The Dropship Unlocked Podcast

Secrets to E-commerce Success With Phil Irvine (Episode 102)

• Lewis Smith & James Eardley • Season 1 • Episode 102

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📞 Ready to Take the Next Step? https://dropshipunlocked.com/training-watch-apply?el=podcast-102-ecom-success-with-phil-irvine

Connect with Phil on LinkedIn ➡️https://www.linkedin.com/in/pirvine/ 

Check out Phil’s drinks brand  ➡️ DRINK MXXN

🗣Hosts Lewis Smith and James Eardley are joined by Phil Irvine, the Head of eCommerce and Growth Marketing at Mojo. 

Phil brings a wealth of experience in multi-channel ecommerce and shares actionable strategies to help you scale your business beyond just Google and Meta ads.

👉 Prefer to watch this on Youtube? Check it out here  ➡️ https://youtu.be/4CyVVzNGYAE

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Topics Discussed:

★ Omni-Channel Marketing Explained: The importance of diversifying marketing strategies beyond traditional channels. Phil's omni-channel approach to ecommerce includes consistent messaging, customer data personalisation, and leveraging a variety of platforms like podcasts and niche audiences. 

★ The Core Principles of Omni-Channel Marketing: Consistency is key: maintaining consistent messaging across all touchpoints, including site experience, ads, and customer service.

★ Practical Advice for New Ecommerce Entrepreneurs: Conduct upfront research to ensure product-market fit before diving into ecommerce.

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Links and Resources Mentioned:

Pick up a copy of Lewis’ book: https://htabook.com 

Get Shopify for £1 a month for 3 months: https://www.dropshipunlocked.com/shopify 

Get a free trial with a professional phone line: https://www.dropshipunlocked.com/circle 

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Key Takeaways:

★ Embrace Omni-Channel Marketing: Expanding your marketing channels can significantly boost growth. Make sure your messaging is consistent across all platforms, and leverage new mediums like podcasts to reach niche audiences.

★ Customer-Centric Approach: Put the customer at the centre of everything you do. Use customer data to personalise their experience and always deliver value through consistent messaging across all touchpoints.

★ Start Strong with Research and Preparation: For beginners, ensure you conduct solid product-market fit research and establish strong backend systems before launching your business.

