DTC POD: How The Best Brands Are Built

“User-generated video has become even more popular thanks to TikTok and Instagram Reels.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “When you use video, you’re able to tell a better story than you would be able to with images.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Video editing tools for beginners has really improved over the past few years making UGV an inexpensive form of content to produce.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Social monitoring can...

“That's the beauty of Pinterest. You don't have to spend a lot. It's a very, very low spend   platform.” @lynnpowered #DTCPOD “Out of all the social platforms there are, Pinterest is the one that has the most empathy and the most positivity.” @lynnpowered #DTCPOD “There's lots of things you can do with no money, unpaid social being an obvious one and creating your own content.” @lynnpowered #DTCPO...

“When you're building your loyalty program, make sure and focus your efforts on understanding what drives loyalty for your customers.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “When you're thinking about your rewards and loyalty program, tie it back to business objectives.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Points might be more effective for targeting spending habits and engagement, while discounts might be a good way to get people...

“A consumer's attention is a finite resource. Make sure you do the most with the time you have with them.” @alliareed #DTCPOD “Reddit is a wonderful tool for research, for tapping into that community and getting a finger on feedback for a product.” @alliareed #DTCPOD I didn't spend any money on marketing or advertising of any kind for the first three years. So it was 100% organic growth.” @alliare...

“Brand exclusives and community go hand-in-hand for brands. You need a great offer to get customers in your community.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Communities can be brand-owned or not brand-owned. It just depends on the bandwidth you have.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “If you decide to create a brand-owned community, build it where your audience is. Don’t just build it on Facebook because it’s Facebook.” @jadesa...

“The more you’re able to provide DTC type tools on a B2B scale, you’ll be better off and have a leg up.” @irleslie #DTCPOD “Where we differentiate is a lot of small things that add up to people wanting to be a part of our brand.” @irleslie #DTCPOD “What makes us unique is that we really don’t have to segment by “office-desk chairs” because we’re not traditional office furniture.” @irleslie #DTCPOD...

“The most common subscription model for eCommerce is a replenishment model. People receive new orders, every X months.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “If you’re able to move more customers to a subscription model, you start to operate more like a software business with recurring revenue.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Creating recurring revenue through subscriptions can help you forecast sales much better. Especially...

“We really invested in our formulations, which allowed us to scale because our products work and our return rate is less than one percent.” @itmebenji #DTCPOD “The space is becoming more crowded, but I view that as very validating and not something that keeps me up at night.” @itmebenji #DTCPOD “We made our facial cleansers in solid stick form, like a deodorant stick. We really took care and effor...

“To address operating constraints created by free shipping, consider adjusting your offer to create efficiency for your business.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Sometimes you’ll see AOV dip with free shipping but that’s usually because of price points when consumers earn free shipping.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Even if your AOV falls, make sure to pay attention to other metrics like conversion rate to see the bi...

“In Q1  of 2021, we spent $4,315 on Trend and made $51,194 from working with creators on Trend's platform.” Ashton Marshall #DTCPOD “We make sure and pick influencers who are aligned with  our product and our target market.” Ashton Marshall #DTCPOD “At the end of the day, you need to create trust. That's the only way people are going to buy it from you.” Ashton Marshall #DTCPOD “Our Facebook group...

“There are two components to going viral, either the product itself is viral or the creator or the person who uses it as viral.” @conorblewis #DTCPOD “I did most of my funding because I was sending out to eighty thousand people that I had nurtured and gotten to know personally. That is the power of generating a strong list and educating your customers.” @conorblewis #DTCPOD “Building a community w...

 “I love the idea of crowdfunding. I'm a huge community builder, super connector, and I love the idea of building an army of people who are fighting for us to succeed.” @cbm #DTCPOD “Our products can create a lot more intimacy and conversation. And I think it's a beautiful thing in a world that's increasingly digital to be in the physical product space.” @cbm #DTCPOD “And I think building interest...

“Make sure you tailor your offer to something that's personal to a customer or shopper.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “DTC brands are starting to look the same. We're going to start to see a shift in brand palettes this year.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Live streaming has really taken off in the past couple of years and will continue to take off.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “The biggest thing that you can do is really und...

