Juliana is the Product Growth Manager for CXL, a Digital Marketing Training center with up-to-date marketing courses taught by the best practitioners in the world.

At CXL, Juliana handles all-things lifecycle marketing. Onboarding, post-purchase communication, user guidance, the works!

Known as ‘The CLV Lady’, Juliana fell in love with Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) during her time as Head of Growth and Product Marketing at Omniconvert, a software as a service (SaaS) for e-commerce conversion and retention.

So what wisdom does Juliana have to share from over 10 years in SaaS and e-commerce?

Tune in to hear Daniel and Juliana discuss:

✔️ Are There 4 Levers of E-Commerce?

✔️ The 4 ‘P’s of Marketing

✔️ Being Real About Customer Loyalty

✔️ The RFM Model

Daniel posits that there are 4 levers of e-commerce:

1. Customer acquisition cost
2. Conversion rate
3. Average order value (AOV)
4. Customer lifetime value (CLV) 

Juliana says that it’s really important to be aware of all your metrics. Your focus, however, varies according to what stage you’re at with your e-commerce business. If you’re just starting out, you’re going to be more focused on customer acquisition and conversion rate than CLV because you don’t have any CLV in the first year of your business.

When it comes to AOV, Juliana says that you need to wait until you have enough transactional data to be able to use that average.

On the other hand, some companies have a ton of data but don’t know how to use it. It’s all very well collecting data, but, as Juliana argues, you need someone (or a team) who knows how to analyze it.

The 4 Pillars of E-Commerce are crucial to a successful e-commerce business. Each one does not necessarily hold equal weight at any one time. You need to measure and prioritize for whatever stage you’re at in your business.

Marketing changes all the time. Through it all, Juliana says, there are 4 ‘P’s of Marketing:

• Product
• Price
• Placement
• Promotion 

Everything is dictated by these.

Often e-commerce is not about re-inventing the rule. You have to start with knowing the basics inside out.

In all her experience in retention marketing, Juliana says that you cannot actually grow your retention rate by more than 10% per year.

If you have a 25% retention rate average, in a good year you might get 31%, in a bad year you may not get more than 20%. According to Juliana, this has nothing to do with the tools you’re using, or how smart you are, it’s about romanticizing how loyal customers are. People are eager to try new brands.

Daniel recalls meeting the then CMO of Death Wish Coffee and being surprised to hear them say that their retention rate was “too high”. They were at the stage where they wanted to get back to acquiring new customers.

Believe it or not, you can have retention rates that are too high. There is no exact formula for all of e-commerce. As Juliana points out, it’s about focusing on doing what’s best for your business.

Like all models and formulas, the RFM model doesn’t work for every business. If your e-commerce brand has at least 5 years of transactional data behind it, however, the RFM model is a great methodology to determine customer value

RFM stands for recency, frequency, and monetary value. If you have millions of customers, these three categories provide good segmentations for buyer behavior.

Juliana warns against being relying solely on RFM to create your VIP tier system. Segmenting your customers into VIPs when they may not yet be loyal customers can be counter-productive. Smaller e-commerce businesses need to go further than RFM to really understand their data.

Klaviyo, Juliana and Daniel agree, provide great engagement metrics and segmentation. Email flows that provide open rates, click-through rates, and conversion offer rich data on customer behavior beyond the purchase.

For anything lifestyle marketing and CLV, go follow Juliana on LinkedIn!

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, so stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If you’re new to e-commerce, where should your priorities be? SwitchGrocery is a Canadian online health food store for keto, paleo, vegan, and gluten-free diets. And at just four years old, it’s thriving.

For this episode of The Ecom Show, Daniel invites the Co-Founders of SwitchGrocery, Neha Charnaliaand Bryan Horsley, to tell us all about their e-commerce journey.

Shout out to the Co-Founders of Keto Chow, Chris and Miriam Bair, for introducing Daniel to Neha and Bryan!

Tune in to hear Daniel, Neha, and Bryan discuss:

✔️ How SwitchGrocery Began

✔️ When to Invest in Email Marketing

✔️ High Converting Email Campaigns

✔️ Raising Funds for SwitchGrocery

✔️ Being Human with Your Customers

Neha laughs,

“I don’t think anyone starts a company with a plan, and we fell into that bucket.”

Much like Chris and Miriam from Keto Chow, Neha and Bryan discovered a low-carb lifestyle first. Bryan’s trainer introduced them to the ketogenic diet, and it did wonders for their health. However, at the time, there wasn’t a huge availability of keto, paleo, or gluten-free products.

Neha and Bryan saw a ‘great need’ for a store that specializes in high-quality keto, paleo, vegan and gluten-free products. A store with founders that are invested in the lifestyle as well as what goes into what they’re selling.

And so Neha and Bryan founded SwitchGrocery. They’re four years in and as a company that was built on social media, they have a great relationship with their customers and US and Canadian suppliers.

Neha and Bryan began heavily investing in email marketing in 2021. Not doing so earlier, Neha says, was a ‘lost opportunity’. In SwitchGrocery’s first two years, Neha and Bryan underestimated and underinvested in email marketing. They weren’t collecting emails via pop ups, and they only launched email campaigns for sales and product promos.

Investing in email marketing has led to a ‘significant increase’ in revenue, and strengthened their relationship with their customers. Neha can’t stress enough the importance of email marketing.

“If there’s anything I would say, just stop and invest in today, it’s email. You can either spend 100 bucks a day on ads or you can nurture the customers you have.”

Neha and Bryan now use Klaviyo. They’ve set up the necessary flows, (welcome flows, abandoned cart flows, new customer flows etc), and send three campaigns a week.

“The flows really allow us to customize. We don’t send mass emails anymore, we really customize to our customers.”Their campaign emails now also include trust and content emails. These will include Neha or Bryan’s favorite piece of user-generated content (UGC) that week, or healthy recipes.

