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Product Startup
Product Startup episodes
- 133: Using Email Marketing to Sell Physical Products
Jacob Anson is the CoFounder of AgencyJR, a firm that has helped sell tens of millions of dollars worth of product for product companies. Today Jacob is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can understand email marketing, learn the different types within, and know how to use email marketing effectively.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- What is email marketing
- How does it fit into overall digital advertising
- Email lists from buyers, email lists from almost buyers, and email lists from cold lead generation
- How do you do email marketing well
- Cold leads need to be advertised harder and more aggressively
- Warm leads need to be nurtured as a community
- Paid ads are the key to generating leads and their emails
- For products that are repeat purchases, keep the profit low
- For one-time buy products, add more value
- Simplicity is key to promoting value
- Think of 3 tips to solve a problem, then promote the product
- There are a variety of offers you can provide
- The "Value-value-sale" system
- List segmentation
- Focus on paid ads to get those emails, then ensure to use automation.
- The two easiest automation programs are checkout abandonment and a popup on your online sales channel.
EPISODE LINKS
Jacob Anson / Agency JR Links:
- Website: https://www.agencyjr.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacob-r-anson-a92597186/
- Software: https://www.klaviyo.com/
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
21 min - 132: Invention Success in the Construction Industry
Todd Drouillard is the Science and Technology Business leader at HED, which is one of the world’s leading architecture firms for manufacturing, warehousing, and distribution center buildings. Todd has been in architecture for 25 years, has his Masters in Architecture, is an AIA director, and is on the Construction Code Commission Board of Directors in Michigan. Today Todd is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers are changing the way they move products to their end customers, and what inventors with construction-related inventions can do to succeed in getting their innovations to market.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- Warehousing innovation is becoming increasingly more important to the success of a scaling hardware product business
- Construction inventions and innovations are happening very quickly in new building design, fabrication, and maintenance.
- How do you get your construction product into the market to get into new or renovated buildings.
- Less labour, more product. This is prefabrication, and there is a lot of room for new construction inventions in this space.
- Product manufacturing and architecture are merging
- To pitch your construction innovation, show that it reduces risk, increases quality, is more reliable, is easy to install.
- A big advantage when designing your product, is to either make it easy to work with other products, or include what used to be multiple products into one
- There are lots of problems on a construction site, solve them with your construction inventions.
EPISODE LINKS
Todd Drouillard / HED Links:
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/todd-drouillard-aia-b9a7a629/
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
22 min - 131: Why Doing Good with Your Hardware Product Matters
Jos Harrison is the Global Head of Design and Brand Experience at Reckitt, the firm which owns many big brands including Lysol, Veet, Finish, Durex, and more. He has been in the design industry for over 25 years. Today Jos is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can learn what ESG is, why doing good for the world is beneficial for an emerging hardware product, and how to start with implementing ESG in your emerging or scaling business.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- Defining ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance)
- Why ESG is important for a small hardware business
- Why ESG is important for the world.
- How hardware startups can do ESG well, and how to do it early on
- What can hardware startups and scaleups learn from big organizations that do this well.
- The idea of a consumer is old, that is changing.
- Manufacturing options, packaging, materials all can be done smart for sustainability and environmental reasons
- Think about iterative design to become more and more ESG friendly over time
- Educate your users
- Buyers are willing to pay more now, for a product that lasts longer; however, there is a caveat in selling
- Small business have a huge benefit over big corporate, as society believes that startups were there to solve a core problem.
EPISODE LINKS
Jos Harrison / Reckitt Links:
- Website: https://www.reckitt.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/josharrison/
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
29 min - 130: Choosing an eCommerce Platform for your Hardware Product
Tim Bucciarelli is a Director at IronPlane, an eCommerce agency that works with many large product brands. Tim has been a leader in the eCommerce space for almost 30 years. Today Tim is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can understand what eCommerce is, how to choose a great eCommerce platform for your current and future product needs, and how to do a good job of building out your platform, especially around business to business sales.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- What is eCommerce
- How do you choose the right platform to sell online
- Back end platforms explained, and how they connect to front end
- How do you do it well
- Understand your customer
- Understand investment
- Wordpress and WooCommerce is an easy way to get started online
- Shopify is a SaaS, a central piece of software
- BitCommerce is a SaaS that is a bit more opened up
- Adobe Commerce / Magento is larger and more customizable
EPISODE LINKS
Tim Bucciarelli / IronPlane Links:
- Website: https://www.ironplane.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-bucciarelli/
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
23 min - 129: The Best Hardware Product Development Processes
John Carter was the Chief Engineer for Bose for over 12 years, most notably being the name behind noise-canceling headphones. After that, he founded TCGen, and has spent 22 years working with some of the biggest hardware brands in the world on improving their product development processes. He is also a fellow writer with me at Forbes. Today John is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can use best practices from the leading hardware development teams in the world to improve your product design, launch, and scaling journey by understanding what it takes to succeed in the long run, utilizing customer feedback, getting to market fast, and many other development secrets.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- To figure out how to make a great product, he worked all around the world to find out how the best in the world did hardware product development.