 “I would definitely recommend starting small with your product line. You can always add but you can’t always take away.” @jazyfent #DTCPOD “You don't need 30 different products. It's so much more than that. You only need a few that customers use very consistently.” @jazyfent #DTCPOD “The main thing is just listening to our customers, who already love your products and asking them what they want t...

We’re changing things up this week with an introduction to the DTC POD’s new DTCers community - an invite-only community for DTC and eCommerce founders, marketers, and more. Most of the Trend team (the operators of the DTC POD) is based out of Austin. Last week’s snowstorm in Texas left most of the team without power (so no podcasts). So we figured this would be the perfect time to jump back into...

“Design is so core to telling your story, and that's really what building a great brand is all about.” @LukasThoms #DTCPOD “There's no longer going to be a single channel business. Everyone is multi-channel, everything is multi-channel, and increasingly everything is more experimental.” @LukasThoms #DTCPOD “As it becomes easier and easier to create products or offer classes or sell content, the re...

This isn’t your ordinary chicken nugget We’re covering one of the hottest brands in DTC - NUGGS, a plant-based chicken brand.  NUGGS was founded by Ben Pasternak, who started as a young, but successful iPhone app creator before starting NUGGS.  NUGGS is targeting millennials and Gen Z people, using irreverent, witty, unapologetically tech-forward branding.  NUGGS are continuously being updated, li...

“My aha moment was when there was a middleman who was not really providing value. So we thought if we could find a way to go directly to the consumer, then we have a business.” @OscarAdelman #DTCPOD “I think we have the idea that if we're doing well now, we're really going to be able to crush it on the other side of this.” @OscarAdelman #DTCPOD “What sets you apart is the relationship that you bui...

“Paid advertising should be complementary to organic efforts instead of being the main driver.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “If you’re able to acquire customers for  50% less, you can put that money back into your brand to grow your product line, do more research, or use it to support your community.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “You should work on decreasing customer acquisition cost and increasing AOV.” @ramongbe...

“When I think about go-to-market strategy, there are two ways of doing it. Top-down where you get as many eyeballs on your brand as possible or bottoms up where you try to turn early adopters into loyalists.” @AmandaMGoetz #DTCPOD “I believe in brand marketing where you create a community first that understands you and is a part of your brand.” @AmandaMGoetz #DTCPOD “I like thinking about my influ...

“If your target audience is experiencing ad fatigue, they aren’t going to be responding well to your ads.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Ad fatigue can cause your conversions to go down and your costs to go up.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “AdEspresso reversed an image and saw a 10% decrease in CPC.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Make sure that your ad campaigns are not creating an overwhelming experience if a customer is als...

“The bridal industry is mostly set up for brick and mortar and wholesale. Because we don’t have a store, we're able to pass savings directly to the customer and keep healthy margins.” @graceleew #DTCPOD “I love creative, I love visuals. I love copy. And so I think just being able to do all of that myself really helped. I didn't have to hire anyone in the early days.” @graceleew #DTCPOD “In the ear...

“By blending the line between media and commerce, you can lower customer acquisition cost and increase lifetime value.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “There are five different way that you can use to launch your direct to consumer brand according to Web Smith’s concept of linear commerce.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “You should focus heavily on acquiring your audience.” @jadesai94 #DTCPOD “Launching with either a PR...

“One of the reasons why TBC-Capital is education first is because we're trying to democratize all the information that's stuck in these corporate boardrooms.” @shondradanielle #DTCPOD “One of my goals in helping underrepresented founders is to help remove as many barriers as I can.” @shondradanielle #DTCPOD “The whole point of live crowdfunding is really for the people in the audience to be able t...

“It took McDonald’s over 10 years to launch 700 locations but Mrbeast was able to launch 300 locations almost overnight.” @ramongberrios #DTCPOD “Mrbeast and his team were approached by Earl Enterprises many times to build a virtual restaurant concept his team turned them down many times.” @ramongberrios #DTCPOD “Mrbeast Burger is just the tip of creator collaborations. The app they created had ov...