Bryan says that ‘contextual’ email campaigns are highly effective. For example, when there was a snowstorm, they sent out a hot chocolate recipe for everyone locked inside. While email campaigns are mostly planned in advance, Klaviyo also allows you to quickly respond to relevant day-to-day events, such as snowstorms.

For this reason, Bryan and Neha have planned emails as well as space in their campaign schedule to connect with customers in their day-to-day experience. These contextual emails tend to have higher open rates, click rates, and conversion. As Daniel points out, attribution is a surprisingly underrated topic in e-commerce.

Neha says that blog campaigns also tend to do very well. She recalls an email campaign she wrote titled, ‘What Makes a Good Business’. It had a 44% open rate and around 23 responses.

Founder emails are especially valuable for increasing engagement and strengthening that brand-customer relationship.

Bryan and Neha have done a few different things to fund SwitchGrocery over the years.

The first was using Clearco, a company that provides funding for ads in exchange for revenue royalties. This enabled to SwitchGrocery to grow with ad funding Neha and Bryan otherwise would not have had.

From there, Bryan and Neha moved to Clearco’s angel investment program. ‘Clear Angel’. This is invested in for longer-term smaller royalty on revenue. Clearco Clear Angel, Bryan allowed SwitchGrocery to scale beyond ads and into inventory.

“Growth is great, but you need the money to order the inventory to then get the growth. It gave us some funds to scale and grow to get to a new kind of level for the business.”

Over the COVID pandemic, Bryan and Neha also were able to take advantage of governmental support. Funding to the Business Development Bank of Canada offered low-interest loans that Bryan and Neha quickly applied for.

These funds have been used to grow SwitchGrocery’s inventory, build their customer service team, and hire developers.

Neha and Bryan always remind their team and contractors to:

“Treat people like people”

That’s been SwitchGrocery’s approach from the very beginning. Neha wrote their first 100 customers thank you cards. The next 1000 received thank you messages on their invoices.

Taking the time to write a unique message for every customer became incredibly difficult to maintain as SwitchGrocery grew. Neha and Bryan wanted to maintain a close relationship with their customers, but they had to change their approach.

So they launched SwitchGrocery’s private Facebook group.

The Facebook group consists of people that have bought from SwitchGrocery, having been invited in their post-purchase thank you email. As of early 2022, there are over 3000 members. If you’re thinking about starting a private Facebook group for your e-commerce, Neha says that you should go for it.

“I can’t recommend this enough. It just has to be genuine.”

For more incredible community-building ideas and entrepreneurial inspiration, follow Bryan and Neha on LinkedIn.

Visit SwitchGroceryfor keto, paleo, vegan, and gluten-free groceries, recipes, and resources.

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, so stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jim Moore has been a marketing entrepreneur for over two decades. But 2016 marked his first venture into Shopify and Facebook ads. Quickly falling in love with the world of e-commerce, Jim became the Chief Marketing Officer of Celtic Knot Jewelry the following year. Ever the serial entrepreneur, Jim is now also the CEO of OptimizeX Inc.

OptimizeX Inc is a Private Equity group that develops Ad Tech SaaS for real-time reporting, attribution, analytics, automation, and AI, to drive customer acquisition and optimize customer lifetime value (LTV).

Let’s see what Jim’s eclectic experiences can teach us about attribution and ensuring the best possible customer experience.

Tune in to hear Daniel and Jim discuss:

✔️ E-Commerce & Creating a Positive Customer Experience

✔️ Facebook, iOS, and OptimizeX

✔️ Why is Attribution so Important?

E-Commerce and Creating a Positive Customer Experience

Before getting into Shopify and Facebook ads, Jim ran a 24 hour a day call center of almost 300 employees from 2009 to 2013. What’s his approach to customer support at his e-commerce store, Celtic Knot Jewelry, and within OptimizeX Inc?

“We look at customer support not as an expense, but as a profit center. It’s not so much support as it is creating a positive experience.”

Celtic Knot Jewelry goes the extra mile not only to ensure excellent brand-customer communication, but high-quality products, custom packaging, and gift-giving. Including a small gift bag with every order demonstrates care and attention to detail that shows a dedication to creating a positive customer experience.

A positive customer experience, Jim continues, goes further than the product you’re selling, the offers you’re promoting, and the creatives you use. All these things are critical, but it’s also about the way you manage a customer experience. Not just replying to social media comments straight away, but also privately messaging them thanking them for their comment, notifying them of your public reply to their comment, and providing further contact details.

“We treat every comment like a potential lead, we treat every engagement like a potential lead. This is how we cultivate the relationship with our audience.”

If a site visitor abandons their cart, they’ll get a phone call from Celtic Knot Jewelry after 15 minutes. The caller will address whatever reason the visitor has for cart abandonment. If, for example, the price seemed too high, they’ll offer a discount. If shipping is too expensive, they’ll offer free shipping.

Similarly, Celtic Knot Jewelry will also call a customer who has made a purchase. They’ll thank them for the order, verify their address, and confirm their order contents.

If anyone leaves a positive review, Celtic Knot Jewelry will reach out to the customer thanking them for the review, then offer a discount that they or their friends can use. To further extend their reach, the reviewer can actually earn 10% of whatever purchase their friends make.

All in all, 40% of Celtic Knot jewelry comes from their call center, 20% comes from email marketing, and 20% comes from SMS marketing.

Facebook, iOS, and OptimizeX Inc

When Jim and his team began building Optimize X Inc, it actually wasn’t supposed to be an attribution platform. It was originally conceived as a reporting and analytics platform.

Then Apple introduced their privacy updates in iOS 14.5, rendering the data inaccurate. This not only affected OptimizeX Inc, but it also affected Jim’s Shopify store. It was time for a new plan. Well, two new plans.

The first plan was to create a customer call center. Following up with customers via phone calls. These work to resolve issues such as abandoned carts and develop a relationship with the customer.

“Let’s go all-in on customer experience because if I can’t generate predictable results through Facebook, I’ve got to be able to recoup that elsewhere.”

The second plan concerned tracking. Once Apple began restricting third-party data, Jim recognized that it was time for first-party tracking.