- How do you know what areas you should focus on for innovation
- Innovation is not free, it takes a tremendous amount of work, sustained effort, and a budget.
- Focus on one key innovation.
- Don’t share with customers too early, design through the concept first.
- How do you reduce risk that is out there.
- Don’t feature creep
- Get to market, then reiterate and improve.
- Principles of agile development and how it applies to hardware consumer products.
- Empower your team
- The importance of industrial design
- Try rotating feedback in hardware
EPISODE LINKS
John Carter / TCGen Links:
- Website: https://www.tcgen.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jcartertcgen/
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
21 min - 128: Creating an App for Your Hardware Device
Piotr Zajac is the CEO of Untitled Kingdom, a 55-person mobile app development company that focuses on apps for physical hardware connected devices. They have built and launched over 75 full-scale apps for hardware products. Today Piotr is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can understand how to best manage the design and development of your hardware device’s app, and what are the best practices for making a connected device’s app great.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- IoT, MedTech, and FemTech
- Building an app for your hardware product
- Think about your end-users
- Onboarding new users with your application
- Intution takes time to develop to your user base
- Create a habit in your user
- Buy their hands, their hearts, and their brains
- Feedback is key
- Quality of apps, FDA Certification, ISO Certfication
- Quality is much more valuable, and far less expensive, in the long term
- Security
- Technology protocols
- Simplicity in your features
- You can change the world with your product ideas
EPISODE LINKS
Piotr Zajac / Untitled Kingdom Links:
Website: https://www.untitledkingdom.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zajacp/The Product Startup Podcast Links:
Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartupYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartupKevin Mako Links:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-MakoFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/21 min - 127: Benefits of Makerspaces to Product Startups
Tom Pupo is the founder and head of Moonlighter Fab Lab Miami, which Mako Design just partnered with on a new 8,000 square foot hardware makerspace right down Miami Beach. Tom has a Masters Degree in architecture, and been running makerspaces for many years. Today Tom is going to share some valuable knowledge for inventors, startups, and small manufacturers on what a makerspace is, what makes one great, and how hardware startups can benefit from them in many ways beyond just space and machinery.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- What does a hardware makerspace do
- What makes a space great
- What are the benefits
- Space, tools, people
- Design, prototype, test, get feedback, and redo
- Co-working, fabrication lab, and STEAM learning center
- Learning design thinking in the design process
- A makerspace is such a pure experience to get to learn about the product development journey
EPISODE LINKS
Tom Pupo / Moonlighter Miami Links:
- Website: https://moonlighterfablab.org/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tpupo/
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
20 min - 126: What Makes a Consumer Product Invention Great
Mark Maybury is the Chief Technology Officer at Stanley Black and Decker. He is also a member of the Defense Science Board and was a Chief Scientist of the United States Air Force. Today Mark is going to share some valuable knowledge for inventors, startups, and small manufacturers on what makes a consumer product great in 2022, and how to consider these things from the design phase, through to production, then onto scaling up.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- What makes a great new product in your industry
- Innovative, valuable, and scalable
- Environmentally and socially
- Big companies look at innovators and inventors to be the change master
- Scaling a hardware startup business
- There are many parts to scaling, not just sales.
- Pitching to Stanley black and decker
- Genuine need, real value created, and a great team (humility)
- Secrets of innovation
- Observe carefully, listen deeply, think outside of the box, experiment with purpose, and collaborate.