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In today's episode, we're very excited to have Phil Irvine with us, the head of E commerce and growth marketing at Mojo. Phil brings a wealth of experience in multi channel e commerce, and he's here to share strategies that go beyond just Google and meta ads. Absolutely. Louis, yeah, this conversation with Phil was fascinating, and I think you'll be interested listening to this today, how we explore his journey in E commerce, but also his approach to omnichannel marketing, and how a customer centric strategy does significantly improve your growth of your business. Yeah, I think by the end of this, you're going to have gained a lot of actionable insights from some of Phil's expertise. Here we'll discuss practical advice for those who are just starting out, right through to some more advanced strategies for our more seasoned entrepreneurs among us. So let's dive in and get started. Welcome to the dropship unlocked Podcast. I'm Louis Smith, the founder of dropship unlocked, and with me is our cloud success coach, James earthley. Now, when we're not recording the podcast episodes, we're running our own e commerce businesses and helping aspiring entrepreneurs launch their own high ticket dropshipping businesses. Keen to build your own six or even seven figure business. My book, the home turf advantage is your blueprint for launching a profitable online store. Grab your copy@htabook.com today, and let's get you started. Now, sit back, relax, and let's unlock your potential with the dropship unlocked podcast today. We're joined by Phil Irvine, so Phil is the head of E commerce and growth marketing at Mojo. So Phil has an impressive background in multi channel e commerce, and today we're diving into the strategies that he uses to grow e commerce businesses beyond the usual channels. So firstly, Phil, it's fantastic to have you with us today. Now thank you for having me and definitely looking forward to discussion. This is a topic that is near and dear to my heart. So happy to be here. Fantastic. No pleasure. So people listening in today will be thinking about how they can increase their sales, their startup businesses quite often. And so we're going to look outside the box of the usual channels. We'll get into that in just a second. First of all, Phil, just to start, could you give us a bit of a background for your personal journey e commerce, and what's brought you to the position that you're in today? Yeah, you know. So I'll start off. I, you know, went to undergrad, got my undergrad degree. Started out with a career in technology. I did technology project management for Johnson and Johnson, the big multinational healthcare company. Got my grad degree in business, and always had a desire to get into some form of marketing or general management. You know, it was around 2009 I started out at a big data company called Experian. Fast forward to 2011 e commerce really started to take off and accelerate for businesses. You know, a lot of businesses were starting to make the shift from traditional brick and mortar or service based to selling direct to consumer. You know, I started out on the agency side. I managed email marketing programs, CRM programs for about two years. I flipped to the brand side. It actually worked for a couple of brands that were really interesting, Beachbody, the books company is in flowers, I did some work with AT and T Sallie Mae and steadily, you know, not just focused on CRM and customer retention, but also got into growth, new Customer Acquisition, understanding how to manage different investment channels and acquire the right customers for scale and growth. And now, ironically, I'm back on the agency side. I'm with a group called Mojo. The group has traditionally been really strong with creative UI, UX, work design, and I was actually bought in as the E commerce subject matter expert to stand up that portion of the agency. But also, what's interesting about my role is I, I run e commerce for two own and operated brands, moon and bear, which are both non alcoholic spirits. Amazing. So you've got a very broad range of experience, both in terms of company size and the different products that you're selling. Are interested across your sort of career. I'm guessing that no matter what size of company there is, there's still some similarities in the way that you're going to market products and the way that you approach the market. Yeah, there's, yeah, there's always consistency, you know, especially with E commerce. And you know, a lot of my experiences in CPG or, you know, consumer packaged goods or consumer products, and, yeah, a couple of things are pretty, pretty key themes is, you know, you want to try to acquire customers at the lowest cost possible, so that you can use money. And. Investment to reinvest in the business, whether it's more marketing, advertising, whether it's product development, shoring up your supply chain, enhancing customer experience, but then the on the tail end of that is making sure you're acquiring the right types of customers that'll that you can turn into repeat buyers and repeat purchasers. I think both of those are, you know, a lot of times organizations are good at one or the other, very rarely are they good at both. And I think I've had the unique perspective to kind of understand, like what works and what doesn't work, to try to accomplish both in that perspective. But, you know, I'd say that's a big theme, and then I know you want to touch on some specifics with omni channel, but it's it's having consistency with the way that you either advertise or handle customer service, basically the way that you interact with your consumers. And having that consistency is another key pillar for steady and consistent growth as well, too. Yeah, because I do want to dive into the different channels that you would recommend and the way that you approach different channels, but it's interesting to note that straight away, consistency is going to be key. So for people that are going to be setting up different channels, of different avenues of finding customers, how do they ensure that they've got consistency? Do they need to spend some time at the drawing board thinking about what their brand represents, or which customer they're going to be serving? Yeah, you know, the A lot of times, you know, a lot of my world is startups, and, you know, we're just trying to scrape by. So the companies that I'm working at right now may not be the best examples on the best way to approach this, but, you know, ideally, you you'd even want to do some some market research about the product market fit. And so product market fit is a, is a is a popular term that I hear a lot these days. It's basically, you know, given what you're trying to sell, whether it's a product or a service. You know, who is your ideal target market, but not only that, but then, how should you position the product compared to competitors, compared to the needs that that specific customer desires? And to your point, the way to establish consistency with the various touch touch points, with the customer experience is going through that upfront research, aligning with the broader team, cross functionally, how you should be interacting and engaging with your customer, and then, typically, what's kind of best practices. A lot of companies call them rtbs, so reasons to believe about your product or service. And a lot of times you'll come up with three to four, you know, kind of anchor talking points or pillars. But then various teams will take those and take those a level deeper, to translate how that manifests through various channels. So you know, your email team is thinking about in an email template. How do we take those three talking points and expand upon those in that long form template, you know, a TV ad. It's a 15 to maybe 32nd video spot. So how do you translate that and then on, you know, on a touch point that's often, you know, not prioritized, but customer service and customer contacts. How do you, how do you also facilitate that when you're getting inbound contacts from your customers as well too. How do you translate your three key pillars to establish that consistency? So, yeah, you know, pretty with the the companies that are doing this the best they do, take that upfront time, you know, research your audience aligned on your reasons to believe, and then translating those across channels to inform how you want to distill that message at various stages in the customer life cycle, interesting so that reasons to believe. I love that idea and giving customers clear reasons to believe in something. But when you say reasons to believe, are you thinking about that from perspective that customers need to know the reasons to believe in buying the particular products from that brand, or is it reasons to believe in a particular mission that the brand represents? What specifically are we trying to make sure that there are reasons for them to believe in? Yeah, no, that's that's a great question. I think the mission is always a key component and a reason to believe the brands that really have staying power can get their customers and prospects to understand their mission, where at some point you don't have to aggressively advertise to them, once you establish a synergy with your mission and what they value, they'll keep coming back to your brand without having to spend the investment dollars. I think that's probably an overarching, you know, reason to believe. But then, depending upon the marketing calendar or the seasonality, um. Um, so take, for instance, I used to work in the auto industry, and typically there would be four new owl releases per year. So a lot of times you, when you think about your go to market plans from a seasonality or product launch perspective, you'll have reasons to believe around that specific product that you want to focus on too, because with a lot of brands, you know, a lot of a lot of the brands I work with, we're trying to give people reasons to become interested in us and engage with us. And a lot of times, whether it's a product launch or or I mentioned seasonality as well, too. You know, obviously for a lot of brands, the holidays huge. So Christmas, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, you know, that's often a big period of time where companies develop very robust campaigns around so I think you know, to your point is great, though, like you, you always want to have the mission top of mind, but you always want to think about relevancy from a seasonality perspective, and also from a from a product perspective as well, too interesting. So plenty of reasons to believe in the overall mission and why that product right now is a great offer for that customer. So something you mentioned as well is that this kind of stepping back approach, looking at reasons to believe, looking at what your brand represents, can sometimes happen a bit further down the line, once you're maybe a bit more established, bit broader shoulders as a company. A lot of people listening, a lot of people that we speak to, a lot of people that we teach, are startups. So they're just getting started with their first e commerce business. When you first start up, you mentioned that you kind of just scraped by initially trying to get product market fit, kind of get profitable as quickly as possible. Does that mean that the branding piece comes a bit later and then your focus is when you're working on startups, just trying to get to bringing down the cost per acquisition straight away and increasing the amount of profit that you make per customer? Yeah, you know, that's a that's an interesting dynamic, because I have seen some brands that have led with really smart methods of new customer acquisition. You know, they may bring in subject matter expert media buyers from meta, Google and so on and so forth. But you know, really, the ones that have that initial growth and acceleration do establish some sort of brand presence. You know, again, I can give you a couple of really good examples, the books company I ran, CRM and partnership marketing, but I came into the company in year six or so. But when they first established their brand, they had this really unique angle in the flower space where every order was tied to a farmer overseas. And so they asked back to your point about a mission. They established this connection that every dollar that you were spending as a consumer was benefiting these individual farmers, and they provided transparency into their sustainable practices, with which they grew flowers and that they managed their farms and and whatnot. They also had a piece around transparent pricing, which was a differentiator in the market. And, you know, I don't want to sell them short. There was other components with the brand development, but there was a lot of thought put into those two key pillars before they went to the market, and, you know, spent a lot of dollars to acquire customers. So I even, even with startups, I think it still is imperative to try to establish, you know, what your brand is and who you are, to be able to get some sort of traction. And then I'll, I'll touch on another great example that I'm still involved with today. So it's a company called Moon, spelled M, xx, n. And, you know, I believe this is the case in the UK, but in the US, the non alcoholic beverage space is really exploding and taking off right now. And so Moon is unique in that it's a non alcoholic spirit, but it's actually THC infused, so there is a bit of a cannabis component. And we designed it so that it's mixed to make tails and whatnot. And, you know, it's a newer space, but there are a lot of competitors that are coming into the market, and Moon really took the time out to establish its brand. If you look at our designs on our website, if you look at our packaging, our inserts, it really is an elevated premium level of presentation that we have across all of those various touch points, and we also reflect that in our pricing as well too. Our pricing is 30 to 40% premium over a lot of competitors. So it was really smart in which the way that moon went, about going to the market, like taking the time out to really establish it, develop that again. And before you know, now we're in the phase that. Where we have this great brand, we've seen some success with media investment in advertising, but we were trying to get into a better spot where we can can extract more funds to be able to really accelerate our growth. So interesting. I think we can learn a lot actually from the experience that you've got through growing moon the drinks brand, even though it's sort of different products than what we'll be selling. So we're saying high ticket, and we sell high ticket products on our E commerce stores upwards of 300 pounds or$300 plus per order. However, I think the way that you go to market, there still be some crossovers with the way that we'd go to market, and also the way that you find your customers keen to dive into having a bit of an omni channel approach to marketing. So first of all, what does that mean to you? And why do you think this can be really effective? Yeah, you know. So I, I'll talk about moon, and then I'll talk a little broader as well, which may, which may resonate more of the audience, but in so bad, you know, with Moon, it's a it's a non alcoholic spirit. It has THC, so it in beverages in general, direct to consumer is still a sales channel that is still in the early stages. I think a lot of companies are still trying to figure it out. Because if you think about beverages and the shipping component, you know it a lot of times it's it's heavy. Shipping costs are high. A lot of companies are trying to figure out, do we charge for shipping? Do we make it free and maybe bake it into the price? So that's still a component that is still trying to be figured out. But when I when I think about omni channel, because at sthc, a natural sales channel, are dispensaries. So depending upon the state in the US, you know, some states have more leniency than others, and in terms of carrying beverages with THC, but, uh, but a starting point is dispensaries. And getting to the point about omni channel consistency, like because we were trying to take this premium value placement in the market. We're very particular about the venues that we approach to to sell our product, kind of wholesale and and retail. You know, we try to look for places that don't look worn down. You know, are we try not to make judgments about the patrons of the residents. But, you know, we we try to go after who we think our audience is going to be, and that's going to respect the drinks. But not only that, when we go to these locations, we actually try to influence the placement of our beverages like we want our beverages placed near other premium beverages, whether they're, you know, spirits or beers or Celsius. So I think that getting at the consistency that's that's part of what we try to, you know, translate across the retail experience. And then when you go online, you see our beautiful designs and elements with our website, our emails, our ads and all things of that nature. So yeah, interesting. So consistency, even across retail to e commerce, is interesting because you think that they would be completely different approaches, but it's still the same brand, and you still got to get that same feeling across. So when you try and sell that premium brand feel on a website through an E commerce channel, how do you get across the premium feel. If that's a brand that image that somebody else wanted to think about, how could they deliver that for their own website? What are the main touch points that you'd see, that you'd look at to try and make it a premium brand? Yeah, yeah. It's a great question. So you know, our web like typically, with an e commerce website, you have your you have your homepage, you have your product page, you have your FAQs. And you know, if you take a look at our site, by the way, it's enjoy MX mxn.com, for your listeners. But you know, we there's a keen attention to detail with the way that the bottles are shot. Through research, we've also found bottle shots with cocktail images translate into a premium perception of your brand, as opposed to, you know, I don't want to say lifestyle shots aren't premium, but we kind of found that, through research over time and with some testing, that that equates to premium. So that's a that's a big thing. I think the other, you know, the other big piece, too, and this is applicable across categories, is the notion of discounting. And, you know, we've kind of had a hard and fast rule of No discounts unless it's, unless it's a, it's a VIP type customer, unless it's kind of a closed funnel channel. So we have some affiliate activities that we're running, and we have some like some small discounting there, but our approach is more. We call them plus ups, or gift with purchase type promotions where you have to make a commitment to buy the product at full price to get some. Type of reward or some type of extra benefit. And I think a common mistake of some brands is that they, they they heavily lean into discounting too early, where you know the note, you know the hypothesis is, is that you're going to see the growth in the beginning. But a lot of times, that doesn't translate into long term success, and it's harder to get those customers back if you're not discounting, because they're they're searching or they're waiting for that discount. So I think that's another huge piece of creating a procession of an elevated brand. Yeah, no, I agree. I think if you overdo the discounts, then, well, for one thing, people expect discounts next time, as you say. And the other thing is, if you're trying to create premium experience, and then the first thing that pops up within 10 seconds on a website is 10% off on a pop up banner, it can really hamper if it's a premium feel that you want to give, that can really take away quite quickly. I'm also keen to touch into different channels that you're testing and using as ways to get customers so still through E commerce, still on your website, but I know you've mentioned things such as podcasts, as well as other channels to generate sales, which are a bit outside the norm. I mean, first of all, let me know a little bit about podcast as a marketing channel. I know you've been looking into that with your drinks friends, yeah, yeah. So um, and ironically, we're on a podcast right now. So this is probably very, very timely, but I'm very, very bullish on podcasts, and I'll admit I'm a little biased. Number one, I used to host a podcast, so I understand the power of the medium. I consume most of my content via podcast, and I see the effectiveness of ads with me personally. But I think coupling that with it is becoming a growing medium of consumption for a lot of consumers. But I think the other reason why we're bullish on it is, I don't know the exact source, but I've heard most consumers consume anywhere from six to eight podcasts consistently. It's kind of been through some research. And what that kind of implies is that if you think about from a show's perspective, the people that consume the podcast are naturally going to be very loyal and very, very passionate about the topic. So I think even though with podcasts, you're not going to have the same reach as classic television or even with digital compared to meta and Google, if you think about it, kind of from a conversion rate perspective, you're likely going to have a higher conversion rate if your advertising aligns with the audience that you're trying to reach with the podcast. And so I think a lot of marketers are, you know, and we could go on this topic for probably a whole separate episode, but cost to spend with media with meta and Google are just increasing for a lot of brands, and I think a lot of brands are just looking how to diversify their investments. So things like podcasts, Reddit, marketplaces is interesting because people classically just think of Amazon and Walmart, but there's a lot of other kind of smaller niche marketplaces that are popping up. But But back to your point, though, I say I think podcasts because of because it's a long form medium, it gives an opportunity to develop a really passionate fan base that is more likely to listen and consume your your ads that you're at, or your ads or sponsors that you have associated with the show. So I think it's it's always good to be creative and open to new channels. So obviously Google and meta is our primary way that we get customers, but being open to different ways it can really differentiate your offer compared to different competitors. They might not be in this space. So when we talk about podcasts, yes, there's obviously the podcast listeners are often going to be more invested in you than Instagram followers because they're with you for a lot longer, in terms of, like, the amount of content that they're consuming. So I can see how it would be really beneficial for it to get your brand in front of podcast listeners. So for people that are starting e commerce businesses and selling high ticket products, let's say, for example, a high ticket a barbecue, for example, and they have their own brand. If they were looking to try and generate sales through podcasts, would you say that they would should have their own podcast and sort of be the the center of discussions around that niche, that barbecue niche or niche, as you'd say, or should they be reaching out to other podcasts in the space and trying to put their affiliate links with with the podcast creators that are already out there? Yeah. I mean, I don't know there's the answer you want to hear, but I do. I would think it's a combination of both. So definitely the latter. If you're a newer brand, you're you know, the biggest ways, and actually, I'm curious to get your take on this too, but when I hosted a podcast, the biggest ways to get follower growth was making appearances on other podcasts, running ads on other podcasts that had like minded audiences. You know, we saw a lot more growth from that perspective than direct advertising I ran. More of a business focused podcast, and we used to advertise on LinkedIn and Twitter, but so I think to the latter of what you just said, Make it appearances, either, you know, through affiliate links or or just appearing as guests on other podcasts. If it's a barbecue brand, maybe it's food, maybe it's wine, or, you know, things along that nature. I'm a big fan though. I think to your first point, you know, running and managing your own podcast. I think if you can, if you can get a good host and have interesting and relevant topics that you could talk about on a regular basis, I would say definitely go that route as well too. But you know, really to have success and staying power, you know, you really need to have, you know, a new show or topic, at least every other week, ideally once a week, you know, minimum, to keep people engaged with with your show. So that's, that's kind of how, how I'd approach it. Interesting. Yeah, they said we, we see a lot of people come and find our podcast when we create episodes on certain subjects that we can see are being searched a lot as well. So that's a way that I would capitalize. If you're going to create your own podcast, just see what people are already searching for in your niche, answer those questions, and that'll be another way of advertising your brand. So it's like content marketing. It's like another way of having a blog or a YouTube channel, but a podcast answering people's questions in the niche and then getting people to drive, drive that growth for your for your podcast. So for example, what we wanted to do with this episode that we spoke about before feathers, we wanted to provide an example of how this is in action. So for your brands, for example, you've come on this podcast today, spoken about moon and bear the two drinks brands that you're working with through Mojo. And so we'll put links in the description for for that. And we've done that. We've done that so that people can see it in action and how it works. So if you're the type of person like Phil who's very confident on a podcast, then that can work. But to that point, Phil as well, if, if they're not the type of person that wants to speak on a podcast, wants to be the public face of their brand, their brand. Could they just reach out to podcasts instead? Have you ever seen anyone do that? Yeah. I mean, I've seen that. You know, another interesting approach, you know, another interesting approach that I've seen with with some of our competitors, actually, is the, I mean, the other big thing that we the other channel we haven't talked about, is Tiktok. So Tiktok is exploding, especially, especially with the younger demographic and and what you'll see a lot of times brands will appoint, they'll have a you know, everybody's trying to get influencers to help promote and and bring their follower group to the brand. But a lot of times people will, you know whether they pay them or whether they just find an influencer that's passionate about their brand, they'll appoint them to be the point person, the face, the spokesperson for the brand, and then utilize that person to not just post on Tiktok or Instagram, but also, you Know, make appearances on podcasts, participate in, or should deals or be the facilitators. So I think that's that, you know, honestly, regardless if the brand's leadership is the face of the brand, I think pursuing influencers and having them help expand the reach should be part of the playbook, regardless. That's it fantastic, some really good, creative ways to drive new sales for an E commerce business there, and for those people that are just starting out in E commerce. Phil, I'd like to know with your experience, the vast experience in different e commerce roles, especially now working with startups, what practical advice would you give to people to help them succeed when they're first getting started? Yeah, I think, you know, I hate to, I hate to drill it down into academic principles, but when I went to business school, the first thing we learned in marketing was you can't be everything to everybody. I think a lot of times when you're just starting out, you're gonna have 1010 you know, 1000 to 10,000 ideas that you want to pursue. But I think the notion of, I think, I think it's always good, as in the early stages, is to document, you know, everything you want to do from an idea standpoint, when you think about setup and growth. But then, you know, try to really focus on three to four things to accomplish each month. And do those things well, is something that I would encourage to each brand and and back to our our point initially taking the time to understand the product market fit of your brand, which entails understanding who your audience is and what you know, what pain points or what values are going to resonate with them, like taking the time out to understand that before you get into developing your messaging, your copy, your ads, your website, design, your customer service scripts, like, like, you know, taking a little bit of time. That to figure that out before just diving in is going to be imperative. And yeah, and then the other thing is, is, I think especially because I'm starting to have discussions, too, about some startup businesses and maybe getting involved with some of those on the side. And I it's, it's interesting, because I talk with a lot of my peers who are advisors for brands, and so many work with CEOs that they think they can be idea creative people, but also operators. And a lot of times, those two skill sets are completely different. And I think the overarching message that I would have is understand what your strikes are and where you're going to need support from other resources or other subject matter experts. So from a people and staffing standpoint, I think a lot of people, you know, we have Superman complexes, and we we want to take the most cost effective way to get a lot of crap done. But I think as soon as you can understand what your weaknesses are and trying to close their gaps or other means is is critically important too. So focus and understanding when it's best to outsource and bring in experts in certain areas, because you can't be the master of all trades. That's why it's the jack of all trades, isn't it? That the saying goes. So fantastic. Really good advice. Phil, really enjoyed our conversation today. If people want to learn more about the work that you're doing and learn more from you, Phil, where would you recommend that they go? Yeah, so LinkedIn is probably the best route. So Phil Irvine, I believe you just, if you just put it. Phil Irvine, Mojo, M, O, J, O, I should pop up also. My email address is Phil at Mojo, psg.com I love to engage in these types of discussions. Uh, happy to help. And also my company, we provide growth e commerce services. So if you need, if you need some help, we can, we can talk about that as well too. So perfect. We'll make sure all of those links are beneath this episode as well, whether that's in the show notes or the podcast or the description of the YouTube video version, and the links will also be there for your drinks brands. But I have to say, the disclaimer is that those links will only work for us customers. I believe, Phil, is that correct? They can only be delivered to us customers. Yeah, that's a good call out. Well, yeah, curly, unfortunately, we only distribute in the United States. I mean, hopefully we'll be international in the near future, but yeah, it's only we only deliver in the United States right now. All good. Well, perfect. We still wanted to illustrate how Podcasts can be a sales channel for people, and so you'll see that in the description if you check that out. But no, thank you again for sharing all of your insights today. Phil, really appreciate it. No, thank you again, too, and really, really appreciate the opportunity here. Louis, that was a great conversation there with Phil. Incredibly insightful. I think he provided a lot of valuable strategies that people can take away straight away from this episode to expand their marketing beyond just the usual channels. Absolutely, yeah, Phil's emphasis on omni channel marketing and customer centric strategies was really powerful. So really enjoyed that one. And I know that these approaches are essential in today's e commerce landscape. So some really valuable tips there, if you're looking to implement the field strategies alongside a solid e commerce framework. My book, the home turf advantage, lays out everything you need to build a successful dropshipping business, combining these insights that you heard today with our structured approach will give you a comprehensive path to success. You can get your copy today@htabook.com enjoying the podcast, we'd love to hear from you leave a comment or a review, and we might just feature it on an upcoming episode, also for detailed show notes and resources. Head to dropship, unlock.com forward slash podcast. If you found value from any episode of this podcast, please take just 10 seconds to leave us a quick five star review on your podcast. App of choice, it helps us more than you could imagine. And who knows, you might just hear your comments on the show. Thanks for being part of our community. Your support helps us keep delivering a new episode every week. Now it's time to answer a question that we've had in from a listener. So thank you very much. To discover with Nasir, who has left a question beneath a YouTube video version of a previous podcast episode, and so that is the way that you can get your questions in to have it answered on a future episode. So discover. Witness here has asked if we create a generic store that provides various categories of products, such as outdoor cooking equipment, games, rooms, items, hot tubs, all in one store. What is your advice on this approach? Thank you for your question, and I'll start by breaking down the pros and cons of having a general drop shipping store, and then I'll provide our recommendation just so it's based on kind of context. So the pros of a generic store, obviously you've got a much wider range of customers interested in all the different categories, so potentially a much wider total addressable market. By doing that, you've also got. Selling opportunities, so potential other things that you can sell to customers that may be because they like to one item in one niche, you could potentially upsell or cross sell them an item in another niche. However, some of the cons of a generic store are that you're going to have brand identity challenges. So it's much harder to establish a really strong brand identity and that kind of niche authority if you're trying to be The Everything Store, if you're trying to compete with Amazon or Wayfair at their own game, you know, those guys have deep pockets, and so it's difficult to try to be another one of them, certainly when you're just getting started and maybe haven't got the marketing budget to stretch as far and wide as they have. The other thing is, it requires much more diverse and complex marketing strategies to effectively target the various customer segments. So imagine you've got customer coming in who wanted to buy a hot tub, but maybe abandon their cart. Now you've got to create a follow up sequence of emails that are specific to a customer who wanted a hot tub, but then you've also got a customer over here that wanted a barbecue and did the same. So you have to make sure the messaging is either very generic and bland, which doesn't really hit home. If you talk to everyone, you're talking to no one, as they say, or you have to have very complex, segmented email campaigns and ad campaigns that target all these so it can be done. It just creates, in my opinion, what is unnecessary complexity, and that's why my recommendation on what I do would be to just start off by focusing on a real niche specialist area. If you build a store around a specific niche, it could help you establish authority within that much smaller market, much much faster and you don't need as wide of a total addressable market. You know, you don't need as many audience members, because your conversion rate will be so much higher, because the customers that do land on your store will feel perfectly at home. They'll feel like they were meant to come to this store for the item that they were looking for. You know, if they walk into your store, your digital store, and they're seeing all the items are to do with hot tubs, and it's to do with home spas and Jacuzzis and stuff like that. Like, you can tailor that experience. You can give away an ebook, you can give away lead magnets. You can give away value videos, reviews, brand overviews. Like, all to do with one specific market, and they'll feel like they're in the right place. If they have any questions, they can ask your customer support person who can be an expert on the brands that you sell, because that's all they talk about in their job as a virtual assistant for you. And so, yeah, it allows you to create a seamless, tailored customer experience and really use the data then to evaluate market demand for your categories and avoid spreading your resources too thinly. Don't just kind of generically, go into lots of different niche areas. Decide which niche has enough demand. That's why it's one of our criteria in the niche validation process to sustain me as a business for years to come. Once I've done that, I could create another store that's just a replica of it. And the benefit then is I have two individual assets, my incomes diversified, and I could sell one of them if I wanted to down the line. And so for your first store, if this is your first time doing this, perhaps starting with a more focused niche will be more of a manageable and effective strategy for you to start getting those sales quickly and avoid that unnecessary complexity. So I hope that helps. Yeah, exactly. It's playing to our strengths, isn't it? Lewis, it's about being a specialist, because it's a lot easier to talk directly to customers with the small business size that we are when we first get started, compared to trying to be an Amazon or the second Amazon. So great, great answer, and a great question, actually, there from nasia. So time now to highlight a recent review that we've had for the podcast as well. And actually, this has been a very nice YouTube comment that we received from Paul Haynes, 75 double two. So thank you very much, Paul for your comment. So Paul said, great video, guys, I really enjoy listening to your podcasts. Thank you so much for your review, Paul, in the form of a comment on YouTube that was really much, very much appreciated. If you found value in today's discussion, we'd really appreciate if you could leave us a review. It only takes a few seconds, but it means the world to us, and it just helps us keep the podcast going. We're always looking to hear your thoughts, and we might feature your review in an upcoming episode. Thanks for joining us on this episode of the dropship unlocked podcast. We hope you'll walk you away with insights and inspiration to kickstart your ecommerce journey. Grab a copy of my book, the home of turf advantage@htabook.com it's a distilled guide based on real experience to help you build your ecommerce venture, don't forget to hit the subscribe button for more strategies and success stories. And if you like what you heard, a five star review would mean the world to us, and you might just get a shout out on an upcoming episode. And finally, thank you for deciding to spend your time with us today. We can't wait to bring you more insights on the next episode of the dropship unlocked podcast. You.