Build an Obsession Brand

Did you have a goal that you didn't accomplish this year? Is this period starting to feel like it was a blow? If you're frustrated with low sales this holiday season, it's time to recharge your approach; it's easier than you may think!

In this episode, we talk about:

• How to acknowledge your emotions in a way that's fruitful, not frustrating
• Realizing that not reaching a goal is NEUTRAL, not negative
• Recognizing what message your sales are ACTUALLY trying to tell you (hint: it's not "you're a failure!")
• Default thinking vs intentional thinking: how to use both to your advantage (when to be deliberate vs going with your instinct)
• Holding ambitious goals in a healthy, productive way

And more!

Join the Waitlist For Our Product Brand Accelerator Program: The Product Brands Accelerator: Learn The #1 Positioning Tool That You Need To Accelerate Your Sales & Stand Out In A Saturated Market. Get on the waitlist now to be the first to apply — spots WILL be limited! Join The Product Brand Accelerator Program: Sign Up Here

Connect with Maureen on instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

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In this episode, we dive into:

• The psychology of a buyer, specifically the type of buyer you want to attract. (There is a difference!) That means you need to understand how your customer makes a buying decision, and how they weigh the pros and cons of a purchase.
• How to motivate your customer to (literally) buy what you're selling; it's rarely going to be solely about your product features! You need to get down to the "why behind the why", aka what changes your product will actually make on their quality of life, and when they would use your product in their routine. (Hint: you want to highlight this exact moment in your content!)
• The difference between product acceptors, rejectors, and reducers (and which customer subset you want to target)
• How to properly convey the value of your product by not dumbing down your genius; let your expertise speak for itself!

Want to learn more?

Join the Waitlist For Our Product Brand Accelerator Program: The Product Brands Accelerator: Learn The #1 Positioning Tool That You Need To Accelerate Your Sales & Stand Out In A Saturated Market. Get on the waitlist now to be the first to apply — spots WILL be limited!

Connect with Maureen on instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

If the words "Black Friday" send a shiver down your spine, you're not alone! Brands all over the world enter this holiday season with the same, unnerving question:

To discount, or not to discount?

Everyone's hunting for a good deal this time of year, but on the other side of things, your business still needs to stay sustainable. So how can you do that while doling out seasonal promos and discounts that eat into your profit margin? Are you stuck giving discounts away to stay relevant this Black Friday?

Here's the good news: you can still honor the spirit of the season WITHOUT sacrificing your profit margin! In fact, this year, your seasonal promos can work for you AND your customers.

In this episode, we talk about how to make this dream a reality, including:

• The hard (but necessary) questions to ask yourself about your promo plans
• How to pick the right brand promotional strategy
• How deep of a discount is too deep
• How to incentivize purchases that will have a lasting impact even when the holidays are over

And more!

Want to learn more?

Download Your Product Growth Guide: Discover the three phases of a product brand's life cycle and identify where YOU are

Work With Us: Schedule A Growth Strategy Call

Connect with Maureen on instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

One of the most common things I see in this industry is some people treating their product-based brand as a service-based brand, or even vice versa: aka, people start a product and try to add being a coach or other service on top of it.

The result? Your messaging gets muddled, your to-do list multiplies, and all that extra effort still doesn't translate into an equal rise in sales.

In this episode, you will learn:

• What the key differences are between product and service-based brands
• How those differences actually look in practice, and
• How to pivot your strategy towards your brand type in meaningful, practical ways

Find out more!

Download Your Product Growth Guide: Discover the three phases of a product brand's life cycle and identify where YOU are

Work With Us: Schedule A Growth Strategy Call

Connect with Maureen on instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

It's disheartening to put so much energy into building a business, only to find yourself in a never-ending cash crunch. Spending your limited resources on worthless things or perfection is a key contributor.

That's why we made this episode. You'll get insight into the three profitable stages associated with product brands, figure out where you are in that cycle, and discover how to allocate your resources accordingly and get the most out of each phase.

Episode Highlights

• [02:04] The three profit stages of beauty brands:
• Stage 1: The emerging stage
• Stage 2: The growth stage
• Stage 3: Scale up stage
• [02:30] Why you should avoid using the term "side hustle" to describe your emerging business
• [04:03] What happens in the Stage 1: The emerging stage
• [07:10] The value of market research
• [08:53] Three things to consider when doing market research:
• Your ideal customer's psychology. How and what are they thinking about before they buy.
• Their buying habits
• Their preferences
• [10:16] Why value must come before perfection.
• [13:40] What happens in Stage 2: The growth stage
• [13:50] How to build brand obsession
• [27:50] The value of a board of advisors/consultants
• [33:51] What happens in Stage 3: The scale up stage

Find out more!

Download Free Guide: The Ultimate Product Brand Growth Guide

Work With Us: Apply to Our Apprenticeship Program: Product Profit Lab

Connect with Maureen on Instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Join our incredible community - Product Entrepreneurs Who Scale

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Running a successful product-based business involves more than just product selling. Business owners must strategically set goals, plan their purchases, and make informed marketing decisions based on customer needs at a given time. Using customer trends to inform decisions regarding what, how and when to sell is a key part of Inventory and Sales planning.

Inventory planning enables product-based businesses to have a more customer-focused approach to the business by buying products based on customer behavior.

In this episode, Darlene Mitchell offers an in-depth insight into a business owner's journey to creating an effective inventory and sales management system. Developing a clear road map, understanding seasonality, and using historical data to inform inventory purchase decisions are some of the key steps she emphasizes.

Darlene explores some of the common mistakes made by business owners in sales planning. She discusses:

• Not having a sales plan
• Not having an inventory plan
• Not knowing how to transition with their customers

Darlene Mitchell is a profit strategist with several years' experience in retail. She drives strategy and helps boutiques and brands develop their businesses.

Episode Highlights

• [01:35] Darlene's introduction
• [03:07] Understanding the difference between Sales Management and Inventory Management

• [04:03] Metrics/numbers you need to know in sales and inventory management

• [08:32] Using customer insights to inform business purchases
• [9:30] Why sales and inventory are important no matter the size of the business
• [11:04] How your business infrastructure needs to look like to float
• [14:40] Why having a clear roadmap is important for business planning
• [16:10] Using seasonality as a technique for inventory planning
• [22:55] How to set up an inventory management system
• [24: 35] How to push your inventory to achieve your sales targets
• [26:55] How to push your inventory to achieve your sales targets
• [28:30] Using promotional strategies in inventory management
• [31:10] Is a sales plan synonymous with a marketing plan?
• [39:00] Adapting customer strategy to customer trends and needs
• [42:05] Actions steps to build a multi-million product-based business

Quotes

"If the customer will not buy it in the next six weeks, don't buy it because your customer's going to buy it marked down."

"If a product frequently sells, buy more of it."

"Figure out when and why your customers are buying."

"Customers are fickle so always test out new products. Test what is going to replace what you are currently selling."

"What inventory management allows you to do is look forward. It focuses on what is about to happen to you."

"Two mistakes made my business owners are not having a sales plan and not having an inventory plan."

"Every product-based business owner should think to themselves, 'Who is my customer? What are they doing? What do they need?"

"Your sales are the number you need to hit. The tactics which is your marketing is how you get there."

Connect with Darlene Y Mitchell

Darlene's Website

Darlene's Instagram

Darlene's LinkedIn

Find out more!

Free Guide: The Ultimate Product Brand Growth Guide

Work With Us: Apply to Our Apprenticeship Program: Product Profit Lab

Connect with Maureen on Instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Join our incredible community - Product Entrepreneurs Who Scale

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Earnings are a great perk that come as a natural consequence of launching your business. Having a clear rationale for doing what you're doing can help you weather the inevitable storms that will inevitably arise as you build your business. And when your why is so strong that you're prepared to keep going even when everything else in your life suggests that you shouldn't, that's when you know you're on the right track.

This is what it's like building a six-figure business. It begins with understanding why you're setting it up in the first place—and that reason should be more than just the money.

Without a solid impetus, it's easy to find yourself repeatedly beginning and ending projects, resting in the middle of something important, or starting something new when it's not quite ready. Therefore, you don't get the result you want.

