing a sale. 

680
00:31:27,080 --> 00:31:31,320
It's like, go away. 
I, I don't know if it's selfish,

681
00:31:31,320 --> 00:31:33,920
stupid or genius, but I was on 
holiday for Black Friday and 

682
00:31:33,920 --> 00:31:37,280
Cyber Monday and I, my team, but
one of them takes you again, 

683
00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:40,080
Nick, we just had these 3 emails
and I was like, what time is it,

684
00:31:40,080 --> 00:31:41,280
10:00? 
Oh gosh. 

685
00:31:42,120 --> 00:31:43,800
But I think, yeah, it's hard, 
isn't it? 

686
00:31:43,800 --> 00:31:46,040
You've got to balance that 
planning ahead with also being 

687
00:31:46,040 --> 00:31:49,000
agile to what's going on today. 
But I, I, I kind of feel like 

688
00:31:49,000 --> 00:31:51,720
suddenly from talking to so many
people like yourself with stock,

689
00:31:51,720 --> 00:31:54,480
you can't afford to get it too 
wrong too often, can you? 

690
00:31:54,480 --> 00:31:57,400
Like, you make a, you make a 
little mistake like you've said 

691
00:31:57,400 --> 00:31:58,920
you've made previously. 
You make that when you're 

692
00:31:58,920 --> 00:32:00,960
bigger. 
That causes a lot of problems. 

693
00:32:02,720 --> 00:32:05,520
Yeah, I've made a huge mistake 
ordering a winter product over 

694
00:32:05,520 --> 00:32:07,840
ordering. 
I probably ordered enough for 

695
00:32:07,840 --> 00:32:10,600
three seasons, didn't pay 
attention to the numbers, just 

696
00:32:10,600 --> 00:32:13,440
got so trigger happy and was 
like, Oh yeah, we'll clear these

697
00:32:13,440 --> 00:32:16,600
all out. 
This is an amazing product and 

698
00:32:16,840 --> 00:32:18,760
didn't have customer 
acquisitions. 

699
00:32:18,760 --> 00:32:20,760
One of my weaker points in 
running the business and I need 

700
00:32:20,760 --> 00:32:22,400
to work on that going forward 
for sure. 

701
00:32:22,440 --> 00:32:24,320
And that's one of my focuses is 
here as well. 

702
00:32:25,560 --> 00:32:28,160
But I didn't have the 
acquisition channels in place to

703
00:32:28,160 --> 00:32:30,280
really clear them all out. 
And it's taken me like a year 

704
00:32:30,280 --> 00:32:32,480
and a half to fight through 
that. 

705
00:32:32,480 --> 00:32:35,280
And then I funded it with credit
card, like a business credit 

706
00:32:35,280 --> 00:32:36,560
card. 
So pretty much made every 

707
00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:39,920
mistake possible. 
Lots of learning this year. 

708
00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:43,200
Yeah. 
I think having spoken to like, 

709
00:32:43,200 --> 00:32:45,760
and you've obviously got a bit 
of a background in finance as 

710
00:32:45,760 --> 00:32:48,520
well, like having spoken to a 
few like successful investors 

711
00:32:48,520 --> 00:32:52,080
over the years just through 
various channels, like, and 

712
00:32:52,960 --> 00:32:55,000
there's been something unanimous
about all of them. 

713
00:32:55,040 --> 00:32:57,720
And they're all like, if you 
want a quick win today, like 

714
00:32:57,720 --> 00:33:00,600
just forget it. 
If you see, I think always going

715
00:33:00,600 --> 00:33:03,200
like, and I think ordering is 
one of those situations where 

716
00:33:03,200 --> 00:33:05,160
and it's easy. 
It's so easy for me to say this,

717
00:33:05,200 --> 00:33:06,760
It's so much harder. 
If I was sitting in your seat, I

718
00:33:06,760 --> 00:33:09,680
probably would have done much 
worse than you have, but you got

719
00:33:09,680 --> 00:33:12,440
to just think like, you know 
what if I order like 1/4 of the 

720
00:33:12,440 --> 00:33:15,440
amount I'm thinking of right now
and they all sell, still a big 

721
00:33:15,440 --> 00:33:17,920
success and I can always order 
more next year. 

