The Ecommerce Influence Podcast: Advanced Acquisition And Retention Strategies For Fast-growing Online Brands

Drew Sanocki is one of my favorite people to talk to. He's been a longtime friend and possesses a wealth of wisdom. Drew has successfully built and exited a company, turned around two other nine-figure retailers and is currently overseeing the growth of PostPilot, which recently achieved 8-figures in annual recurring revenue (ARR). What distinguishes Drew in my mind is his unwavering commitment to his family and his well-being. He has a wonderful family and leads an inspirational life. In this episode, we gain valuable insights into his mindset and philosophy on building both a fulfilling life and a successful business. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Why Drew is waking up at 4:30 a.m. and sprinting at 51 years old A transparent look at his daily schedule while managing one of the country's fastest-growing companies. The strategies he uses to maintain connection with his kids and wife while running a startup The details behind his acquisition of PostPilot for $50,000 and its transformation into an 8-fi

The return episode is here!  I'm back! After an unexpected 10-month break, this is the long-awaited return episode.  The truth is, letting the podcast go dormant was never my intention. I had been planning to launch a new episode for months. However, even with the best intentions, it never happened. So what happened? A lot of unexpected things changed in my life.  I believe there are times for learning and times for sharing. I have been in a heavy learning phase over the last year. Now is the time for sharing.  All is revealed in this all-new episode.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: What I have been up to for the last 10 months My thoughts on parenting and entrepreneurship Why I have been spending the majority of my time in real estate recently Why I took back over as CEO of Brand Growth Experts How a trip to Japan changed my trajectory  Lessons I've learned from the last year What to expect from this podcast going forward Resources:  Have thoughts! Hit me up on Twitter

The best of 2022 and how to start planning for 2023. Listen to this episode with a notepad or your phone ready to take voice memos. Jot down a few ideas to bring into your 2023 roadmap and plans.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: How to create exciting and super profitable product launches What the future of eCommerce buying behavior might look like How to use influencers to get content that performs  How to use challenges to build community and lower acquisition costs Resources: @austin_brawn on Twitter @lilyackerly on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

The big wins, what didn’t work, and what to do next. Austin and Lily recap BFCM 2022. As you’re reflecting on your own campaign you can compare how you did and maybe jot down some things to consider for next year too.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Diversifying your offer Buy now, pay later & the state of the American consumer  SMS overload: what happened? What to do with customers gained during the holidays  Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

A couple of months ago Lily started a new role as CMO at an early-stage eComm brand. And it’s been a crazy first 60 days as CMO - she stepped in at the beginning of Q4. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: A strategy to balance long-term growth needs with immediate fire drills  Laying the groundwork for 2023  How to build a customer archetype  Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

If you’re a marketer who dreads financial planning this episode is for you. Learn how to build a plan that supports your marketing strategies (instead of hindering them) so your business can grow with fewer bumps.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: The tiers of financial planning & what’s important at each level of business growth How to think about debt vs equity financing and when to consider each The financial KPIs to track on your weekly, monthly, and annual metric sheet Inventory planning: and how to structure your finances so you can stay in stock How the current economic state of the U.S and the world may impact eComm and what to be prepared for Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

Parenting and being an entrepreneur, Austin share’s what life’s been like in his new role as first-time Dad.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Planning paternity leave as a business owner  Tips for working with a newborn in your life  Life changes & advice for other parenting entrepreneurs Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

How to use video to vastly increase conversion with live shopping. Educate customers, build loyalty and have fun!  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: How to increase your add-to-cart rate with live shopping and shoppable video How to bring the acquisition benefits of the in-store experience online How to replicate a social feel on your own site so you can depend less on platforms like Meta  The different types of live commerce Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

Our framework to run your business effortlessly and a sneak peek into the Effortless Growth Operating System we've built to help clients do this. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Why your “superhero syndrome” is hurting your business How to identify what needs to get done and where the opportunities to move the needle are A system to outsource & delegate  How to do more of the things you shine at, and less of the things you’re not an expert on Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

This is a brand that didn’t start with the expectation of selling online. McCullough has a human-first perspective and there’s a lot to learn from him on customer experience and leadership. A conversation about connection and the human experience, two things that are just as important (if not more important) to building and growing your brand as your marketing strategy.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Wins and learnings from manufacturing an innovative product that no one wants to work on What valuing relationships across all areas of your business could do for your success How focus groups could improve your product offering Birth of a product - getting an idea and figuring out if it’s a good one  Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

One of the biggest challenges eCommerce businesses face is low profit to turn this around you need to turn one purchase into two (into three and so forth!)   Today we’re going to talk about how to drive repeat customers so that you can be more profitable and have more cash to fuel back into your business.    What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Why repeat sales so important - and should be top of mind from day 1  How to improve your product by offering more value & keep customers coming back Strategies to automate sales and easily turn one purchase into two The system to roll out new products consistently so that your loyal customers always have something exciting to come back and purchase  Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

Build a better brand by staying focused and paying attention to the opportunities, and eliminate shiny object syndrome. The truth is more does not equal better.  Max Rast is the founder of Klar, a data tracking and reporting software. Max built this software after his experience as a CMO at a fast-growing food and beverage DTC.  He was obsessed with spreadsheets and trying to build a clear picture, without getting bogged down in all the tiny details of attribution and the millions of data points available to eComm marketers.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: When international expansion is a good idea for scale How to think about influencers and track the revenue they bring in How to simplify your KPI sheet and metric tracking to build a better brand Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