In this episode, Maureen explores every entrepreneur's steps to achieve their goals. The key steps she highlights include:

1. Establish what you want, not what you think you can do
2. Rely on your belief, not your ability
3. Be a rule breaker
4. Keep a concrete focus on what you want
5. Move beyond the resistance that constantly shows up

Episode Highlights

• [2:47] Why you need to understand your 'why.'
• [3:35] If one line of business is not successful yet, do not start another
• [6:25] Understanding your different roles in your business
• [12:49] How to identify and establish your goal
• [15:34] Who you need to become to achieve your goal
• [17:55] Why you need to make your business urgent
• [22:00] What thoughts and beliefs are making you stuck?
• [25:20] An exercise in understanding the beliefs you're accepting
• [27:47] Getting started requires inner belief, not confidence
• [33:00] Things that hold people back
• [34:28] Identify rules to break
• [43:50] Why you must concretely focus on what you want
• [49:40] How to move past the resistance that shows up

Quotes

'Wherever you are right now, you are very successful… Many of us usually set some very audacious goals in our businesses, but we never understand what is expected and what is required of us to achieve that goal.'

'It's not about the money. Money is a byproduct of what you'll get when establishing your business.'

'When you have a hard why, you're willing to withstand the storms in your business.'

'Once you untether the identity of your business from you, then you start making decisions out of the company's interest and not your own interests.'

'The key to success is to become the person who has the thoughts and takes the actions to produce results over and over again.'

'Don't copy somebody's actions; copy the thoughts and feelings that person had when taking action.'

'If you don't feel successful right now, making 100K will not make you feel successful.'

'Don't establish a monetary goal based on what you think you can do; establish a monetary goal based on what you really want.'

'We prioritize what we value.'

'The success of your business hinges upon how fast you can bounce back up when you've bounced down.'

'All of us are scared, but we are choosing to move past our fears.'

'For you to create a different outcome and create a different result, you have to break a rule.'

'When you keep a focus of what you want, the universe conspires to bring it to you.'

'Discomfort is the price we pay for the goals that we want.'

'If you're willing to do what is required, everything else reveals itself.'

Find out more!

Download Free Guide: The Ultimate Product Brand Growth Guide

Work With Us: Book A Free Growth Strategy Call

Connect with Maureen on Instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Join our incredible community - Product Entrepreneurs Who Scale

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

We all face periods when we feel like trashing our businesses and giving up. This occurs when you have tried a strategy and committed significant resources or juggling an excessive number of responsibilities, but your sales remain flat or fluctuate erratically. So you might be scratching your head now, wondering what you're doing wrong.

This is the episode for you if that description fits your experience.

In this episode, I will examine five potential causes for your inconsistent sales. In a nutshell, they are as follows:

1. A lack of vision
2. Doing it on your own
3. Doing many things and not focusing on the things actually driving sales
4. Having a complicated business model and bloated product assortment
5. Complicated marketing and sales channels

You will leave this episode with a firm grasp of where you went wrong and what you need to do to make things right. You'll appreciate the value of vision, a coach or mentor, and how less means more in product assortment and marketing.

Episode highlights

• [02:00] The value of a vision
• [08:24] The value of sharpness and decisiveness in decision making
• [09:35] Why you shouldn't go solo
• [21:47] Why you should prioritize a few activities
• [26:35] Product cannibalism and how to avoid it
• [26:50] How a bloated product assortment chocks and drowns your business
• [27:14] How more products don't always equate to more money
• [36:00] How multiple marketing channels harm your business

Get in touch!

Get Maureen's free training, Maximize Your Product Sales.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Join our incredible community - Product Entrepreneurs Who Scale

Learn how Maureen can help you grow your brand at any stage.

Connect with Maureen on Instagram.

Marketers' longtime reliance on third-party consumer data is fast becoming obsolete. For example, advertising on social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook, where targeting audiences can yield highly successful campaigns, has always been a cornerstone of the direct-to-consumer marketing strategy.

However, it is more important than ever to create direct connections with consumers in light of iOS14's restrictions on third-party cookies for tracking, Chrome's deprecation of third-party cookies in browsers beginning in 2022, and the General Data Protection Regulation.

That's why it's perfect timing that Gen Furukawa will be on the podcast today. He is here to share a more legitimate, effective, and cheaper alternative to better understand your customers and cater to their specific needs.

Gen has been in the e-commerce space for 10+ years, with the last seven years in the e-commerce SaaS environment. Before Prehook, Gen was part of the founding team and VP of Jungle Scout, the leading software for Amazon sellers. He also hosts the e-commerce marketing podcast, Cart Overflow, where he shares what the best brand operators, agencies, and tech platforms are doing to grow their e-commerce revenue.

