When you are just getting started with your first eCommerce business it is overwhelming trying to navigate how to make the product a reality.

Today we talked with Alex Burdge, co-founder and CEO at Shyft. Alex has a background in product design, working with manufacturers all around the world, and so much more within the supply chain world. He has built a large team of experts that can take your idea and make it come to reality without you having to go through the learning curve of starting a new venture.

Learn more about how to find a manufacturer, where to look, how to work with them, and everything in between.

If you'd like to connect with Alex, you can hit him up on Linkedin.

Adam is as passionate about packaging as he is about preaching the good word. He is a high-energy expert that has created amazing packaging for dozens of notable brands.

In our conversation with Adam we talk through the 4 buckets of sustainability and how packaging can build brand, reduce costs, and be better for the planet.

If you'd like to connect with Adam you can check him out at packagingpastor.com

We've all know how important popups are for capturing emails and growing our customer lists, however how many of us are making them a priority? It's time to focus on your popups and grow your eCommerce business!

Matt Cimino joins us today to talk through the importance of popups and how to optimize them. He even drops a new term that I love, "positive friction", which basically means that you ask your site visitors more questions, but they have to be the right questions. Doing it in the right way can 2x your popup conversion rate (email/sms signups).

Matt has spent the past 8 years perfecting the art of popups. He began running an agency that focused on that for some large brands (we're talking house-hold name brands). While doing that his team began creating very customized solutions for these brands. They A/B tested tens of thousands of times to dial in the perfect recipe.

Two years ago Matt decided that the world needed a popup software that was built with all these optimizations and learnings already built in, not as an afterthought product on another software (ie. ESP goes POPUP). Thus was Amped was born!

Learn how important your popups are and how you can double your engagement with them on today's episode!

If you'd like to learn more about Amped visit https://www.amped.io/

You can connect with Matt on linkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattcimino/

Jeff Oxford is a specialist in eCommerce search engine optimization. He walks us through the newest as well as the time tested techniques in SEO. Obviously he does this all day everyday and would love to have more clients to work with, but Jeff also drops some truth bombs on how a small startup business can start getting SEO traction without breaking the bank on hiring an agency.

We talk with Jeff about a few key things that any brand can implement in order to start ranking well for their desired keywords. He even tells us how to effectively vet a new agency to make sure they are a good one (because we all know there are more mediocre ones than actual good ones!)

Search engine optimization is a zero sum game, so it will always have to play a role in your marketing efforts even if you pull back on it for a year or two. Your competitors are most likely coming after your position so don't get lazy with your SEO game!

To contact Jeff just go to his website 180marketing.com.

Hunter Stutz, from Pitted Labs, talks to us today about the ins and outs of walmart.com. Pitted labs started out as an amazon agency and has expanded into multiple different channels including a fulfillment center and VC firm. One of their most unique expertise is on taking brands who sell on Amazon and expanding their reach to Walmart.com

Hunter dives into how Walmart.com compares to Amazon, why a brand would want to sell on Walmart.com, how to be successful on Walmart.com, and what expectations they should have while selling on Walmart.com. Spoiler alert, it won't be as big as Amazon, at least not yet, but as an early adopter your brand will be able to capture traction on Walmart.com before it really takes off.

If you are interested in talking with Hunter and Pitted labs, please visit their website here.

How many times has your brand heard from a customers "well, Amazon does it!"? Amazon has really pushed the boundaries of fast and free shipping in the past 10 years and there is no end in sight. When two day shipping was the holy grail of shipping time, but now they are pushing into one-day and same-day shipping.

In this episode we talk with Manish Chowdhary, an expert in the logistics and shipping world. He is the founder of Cahoot, a company that enables these fast a free shipping methods for eCommerce brands. Manish is a walking dictionary when it comes to the shipping, warehousing, and logistics industries.

Cahoot is a peer-to-peer network that makes it so you can unlock Amazon-like shipping times for your eCom brand. Just think, the Uber of eCommerce fulfillment. For more information about Cahoot click here.

Whether you use Cahoot or not, the future of eCommerce is fast and free shipping for customers. It is time to face that reality and see how you can unlock that ability for your brand.

Gabe is a master at driving traffic through many paid advertising channels such as Facebook ads, Google ads, influencer marketing and more. Most of his experience has been in driving sales for direct to consumer eCommerce brands. He recently moved into the fintech Saas world, where he is able to take the principles of marketing a physical into a service based software business.

Gabe walks us through how he builds his frameworks, or funnels, and how building a strong foundation of touch points with your traffic works no matter the industry or product.

Connect with Gabe on Linkedin.

Amazon is a beast, but it's becoming even more important to sell your product on their platform. In this episode we discuss what it takes to sell on Amazon, why you should or shouldn't sell on Amazon, and who you should hire to help you do it.

Josh is the founder of a top tier Amazon consulting agency and shares all of his expertise on how to approach Amazon as an existing brand or as a new product.

Just like it's become necessary to have a social media presence (if you're not on facebook or instagram, do you even exist?!) the same thing is happening with Amazon. In order to keep and find new customers Amazon can be a part of a solid marketing and sales strategy.

But just being on Amazon isn't enough, there are so many intricacies of the platform that you want to make sure you approach it in the right way. There are agencies built to help you do that, or you can tackle it yourself by hiring someone in house to manage it. No matter how you approach Amazon, this episode will give you perspective to make those hard decisions.

If you're more interested in what Josh does or connecting with him, follow him on linkedin here.

There comes a time in every direct to consumer brand's lifetime where they are spending on Facebook ads, Google Ads, Display ads, and feel somewhat tapped out on those channels. Even though the barrier to entry on digital PPC is so low and highly scalable, diversifying a advertising strategy is the best way to scale and future-proof a rapidly growing business.

Direct mail is making a comeback in the advertising space and it is proving to be even more effective than most digitally native brands originally thought. In this episode we go into detail on what direct mail looks like for a D2C company. From what the minimum spend looks like to what different kind of campaigns perform well, we talk about different strategies that a brand can employ to effectively scale a direct mail advertising campaign.

To learn more about Megan and Labyrinth Digital you can go to https://labyrinth.digital/.

As your product goes from idea to international best-seller you'll go through various growth stages. Working with a third party logistics (3PL) company can really help you go from a basement operation to a full-fledged business. However, working with a 3PL comes with its own issues and isn't right for every brand, in this episode we get into all those details.

You'll hear how Braden first took the plunge into the 3PL world and how him and his partners have turned their 3PL into a thriving business. We also talk about what the brand/3PL relationship looks like from the warehouse side, giving perspective to brand owners and operators.

We go over when you should rely on a 3PL and when you shouldn't, what kind of different 3PLs are out there, and how to pick the right one for you.

This episode will broaden your perspective on working with the warehousing world.

For more information about launch fulfillment you can check out their website here