A framework to get clear on your acquisition strategy and drive predictable revenue so you can grow your business.  Predictable revenue is one of the pillars of the 7 Figure Founder program with Austin. A lot of early-stage eComm owners look to what they see other brands do but the truth is if you double down on just one channel you’ll be able to stabilize your business and hit 7 figures.  This is how we think about this “one channel” strategy and some of the ways we help clients implement this. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: How to determine the best channel for your business Understand the type of product you’re selling and how potential customers will find it  The 4 key phases of scale  Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

How eCommerce brands can provide a customer experience that mimics the best parts of in-store shopping to bridge the gap between retail and DTC. Building relationships is easier in person, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t delight customers with a personalized shopping experience in your online store.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: The power of live product demos & live shopping  How to build an ambassador program that delights participants and makes fans for life  What supporting customers post-purchase should look like  How to use exclusive retail partnerships to increase brand awareness and ultimately convert people online Resources: Live Shopping Tool 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

How to build a brand-focused website that will increase conversion with brand first CRO. Brand building and storytelling are hot topics in eComm right now. Between the changes in privacy making it harder to scale by simply running well-targeted ads to consumers expecting more transparency - being able to relate to the people who land on your site is more important than ever.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: Why storytelling is a critical piece of building a brand  What brand first CRO is & how to do it How smaller brands can prioritize content and what’s most important to focus on What and where to optimize your site pages Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

How do you manage and motivate a team? Today we’re going to share strategies for small teams.  If you have a mix of in-house employees and a few contractors or if you’re going to be making your first hires soon this episode will help you lay the foundation to have success as you grow your team.  If you’ve already built a team and you’re looking for fresh ways to motivate and manage there’s some insight for you here too.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: How to have meetings that are productive while also connecting with your team  Performance reviews that actually set goals & give feedback  What to do when someone isn’t performing  How to set up a training & onboarding process  How to manage and motivate contract partners vs in-house employees  Resources: Podcast 359: HOW TO DECIDE IF IT’S TIME TO HIRE AN AGENCY Podcast 353: HELP! HIRING, SYSTEMS, AND ACQUISITION CHANNELS, OH MY! A RECAP OF OUR LIVE PROFIT SUMMIT 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrow

How do you grow a DTC brand in today’s climate? Here are some of the customer acquisition strategies being used by a top brand growth manager right now.  Michael Grasewicz started at Taylor Stitch and has played an integral role in the fast growth stage of several DTC brands. This is what he’s learned along the way.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: What to do with your ads in the current state of Facebook Fast Growth strategies for eCommerce and DTC brands Paid vs organic customer acquisition and the place for each  Resources: 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

What started with an idea to heal her own health issues became a conversation with other women and turned into a big experiment that lead to a successful business.  This episode is about how Monica Grohne, the founder of Marea, went about scaling a DTC business.  What You’ll Learn From This Episode: The journey from idea to start up to building a brand & scaling a DTC business Channels that are working and how to focus with a small team How to be bold in your marketing  Resources: Monica on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MonicaGrohne Monica on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/monicagrohne/ Marea on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mareawellness/ Monica on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1GaSFmR654_XwANV0mYSnw 7-Figure Founder (Get Austin Brawner's help & scale to 7 figures) @BrandGrowthX on Twitter Review or subscribe on iTunes

In this Greatest Hits episode, Perfect Keto's Co-Founder, Dr. Anthony Gustin, talks about how Perfect Keto started off as a side project and then experienced massive growth -- making $100MM in just 19 months. Dr. Anthony Gustin cofounded Perfect Keto as a side project in November of 2016. He had one goal in mind: making keto easy. Within 4 hours of launching, the company made $20,000 and took off like a rocketship since. Little did he know, the creation of Perfect Keto was at the rise of one of the largest diet crazes of the past 50 years.  Anthony joins us to talk about Perfect Keto's growth, his business beliefs, and why he thinks going into retail is the last resort. We also discuss his experience of burnout and how entrepreneurs can best avoid it.  Enjoy! Episode Highlights 4:58 The problem with copying someone else’s formula for success 7:15 Starting a multimillion-dollar company by accident 12:52 What it’s like riding the wave of one of the largest diet crazes 16:02 How to solve nearly all of the pro

In this Greatest Hits episode, we revisit a conversation about building a large, successful business with close to $40 million in revenue without using any paid social. Our guest, Nate Lipton of GrowersHouse, shows us how it can be done. And, in addition to not using paid ads, he’s been able to get his customer acquisition costs to zero. Nate shares the different approach to marketing that has helped him build several incredibly successful companies in the cannabis and hemp industries. He talks about exactly how you can use YouTube to establish yourself as a trusted brand and drive ad-free sales.  If you’re looking for some refreshing ideas for how you can drive more revenue, this is a great episode to jog your imagination about what’s possible. Episode Highlights:  5:54 Nate’s involvement in the cannabis and hemp industries via multiple different businesses 9:44 Fixing a gap in the cannabis industry: the creation of the Growers Network 12:18 The YouTube channel that lifted the veil on growing operations 16: