Retention Chronicles (Mariah Parsons)

On Retention Chronicles we’re joined by Dave Burchett, Founder & CEO of Avance Vinyl, a leading DTC shop with the highest quality vinyl, rhinestones, sublimation paper, and crafting supplies. In the episode, we chat about what inspired Dave to get into the vinyl and crafting space, creating a repeatable process, business differentiators, knowing your target market, ad creative, targeting your ICP, social media and shoppable stores, what questions you should ask yourself around Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and rewarding your customers to increase retention.

RC Williams, Co-Founder of Rejuvia and 1-800-D2C, joins Retention Chronicles Season 5 to discuss streamlining and evaluating technology for D2C brands.

RC tells Mariah about how he and his mother started Rejuvia four years ago and how they dove into the business headfirst. After running the business for a while, they tracked what was working for them and they’ve fine-tuned their business strategy.

He details how brands that are just starting out shouldn’t load heavy on technology, they should keep it light early and then add on different technology as they grow. He warns brands against enabling a tech stack just because a competitor has a certain software. 

With the brands he interviews in his ‘Under the Hood’ series, RC shares the learnings he’s receiving from founders and recognizes that behind every successful brand there lies hurdles they’ve overcome.

RC also discusses how he rules out personal bias with 1-800-D2C, his technology recommendation platform. He says that with the privacy changes, a lot of brands are looking to third party tools to provide analytics as well as smart AI tools to increase efficiency of smaller teams.

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Taking over a platform for DTC brands to find valuable tools and apps. 1:39

• Founding a brand and choosing a tech stack with unbiased recommendations. 3:10

• Staying up-to-date with new tools and updates in the DTC space. 8:21

• DTC brand operation, paid media, and retention. 13:28

• Growing a brand through tech stack and product development. 20:16

• Tech stack configuration, data analytics, and privacy updates. 23:55

• AI tools and under-the-hood interviews with founders. 31:25

• E-commerce growth and operational efficiency. 37:19

Ted Galperin, Partner and Head of Retail at Mythology, and Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles & Head of Marketing at Malomo, discuss crafting immersive design. Ted’s work on the American Girl store in Dallas emphasizes the challenge of fitting a large experience into a 5,000-square-foot space. Key elements include a life-size dollhouse, a premium salon, and a cafe with a doll-sized door. Galperin also highlighted the importance of nostalgia in modern retail, citing examples like Vacation Sunscreen and Olipop. He shared insights on Warby Parker's retail strategy, focusing on creating a library-like atmosphere to enhance the customer experience. Additionally, he discussed the Sonos store in Soho, which used sound-attenuated pods to showcase the product's audio quality effectively.

Episode Timestamps:

• 2:28: American Girl Store Project Overview

• 10:24: Nostalgia in Retail and Market Trends

• 19:06: Mythology's Multifaceted Approach

• 22:25: Warby Parker's Retail Experience

• 32:29: Sonos Retail Store Innovation

• 36:30: Balancing New and Returning Customers

  40:17: Retail as Marketing and Awareness Tool

Ryan Gresh, Founder & CEO of The Feel Good Lab, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss his journey in creating a natural pain relief cream to help their customers feel good and soothe chronic pain.

If you’ve ever experienced searing pain, you know that the one thing you want is for that pain to be gone. But, common over the counter medicines, such as NSAIDs, are bad for your GI health if taken for long periods of time. That’s why Ryan and his father founded The Feel Good Lab to help people find hope through their products. 

One of the things Ryan wanted to guarantee with their customers was that their solution had credibility and was FDA backed. 

On the business side of things, Ryan talks about how the AOV is low for their pain relief cream because it’s a commoditized product, which can be hard to break even on. Which is why customer retention and the lifetime value of their business is so essential. Where The Feel Good Lab team wins is with their LTV and credibility with their customers. Their customers fall in love with the brand, and come back time and time again for that reason. 

But not only do they fall in love with The Feel Good Lab brand, but the educational resources they provide. They educate their customers on the best way to use their products, such as right after a steaming shower because the product will absorb better. 

Ryan also tells Mariah about how they make their packaging standout because none of their competitors were using clean, white packaging. 

Knowing one’s ideal customer profile (ICP) is essential for accurate and successful marketing. Ryan dives deep into the 3 ICPs their 3 products market best with. It’s an interesting dynamic between the age groups and goals of their three customer profiles that you won’t want to miss out on. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Chronic pain relief and the importance of hope. 1:13

• Branding and marketing strategies for a direct-to-consumer wellness brand. 5:44

• Building a successful brand through customer service and authenticity. 10:11

• Customer service, product development, and branding. 16:12

• Product development and packaging design. 19:47

• Pain relief and natural remedies. 22:24

• Wellness, pain management, and education. 28:36

• Targeting different customer personas for a health and wellness brand. 33:43

• Social media marketing for a wellness brand. 38:18

• Marketing strategies for a health and wellness company. 42:39

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Luke Droulez, VP of Marketing at PAX, a leading global cannabis brand on a mission to enhance consumers’ lives through exceptional cannabis experiences. Our host, Mariah Parsons, and Luke discuss regulation around restricted goods, interstate commerce, running ads on restricted goods, branding around discretion for their customers, launching their own products , hosting launch events, working with celebrities on launch initiatives, cannabis living at the intersection of art, music, and technology, wholesale and direct sales, using their website as top of the funnel interaction, opening new markets, setting up warranty to make sure care and maintenance are at the forefront of their products, how to create more branded moments and brand affinity. Register for our LIVE PODCAST: https://gomalomo.com/resources/live-podcast-bfcm

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Joe Vancena, CEO & Co-Founder of Status. Noah, Mariah, & Joe talk about having the confidence to start a business, discovering product market fit, asking why there is a consumer gap rather than discovering what the consumer gap is, how data scrambling policies make personalization harder, what’s working in retention this year, why consumers check out as guests, how Shopify is a word-of-mouth environment for apps, how Shopify brands can couple rewards and returns programs during BFCM & more. 

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Megan Christian, Social Media Manager, at YESCOM USA, an ecommerce brand that has been fueling projects that fill consumer’s passion for the past 20 years. On this episode we chat through how to approach thinking through your brand personality and how it differs for a creator and for a brand, thinking like a social media scroller, combining flexibility and a social media content plan, recognizing all possible first touch points with customers on social, how to get people to your website through social media, different approaches to work with a brand or a creator, and more!

Jules Weldon and Stacey Pierce, Co-Founders of OME Gear, join Retention Chronicles for the final episode of Season 4 to discuss the struggles and successes of building a multi-use product. 

Jules and Stace took their product vision and turned it into a 5-in-1 innovation that their customers rave about. But, it hasn’t been an easy journey to get there. They chose their dreams over their belongings and sold their house to back their business, betting on themselves and their determination to succeed. 

The leap has been well worth it, as their customers love OME Gear’s The Wanderer. Whether it’s emailing Stace and Jules directly, sharing across social media, or organic word-of-mouth marketing, the quality of product really shows at OME Gear. 

But, it’s not only products that glow, but also services. Jules & Stace personally email each customer after purchase to familiarize and introduce themselves. That’s relationship building at the next level, and the team of co-founders makes sure that as they grow, they don’t want to lose that level of connection with their customers. They’ve created and continue to create a loyal consumer base with their personal post-purchase experience.