722
00:33:18,080 --> 00:33:20,720
I could even do a pre-order and 
say that I'll have more in two 

723
00:33:20,720 --> 00:33:22,480
months. 
You can order them now and I'll 

724
00:33:22,480 --> 00:33:24,960
just order for the amount that I
need or I think I need. 

725
00:33:25,440 --> 00:33:28,080
And it's like just playing the 
slower game actually means in 

726
00:33:28,080 --> 00:33:30,800
two years time you'll be running
a lot faster than if you keep 

727
00:33:30,800 --> 00:33:32,840
making those issues. 
But yeah, I've certainly racked 

728
00:33:32,840 --> 00:33:35,360
up the odd credit card debt and 
gone like how am I going to pay 

729
00:33:35,360 --> 00:33:37,360
for this? 
Like not in recent years might 

730
00:33:37,360 --> 00:33:39,720
have, but certainly earlier on 
when it was like just me and it 

731
00:33:39,720 --> 00:33:42,360
was just that agile kind of I 
can just do what I want and go 

732
00:33:42,360 --> 00:33:43,960
with the wind. 
It's it's difficult. 

733
00:33:44,000 --> 00:33:46,920
It's difficult for sure. 
But talking about acquisition 

734
00:33:46,920 --> 00:33:50,520
then, is there any marketing 
strategy campaign you've run, 

735
00:33:50,520 --> 00:33:52,640
something you've done that's 
actually like surprised you 

736
00:33:52,640 --> 00:33:54,440
either because it's been so good
or so bad? 

737
00:33:54,440 --> 00:33:56,840
Has there been anything that's 
really stood out today? 

738
00:33:57,960 --> 00:34:01,640
Most of it's been surprising how
bad it is, no, So I've been 

739
00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:04,240
struggling a lot over the last 
year or two with Facebook ads 

740
00:34:04,240 --> 00:34:07,120
and that's kind of been my only 
focus in terms of acquisition. 

741
00:34:07,200 --> 00:34:08,400
It makes sense. 
I think the most for the 

742
00:34:08,400 --> 00:34:11,840
business and I don't want to 
diversify my brain and splinter 

743
00:34:11,840 --> 00:34:13,600
out what I'm thinking about when
it comes to acquisition. 

744
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:16,840
And it's been a struggle. 
Like I've I've been running my 

745
00:34:16,840 --> 00:34:19,239
own, been watching all the 
Youtubes and that sort of thing 

746
00:34:20,040 --> 00:34:22,679
and haven't really had like a 
really good return on it besides

747
00:34:22,679 --> 00:34:24,719
almost like a break even. 
That's kind of where I've been 

748
00:34:24,719 --> 00:34:27,560
sitting at. 
I did have one campaign recently

749
00:34:27,560 --> 00:34:29,840
for this actually. 
This is my new custom fleece 

750
00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:34,199
jacket that I made this year. 
And that was my first ad that 

751
00:34:34,199 --> 00:34:37,840
has done like over three row ads
consistently over like a couple 

752
00:34:37,840 --> 00:34:39,960
weeks span. 
And I was blown away at the 

753
00:34:39,960 --> 00:34:44,080
power of having a good ad and 
being able to really run 

754
00:34:44,080 --> 00:34:46,639
profitably on an ad like that 
was fantastic. 

755
00:34:46,639 --> 00:34:49,480
And so that's also, it was my 
focus for this last year. 

756
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:52,560
It's my focus going forward. 
Like I want to try and improve 

757
00:34:52,560 --> 00:34:57,160
the acquisition from a Facebook 
ad perspective and really have 

758
00:34:57,160 --> 00:34:59,120
better performance than I've had
in the past. 

759
00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:00,800
Yeah. 
Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

760
00:35:00,800 --> 00:35:03,320
And I guess with a brand like 
yours, like we, we sometimes 

761
00:35:03,320 --> 00:35:05,360
have brands where I'm literally 
sitting there scratching my head

762
00:35:05,360 --> 00:35:07,600
going, you don't have anything 
unique. 

763
00:35:07,720 --> 00:35:10,320
Like there's nothing I can put 
on the web page, the advert to 

764
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:13,280
say it's better than all the 
others because like, I can't, 

765
00:35:13,280 --> 00:35:15,600
there's nothing to do with that.
With you, it's almost like the 

766
00:35:15,600 --> 00:35:17,160
opposite. 
Like there's so much in the 

767
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:18,880
story. 
Do you find one of your 

768
00:35:18,880 --> 00:35:22,040
challenges is how do I get that 
across quickly in like 3 seconds

769
00:35:22,040 --> 00:35:25,280
on a video on a tight budget? 
Like how do I do that? 

770
00:35:25,440 --> 00:35:27,920
Yeah, definitely. 
I think that there's, I try and 

771
00:35:27,920 --> 00:35:30,120
cram too much often into ads. 
I think that's a mistake I've 

772
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:31,840
made in the past. 
I need to get better at testing 

773
00:35:31,840 --> 00:35:34,240
and figuring out like, hey, 
let's test this one thing versus

774
00:35:34,240 --> 00:35:36,920
this other thing and see and 
kind of narrow it down to see 

775
00:35:36,920 --> 00:35:39,680
like what's resonating the best.
Another problem that I have is 

776
00:35:40,280 --> 00:35:42,800
being an apparel company. 
I've, I know I've got too many 

777
00:35:42,800 --> 00:35:46,080
products in general like that 
splinters my attention and also 

778
00:35:46,080 --> 00:35:48,640
makes it harder for marketing. 
So like when it comes to ads, 

779
00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:50,960
which products do I feature? 
Which ones are converting the 

780
00:35:50,960 --> 00:35:52,920
best? 
I had a product over the last 

781
00:35:52,920 --> 00:35:56,080
year or so that was doing, it 
was last fall up until the 

782
00:35:56,080 --> 00:36:00,120
summer was doing phenomenal for 
ads and it was really like going

783
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:01,600
through inventory. 
I couldn't keep it in stock. 

784
00:36:01,600 --> 00:36:03,680
I was selling it out every 
couple weeks, but then all of a 

785
00:36:03,680 --> 00:36:06,560
sudden it just kind of hit a 
wall, which was really odd. 

786
00:36:06,560 --> 00:36:08,760
And haven't really done much 
with it for the last couple 

787
00:36:08,760 --> 00:36:11,560
months. 
But so it's always feels like a 

788
00:36:11,560 --> 00:36:14,080
moving target. 
It's always kind of changing and

789
00:36:14,600 --> 00:36:18,760
I haven't quite solved that sort
of puzzle in the in the company.

790
00:36:19,720 --> 00:36:22,600
Yeah, something you said earlier
that's kind of resonating around

791
00:36:22,600 --> 00:36:25,040
my head as you were talking 
about how to approach the ad 

792
00:36:25,040 --> 00:36:27,440
content, especially like what to
actually put in the ad. 

793
00:36:27,440 --> 00:36:29,560
How do you say enough without 
saying too much? 

794
00:36:30,080 --> 00:36:32,880
You mentioned earlier about like
customers, the, you know, the 

795
00:36:32,880 --> 00:36:35,240
customer never lies, but they do
sometimes and it's not always 

796
00:36:35,240 --> 00:36:37,680
known, like, and actually they 
don't always tell the truth. 

797
00:36:38,200 --> 00:36:40,760
I think I literally have a 
conversation with one of our 

798
00:36:40,760 --> 00:36:44,320
clients very, very recently. 
Like, I think I forget what time

799
00:36:44,320 --> 00:36:46,240
it is now, but yeah, either this
morning or yesterday. 

800
00:36:46,760 --> 00:36:48,760
And the conversation was like, 
what? 

801
00:36:48,760 --> 00:36:51,040
What for you is like the most 
important USP? 

802
00:36:51,040 --> 00:36:52,320
What do you want to push as a 
business? 

803
00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:55,000
Where does the brand sit? 
And they gave me this beautiful 

804
00:36:55,000 --> 00:36:56,520
kind of story. 
And I said, like, look, this 

805
00:36:56,520 --> 00:36:58,280
sounds amazing. 
We can get that across in an 

806
00:36:58,280 --> 00:36:59,600
advert. 
We can shoot some videos for 

807
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:00,600
that. 
We can run some really good 

808
00:37:00,600 --> 00:37:03,440
Facebook shopping camera. 
The challenge I said to them is,

809
00:37:04,480 --> 00:37:06,080
do customers want that? 
And they're like, yeah, yeah, 

810
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:07,480
yeah. 
And I was like, that's great, 

811
00:37:07,480 --> 00:37:09,480
Prove it. 
Prove to me that customers 

812
00:37:09,480 --> 00:37:13,040
really want that, or that that's
the number one reason they buy. 

813
00:37:13,040 --> 00:37:15,240
And they were like, maybe we 
need to ask them. 

814
00:37:15,240 --> 00:37:17,200
And I said, yeah, you're 
probably on something now, but 

815
00:37:17,200 --> 00:37:18,440
we need to be really clever 
actually. 

816
00:37:18,440 --> 00:37:20,800
And, and I've had this a lot 
over the years with, with those 

817
00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:24,200
surveys, those pop ups or like 
you said earlier, going to meet 

818
00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:26,800
customers face to face and 
selling so powerful. 

819
00:37:26,800 --> 00:37:29,440
Like we have loads of Christmas 
markets at all the raging cities

820
00:37:29,440 --> 00:37:32,360
in the UK right now, like loads 
of little literally sheds with 

821
00:37:32,360 --> 00:37:34,720
some fake snow on top. 
But people selling beautiful 

822
00:37:34,720 --> 00:37:37,160
products, lots of little stores 
like yours, you meet customers, 

823
00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:39,160
you see they're actually going, 
wow, I love that colour. 

824
00:37:39,160 --> 00:37:41,240
Wow, that colour's amazing. 
Wow, I love that colour. 

825
00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:43,160
Right. 
Are we getting the idea the 

826
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:44,920
colour? 
It's about colour, you know, So 

827
00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:47,480
whatever your brand name is, 
make your tagline like the the 

828
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:51,560
colour that makes you go wow, 
like try that, see if that 

829
00:37:51,560 --> 00:37:52,880
starts to stick. 
Put that at the beginning of 

830
00:37:52,880 --> 00:37:54,720
video. 
Someone goes, wow, look at that 

831
00:37:54,720 --> 00:37:56,040
color. 
And then of course the next year

832
00:37:56,160 --> 00:37:57,800
you're now looking at the 
product going, that's a really 

833
00:37:57,800 --> 00:38:00,520
cool color, a really cool design
or actually, wow, it's so soft, 

834
00:38:00,680 --> 00:38:02,600
it's so soft. 
And then like it goes around and

835
00:38:02,600 --> 00:38:04,520
Nan's got the same scarf on her.
She's asleep. 

836
00:38:04,520 --> 00:38:07,840
Like it's that kind of thing. 
Fine line between making Nan 

837
00:38:07,840 --> 00:38:09,160
look like she's asleep or being 
dead. 

838
00:38:09,160 --> 00:38:10,840
But yeah, there's got to be 
really careful with some 

839
00:38:10,840 --> 00:38:13,400
marketing executions. 
But I think it's with that 

840
00:38:13,400 --> 00:38:16,400
particular client. 
I challenged them and said, you 

841
00:38:16,400 --> 00:38:18,920
know what, thinking about the 
customer for a second, customers

842
00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:21,160
are inherent. 
We're inherently selfish beings,

843
00:38:21,160 --> 00:38:23,920
humans, and that's really hard. 
The customer probably just wants

844
00:38:23,920 --> 00:38:26,080
something that's not expensive 
and it's super comfortable. 

845
00:38:26,280 --> 00:38:29,720
Like if it's just AT shirt and 
it's AT shirt like an underlayer

846
00:38:29,720 --> 00:38:31,240
you designed to put something on
top of it. 

847
00:38:31,480 --> 00:38:33,960
It doesn't really matter how it 
looks unless you're going to go 

848
00:38:33,960 --> 00:38:36,720
quirky bright colours like a lot
of sports players would wear in 

849
00:38:36,720 --> 00:38:38,480
the winter. 
You know, they put on even 

850
00:38:38,480 --> 00:38:41,320
they've got a blue football 
rugby kit or whatever, they put 

851
00:38:41,320 --> 00:38:43,840
a bright yellow underlayer on 
just to be like, I'm yellow. 

852
00:38:43,880 --> 00:38:45,640
Like see me come in, make a 
statement. 

853
00:38:46,360 --> 00:38:48,000
But that's the brand. 
And it's you've got to think 

854
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:51,280
about like either someone wants 
to look better, feel better, be 

855
00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:54,240
more comfortable, feel like even
if they haven't, you want to 

856
00:38:54,240 --> 00:38:55,920
feel like you've saved some 
money on something. 

857
00:38:56,920 --> 00:38:59,080
It's hard though, isn't it? 
Like talking to customers and 

858
00:38:59,080 --> 00:39:00,600
really kind of grasp what that 
is. 

859
00:39:00,960 --> 00:39:03,960
So what's what's crazy is like I
have a story about this exact 

860
00:39:04,080 --> 00:39:06,000
same situation. 
I have one of my biggest 

861
00:39:06,000 --> 00:39:09,440
products categories is this 
T-shirt, basically graphic 

862
00:39:09,440 --> 00:39:10,760
T-shirt. 
I've got a couple different 

863
00:39:11,000 --> 00:39:14,880
designs on it and I call it the 
eco tee because it is the most 

864
00:39:14,880 --> 00:39:16,360
eco friendly T-shirt that I 
could find. 

865
00:39:16,480 --> 00:39:18,320
Each T-shirt saves 100 gallons 
of water. 

866
00:39:18,320 --> 00:39:20,560
It's made from six recycled 
water bottles keeping amount of 

867
00:39:20,560 --> 00:39:22,440
landfills. 
Organic cotton. 

868
00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:24,720
Like it's made from a 
sustainable tree that's kind of 

869
00:39:24,720 --> 00:39:26,360
like bamboo. 
So it's really easy to grow 

870
00:39:27,160 --> 00:39:29,240
carbon neutral. 
Like you know 10 different 

871
00:39:29,240 --> 00:39:30,840
characteristics about how it's 
eco friendly. 

872
00:39:31,640 --> 00:39:38,960
The number one reason people buy
it by far is how soft it is. 

873
00:39:39,640 --> 00:39:42,520
And straight away. 
For, for months and months and 

874
00:39:42,520 --> 00:39:45,080
months, I was focusing on like 
the eco friendly aspects to it. 

875
00:39:45,200 --> 00:39:48,640
I was just talking to an 
employee at REI yesterday, 

876
00:39:48,640 --> 00:39:49,720
Monday. 
I don't even know what day it 

877
00:39:49,720 --> 00:39:51,560
is. 
I think it was Monday, but she 

878
00:39:51,560 --> 00:39:53,240
was like, I have six of your eco
teas. 

879
00:39:53,240 --> 00:39:55,320
Like they're the softest 
T-shirts in my drawer. 

880
00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:58,440
I, I grabbed them because 
they're so comfortable and I'm 

881
00:39:58,440 --> 00:40:00,800
sitting in my head like running 
through all the US PS around eco

882
00:40:00,800 --> 00:40:03,840
friendliness and, and donating 
back to the parks and all these 

883
00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:05,320
things. 
And it's like, no, that's not 

884
00:40:05,320 --> 00:40:06,920
what they actually care about. 
Like they care about it being 

885
00:40:06,920 --> 00:40:08,120
that soft. 
So I need to. 

886
00:40:08,760 --> 00:40:11,520
Yeah, you're a. 100% right, 
where it's like, what does the 

887
00:40:11,520 --> 00:40:13,640
customer actually care about? 
It's not what's in your head, 

888
00:40:13,640 --> 00:40:15,600
it's what in in their head. 
And you need to convey that and 

889
00:40:15,600 --> 00:40:18,800
I need to get better about that.
Yeah, and I something we've been

890
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:21,040
working on and we're not we 
haven't perfected this yet. 

891
00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:23,360
We're not experts at it is he's 
trying to achieve. 

892
00:40:23,400 --> 00:40:26,800
I almost like the kind of I call
them like primary and secondary 

893
00:40:26,800 --> 00:40:29,080
buy reasons. 
The primary one is the reason 

894
00:40:29,080 --> 00:40:30,720
that they get out of bed in the 
morning and look for that 

895
00:40:30,720 --> 00:40:32,600
product, the reason they come to
your site, the thing that 

896
00:40:32,600 --> 00:40:34,920
attracted them in, the reason 
they're adding to car, the 

897
00:40:34,920 --> 00:40:37,200
secondary option. 
The secondary thing is the 

898
00:40:37,200 --> 00:40:39,640
reason they buy it from you. 
And that's what I've been trying

899
00:40:39,720 --> 00:40:43,360
to diversify with some of our 
clients to go like, look, you 

900
00:40:43,360 --> 00:40:45,840
plant trees with every order. 
I'm not slapping that as the 

901
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:47,080
number one headline on Google 
Ads. 