Third-party tracking, Jim explains, means that you’re relying on a third party to track data for you. You use your script on their domain and you just get access to reporting and their dashboard. First-party tracking means that you track data on your own domain. Apple does not interfere with first-party data tracking. If they did, Shopify simply wouldn’t work.

Jim and his team, therefore, launched a server on their domain, creating a subdomain that tracks site visitor activity: how long they stay for, how far they scroll, what they click on, or if they watch a video. That data is then sent back to Facebook.

In developing this system, the OptimizeX Inc team realized that in order for all their tools to work, end to end analytics, automation, and AI, they needed to focus on attribution.

“It’s kind of like building a house. Getting the structure up takes no time at all. But it’s once you get the structure, the thing that takes time is finishing the house, getting all the fine details where you want it to make it your home.”

Optimize X Inc will be looking to keep the beta open through the end of March 2022 and make its official launch in April.

Why is Attribution So Important? (29:31)

Put simply, attribution identifies the touchpoints towards conversion. What series of actions does a customer take before converting. How important is each step?

As Daniel points out, attribution is a surprisingly underrated topic in e-commerce.

Cold audiences need data. The more customer data you can track, the more accurately Facebook can predict who you show your ads to. When you put your first-party data back into Facebook, your retargeting improves.

Jim advises anyone who is struggling with performance or attribution is to not think of Facebook as the be-all and end-all. It is not the only way to manage customer acquisition.

Focus on building a community. Engage with your audience. Understand their needs, wants, frustrations, and struggles. Produce products that speak to them a create the best customer experience you can.

“It’s great to get your data back to Facebook so that your ads perform predictably. But if things don’t work, there's always a solution. You just have to dig down and find it.”

Be the first to hear about OptimizeX Inc updates by following Jim on LinkedIn!

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ronnie Tejais the Founder of Branzio Watches. With over 15 years of experience in digital marketing all around the world, Ronnie knows a thing or two about building marketing strategies, building a business, and perseverance.

Tune in to hear Daniel and Ronnie discuss:

✔️ Ronnie’s Path to E-Commerce

✔️ Discovering the Importance of SEO

✔️ Is SEO Worth the Time?

✔️ The Value of Email Marketing

✔️ Advice for Entrepreneurs

Ronnie’s Path to E-Commerce

Ronnie is a ‘self-taught’ digital marketer, leading online marketing strategies for businesses around the world. After moving to Canada, Ronnie harnessed his marketing skills in work for HSBC, BestBuy, and SoftwareKing.

At 29 years old, Ronnie decided to invest his time in the watch market. Once he read that watch profit margins are ‘phenomenal’ he jumped right in!

“My focus from day one was to find the supply chain, the suppliers, the ops, and run a team that is far more efficient than I could be as an individual.”

Branzio Watches hire leading watchmakers and designers from around the world. Ronnie’s job is to harness global talent as efficiently as possible.

“I’m a generalist who is surrounded by extremely capable specialists.”

Discovering the Importance of SEO

Ronnie learned all about SEO through networking. If you’re in e-commerce, Ronnie highly recommends going to the yearly Chiang Mai SEO Conference in northern Thailand.

“You will be surrounded by some of the best people around and the friendliest people who are happy to talk about SEO.”

The Chiang Mai SEO conference is especially valuable in bringing together so many perspectives on SEO from different spaces in digital marketing. Ronnie’s self-taught SEO knowledge was based entirely on Google Paid ads, but over the last 7 years, he’s acquired several websites in the affiliate space. Learning about SEO in the affiliate space showed Ronnie what he needed to scale.

Ronnie favors a holistic approach to SEO. Networking with digital marketers across industries to explore how different platforms present different opportunities for SEO.

Is SEO Worth the Time?

To put it simply: yes. You just need to be patient.

Just as you need to have a paid strategy, a social media strategy, or an influencer strategy, you need an SEO strategy.

And if you’re worried about things taking too long? 4 years ago, Branzio Watches were getting 5000 visits per day, today they have around 2 million. And that's free organic traffic. That’s a lot of revenue. If you want to be an entrepreneur, Ronnie advises, you need to think of the long-term.

While prioritization varies from store to store, Ronnie says that paid ads, influencers, SEO, and email should be at the foundation of any e-commerce business. No one element of digital marketing (such as paid ads) is a get-rich-quick solution. A lucrative marketing strategy uses multiple channels. And it takes time.

The Value of Email Marketing

“Email is basically like free sales.”

Like Daniel, Ronnie is in love with Klaviyo. He’s even on their customer advisory board. 12% - 13% of total store revenue in Branzio Watches comes from email.

“So always keep an eye on how to grow your email list.”

A fantastic way to do that is through a quiz. If you’re looking for an example of what a great Shop Quiz looks like, Ronnie recommends checking out Beardbrand. Their quiz recruits 600 - 1000 subscribers a week.

Advice for Entrepreneurs

“Perseverance, man, you need to persevere, don’t give up.”

Ronnie says that he truly found focus last year. He gave up drinking, started waking up at 5 am, and his life changed. He doesn't work 80 hours, he works a normal 30 - 35 hours a week, but his efficiency has skyrocketed. Ronnie isn’t a fan of the “100 hour working week” hustle culture.

Ronnie advises that people often make the mistake of thinking that if they follow one golden rule they’ll get there. Everyone is different. Most entrepreneurs have two of three qualities:

They’re very passionate about their idea.

They’re in the right place at the right time.

They put in years of work.

If you’re truly passionate about your idea, you’ll see it through to the end.

Check out Branzio Watches and follow Ronnie on LinkedIn for more great e-commerce advice.

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Copywriting is one of the most important skills of e-commerce marketing. So let’s take a deep dive into high-quality copywriting and how to incorporate effective storytelling into your email marketing.

Francis Nayan is a Direct Response Email Copywriter and Strategist for 7-8 Figure E-Commerce Companies. Francis specializes in automated behavior-driven emails that provide a steady stream of cash flow for e-commerce businesses around the world.

Daniel and Francis would like to give a shout-out to Joshua Chin, Csaba Borázi, and the Chronus Creative Agency for helping them get connected. Thanks, folks!

Tune in to hear Daniel and Francis discuss:

✔️ How did Francis Get Started in Copywriting?

✔️ How to Increase Conversions With a Personal Tone of Voice

✔️ How Do You Tell Stories in Emails?

✔️ How to Handle Customer Objections

✔️ How Long Should An Email Be?

How did Francis Get Started in Copywriting?

It all began in 2017. At the time, Francis was working as an English teacher in Budapest. He’d been in this role for one and a half years, and he wanted a change. When considering his options, Francis met a copywriter and an international meeting spot. Copywriting appealed to Francis as a career choice that would allow him to work remotely and travel.

From his first client on Upwork, Francis would take on various projects from emails to blog posts and website content until eventually he was hired by an e-commerce email marketing agency. Francis particularly enjoys the ‘instant gratification' from email marketing - seeing how well your work performs a mere few days after launch. That’s when began ‘niching down’ and taking on e-commerce clients.

Daniel and Francis agree that taking on feedback and understanding how customers are responding to your copy is crucial to professional development and success.

How to Improve Conversion with a Personal Tone of Voice

Authentic marketing has never been more important. Millennials and Gen Zs are particularly receptive to a personal and genuine style tone of voice (TOV).

“Nowadays, the buyers are smart. They know what boring templated jargon build copy looks like. They don’t have to be in marketing to know what that is. We have to give the customers credit.”

It’s important for the customer to feel like they’re having a one-to-one conversation while they’re reading your copy. Francis recalls one of his most important lessons from copywriting expert, John Carlton: pretend as if you’re talking to your friend at a bar. ‘Barroom copy’ reads more like offering advice to a friend rather than hard selling.

Naturally, this TOV works best with advanced segmentation, personalized automation, and top-notch design. In Francis’s words, that is ‘smart marketing’. Smart marketing for the smart consumer.

How Do You Tell Stories in Emails?

It goes without saying that marketing emails are shorter than landing pages. So how do you harness storytelling in such short-form content?

As Francis points out, e-commerce emails are limited to fewer than 500 words. Above all, stories show the transformation. To incorporate storytelling into your emails, you need to show how your product takes a customer from point A to point B. You don’t even need 300 words to do that. Most of this involves showcasing what makes your product unique and how it works better than that of your competitors. The more you demonstrate this transformation, the more you can simplify the copy.

“When I say storytelling, it’s not necessarily having that long narrative, it’s showing the transformation.”

It’s not just writing emails that promote a 20% discount, it’s showing the customer why they should use your discount code.

If you are going to go down the narrative route, Francis and Daniel recommend engaging your customers with a story told over a series of emails. AndréChaperon calls this the ‘Soap Opera Sequence’.

The ‘Soap Opera Sequence’ works best at around 5 emails with a call to action (CTA) on the third email. Customers will lose interest if the sequence is too long.

How to Handle Customer Objections

The best way to handle customer objections is to be upfront about them. Don’t hide the fact that there will be certain things your customers face, but that you have a solution to it. For example, “We realize some items will take some time to arrive. That’s why you can track your order every step of the way/we only charge X - amount for shipping.”

Always mention potential objections in the footer or P.S. Or dedicate an entire email to one. For example, “Worried your item won’t fit? Here’s our exchange policy.” Just make sure that your customers know that their objections are being taken care of.

How Long Should an Email Be?

Francis says that this all comes down to testing. Generally, don’t make it too long. Don’t have 300 - 400 words of copy with 10 - 20 product blocks.

The more expensive a product is, the more copy you’ll need.

Francis prefers ‘short, punchy copy’.

“People are just scrolling through their emails, and you want to stand out and get the point across pretty quick.”

Use short concise copy that tells a story of transformation.

For more fantastic advice on copywriting and marketing, be sure to follow Francis on LinkedIn and check out our episode with Csaba Borázi, ‘Why Copywriting is the Number One Skill in E-Commerce Marketing’.

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Want to increase your organic reach? Let’s talk Authority First SEO.

Dale Bertrand is an SEO Strategist, Keynote Speaker, Business Coach, and the Founder of Fire&Spark. Fire&Spark is an SEO firm that helps e-commerce and B2B brands leverage Authority First SEO to double or even triple organic search revenue.

So, what is Authority First SEO anyway? Tune in to hear Dale and our CEO and podcast host, Daniel Budai discuss:

✔️ Becoming a Founder in Digital Marketing

✔️ What is Authority SEO?

✔️ Why Does Authority First SEO Perform Well on Google?

✔️ Purpose Driven SEO

✔️ Technical SEO

✔️ SEO Advice for E-Commerce Owners?

Dale has a very technical background. After graduating from engineering school, Dale worked as a software developer for 20 years.

In 2008, Dale decided to switch over to digital marketing. He began as a freelancer then founded his SEO agency Fire&Spark.

Fire&Spark began as an office of 20 people in Boston. When the pandemic hit, they went remote and, like many agencies, never looked back. They’re now stretched across many time zones from Europe to the US.

“We focus on SEO. We’re SEO all day, every day.”

And many of Fire&Spark’s clients are in e-commerce. Dale and his employees especially love working with mission-driven e-commerce brands.

Primarily, Fire&Spark focuses on Authority First SEO.

Authority First SEO makes brand authority the core focus. This means improving a website’s ability to post high-ranking content. Naturally, Fire&Spark also focuses on the technical aspects of SEO, but the authority side of SEO really moves the needle. Authority First SEO can double or even triple your organic traffic.

Dale identifies 3 fundamentals of SEO:

1. Building a high-functioning website where Google can index your site.
2. Keyword visibility: targeting the right keywords and search intent so that you’re offering information or a product that people are actually looking for.
3. Authority: building authority on Google so that your content is relevant to search intent. The reason why Google should choose your piece of content over your competitors' content.  