In this episode, Gen emphasizes three quiz benefits of e-commerce quizzes:

• They reduce customer acquisition cost
• The end of third-party cookies and increase in data protection
• Personalization attracts customers

By the end of this episode, you will learn how to leverage quizzes in your direct-to-consumer business, whether or not a quiz is suitable for your brand, and how to create one. In addition, you will gain priceless insights on how to achieve personalization at scale, why fastest-growing direct-to-consumer brands use quizzes, how to promote them, and tips to increase their opt-in rate.

Episode Highlights

• [01:45] Prehook's founder story
• [04:04] How to tell if your business needs a quiz
• [05:32] Three reasons why the fastest-growing direct-to-consumer brands leverage quizzes
• [05:40] The value of personalization
• [07:21] How to achieve personalization at scale
• [10:37] How to set up a quiz
• [13:07] Ways used to promote quizzes
• [14:33] Tips to increase the opt-in rate for quizzes
• [18:49] What is zero-party data?
• [21:55] Gen's advice for growing e-commerce businesses

Quotes

"I think the brands that might not benefit much from quizzes might be like a single SKU brand. So product where it's like, alright, you get one product. The decision is easy. It's more focused on can the merchant sell the product or not?"

"Once you're able to understand the customer challenges and their goals, you can bridge the gap from where they currently are to where their goals are. And that's where we can fill the gap with a quiz."

"Once you're layering on their needs, goals, challenges, all of a sudden, you can play to those more. And it impacts your messaging, what you're sending, when, and how."

"So when people ask, like, okay, what should I consider? What should I do in building the quiz? I think the first and most important thing is to define what your goals are. Like what data points are most interesting or helpful to you to improve your segmentation and set your targeting to be more specific?"

"What is the exchange of value between the merchant and the visitor? And how can you make it most compelling?"

"The quiz is more like an exchange or a conversation to enhance or improve the opt-in."

Connect with Gen Furukawa

Gen Furukawa's Company Website

Gen Furukawa's LinkedIn

Email: [email protected]. | Try Prehook free for 14 + 30 days if you mention Maureen in your email

Download Prehook on App Store or Shopify

Gen Furukawa's Podcast: Cart Overflow

Find out more!

Training: Uncap Your Growth & Bring in More Product Sales without Changing Your Branding or Packaging

Work With Us: Apply to Our Apprenticeship Program: Product Profit Lab

Connect with Maureen on Instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Join our incredible community - Product Entrepreneurs Who Scale

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

As long as marketing remains a mystery to you, you'll struggle. Chasing random shiny-objects on the internet won't work. Throwing spaghetti won't work. The only thing that WILL work is to design a marketing strategy with scientific precision.

In this episode, I explain why your marketing efforts aren't yielding the desired results. If you are looking to turn your product-based business into a well-oiled profit machine, you need to understand that marketing follows a very specific framework. And if you're not following it, you'll be banging your head against a revenue ceiling of your own making.

Episode Highlights

• [01:20] Two scenarios that explain why your marketing is not working
• [03:30] Three keys to effective marketing
• [05:07] What faith can do
• [09:25] Three types of entrepreneurs
• [16:24] The difference that getting support makes
• [22:38] Four reasons why your marketing is not sticking

Quotes

"Three things have to happen when it comes to effective marketing: intentionality, being strategic, and being willing to work to make things happen."

"…the bridge between where I am today and where I want to be is faith, and I cannot know how to do something until I take that first step."

"You must understand that faith will get you where you want to be. You must be willing to bet on yourself when you don't feel like doing it."

"Hope and hustle don't build empires. Instead, it's strategy, precision, and faith that actually build empires."

"…every time you're caught in the strategy, planning, and preparation to figure out the next best thing, you're trapped in perfectionism. So ask yourself, has perfectionism served you?"

"We're not used to investing in ourselves. That investment is an investment to save you time and money that you otherwise would have lost because you don't know what you are doing."

"…whatever you're resisting is what you're supposed to be doing because that is where your breakthrough will come from."

"…the reason your marketing isn't delivering results is that you're potentially telling your own story instead of your audience's."

Find out more!

Training: Uncap Your Growth & Bring in More Product Sales without Changing Your Branding or Packaging

Work With Us: Apply to Our Apprenticeship Program: Product Profit Lab

Connect with Maureen on Instagram: Maureenmwangiofficial

Join our incredible community - Product Entrepreneurs Who Scale

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.

Android users can subscribe and rate our podcast on Spotify.

Subscribe and rate our podcast on iTunes here.