Stace, Jules, & Mariah also discuss posting on social media and how difficult it really is to keep up with and create content for. They make sure to share both their success stories and struggles as female founders so that they can pave the road and fill potholes for founders who come next. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Transforming products and taking ideas to market. 1:23

• Minimalism, sustainability, and multi-use products. 8:26

• Using a product called "Wanderer" for convenient transportation. 11:30

• Using customers as brand ambassadors for a new product. 17:12

• Building a successful outdoor gear brand. 21:57

• Branding, social media, and customer connection. 28:26

• Podcasting, entrepreneurship, and vulnerability. 34:29

• Social media strategy and kindness online. 40:22

• Customer experience and marketing strategies for a product-based business. 44:27

• Entrepreneurship, vulnerability, and problem-solving. 51:29

Allyse Jackson, Founder & CEO of Beehive Meals, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss how she’s managed and organized operations and logistics for her ecommerce business. 

Without intending to, Allyse started her business Beehive Meals by prepping freezer meals when she was pregnant. After realizing she over prepared food for her family, she started to realize she needed to get ride of some of her prepped meals.

After delivering extra meals to friends and family, Allyse saw how well they were received and went to Facebook to see how many people would be interested in a delivery service.

After seeing a very high demand, Allyse started Beehive Meals and has learned many lessons in scaling in the food and beverage industry. Allyse shares her past and current experiences and challenges with inventory, storage, distribution, and delivery expectations in the ecommerce space.  

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps: 

• 2:55 Entrepreneurship, crowdfunding, and meal prepping

• 7:16 Starting a meal prep business and its success

• 12:33 Starting a meal prep business

• 16:34 Managing a meal prep business during pandemic

• 21:21 Pivoting a food business during the COVID-19 pandemic

• 27:15 Navigating growth challenges in the meal prep industry

• 33:40 Expanding a meal prep business with freight model

• 39:18 Entrepreneurship, self-doubt, and networking

• 45:36 Food delivery challenges and solutions

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Pooja Parikh, VP of Planning and Operations at Andie Swim. Pooja tells Mariah about her background as well as how Andie Swim was started to make all customers confident and comfortable in swimwear, helping customers with sizing guides and quizzes, designing swimsuits for all bodies, how budget allocation has changed as Andie has grown, ensuring the first touchpoint with a customer is valuable, expanding their post-purchase experience to include returns and exchanges, the Malomo + Loop integration, and more!

Mariah Parsons, Head of Marketing at Malomo and Host, and Lisa Oberst, Founder of Womads, discussed the importance of sustainability and comfort in footwear design, particularly for women. They emphasized the need for quality control and good relationships with manufacturers. They also discussed various challenges and opportunities in the e-commerce industry, including networking, technology integration, and customer experience. They highlighted the significance of optimizing transactional emails for customer engagement and creating personalized customer experiences. Mariah and Lisa stressed the importance of building relationships with other entrepreneurs and marketing agency directors, and simplifying the reverse logistics process to foster long-term relationships.

Episode Timestamps

• 0:05 E-commerce brand Womads and its founder Lisa, with a focus on versatile and comfortable accessories for women

• 4:11 Shoe design and development, focusing on flexibility and comfort

• 11:04 Shoe design, manufacturing, and partnerships in Colombia

• 17:36 Entrepreneurship, manufacturing, and quality control

• 22:31 Launching a shoe brand, marketing strategies, and tech tools used for e-commerce and customer management

•  28:26 Simplifying reverse logistics for e-commerce businesses

• 32:08 Customer experience and e-commerce strategies for a women's shoe brand

• 35:56 Post-purchase experience and tech stack for a fashion brand

  41:47 Email and SMS marketing strategies for e-commerce brands

On this week’s episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Aaron Dungca, Director of Merchant Success at Rebuy, a personalization platform that creates intelligent shopping experiences. Aaron, Noah, and Mariah chat through;

• How merchant success and retention relate

• Taking a consultative approach to help rather than sell

• Creating lasting relationships

• What it means to have an intelligent shopping experience and how to create one

• KPIs to look for

• How to increase your AOV (average order value) and ROI (return on investment) on ad spend

• How to navigate building partnerships with other technologies vs building out product features

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Episode resources: The Leader Who Has No Title by Robin Sharma, The Customer Success Professiona’ls Handbook by Ashvin Vaidyanathan, How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie, Malomo Resource Library.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Dylan Byers, Jacob Paduch, and Liam Veregin, the Co-Founders of Aplo, a leading ecommerce performance marketing platform. In this specific episode, we chat through understanding how different technologies have different attribution models, omnichannel cohesion is overlooked by many, how different platforms have different attribution models, how to retain holiday shoppers, how to approach holiday ad creative and campaigns around Black Friday Cyber Monday (BFCM), which months are the most valuable cohorts of customers, and more!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we go through some of our favorite season 2 moments with DTC brands. We feature highlights from Steve O’Dell, Co-Founder and CEO of Tenzo, Michelle Paulhus, Sr. Growth Marketing and Retention Manager of Olipop, Tim Swindle and Scott Brown, Co-Founders of Paddlesmash, Hannah Toporoff, Social Media and Marketing Coordinator and Jennifer Mckay Newton, Founder and CEO of DefineMe Fragrances, Sergio Tache, Founder and CEO of Dossier, Matt Orlic, Founder of Football Supplements, and Luke Kingma, Creative Director at Bored Cow.

Chad Fisher (Founder) and David Stober (COO) of Ambaum join Retention Chronicles to discuss when merchants should use third party apps vs. custom solutions within Shopify’s capabilities

The Ambaum team has been in the Shopify ecosystem since the early days. Chad and David share their experiences running a Shopify agency, and then expand on their experience to further discuss optimizing a Shopify store for growth. 

Mariah emphasizes the importance of considering a brand's position on the growth curve when making decisions about what technology to add to your Shopify storefront. No brand is similar, and that’s what makes Shopify such a breeding ground for creativity. The group also discusses the evolving landscape of Shopify and its implications for custom development versus using apps. 

Later, they discuss the value of attending industry events and networking with brands and agencies to build relationships that can benefit both parties.

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• 8:46 Leveraging Shopify's growth for agencies and brands, with a focus on the increasing number of things touching the platform. 

• 16:56 Shopify's future direction and its impact on merchants. 

• 21:44 Shopify's capabilities and when to use custom vs. app solutions for merchants.

• 26:45 E-commerce, marketing, and branding for merchants.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Nate Hodge, Co-Founder and CEO of Raaka Chocolate. Raaka is a bean-to-bar, transparently traded Cocoa based product that emphasizes taste, quality, and authenticity. We chat through the founder story of Raaka, how far consumers can be from the production of their food, Raaka’s transparent trade model, branding centered around real people behind the product, first party research and data, segmented post-purchase email and SMS flows, and learning about the lifecycle of social media.

Georgia Grace Edwards (Co-Founder/CEO) and Charlotte Massey (Co-Founder/COO) of Gnara join Retention Chronicles Season 5 to discuss founding their brand with their patented GoFly technology.

Georgia Grace and Charlotte patented their GoFly technology to create a new industry for women’s pants. In addition to the familiar zipper fly that allows you to take your pants on and off, a second zipper extends from beneath the first zipper to the back of the waistband. 

The founder pair grew up in the great outdoors, and having experienced first hand the issue of not being able to easily use the restroom in nature, they started researching the history of women’s pants while in undergrad. 