Dale says that Google search results used to be far easier to manipulate. When he was just starting in SEO, you could just put lots of keywords in an article or blog, whether they were relevant or not, and your content would be favored in search results.

Now, those manipulations are useless. Google’s AI is a lot better at understanding search queries. For example, if someone types in ‘3D printing service’, they are looking for someone to manufacture parts for them on a 3D printer. If someone types in ‘3D printer’ into Google, they’re looking to buy a 3D printer. Google’s AI is now really good at discerning between the two. In other words, understanding search intent and queries.

“Fundamentally, an AI search engine like Google is about predicting human behavior.”

And the Google search engine is learning. It’s not just showing us the best results, it’s learning from what we click on. If we click on a website do we stay there? Or do we come back immediately to Google and click on something else?

This means that Google is better than ever at classifying web pages and ranking which ones it should show.

“At the end of the day, it’s all about making sure that you’re targeting the right search intent instead of keywords.”

As a marketer, therefore, you need to know what your customers are searching for. Google’s AI is excellent at understanding what people are looking for and finding the right content. That content needs to be good enough to satisfy your customers' queries and make them stay.

Your customers won’t just be looking for your product or service, they’re looking for information related to your product or service. Namely any relevant pain points and problems. Knowing what your customers are searching for is what Dale calls ‘customer intimacy’.

Essentially, your authority on Google is improved with awesome content that your customers engage with.

Purpose driven SEO takes a top-down approach to SEO. Bottom-up focuses on all the technical signals that Google needs to see. Top-down focuses on your overarching marketing strategy.

This involves a close examination of your brand. What is remarkable about your brand? Do you have a story? Do you have a social mission? Stories are very powerful from an SEO perspective. Telling a compelling story makes for a great purpose driven SEO campaign.

Having a purpose is key to building authority content. It allows you to partner with like-minded individuals and organizations. This, in turn, creates more content via content partnerships and UGC (User Generated Content) because there’s a subject matter that you all care about. UGC is not created because customers want to help you sell more, it's created because they agree with your purpose.

Google wants to see brands that are either already established or are building momentum. Purpose driven SEO is crucial to establishing your brand.

While Dale focuses on Authority First SEO, he also recognizes the importance of technical SEO. The difference today is that platforms like Shopify, WordPress, and HubSpot make the technical aspects of SEO relatively simple.

The main technical focus, Dale says, should be on page speed. If your pages are too slow, Google can’t crawl or index your website.

From there, it’s all about establishing authority with relevant content that your customers engage with.

Dale acknowledges that there is a lot of competition in e-commerce. So you need to establish whether your website has a content problem or an authority problem. Sometimes you need to address both, but usually, the emphasis should be on one or the other.

To establish SEO authority, carve out longtail keyword niches where you don’t have a ton of competition. If you already have some authority, make sure that you create content that addresses your customers’ pain points.

Dale also advises against what he terms as ‘inefficient content’. Writing articles is the hardest way to do content. FAQs are very efficient in getting your keywords in and satisfying top-of-the-funnel queries.

To learn more about SEO and driving traffic to your store, visit Fire&Spark and connect with Dale on LinkedIn.

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We’re very excited to welcome Chloë Thomas to our 88th episode of The Ecom Show. Chloë is a keynote speaker, bestselling author, and Founder of the award-winning eCommerce MasterPlan podcast.

Tune in to hear Chloë and our CEO and podcast host, Daniel Budai discuss:

✔️ How Did Chloë Begin in E-Commerce?

✔️ How Has E-Commerce Changed in 20 Years?

✔️ Trend #1: Zero-Party Data

✔️ Trend #2 Selling Where the Customer Wants to Buy

✔️ Trend #3 Why the Message Beats the Medium

✔️ Trend #4 Partnership Marketing

✔️ Trend #5 The Path to Net Zero

How Did Chloë Begin in E-Commerce?

Chloë’s e-commerce journey when she began working for a UK high street and catalog retailer. Specifically, optimizing their website and digital marketing.

Back in the early 2000s, Chloë led the e-commerce for a group of mail-order brands. Building their first website, implementing their email campaigns, setting up Google ads, etc. From there, Chloë created an online marketing agency that she ran for 10 years.

Now? She’s a globally recognized e-commerce thought leader.

“I am incredibly lucky to get to think, speak, and write, on the subject of e-commerce.”

How Has E-Commerce Changed Over the Last 20 Years?

Chloë has been in e-commerce for almost 20 years. So it’s safe to say that she’s seen a lot of changes!

The biggest change Chloë identifies is that the software has become more accessible. While the barriers to entry are lower, this has actually made things more difficult. E-commerce owners need to do a lot more to stand out from the competition.

“The successful people are the ones who work out what they should do and actually deliver on it. So in many ways, nothing’s changed. And in some ways, everything’s changed.”

This year, Chloë predicts that these 5 areas of change will guide the future of e-commerce.

1. Zero Party Data
2. Selling Were the Customer Wants to Buy
3. Message Beats the Medium
4. Partnership Marketing
5. Embrace the Path to Net Zero

Trend 1: Zero-Party Data

Zero Party Data is data collected directly from the consumer. In other words, permission-based marketing. This is usually collected via shop quizzes or surveys. And Chloë is a big fan.

“It’s marketing done well. As a pure trained marketer, I love it when marketing is done properly.”

Chloë stipulates that zero-party data drives results for two key reasons:

1. Personalization

Zero-party data allows e-commerce owners to send out more personalized, content-driven marketing that resonates with their customers.

1. Engages the customers

Quizzes and surveys engage the customers. Neuromarketers have identified that if human beings feel like if they have had some input in the creation of something, they are more likely to back it. In the case of zero-party data, backing it is buying it.

Trend 2: Selling Where the Customer Wants to Buy

Chloë describes this trend as an amalgamation of several online shopping trends.Consumers are increasingly buying online. In games, on marketplaces, on social media, Messenger chats, WhatsApp. Consumers are making purchases from pretty much anywhere you can think of online.