902
00:40:47,080 --> 00:40:49,200
That's not going to work. 
Or the first thing we say like 

903
00:40:49,320 --> 00:40:51,720
we've been planting trees for 
three years now and it's like, 

904
00:40:51,720 --> 00:40:53,880
that's not a long time. 
And then it's like, so why don't

905
00:40:53,880 --> 00:40:55,520
you buy one of our luxury 
furniture items? 

906
00:40:55,520 --> 00:40:57,720
It's like, what? 
Why would I buy one of your 

907
00:40:57,720 --> 00:40:59,320
luxury furniture? 
A good question. 

908
00:40:59,520 --> 00:41:00,600
I'm not really interested to 
skip. 

909
00:41:01,240 --> 00:41:03,400
And so I think it's it's about 
leading with like, you know, 

910
00:41:03,440 --> 00:41:06,400
this item is going to brighten 
up your home or as you say, like

911
00:41:06,560 --> 00:41:10,200
it's the softest tea. 
And one of our sponsors, Saguno 

912
00:41:10,200 --> 00:41:12,640
sent me a few T-shirts and 
they're made by American 

913
00:41:12,640 --> 00:41:15,320
Apparel, but it's not UK 
American Apparel. 

914
00:41:15,320 --> 00:41:17,840
It's proper American, American 
Apparel from North Carolina. 

915
00:41:18,040 --> 00:41:20,440
And it is they were organic 
cotton and they are so soft. 

916
00:41:20,800 --> 00:41:23,640
I wear it all the time. 
And I told them this and they 

917
00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:25,280
went, that's why we chose it. 
It's soft. 

918
00:41:25,280 --> 00:41:27,600
So people want to wear it and 
then, you know, name is being 

919
00:41:27,600 --> 00:41:30,640
plastered around. 
Then someone at my local church 

920
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:33,640
ran up to me one night and was 
like, I like that T-shirt. 

921
00:41:34,120 --> 00:41:36,160
I could find some random e-mail 
company. 

922
00:41:36,160 --> 00:41:37,560
I couldn't find the Saguno 
brand. 

923
00:41:37,560 --> 00:41:39,040
I'm like they're not a clothing 
brand. 

924
00:41:39,600 --> 00:41:41,400
They're an e-mail marketing 
company. 

925
00:41:41,800 --> 00:41:43,680
And they're, my wife was like, 
why wearing that church is if 

926
00:41:43,680 --> 00:41:46,760
you felt this thing, she's like,
that's nice come over. 

927
00:41:46,760 --> 00:41:50,600
She's wearing my T-shirt. 
So I think, yeah, I think it's a

928
00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:52,840
real challenge. 
And the problem is whether you 

929
00:41:52,840 --> 00:41:55,040
go down like that, all the eco 
stuff you've listed or you go 

930
00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:57,640
down the customer go, it's soft,
it looks good, it makes me feel 

931
00:41:57,640 --> 00:41:59,800
good, it washes easily, it folds
really nicely. 

932
00:41:59,800 --> 00:42:02,720
It never creases whatever that 
USP is. 

933
00:42:02,840 --> 00:42:05,920
There's loads of them in both 
lists and it really is a 

934
00:42:05,920 --> 00:42:07,000
challenge. 
And I think like you said 

935
00:42:07,000 --> 00:42:09,120
earlier about AB testing, AB 
testing is ads to see which one 

936
00:42:09,120 --> 00:42:11,480
works best. 
It's got to be got to be hard on

937
00:42:11,480 --> 00:42:12,640
the agenda for the year, as you 
said. 

938
00:42:12,640 --> 00:42:16,120
So yeah, but it's it's not easy.
And I think, but you've you've 

939
00:42:16,120 --> 00:42:18,200
made strides more than I would 
say a lot of kind of medium to 

940
00:42:18,200 --> 00:42:20,560
big companies we work with have 
done, which is you've got that 

941
00:42:20,560 --> 00:42:23,080
focus group. 
You can ask people, staff and 

942
00:42:23,080 --> 00:42:25,440
also just say to be honest with 
me, like I don't care if you 

943
00:42:25,840 --> 00:42:27,440
prefer it because it's soft 
rather than eco. 

944
00:42:27,720 --> 00:42:29,680
I just better the devil I know 
than the devil I don't. 

945
00:42:29,680 --> 00:42:31,040
I'm still going to talk about 
the eco stuff. 