From there, they completed both incubator and accelerator programs to establish their minimum viable product (MVP) where they could start selling products. 

After learning the legal and manufacturing sides of a patent, they began operating as a service where they would install their zipper technology in one’s favorite active pants. But, after seeing the market for this technology, they grew Gnara into what it is today by working with designers and investigating the history of women’s apparel and sizing.

Georgia Grace and Charlotte also speak to deciphering between utility and design patents. They attribute a lot of their learning to in-person trade shows where other founders shared their successes and challenges but acknowledged that the COVID-19 pandemic has affected those events. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Outdoor gear company Gnara’s origins and founders' backgrounds. 1:42

• Outdoor adventures, entrepreneurship, and gender equality. 3:10

• Entrepreneurship backgrounds and career paths. 6:29

• Entrepreneurship, business growth, and accelerator programs. 9:01

• Remote work and entrepreneurship. 16:35

• Innovative pants with hidden compartments for hygiene products. 18:54

• Designing and implementing functional clothing with zippers. 22:54

• Clothing design, sizing, and patents. 27:14

• IP law and its impact on accessibility. 35:41

• Entrepreneurship, e-commerce, and collaborations. 37:33

• The impact of the pandemic on the outdoor industry's largest trade show. 41:27

• Learning and problem-solving strategies for brand operators. 45:20

• Entrepreneurship, business growth, and collaboration. 47:59

Today we have a special episode for you! On sept 7th 2023, Malomo hosted our fist ever live podcast with some amazing partners of ours. This live podcast is broken up into two sessions and this is the second of two. Part 1 was focused on how to best prep for Black Friday/Cyber Monday (or BFCM) from both a marketing and CX brand perspective while part 2 was focused on how to best retain holiday customers from a brand and SaaS POV. A special thank you to our panelists: Colin Waters, Assistant Director of Customer Experience at Brumate, Katy Eriks, Director of CX at SuitShop, Max Conley, Director of Ecommerce at Raaka Chocolate, Ryan Powell, Group Director of Marketing & Partnerships at Ryder Ecommerce, Vaishali Ravi, Product Marketing Manager at Loop, and Malomo’s very own Noah Rahimzadeh and Yaw Aning! Malomo is currently running our Tracking Page Contest until 10/2/2023 and it is open to all Shopify/Shopify+ brands and agencies. Check it out here: https://gomalomo.com/tracking-page-contest

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Jim Breese, Head of Growth at AppHub, an agency that delivers a comprehensive suite of ecosystem leading apps and unparalleled customer support that helps e-commerce businesses reach new heights. On this episode, we discuss entrepreneurship and finding passion in content, how 93% consumers look at reviews, Shopify apps that save money and prove ROI, customer retention and saving costs, how attention is the currency of the internet, reasons someone would sunset a DTC brand, & more!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles we’re joined by George Kapernaros, Founder & CEO of YOCTO. Noah, Mariah and George talk about how specialists at Yocto can only work with a maximum of 3 clients at once so they can closely spot gaps and inefficiencies in their strategy, his skepticism that consumers buy from transactional emails but was then proven wrong by insane engagement rates, how the engagement on transactional emails helps the deliverability of your marketing emails, believing the power of transactional messages and purchasing from the order tracking page, using the number of unique clicks to website from email as their main KPI, the areas that brand owners frequently neglect in their email & SMS marketing, & more!Malomo is currently running our Tracking Page Contest until 10/2/2023 and it is open to all Shopify/Shopify+ brands and agencies. Check it out here:https://gomalomo.com/tracking-page-contest

On this week’s episode of Retention Chronicles, we welcome Josh Knopman, Director of Growth and Digital Product at Caraway, a brand that centers around beautifully designed non-toxic kitchenware. Caraway has been doing such amazing work on communicating with their customers and it truly shines through in this episode. Josh recounts all of their efforts by telling Sarah and Mariah about the unique communication channels they considered and ultimately implemented in order to add value to their very loyal consumers. Josh acknowledges the strategic shift of focusing on customer acquisition to retention and importance of capitalizing on the post-purchase space, which he believes is underinvested in. Josh also tells us about the experience in growing a brand from a single product to a multi-product company with a product that has a lower frequency of purchase than consumer goods while still being able to maintain customer engagement. With all the supply chain demands and backorders, we discuss the importance of transparency and thoughtful messaging with your customers, which flows into the overall intentionality behind Caraway’s messaging and support team. Caraway does something very unique for their customers who reach out to the support team for some assistance but you’ll just have to listen to find out! Consider this your warning, all this talk about cookware and bakeware may make you want to grab a snack! Enjoy!

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

In this episode, Sarah and Mariah welcome our first customer guest, Bryan Smith. Bryan is Head of Ecommerce at Ned & Co, a D2C brand that specializes in hemp products. We dive right in and talk about the importance of a brand’s story, possible touch points with customers, tempering expectations, performance goals, and incorporating user generated content. One awesome topic we discuss is everything that surrounds a subscription mode- in the ecommerce world, there can be negative connotations that surround this business structure. But luckily for us, Bryan walks Sarah and Mariah through the very successful structure of Ned’s subscription and how they’re winning in their customer experience by looking into the nuances around cancellation policies and messaging frequency. Bryan also shares the different and easy platforms that Ned uses to grow different avenues of their business, so stay tuned and subscribe for more customer guests to come!

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

This episode we’re joined by Vasa Martinez, Founder of Growthbuster, an ecommerce agency, and Perfy, a beverage brand, as well as the CMO at Outer Aisle. On today’s episode we talk about

• Vasa’s internship with Quest Nutrition Bars

• Developing a network early in your career to learn from the best

• When to outsource to get the job done vs when to keep it in house

• Creating a rolodex, or a housefile, to know your audience

• Shifting your retention strategy based on the quarter

• How to get people to continue to open email and SMS

• As well as how being authentic manifests a better connect with your customer

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

Nikki Tooman, Founder & CEO of Sticky Digital joins Retention Chronicles and if hearing Noah and Nikki discuss Shoptalk 2022 isn’t enough incentive to listen in, then hearing Nikki’s perspective of the Shopify brand and partner ecosystem sure is! Nikki has been in the Shopify ecosystem since Shopify has been in the game, and learned the core of the ecosystem at one of the biggest agencies at the time. 

For all our Shopify brands out there, do you know exactly what technology you should be using for your specific storefront? Nikki knows it all and shares it all so you’ll have to listen to hear all of her shoutouts, but we’ll break it down for you real quick- Loop, Recharge, Yotpo, Klaviyo, Okendo/Junip, Gorgias are table stakes for Nikki and her team. 

Retention marketing (email, SMS) and conversion rate optimization (CRO) is her jam - she and her team at Sticky Digital excel working with Shopify brands. 

What do you think the goal of partnerships is? Generating revenue, getting better discounts, relationship building? You’ll have to listen to hear what Nikki says about the industry and how to truly map a good partnership. 

BFCM (Black Friday/Cyber Monday) is in full-swing for the ecommerce community and Nikki shares her BFCM tips for Shopify brands: 1) Start your efforts early, 2.) We need to figure out retention stuff set up today & 3.) Post-purchase survey for first time purchasers. 

Did you know that 20% of your website traffic hits the order tracking experience? Turn all of that customer engagement into customer loyalty. Malomo helps you get ahead of shipping issues, brand your order tracking experience, and reconvert shoppers while they wait for their package to arrive. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Liz Krupka, Owner of Nomadd Marketing, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss email marketing and optimizing email templates

Great email marketing has to parallel a brand’s tone and great customer experience. This is what Liz and her team focus on. 

Liz and Mariah talk about how some ecommerce merchants have lost creative aspects of their marketing due to the shift towards performance marketing. The key is that these brands aren’t following what originally brought their customers to know and love their brand. So, some emails become too sales heavy, which end up turning customers away. 

Liz proposes that instead, brands focus on what drove their audience and hone in on that. Find out which emails are the most successful that appeal to their audience and optimize those rather than fully redoing their emails.

Liz also talks about email templates for ecommerce brands and how to compare templates accurately. Brands must take into account the email copy, email creative, email offerings, the seasonality, historical data, the economy, and more. 

There are also considerations brands should make when considering becoming a promotion-heavy brand vs one that does not run promotions. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timeline:

• 2:07 Celebrity endorsements and product placements in social media

• 6:42 Marketing strategies and post-purchase experiences

• 12:26 Email marketing challenges and strategies for brands in Utah

• 17:51 Email marketing strategies and audience analysis

• 23:04 Email marketing templates and their importance in improving email performance

• 28:27 Email marketing strategies and industry benchmarks for e-commerce brands

• 32:38 Marketing strategies, tactics, and best practices for email and SMS campaigns

• 38:54 Reducing promotions to focus on loyalty programs

• 43:05 Sustainable marketing strategies for fashion brands

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined my Michelle Paulhus, Sr. Growth Marketing and Retention Manager of Olipop, a healthy soda brand. On this episode, we discuss;

• Selling in retail and DTC

• Food pairing with Olipop flavors

• How Olipop launches new flavors

• Making repeat purchases easy

• Utilizing post purchase transactional flows to educate customers

• Using post purchase transactional flows to generate UGC

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Luis Lluis, Founder of GrowthStable, a leading agency for Shopify brands to enhance their suite of Ecommerce tools. Luis, Noah, and Mariah chat through Luis’s background as the Director of Ecommerce for Porto’s Bakery as well as continuing the conversation and excitement with your customers post-purchase, how to achieve the growth margins you’re looking for, creating a cyclic flywheel with increasing LTV, how brands are losing money on acquisition, retention as acquisition, and more!

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Cavelle Bieker, Marketing Manager at Pendleton. Our host Mariah Parsons and Cavelle talk about Pendleton’s history in retail, continued collaboration with the indigenous community, creating a timeless brand filled with heritage, the power of branding for the consumer, marketing multiple products in one image so consumers can see products in their home, how Facebook is the best revenue generator for them, generating leads from newsletters, and huge holiday giveaways!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we are joined by Marco de Paulis, Director of Partnerships at Whiplash. Whiplash is a 3PL (third-party logistics), also known as a nationwide omni-channel fulfillment provider. Marco explains what a 3PL is and does, what to look for and prioritize in the shipping and fulfillment space, how to be efficient while setting up your inventory, how to live up to the buy once the customer purchases, how to improve customer satisfaction and so much more.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Episode resources: Privy and Crossbeam

Mariah Parsons and Rachel discussed the importance of prioritizing customer experience and tailored marketing strategies to grow e-commerce brands. They emphasized the significance of celebrating milestones, launching new collections, and understanding the target audience to create effective marketing strategies. Later, Mariah and Rachel discussed digital marketing strategies, including social media marketing, influencer marketing, and the ethical implications of using AI-generated content in fashion marketing. They also explored the challenges of the apparel industry, including returns and exchanges, and the need to balance profit margins with offering lower prices to attract more customers.

Episode Timestamps:

• 0:05 E-commerce brand growth and marketing strategies with Ivy City Co

• 3:24 Marketing strategies and roles within a company

• 9:33 Using AI in photo shoots for fashion brand, balancing efficiency with human connection

• 16:36 PR and social media strategies for a fashion brand

• 21:31 Leveraging Instagram and TikTok for a clothing brand, with a focus on content strategy and audience engagement

• 25:07 Social media presence and trustworthiness

• 30:51 Marketing strategies and customer experience for a fashion brand

• 37:33 Apparel industry returns and exchanges, with strategies to reduce them

41:50 Reducing returns in retail with a focus on product pricing and marketing

On this episode of Retention Chronicles we’re joined by Mat Bingham, Director of Technology Partnerships at Okendo, the customer marketing platform that builds connections through showcasing high-impact social proof such as product ratings & reviews, customer photos & videos, and Q&A message boards. On this episode we chat about

• collecting data and influencing customer behavior,

• what to do if you have 5 reviews for one product and 100 for another,

• how cross and upsells should include social proof, UGC, and/or reviews

• onsite post purchase surveys

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Steph Hon, Founder & CEO of Cadence, a beautiful, modular, and customizable container system. Steph and Mariah talk about the inspiration behind Cadence and bringing routines on the go, quality product design with a first-of-it’s-kind magnetic and modular container system, developing the correct messaging for branding, how to be clever and focused with social media strategy, and more!

On this episode, Brian and Mariah chat through whether they’re a loyal Google maps or Apple maps user, Brian quizzes Mariah on geography, AARP going viral on TikTok, if Amazon Prime Day takes away from BFCM or adds to it, the newest Shopify ad, and Chipotle announcing they’re now in the Metaverse.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Adam Robinson, Founder & CEO of Retention.com. On this episode, Adam, Mariah, and Noah chat about growing, engaging, and reactivating a first-party database, identifying anonymous website visitors and getting their email addresses, ad technology, buying a domain, retaining funnel leakage and customer recapture, setting up a product view abandonment flow, and more!

Mariah Parsons and Rachel Nilsson, Founder of RAGS, discussed Rachel’s experience in building her e-commerce business, emphasizing the importance of perseverance, creativity, and customer satisfaction. 

Rachel shared her journey, including managing demand, partnering with large companies like Nordstrom and Disney, and navigating the unpredictable journey of entrepreneurship. 

They also discussed the pros and cons of implementing limited edition models to increase FOMO marketing and getting creative with inventory sales.

After Rachel’s premiere on Shark Tank, she navigated through having to deal with copycats but ultimately refocusing on doing their own thing and doing it well.

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps

• 4:37 Starting a clothing line from scratch, growing through social media and Shark Tank appearance

• 9:56 Limited edition drops, FOMO marketing, and serving customers

• 17:32 Limited edition products, inventory management, and consumer behavior

• 24:45 Challenges and successes of limited edition clothing model, with a focus on founder's personal experience and lessons learned

• 29:38 Entrepreneurship, success, and surrounding oneself with a supportive community

  33:04 Entrepreneurship, innovation, and dealing with copycats

On this week of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Garret Akerson, Co-Founder of Kindred Bravely. Garret tells Mariah about how they started Kindred Bravely as a fully remote company in 2015, testing their product by giving it to family and friends, gathering social proof in early stages, running social proof ads, selling on Amazon and Shopify, being customer experienced focused, having their customer care team be responsible for social media replies, launching in Target, having a clear message for ads and website experience, educating the market on correct intimates measurements, reducing returns with product education, the DTC space shifting in terms of who is charging for shipping & more.