This opens up a whole new world of processes. Understanding what it means to sell on TikTok, WhatsApp, or Pinterest, for example, requires a deep understanding of the platforms. Every one of these channels has its process that e-commerce owners need to learn about and integrate into their stores.

All these marketplaces open up or tap into a new customer niche. Vegan marketplaces are very popular, for example. Net-zero marketplaces are opening up. Recently, Chloë recorded a podcast episode with a company that’s creating a marketplace for disabled consumers. This is a huge untapped market for many online businesses.

Chloë’s advice for keeping up with this trend is to have a tech stack that enables you to adapt quickly. Make sure your product information is in a format that allows you to fire it out to different places quickly. Keep track of your inventory system. Have a marketing team that's ready to twist and pivot.

“The biggest lesson of 2020 was that if you had the right tech stack, life was a lot easier.”

Trend 3: Message Beats the Medium

In the world of the smart consumer, your marketing needs to be creative.

Chloë says that there’s a consumer desire for connection. They want to know the story behind the product that makes sense to them. To know that their decision to buy aligns with their morals. Secondly, there is huge competition. To stand out, you need to be engaging with the consumer and have great creative marketing across channels. Your marketing team needs analytical creative people who understand great copy and design.

Trend 4: Partnership Marketing

If creative marketing is not your strong suit, Chloë advises investing in partnership marketing.

In influencer marketing, the brand owns the right to use the creative marketing that their influencer creates.

Anything you can do with someone that your customers trust is very powerful. It enables your brand to get in front of a good audience and get someone else to create creative marketing.

Affiliate marketing harnesses partners who will promote your brand for a commission.

You can also turn your customers into advocates through a loyalty program or a customer referral incentive scheme. The start of the year, Chloë, advises, is the best time to do it.

Trend 5: Getting on the Path to Net Zero

Increasingly customers are pushing for sustainability, government pressure is on, and as Chloë puts it,

“Quite frankly, it’s the right thing to do for the planet.”

E-commerce industries still have a lot of work to do on the path to net-zero. It’s something to start talking about and get excited about. Evaluate the impact your e-commerce has on the environment and work on reducing waste and your carbon footprint as much as you can.

For even more fantastic advice on how to win at e-commerce this year, check out Chloë’s eCommerce Master Plan Podcast, her Keep Optimizing Marketing Podcast, visit chloethomas.com or follow Chloë on LinkedIn.

Thank you for listening! We come out with new episodes every Thursday, stay tuned!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

#87 Daniel Budai from Budai Media: 3 More Tools to Scale Your E-Commerce

We’re building quite the e-commerce toolbox here!

For episode 87 of The Ecom Show, our CEO and podcast host Daniel Budai takes a look at:

✔️ 3 More Tools to Scale Your E-Commerce

✔️ Entrepreneurship

✔️ Advice from Dan Kennedy and Tim Ferriss

Let’s dive straight in.

3 More Tools to Scale Your E-Commerce

VideoWise

If you want to keep up with the rise of social commerce, VideoWiseshould be your go-to software tool.

VideoWise allows e-commerce owners to connect their Shopify store with TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and other social media channels to add product review videos and other forms of user-generated content (UGC).

E-commerce owners are also free to upload videos from their libraries.

VideoWise significantly increases conversion rates for e-commerce stores on both desktop and mobile. On average, if you have 250,000 website visitors, VideoWise increases your revenue by $20,000. That’s almost 10¢ per visitor.

As for pricing, they only charge $49 per month and 2% of direct video sales. A direct video sale is when a customer converts within your product video. If they watch the video and buy your product elsewhere, this does not constitute a direct sale.

Their analytical tools are also top-notch. On your analytics page, you can see the number of views for each video, average watch times, direct sales, and more.

The Founder and CEO of VideoWise, Claudiu Cioba prides himself on being transparent about conversion. Take a look at what he has to say about honest attribution models in episode #74 of The Ecom Show: How to Use Video on Your Shopify Store Without Slowing Site Speed.

VideoWise is an excellent tool for increasing conversions, engagement, and harnessing UGC without slowing down your website.

Daniel highly recommends checking it out.

FreeCashFlow.io Daniel cannot emphasize enough the importance of having a good accountant for your e-commerce, or even any business.

If your e-commerce is in the US, Daniel recommends checking out FreeCashFlow.io. FreeCashFlow.io are absolute experts on bookkeeping and tax planning. Here are just a couple of examples of how you can save money with proper tax planning:

Startup Cost Deduction This startup cost allows US entrepreneurs to claim a deduction of up to $5000 for any business cost up until the point their business is created.

This includes product research, travel, and work with lawyers and accountants. You just need to keep your receipts and documentation.

Home Office Deduction

There are two ways you can claim a tax deduction from running your business at home.

The first way is the Simplified Calculated Method in which the highest deduction available is $1500.

The second method is more complicated but lucrative: The Actual Expenses Method.

The actual expense method takes the square footage of your office space as a percentage of your total home. Your tax deduction can then cover whatever cost is included in that percentage. That includes rent, mortgage, or even repair maintenance. The biggest deduction FreeCashFlow.io has claimed for their client using this method is $14,000.

For more tax advice, check out Daniel’s podcast episode with the Co-Founder of FreeCashFlow.io: Tax Planning and Deductions All E-Commerce Owners Should Know About.

OptinMonster

Daniel is a huge fan of OptinMonster. When he began his email marketing career in 2018, OptinMonster was the first pop up tool he ever used. And he’s still using it today!

Despite testing many pop up tools over the years, (Privy, Klaviyo’s pop up feature, OptiMonk), OptinMonster always comes out on top.

OptinMonster stands out with its multiple customization options. Including lightbox pop ups, floating bars, scroll boxes, exit-intent pop ups, and more.

With its integration with Google Analytics, on-site retargeting and personalization, lead segmentation, exit-intent technology, purchase history, and advanced traffic redirection, OptinMonster is a great tool to use if you want to increase your conversions without spamming your visitors. Returning visitors, for example, will see a different pop up to new visitors. This provides a more personalized and optimized experience for your customers.