946
00:42:31,040 --> 00:42:34,200
I'm still going to donate to the
parks, but in but I'm going to 

947
00:42:34,200 --> 00:42:36,200
lead with that now. 
And actually we're going to make

948
00:42:36,200 --> 00:42:38,640
a softer T-shirt. 
Imagine your focus group going. 

949
00:42:38,800 --> 00:42:40,360
We want a softer T-shirt Yeah, 
do it. 

950
00:42:40,360 --> 00:42:43,280
And it's like I'm going to make 
a softer one, an even softer one

951
00:42:43,280 --> 00:42:43,960
than this. 
It's like. 

952
00:42:44,240 --> 00:42:47,520
And then you suddenly find like 
350 of your 400 users for it 

953
00:42:47,520 --> 00:42:50,560
because it was soft. 
But yeah, yeah well, look, we'll

954
00:42:50,560 --> 00:42:53,200
bring things into land there, 
but yeah, David, look, it's such

955
00:42:53,200 --> 00:42:56,680
a cool adventure. 
I and and no pun intended about 

956
00:42:56,680 --> 00:42:58,280
your brand, but yeah, I love 
hiking myself. 

957
00:42:58,800 --> 00:43:01,160
But what we'll do is I think 
we'll try and get you back on in

958
00:43:01,160 --> 00:43:02,640
a year. 
If you guys have enjoyed talking

959
00:43:02,640 --> 00:43:05,280
to David as well, I'm going to 
convince him after we click 

960
00:43:05,280 --> 00:43:06,320
start to come join the growth 
hubs. 

961
00:43:06,360 --> 00:43:07,960
Yeah, join the growth hub guys. 
It's completely free. 

962
00:43:08,360 --> 00:43:09,880
But David, I, I really 
appreciate your time. 

963
00:43:09,880 --> 00:43:10,720
Thank you so much for joining 
us. 

964
00:43:10,720 --> 00:43:13,280
Appreciate your honesty as well.
I haven't had someone on here 

965
00:43:13,280 --> 00:43:15,240
for so long saying like, you 
know, for quite a while saying 

966
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:17,200
we failed at that. 
We failed at that found out, but

967
00:43:17,200 --> 00:43:18,920
we learnt the lessons. 
So yeah, I really appreciate 

968
00:43:18,920 --> 00:43:20,120
your time. 
Thank you so much. 

969
00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:21,200
Very welcome. 
It was. 

970
00:43:21,240 --> 00:43:23,760
It was so fun, I loved it. 
Good, good. 

971
00:43:24,200 --> 00:43:26,040
And yeah, we'll try and get one 
in about a year for everyone 

972
00:43:26,040 --> 00:43:27,560
else listening. 
And thank you so much for tuning

973
00:43:27,560 --> 00:43:29,160
in. 
First episode of the year. 

974
00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:31,720
I hope we didn't sound too 
sleepy, but I'll be awake by 

975
00:43:31,720 --> 00:43:33,360
next episode a little bit more 
than today. 

976
00:43:33,360 --> 00:43:35,280
But yeah, great to have you all 
tuning in. 

977
00:43:35,320 --> 00:43:36,880
If you haven't already, check 
out all of our different 

978
00:43:36,880 --> 00:43:39,040
channels. 
And yeah, as I've kind of snuck 

979
00:43:39,040 --> 00:43:41,040
in earlier, we are launching 
some new things at the moment 

980
00:43:41,240 --> 00:43:43,080
and do definitely check out the 
growth hub. 

981
00:43:43,080 --> 00:43:44,440
There's loads of events going on
at the moment. 

982
00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:46,440
We've got some really cool round
tables, some cool guests. 

983
00:43:46,800 --> 00:43:49,440
We've also potentially got the 
CMO of Gym Shark coming on to a 

984
00:43:49,440 --> 00:43:51,560
round table. 
She can come meet him and ask 

985
00:43:51,560 --> 00:43:53,080
questions as well. 
He's a good friend of mine here 

986
00:43:53,080 --> 00:43:55,520
in London. 
So yeah, hopefully have have 

987
00:43:55,520 --> 00:43:57,280
Richard done soon. 
But yeah, thanks Julian. 

988
00:43:57,280 --> 00:43:58,840
Back again next Friday. 
And if you haven't already, 

989
00:43:58,840 --> 00:43:59,760
please hit the subscribe button.