On this first episode of season 3, we’re joined by Drew Himel, Founder & CEO of FIRESIDE, a marketing services company based in Denver, Colorado, supporting clients across the US and around the world. For some fun stuff to chat about before getting in the thick of things, we talk about biohacking and yoga, then we dive into business strategy such as making ROI positive quickly, the ideal tech stack for ecommerce brands, accurately communicating to your customers when a shipping issue occurs, making sure inputs are correct in google analytics for accurate attribution, decreasing churn or CAC, and humanizing the customer experience.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, Noah and Mariah discuss and try Google Multisearch, searching for a brand on social media before buying from them, shoppable ads on social media and Google, creating content on TikTok, trying Bored Cow (animal free dairy milk), layoffs in the technology industry, and more!

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On the fourth episode of Retention Chronicles, Sarah and Mariah are joined by Lisa Oberst, Director of Email Marketing at FuelMade, and Cristina Donati, Senior Marketing Manager, also at FuelMade. On this specific episode we chat about so many different things as they pertain to customer retention, like making a good brand impression, valuing and knowing your customers, customer first data, personalized surveys and quizzes, and so so much more. We have a really rich fact check so be sure to have your pen at the ready! We share a ton of laughs along the way so be sure to learn- and laugh- along with us!

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Jesse Clemmens, Co-Founder & CEO of HiTide, a Shopify solution for growing email and SMS lists through direct message automation. Jesse shares HiTide's journey from helping creators manage messages to focusing on Shopify brands, emphasizing the importance of bridging social media engagement with direct messaging for retention. He highlights that 60% of social followers engaging with posts are not yet subscribed to email or SMS lists, presenting a significant untapped market. Jesse also discusses best practices for direct messaging, emphasizing the need for timely, personalized communication to avoid spam and enhance customer relationships.

Episode Timestamps: 

• 1:51 Jesse's Background and HiTide's Origin

• Jesse introduces himself as one of the co-founders of High Tide, a solution for Shopify brands to grow their email and SMS lists.

• He explains that High Tide focuses on direct message automation, bridging the gap between social and brand-owned channels.

• Jesse shares his background, including his experience at Meta and Google, and the initial idea of helping creators organize messages.

• He describes the pivot from the Creator space to the Shopify ecosystem, emphasizing the success of their current platform.

• 8:00 The Role of Social Media in Retention

• Mariah and Jesse discuss the importance of social media in the Shopify ecosystem and the challenges of managing inboxes.

• Jesse explains the inconsistent reach of social media and the value of direct messages in reaching consumers.

• He highlights the potential of SMS as a personal and professional communication channel, with consumers signed up to fewer brand text lists.

• Jesse shares insights on the high conversion rates of SMS opt-ins and the importance of measuring the value of subscribers.

• 13:12 Best Practices for SMS and Email Marketing

• Jesse outlines the best practices for SMS and email marketing, including the importance of welcome automations and event-specific campaigns.

• He emphasizes the need for brands to understand the value of individual subscribers and measure the success of new channels.

• Jesse discusses the importance of having a well-tested program for both welcome automations and event-specific campaigns.

• He highlights the role of SMS platforms in optimizing messages and the importance of measuring the output of new channels.

• 21:07 Segmentation and Retention Strategies

• Mariah and Jesse discuss the importance of segmenting customers based on their engagement and purchase history.

• Jesse explains how High Tide helps brands fill out customer profiles and send targeted messages based on engagement data.

• He highlights the potential of re-engaging customers who have previously opted out of SMS or email lists.

• Jesse shares insights on the untapped potential of social followings and the importance of capturing serendipitous interactions.

• 30:40 Leveraging Social Media for Retention

• Mariah and Jesse discuss the potential of social media for retention, emphasizing the importance of timing and engagement.

• Jesse shares examples of how brands can use social media to alert customers about product availability and sales.

• He highlights the importance of capturing moments of engagement, such as comments and tags, to build long-lasting impressions.

• Jesse emphasizes the role of direct messages in building trust and winning lifelong customers.

• 41:29 Best Practices for Direct Messaging

• Jesse provides an overview of the best practices for direct messaging on social media platforms.

• He explains the importance of reactive messaging and the rules set by Meta to avoid spam.

• Jesse highlights the potential of direct messages to convert social followers into subscribers and the importance of following specific rules.

• He emphasizes the role of High Tide in keeping accounts safe and ensuring compliance with Meta's guidelines.

On this first episode of Season 4 of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Mahdi Mahil, Partner Manager of Ecosystems at Attentive. Mahdi, Mariah, and Noah discuss building long term relationships with customers and building out partnerships at Attentive, how the SMS landscape has changed over the past 6 years and recognizing the potential of SMS, how tech partners smooth out the rest of the customer journey, adapting to customer demands, how the Attentive team focuses on innovation, deliverability, and compliance, how SMS as a channel is well positioned to retain customers, frictionless customer account creation, and more!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Andy Warren, Senior Director of Strategy at Tomorrow Agency, an ecommerce focused digital agency based in New York City and official Shopify Plus Agency Partner. We chat about;

• Enterprise level methodology for both creative and technical strategy

• What enterprise brands are looking at

• How enterprise and SMB brands differ in documentation of strategy

• Data metrics that show conversion and revenue generated

• The gap between customer expectation and merchant expectation

• Why ‘Micro Personalization’ is attainable for everyone

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Michael De Santis, Director of Business Operations at Doris Dev, a full suite product development agency, and is a member of the founding team at Canopy, a no mist and no water diffuser brand. Michael, Mariah, and Noah chat through product inception and design, eco-friendly packaging, fulfillment, product testing, thinking about retention even when you're developing your product, building customer loyalty with samplers, and more!

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Kasey Luck, Founder & CEO of Luck & Co. Kasey, Noah, and Mariah chat about the founding of Luck & Co and their focus on retention via email and SMS, freelancing on Fiverr, Kasey’s love of email and SMS, attribution windows, orchestrating across channels, adding specific flows for loyalty and referral programs, taking ownership of transactional emails, A/B testing email length, & more!

On this week of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Brian Roisentul, Founder & CEO of BSR Digital. Noah, Mariah, & Brian discuss his background as a developer and how that led to a love of marketing, facebook ads and buying likes to boost posts, providing business results and leads, establishing 90 day goal plans to evaluate growth & access accountability, building email marketing for a 7 figure brand, helping a fashion brand double revenue in 6 months, performing a deep dive into the ICP of a brand, helping merchants build their own app, bringing back existing customers for BFCM promotions, & more!

James Van Erck, Co-Founder & COO of Rebuy, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss software that generates post-purchase revenue for Shopify brands. 

With his extensive background in ecommerce, James has a lot of experience to share with Shopify brand founders, operators, and marketers. A lot of brands focus on how to acquire their customers, but enough aren’t focusing on how to retain them after they make a first purchase. This is what James, Noah, and Mariah discuss. How do ecommerce brands retain their customers? 

There are a lot of ways to increase customer retention, but James shares one of the most crucial ways, and that’s by increasing post-purchase upsells and cross sells with dynamic product recommendations. This is why the Malomo and Rebuy software work so well together, and to hear more about that, you’ll want to tune into this episode.

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode timeline: 

• 2:24 Building software for e-commerce merchants. 

• 6:36 Ecommerce strategies and retention tactics for Shopify brands. 

• 10:50 Post-purchase offers and gift card upsells. 

• 18:40 Personalized product recommendations and gift cards. 

• 23:36 Personalization platform Rebuy and its benefits for Shopify brands. 

• 27:35 Post-purchase experiences and personalized product recommendations.