At Budai Media, we see pop up conversion rates as high as 10 - 20% using OptinMonster.

Check out our case study: Over $1.2 Million Generated Using Klaviyo Email Marketing to see how you can use OptinMonster pop ups to generate revenue for your store.

Some Thoughts on Entrepreneurship

Last week, Daniel asked his LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram followers a question:

How many years ago did you launch your business?

Over 100 people responded, many with their own stories to tell. Entrepreneurship is not always easy in the beginning. But once you gain some traction and success, looking back to your humble beginnings can be a beautiful thing.

Daniel’s question put him in contact with some people he hasn’t spoken to in years. When you look for it, there is a thriving community of business owners ready and willing to help each other out.

Reflections from Dan Kennedy and Tim Ferriss

“The company that can spend the most to acquire a customer wins.”

- Dan Kennedy

Dan Kennedy is an absolute legend in direct response marketing, but Daniel believes that there’s more to acquiring customers than money. If you understand the buyer persona better than your competitors, you can still win. Even if you have less money.

Gymshark, for example, began in 2013 as a relatively tiny competitor to other sports brands such as Nike, Adidas, and Puma. Its Founder and CEO, Ben Francis, identified a niche that his competitors had failed to fit. In other words, he sought to serve his buyer persona. While Gymshark is not as huge as Nike just yet, it grew exponentially over a few short years, valuing at over $1.45 billion in 2022. It’s safe to say that Gymshark hasn’t been suffocated by its competition.

“What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do.”

• Tim Ferriss

Now, this is something Daniel agrees with! Take a moment to think about your deepest fears. That’s the first step in addressing them.

Daniel’s biggest fears are deep water and heights. And guess what he has planned? Deep diving, sky diving, and mountain climbing!

Feeling the fear and doing it anyway is not only a huge confidence boost, it trains you to power through difficult situations.

If you liked this episode of The Ecom Show, please feel free to leave any comments you have on our YouTube channel, contact Daniel on LinkedIn, or check out another episode!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Let’s talk scaling, marketing, and friendship. (It turns out that there are friends in business).

For episode 86 of The Ecom Show, our CEO and podcast host Daniel Budai takes a deep dive into:

✔️ 3 Must-Have Tools to Scale Your E-Commerce

✔️ Friendship in Business

✔️ What Marketing Channels Should You Try This Year?

✔️Advice from Jeff Bezos & David Bebee

Let’s go!

3 Must-Have Tools to Scale Your E-Commerce 

Recart

Recart streamlines Facebook Messenger and SMS marketing with automated flows, opt-in tools, and software integrations.

Take a look at how we made 18% of a print-on-demand store’s monthly revenue with Recart. Recart allowed us to connect a Messenger welcome flow with a popup, thus tripling our client’s opt-in rate. Generally, opt-in rates tend to be higher on Messenger than with email.

For our client in pet e-commerce, we used Recart to triple our client’s monthly revenue from Messenger.

Daniel highly recommends Recart for e-commerce owners, even if you’re just starting out. Their basic plan is very affordable and their pricing increases as your business grows.

ShopifyShopify doesn’t need a big introduction. As the fastest-growing e-commerce platform in the last six years, over 2 million online stores use Shopify as of 2022.

Unlike BigCommerce and WooCommerce, Shopify takes care of your website domain. This means that you don’t have to deal with any domain admin, but it also means that your website can be shut down by Shopify if your store inadvertently runs into any legal issues.

Like Recart, Shopify is also very affordable. Its pricing begins at $29 and increases as your e-commerce store grows.

Plus, Shopify apps allow you to integrate e-commerce software such as Zipify One Click Upsell, Reconvert, Klaviyo, and many more.

Shopify themes are also a cheap way to improve optimization. They are by no means a single solution to conversion rate optimization, but they are helpful if you’re just starting out with a tight budget.

We’re proud members of Shopify’s partner program. Take a look at how we can help optimize your Shopify store here.

Octane AI

Octane AI began as a Messenger chatbot platform. In 2021, they quickly realized how important zero-party data would be to e-commerce, and introduced two new incredible features:1. Shop Quiz

Shop Quiz collects zero-party data (data voluntarily given by the customer) to personalize product recommendations and build a detailed buyer persona. 2. Conversational Popups Conversational popups allow you to collect email, SMS, and Messenger opt-ins by asking customers about their needs and preferences. And the personalization doesn’t stop there. Octane AI integrates with Klaviyo so that you can not only personalize your welcome flows, but also all future communications with your customers. If you want to learn a ton about your customers and drastically improve your SMS and email marketing and their shopping experience, Octane AI is the tool to use. Friendship in Business Business is not all about being cut-throat. Bob Iger, who was the CEO of Disney for 15 years talks about the importance of friendship and staying in touch with your emotions in his book, The Ride of a Lifetime.While conferences are often about serious networking, don’t be afraid to have some fun and make some friends. Thriving in business is a wonderful experience to share.

Poll: What Marketing Channels Should You Try This Year?

Last week, Daniel asked his followers: What Marketing Channel Will You Try in 2022? And the results are in!

Over half of the respondents on LinkedIn said that they would try TikTok.

It’s safe to say that TikTok is really hot right now. In light of the iOS 14 and iOS 15 updates, many e-commerce owners do not trust Facebook as much as they once did. Plus, TikTok is thriving as a Gen Z platform. It’s a very different user experience from Facebook and Instagram, and it’s easy to consume a lot of content in a short space of time. Daniel predicts that TikTok will be bigger than any other social media platform in a couple of years.

Advice from Jeff Bezos and David Beebe 

“It’s hard to find things that won’t sell online.”

• Jeff Bezos, Founder & CEO of Amazon 

If you’re just starting out in e-commerce, take some advice from someone who’s been in the industry for over 25 years. Almost anything can be sold online. It’s about putting in the time and work to learn how.

“Content marketing is like a first date. If you only talk about yourself, there won’t be a second one.”

• David Beebe, Founder and CEO of Storified Brands 

Even when advertising your brand, try not to make everything about you. Talk about your clients and partners, interview other people in your field, engage with your audience.

If you liked this episode of The Ecom Show, please feel free to leave any comments you have on our YouTube channel, contact Daniel on LinkedIn, or check out another episode!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

#85 Daniel Budai from Budai Media: Scale Your E-Commerce With These 3 Digital Marketing Tools

Our CEO and podcast host Daniel Budai is back with more tips and tricks for scaling your e-commerce in 2022.

This week, Daniel takes us through:

✔️ 3 Digital Marketing Software Tools You Need in 2022

✔️ 3 Marketing Personalities We all Could Learn From

✔️ An Introduction WhatsApp Marketing

✔️ Motivational Musings

Let’s dive right in!

3 Digital Marketing Software Tools You Need in 2022 

PushOwl

PushOwl is the most popular push-notification platform. And for a good reason!

PushOwl is used by over 20,000 Shopify stores and it’s very budget-friendly. Your first 500 push notifications are free. From there, Push Owl is between $19 - $50 a month for up to 30,000 messages per month. Considering the return on investment (ROI) for push notifications, this is a great deal.

One limitation of push notifications is that they do not work on iOS and iPhones. If the majority of your visitors are using iPhones (as opposed to desktop or tablets) it may not be worth your while to use PushOwl.

Push notifications are fantastic for browse abandonments, abandoned carts, and shipping notifications. If using push notifications for sales events, namely flash sales, Daniel recommends only targeting your engaged customers. Take care not to spam your visitors, this will decrease your website conversion rate.

Naturally, you should always ensure your customers have opted in for push notifications. PushOwl never sends notifications without your customers’ consent.

If you have a Shopify store, Daniel highly recommends PushOwl as your push notification platform of choice.

ReConvert If you’re looking to really level up your conversion rate optimization (CRO), ReConvert is the place to go.

ReConvert allows e-commerce owners to optimize their post-purchase ‘Thank You’ page. Features include upsells, time-sensitive offers, product recommendations, and surveys. As we know, surveys are invaluable for collecting zero-party data. Plus, ReConvert integrates with Klaviyo. This means that you can set up personalized email flows (birthday flows, for example) based on data collected from your ‘Thank You’ page.

Daniel also recommends filming and uploading up a ‘Thank You’ video to either your ‘Thank You’ page or post-purchase email. Genuinely thanking your customers (don’t use this video to upsell) builds trust in your brand.

Another fantastic thing about ReConvert is its accessibility. Its visual builder is fantastic for setting up sales funnels and flows. Check out their video on how to set up post-purchase funnels for your e-commerce here.

Klaviyo

Klaviyo is the best tool for e-commerce email marketing. In fact, it’s our go-to toolat Budai Media.

There are a few email marketing platforms out there, but Klaviyo’s data analytics sets it apart from its competitors. Its AI is advanced enough to predict not only your customers’ expected dates of next order but also their lifetime value. The most powerful email marketing is founded on close data analysis and advanced list segmentation.

So what are the downsides? Klaviyo is expensive. More expensive than its two key competitors, Mailchimp and Drip. In this instance, however, you get what you pay for. Daniel advises that once your store revenue reaches $10,000 - $20,000 a month Klaviyo is by far your best option.

Klaviyo’s help center is also very easy to navigate. Check it out here.

3 Marketing Personalities We All Could Learn From 

Dan Kennedy

We’re off to a fantastic start with a renowned marketing strategist, Dan Kennedy. Kennedy has authored 32 books, including his ‘No BS’ series, ‘Why Advertising Fails’, and ‘Speak to Sell’. He has study groups in over 100 cities.

When it comes to direct response marketing Dan Kennedy is your man. Check out his work on Amazon.

David Ogilvy

What couldn’t we learn from the “Father of Advertising” David Ogilvy? Ogilvy is revered for his highly successful advertising campaigns for Rolls Royce, Dove, and Shell in the mid 20th century.

Ogilvy’s dedication to customer research and measuring market results led to his incredible success. Failing to measure your results, Ogilvy advised, is one of the worst mistakes you can make. Now that we’re in the digital age, it’s far easier to measure market results than it was in Ogilvy’s heyday. You can never have too much data analysis!

Gary Halbert

Gary Helbert is a copywriting celebrity and probably the biggest influencer on direct response copywriting. His AIDA model: attention, interest, desire, and action is to trace the customer journey across marketing channels.

Helbert wrote a series of enlightening letters to his son on advertising, business, and psychology. They’re available online, and Daniel highly recommendschecking them out.

WhatsApp Marketing Last week, Daniel asked his followers a question: Have you ever tried WhatsApp marketing? 

To his surprise, the response was, overwhelmingly, “No”.

WhatsApp marketing is much like Messenger marketing. It’s owned by Facebook, and it’s great for building trust with your customers. Daniel advises against using the same tone for Messenger and WhatsApp as you would for your emails. WhatsApp is for communication with your customers - don’t bombard them with sales messages and make sure that you are quick to reply to any inquiries they may have.

Over the coming weeks, Daniel will continue research into the somewhat untapped world of WhatsApp marketing. In the meantime, check out SuperLemon and Sirenato get started on the platform.

Motivational Musings 

It wouldn’t be a Daniel Budai Master Show without a few of Daniel’s favorite quotations!

“Quality is never an accident. It is always the result of intelligent effort.”

• John Ruskin   

Quality takes time and work. It can take years, sometimes even decades.

“Be so good they can’t ignore you.”

• Steve Martin   

Never take being ignored personally, Just work on getting there.

If you liked this episode of The Ecom Show, please feel free to leave any comments you have on our YouTube channel, contact Daniel on LinkedIn, or check out another episode!

Watch this space for Daniel’s very own e-commerce playbook for a successful 2022 coming out very soon!

Follow Daniel Budai:

Daniel's LinkedIn

Daniel's Facebook

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.