EPISODE LINKS
Mark Maybury / Stanley Black and Decker Links:
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-mark-maybury-28532/
- Website: https://www.stanleyblackanddecker.com/
- Submit to Stanley: https://www.stanleyblackanddecker.com/submityouridea
- Accelerator: https://www.techstars.com/blog/stanley-and-techstars-accelerator
- Stanley Ventures: https://www.stanleyventures.com/
- Stanley Impact Challenge: https://www.stanleyblackanddecker.com/social-responsibility/people/impact-challenge
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
24 min - 125: Pitching Your Invention to Big Product Businesses
Dougal Grimes is the Vice President of Innovation and Inventors Relations for SpinMaster Toys. He leads a team of people who review product pitches from inventors just like you. Before this, he worked for over 10 years as a leader in many different roles at Hasbro. Today Dougal is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can best pitch to large product brands like SpinMaster, and what you can do to best prepare for, deliver, and expand your product’s success with this type of partnership.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- Developing the toy idea out
- A great idea can come from anywhere
- Big ideas come from the mass market, not in-house design teams
- The process of meeting inventors is quite freeform
- Pitching the idea well is important, and applies to all type of industries
- Have a quick pitch, then a proof of concept physically, then prove feasibility of manufacturability, that it is safe, that it is viable, and possibly that it has intellectual property protection.
- Look for toy fairs, conferences, reach out via LinkedIn, find the invention submission areas of the company.
- Remember, a product pitch is a promotion.
- Don’t lead with the technical aspects, lead with the features.
- Remember, you are bringing a solution to a company when you pitch.
- The inventors vision and passion can help push a product through to greater success even after a licencing deal is struck
- Timelines for toy inventors getting to market
EPISODE LINKS
Dougal Grimes / SpinMaster Links:
Website: https://www.spinmaster.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dougalgrimes/The Product Startup Podcast Links:
Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartupYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartupKevin Mako Links:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-MakoFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/39 min - 124: Raising $1 Million for a Hardware Startup
Ryan Lewendon is the Co-Founder and Partner at the law firm Giannuzzi Lewendon LLP. They have 30 lawyers, 1,500 product companies they work with, and hundreds of finance deals run by them per year, in addition to a number of other legal and advisory services to scaling product companies. Today Ryan is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can raise their first big fundraising round of 1 million dollars or more, how to plan for it, execute on it, then spend the money smart when it comes in.
Today you will hear us talk about:
- How to prepare for big-league funding
- Make sure you have a well-vetted product before going to production
- How to make sure you have the right investors
- Work on the right terms
- Explain why this round is so important
- SAFE agreements or Convertible notes agreements for physical consumer products
- How to raise that funding
- How to scale with those funds when you get them
- Build out your human capital, and start with the people where your weaknesses are.
- Remember, your investors are very experienced in this.
- Build out your supply chain
- Build out your distribution network and partners
- If you are going to raise more rounds, when do you start planning the next fundraising round
EPISODE LINKS
Ryan Lewendon / Giannuzzi Lewendon LLP Links:
- Website: https://gllaw.us/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-lewendon-3ba01111/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GiannuzziLewendon
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/giannuzzilewendon/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/GiannuzziGroup
The Product Startup Podcast Links:
- Website: https://www.ProductStartup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ProductStartup/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/ProductStartup/
- Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProductStartup/
- Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ProductStartup/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ProductStartup
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@productstartup
Kevin Mako Links:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Entrepreneurs/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KevMako/
- Quora: https://www.quora.com/profile/Kevin-Mako
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KevMakoPage/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/KevMako/
38 min
About Product Startup
From the publisher's feed
The Product Startup Podcast is the hardware product development industry's #1 podcast. From invention idea to getting onto store shelves, and everything in between. Hear how inventors, product…
startups, & small manufacturers created their inventions and launched their physical product businesses. Learn from the industry's top industrial designers, mechanical engineers, PCB designers, consumer product managers, manufacturers, patent attorneys, hardware investors, product sellers, wholesalers, retailers and more. Learn about industrial design / product design, prototyping, 3d printing, additive manufacturing, product manufacturing, marketing, selling, patenting, logistics, and product business scaling. Hosted by Kevin Mako, the leading strategy and fundraising consultant for hardware startups at www.productstartup.com. Sponsored by TriMech Group, offering a comprehensive range of design, engineering, and manufacturing solutions backed by expertise that is unrivalled in the industry.