In this episode of Retention Chronicles, Brynn Snyder, CEO and Co-Founder of Slate Flosser, joins Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles and Head of Marketing at Malomo, to discuss her journey from a multi-business entrepreneur to developing a groundbreaking three-in-one flosser. Snyder shares insights into her life as a mother of five, her entrepreneurial roots, and how personal experiences in her husband's dental practice inspired the creation of Slate. The conversation covers the intricate processes behind product development, the challenges and costs associated with launching a high-quality product, and the crucial role of feedback from dental professionals. Snyder emphasizes the importance of education in marketing, the effectiveness of different acquisition channels like Meta and Google ads, and the nuanced strategies for retaining customers through email, SMS, and subscription models. She also highlights the significance of key support systems such as female founder networks and advisory boards in navigating business challenges. As the episode wraps up, Snyder discusses Slate's marketing strategies around habit-building and the limited sales events, providing listeners with a special discount code (MARIAH10) for aspiring buyers.

SLATE FLOSSER DISCOUNT CODE: MARIAH10

Episode Timestamps:

00:15 Meet Bryn Snyder: CEO and Co-Founder of Slate Flosser

00:47 Inspiring the Next Generation of Entrepreneurs

02:38 The Journey to Founding Slate

04:30 Innovating Oral Health: The Slate Product

14:51 Challenges and Triumphs in Product Development

20:28 Educating Dentists and Consumers

21:16 Finding Initial Testers

22:58 Kickstarter Insights

24:36 Marketing Strategies

28:41 Retention Marketing

33:56 Holiday Gifting Potential

36:44 Networking and Problem Solving

38:42 Promotions and New Year Resolutions

39:46 Conclusion and Discount Code

Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles & Head of Marketing at Malomo, is joined by Kes Nielson, a branding expert and Founder of BRAAAND. They discuss the importance of branding in e-commerce. Kes emphasizes that branding extends beyond logos and color palettes, focusing on creating emotional connections with customers to drive long-term loyalty and revenue. She highlights that effective branding can increase revenue by 20-23% and improve customer retention. Kes also discusses the significance of branding in societal issues, citing a campaign for Fight Against Domestic Violence (FADV) that aims to raise awareness and empower victims. She stresses the importance of uniqueness and intentionality in branding strategies.

Episode Timestamps:

• 2:24 Kess's Background and Branding Philosophy

• 5:25 The Importance of Branding in Customer Experience

• 8:24 Challenges and Opportunities in Branding

• 8:39 The Role of Emotional Intelligence in Branding

• 37:08 The Impact of Branding on Societal Issues

• 43:39 Collaborations and Partnerships

• 48:19 The Future of Branding in Ecommerce

Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles and Head of Marketing at Malomo is joined by Alyssa (Lissy) Kotter, the Founder and CEO of Lissy Skincare, a brand specializing in acne and fungal acne-safe skincare products. Lissy shares her background as an esthetician and her struggles with acne, which led her to create a line of products that cleared her skin. The brand's flagship product, the Mandelic serum, launched in 2022 and has been highly effective. Lissy discusses the challenges of developing fungal acne-safe products, the importance of customer experience, and the role of TikTok in driving sales and customer retention. She also hints at an upcoming moisturizer launch and plans for Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotions.

Episode Timestamps

• 1:48 Lissy's Background and Skincare Brand

• Lissy introduces herself as the founder of Lissy Skincare, a brand focused on acne and fungal acne-safe skincare.

• Lissy explains the brand's mission to create products that are safe for acne-prone skin, pregnancy, and breastfeeding.

• Mariah asks Lissy to explain the difference between typical acne and fungal acne.

• Lissy describes typical acne as lesions that come to a head and heal, while fungal acne is an overgrowth of yeast on the skin that looks like flesh-colored bumps and does not react to typical acne treatments.

• 21:55 Lissy's Journey to Founding Lissy Skincare

• Lissy shares her background as an esthetician and her struggles with acne since middle school.

• Lissy discusses her decision to attend esthetician school to learn how to clear up her own acne and help others.

• Despite her training and using various skincare products and treatments, Lissy's acne persisted, leading to a teacher's concern about her job prospects.

• Lissy's research into fungal acne triggers and her frustration with finding fungal acne-safe products inspired her to create her own skincare line.

• 22:11 Product Development and Launch

• Lissy describes the process of developing Lissy Skincare products, starting with the Mandelic serum.

• The Mandelic serum cleared Lissy's acne and fungal acne within days, leading to the brand's launch in 2022.

• Lissy explains the importance of ensuring all products are fungal acne-safe and safe for pregnancy.

• The brand has since added three more products: a Hydrating Serum, a Vitamin C serum, and a cleanser, all of which are fungal acne-safe.

• 22:27 Customer Experience and Retention Strategies

• Mariah and Lissy discuss the importance of customer experience and retention in e-commerce.

• Lissy acknowledges the need to improve customer experience and mentions her team's efforts to provide excellent customer service.

• Lissy highlights the role of TikTok in driving sales and the challenges of not having customer emails from TikTok shop.

• The brand uses email flows, social media, and a subscription model to retain customers and encourage repeat purchases.

• 22:46 TikTok Strategy and Paid Advertising

• Lissy shares the success of TikTok shop in driving viral videos and sales for Lissy Skincare.

• Despite the saturation of TikTok shop, Lissy continues to post videos and engage with customers on the platform.

• The brand has recently started experimenting with paid advertising on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok to diversify its marketing efforts.

• Lissy emphasizes the importance of video content for selling products and sharing customer testimonials.

• 40:08 Future Plans and Final Thoughts

• Lissy teases the upcoming launch of a moisturizer on October 24, which has been in development for almost a year.

• The moisturizer is a significant product for the brand, as it is challenging to find fungal acne-safe moisturizers.

• Lissy mentions plans for Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals to attract more customers.

• Mariah wraps up the episode by congratulating Lissy on her upcoming launch and thanking her for sharing her journey and insights.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Aaron Quinn, Founder and CEO of eHouse, a customer-first eCommerce agency, combining the best of UX design, technology and analytics to create sites that shoppers love. Mariah, Noah, and Aaron discuss how to put energy in the right places in both a professional and personal sense, what Aaron has learned from 20+ years of experience in ecommerce, being approached by Shopify to be a strategic partner and knowing that it was the right direction for their team, how Shopify has enabled brands to focus on the consumer first, how great customer support can build a brand consumer relationship even when there’s an issue, launching headless websites, engaging with the customer to increase retention, generating revenue and loyalty during the post-purchase experience, providing value while a customer is waiting for their order, & more!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by FriendBuy’s Head of Partnerships, Samantha Samuels and Partner Marketing Lead, Emma Kimberly. Friendbuy is a platform that powers referral and loyalty programs for the world’s most innovative brands. By listening to this episode, you’ll learn about;

• Key benefits of referral and loyalty programs

• KPIs to pay attention to

• Why referral channels are great for growth

• What incentives are successful and motivating to your customers

• Scaling word of mouth marketing

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

Episode resources: Friendbuy blog, Morning Brew, Future Commerce, Seth Godin's blog.

Ross Martin, President of Known Agency and General Partner of Lunch Partners, joins Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles and Head of Marketing at Malomo, to discuss his journey in marketing. Known, an integrated agency ranked third by Ad Age combines research, creativity, and innovation, working with clients like Shake Shack and TikTok. Ross highlighted their unique approach, such as using AI to identify relevant Reddit conversations for Shake Shack. He also shared insights from Lunch Partners, emphasizing the importance of resilience and heart in founders. Ross praised Mikmak for connecting legacy brands with social commerce, showcasing the power of AI and consumer intelligence in driving business outcomes.

Episode Timestamp:

• 1:56 Ross Martin's Background and Early Career

• 5:55 Marketing Insights and Innovative Strategies

• 6:41 Known Agency's Origins and Capabilities

• 24:26 Challenges and Opportunities in the Agency World

• 26:06 Lunch Partners Venture Fund

• 31:20 Investment Thesis and Founder Traits

• 36:43 Innovative Campaigns and Collaborations

• 41:15 Ecommerce Innovations and Future Opportunities

On this episode, we’re joined by Tim Swindle & Scott Brown, Co-Founders of Paddlesmash, the next great backyard game where Pickleball meets Roundnet. We touch upon manufacturing in the US vs internationally, creating new board games, getting games on the shelves of big retailers, the virality potential of games, how its changed getting the products into the hands of the consumer, sending free product out to get content back, QR codes on packaging, and building brand awareness through DTC so there's brand recognition in retail.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Jon Snow, Founder & President of The Snow Agency. Noah Rahimzadeh, Mariah Parsons, & Jon Snow talk about monetizing influencer marketing, integrating with other partners, understanding the value of an agency background, using modern day media buying principles to leverage, creating narratives and blending SEO with launching a new brand, how to amplify all your efforts, looking at retention marketing, taking the human element out of media buying, understanding the Shopify tech stack before approaching paid media, Diversifying where you're selling your products on all platforms, the risk of competition on social media, & more!Register for our LIVE PODCAST: https://gomalomo.com/resources/live-podcast-bfcm

Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles and Head of Marketing at Malomo hosts Aneto Okonkwo, Co-Founder & CEO of Remarkable AI,  an AI growth marketer for consumer brands. Aneto discusses the importance of marketing, particularly in scaling new companies, and shares insights on customer retention strategies. He highlights the effectiveness of personalized email campaigns, which can yield 50-100 times return on investment per recipient. Aneto also emphasizes the value of engaging with customers on social media and leveraging influencer marketing. Additionally, he stresses the significance of addressing customer issues promptly to enhance brand loyalty and retention. 

Episode Timestamps:

• 3:06 Challenges of Starting a New Company

• 3:55 Importance of Marketing and Customer Engagement

• 6:18 Remarkable AI's Services and Customer Engagement

• 7:14 Data Analysis and Customer Insights

• 10:25 Social Media and Community Engagement

• 14:39 Influencer Marketing and Product Seeding

• 18:34 Email Marketing and Retention Strategies

• 20:17 Expanding LTV and Cross-Selling

20:43 Seasonal Strategies and Customer Support

On today’s episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Jennifer McKay Newton, Founder & CEO, and Hannah Toporoff, Social Media + Marketing Coordinator, at DefineMe Fragrances. DefineMe Fragrances is a clean, every-day fragrance brand all about bringing out your emotions through fragrance. On this episode we chat about the founder story of DefineMe, the science behind fragrance and emotion, hidden easter eggs in each butterfly logo, evoking what a scent smells like online, how DefineMe’s crystal infused perfumes are paired with scents, the launch of their hair fragrances and educating customers around products that go into your hair, the DefineMe Goddess Gang, TikTok learnings and #perfumetok, using the post-purchase experience to retain customers, as well as preparing for BFCM with email and SMS messages, gift guides, and bundles.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

Dallas Parsons, Senior Director of Marketing at Mixhers, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss adding value to the ecommerce customer experience. 

Dallas started at Mixhers as a customer success manager, so she knows exactly what their customers care about most after her first-hand experience. She’s since transitioned into their marketing department to focus on customer retention, email marketing, designing the customer experience, implementing marketing technology, loyalty programs, & more. 

Like many ecommerce brands, Mixhers continues to focus on customer retention as customer acquisition costs (CAC) continue to rise. They chose to funnel their energy towards what was working for them - email marketing.

Dallas and her team decided to define an email marketing strategy that helped educate their customers. They did this by enabling a product quiz around which supplement would be the best for that customer based on their answers. 

At face value, some ecommerce brand operators would argue that this isn’t a smart marketing approach as it could add friction to the buying experience. But, the Mixhers team saw that it actually helped their customer’s buying experience and resulted in higher revenue. With more confidence in what product they were buying, Mixhers customers benefited largely from this addition.

Dallas tells Mariah about this decision and much more on this newest episode of Retention Chronicles.

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• 8:47 E-commerce retention strategies, including lifecycle marketing and customer acquisition costs
• 15:03 Adding value to customer journey for subscription-based supplements
• 21:16 Email and SMS marketing strategies for a supplement brand, including customer journey mapping and lifecycle marketing
• 29:45 Developing a mobile app for tracking menstrual cycle and symptoms, with goals to increase brand trust and loyalty
• 34:30 Returns and exchanges in the supplement industry, with a new product launch coming soon

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Adam Sharon-Zipser, Director at Elephant Room & Giftnote, and Nick Kennedy, Head of Client Success & Partnerships at Elephant Room and leading Growth at Giftnote. Elephant Room is an integrated digital agency focusing on building and growing online presences for Australian businesses while Giftnote is helping online brands unlock their giftable revenue. The group chats about trends from BFCM 2022, performance marketing, big results for startups, the Shopify ecosystem, benchmarks to look at, giftable revenue, marketing to both gift givers and gift receivers, what converts gifts receivers to first time buyers, and more!

Today, we’re joined by Luke Kingma, Head of Brand at Tomorrow Farms and Creative Director at Bored Cow, the leading brand for animal free dairy milk. We talk about demystifying lies around the new food industry like precision fermentation or cell based meat, the waves of social media from legacy platforms to new platforms, creating political commentary that isn't divisive, basing a marketing strategy around edutainment, collecting consumer insights across the journey, and doing something fun and memorable in marketing.

Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles, and Bob Verlaat, Co-Founder of Dore & Rose and Hears, discussed their experiences launching and scaling e-commerce brands, emphasizing the importance of having a clear vision, solid business plan, and strong support system. Mariah highlighted the value of taking calculated risks and learning from failures, while Bob stressed the need to maintain quality and customer satisfaction as the brand scales. Bob added their perspective on launching multiple brands and incorporating user-generated content in advertising. The group discussed factors to consider when launching a product, the role of artists and influencers, approaches to launching and retaining customers, and the challenges they faced in a saturated market. They emphasized the importance of problem-solving, educating consumers, providing a seamless customer experience, and scaling while maintaining passion and caring attitude.

Episode Timestamp:

• 5:55 Launching two e-commerce brands, Doreen Rose and Here's, with different approaches and industries

• 13:12 Brand collaborations and launch strategies

• 16:44 Launching a new brand in a saturated market with limited attention span

• 23:23 Using user-generated content (UGC) in ads for authenticity and engagement

• 27:29 Educating customers through product development and customer experience

• 34:17 Scaling customer service and technology for two e-commerce brands

Mariah Parsons and Jonathan Penna, Co-Founder of ORBYT Skin & Azio Beauty, discussed their experiences navigating the challenges of e-commerce during the COVID-19 pandemic. Jonathan shared his journey of transitioning from a bakery to an e-commerce business, highlighting the challenges of scaling an operation during a global health crisis. 

Mariah provided context and asked questions to delve deeper into the topic, exploring the impact of COVID-19 on the e-commerce industry and the strategies for adapting to the new normal. Later, Mariah and Jonathan discussed various strategies for building successful subscription-based businesses, including personalization, direct-to-consumer marketing, and optimizing subscription retention and growth. 

Jonathan shared their experience with onboarding AI-powered customer support tools like Sienna AI, emphasizing the importance of careful onboarding and optimizing automations.

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• 3:49 Skincare brand development and marketing strategies

• 9:10 Pre-orders and subscription model for a brand, with focus on education and UGC to drive sales

• 13:37 Marketing strategies for a skincare product with pre-orders and subscriptions

• 18:36 Implementing dynamic pricing for subscriptions, with focus on customer frustration and retention

• 23:02 Increasing subscription conversions through easy customization and control transfer to customers

• 28:44 Subscription services and customer preferences

• 34:12 AI-powered customer support tool and retail expansion

• 38:50 Strategies for expanding a subscription-based e-commerce business

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Olivier Momma, Co-Founder of Ekster, a trackable wallets, card holders, bags and tech accessories brand that provide function and style at your fingertips. Olivier and Mariah talk about Ekster’s very successful launch on kickstarter, building out a kickstarter launch guidebook for other brands, the roadblocks Ekster faced when scaling, conversion rate optimization and website design, A/B testing, international SMS strategy, email drip campaigns, using post-purchase emails to survey customers, return management, & more!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, Brian and Mariah get each other's opinions on;

• If a sales representative offering a gift card is an effective outbound strategy

• Being a high LTV customer by subscribing to various brands (or not)

• Disney adults and the business strategy behind theme parks

• Influencers turning their audience into buyers

• The Attentive x Loop integration

• The competition between TikTok and Instagram.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode Yaw and Mariah chat with Aaron Schwartz, President of Loop Returns, the leading returns & exchange platform that helps Shopify’s best brands optimize return costs, retain more revenue, and prevent return losses. Aaron tells us about his past ventures as Founder of ModifyWatches, which was acquired by Custom Ink, Founder of Passport Shipping, and previous Chief Business Officer of Returnly. We also chat through the notion of influencers on a local level, when there’s demand but people aren’t buying if shipping isn’t up to par, carrier handoffs, keeping track of feedback from different channels, sustainable growth, and how consumers are trained to look for pitfalls.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, Kat Gordon, Head of Customer Success at Malomo, Sarah and Mariah discuss customer retention as it pertains to Black Friday Cyber Monday. We first focus on why it is important to concentrate on customer retention during the hectic holiday season. Obviously, brands want to keep the customers they gain during the holiday season and maintain those they already have. Kat, Sarah, and Mariah discuss some strategies on how to do exactly that. We first kick it off by covering how to adjust and troubleshoot, why it's smart to optimize for mobile, as well as how to handle a surge in website traffic and shipping fulfillment. Then, we dive into some initiatives to reward loyal customers, from both the customer success and marketing avenues. Then to finish out the episode we dive into the post-purchase experience and how to provide the best support possible to increase customer retention. Stay tuned until the end to hear Sarah and Kat’s advice as to what they have carried with them from each holiday season to the next and for the fact check where I will make sure we cover all the bases we ran through in this episode.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, Brian and Mariah get each other's opinions on;

• Trying Tenzo matcha, reading instructions, and the post-purchase experience

• Improvements for SMS strategy from a consumer perspective

• Bed bath & beyond and the downfall of department stores

• If DTC brands have the option of having a wedding registry

• FedEx announced they’re raising prices because of a lack of demand, inflation, and market instability

• Adobe purchasing Figma for $20 Billion and how Figma made collaborative design a thing

• The differences between Canva and Figma

• The meaning of ‘cheugy’ and what constitutes as cheugy

• Texting and slacking with abbreviations

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles we’re joined by Lexi Montee, Vice President of Marketing and Communications at Happiest Baby. Lexi tells Mariah about their success in word of mouth marketing for their SNOO technology and building community around product, how comments on social are becoming the new UGC, expectation management with reviews, sharing stats on what’s average with children to educate new parents, segmenting based on what kind of parent their customers are, in-app support for customers, working with the FDA to get approval, and more!

Today on Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Christina Dorr Drake, Co-Founder & CEO of Willa’s Oat Milk. We joyfully chat through many things on this episode, such as, pivoting from an agency background to founding a CPG brand, starting as an entrepreneur and learning how to work with a smaller team, revolutionizing the oat milk business to use the whole oat (rather than just the sugary part), food waste and how to prevent it, experimenting with different tactics on social media, gifting product to influencers, and providing different customer experiences to meet them where they are at.

On this week’s episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Sergio Tache, Founder & CEO of Dossier, the leading perfume brand that is the fair alternative to luxury perfumes. Yaw and Sergio share a background in Investment Banking and have brought those learnings, such as having a strong work ethic and finding a great mentor, into founding their own brands. We also discuss the large profit margins of the beauty industry, creating more value and giving back to the consumer, removing nasty ingredients, marketing scents, empowering the buyer to make a good decision, influencer marketing, and conveying a story through video.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

Today we’re joined by Matt Orlic, Founder of Football Supplements and Inspire Brands Group. On this episode we talk through Matt’s entrepreneurial spirit starting 26 different companies and the lessons he has learned from starting so many businesses. We spend the majority of our time talking about educating your customers around healthy nutritional practices, influencer marketing, knowing the right market, content creation, and prepping for BFCM.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this special episode of Malomo’s Retention Chronicles podcast, we’ve taken out some of our favorite Season 3 moments with DTC brands. Listen now to hear what leading ecommerce pros think about the Shopify ecosystem, customer retention and loyalty, transactional emails and SMS, post-purchase strategy, product development, finding your branding, and more! We highlight our conversations with Dave Burchett (Founder & CEO of Avance Vinyl), Christina Dorr Drake (Co-Founder & CEO of Willa’s Oat Milk), Nate Hodge (Co-Founder and CEO of Raaka Chocolate), Megan Christian (Social Media Manager at YESCOM USA), Molly Kerrigan, (Director of Retention at Shinesty), Louise Fritjofsson (Founder & CEO of Martie), Steph Hon, (Founder & CEO of Cadence), Pooja Parikh (VP of Planning and Operations at Andie Swim), Stephanie Cohen (Founder of Stephanie Cohen Home), Josh Knopman (VP of Growth & Digital Product at Blueland), Chuck Bowen (Founder & CEO of Mission Mercantile), and Lexi Montee (Vice President of Marketing and Communications at Happiest Baby).

Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles & Head of Marketing at Malomo, and Lindsay Baylor, Senior Director of Customer Care & DEIB at Kendra Scott, discussed the importance of leveraging technology and diversity initiatives to improve customer service at Kendra Scott. They emphasized the value of creating an online experience that is easy for new customers to adapt to, and the need for a comprehensive view of the customer journey. Mariah Parsons and Lyndsay Baylor also discussed the importance of integrating customer data from various sources to create personalized experiences, and the challenges of connecting data from online and in-store interactions. Finally, Mariah Parsons and Lyndsay Baylor discussed the importance of diversity, equity, and inclusion in the fashion and jewelry industries, and the need for brands to be intentional and authentic in their approach to diversity and inclusion.

Episode Timestamps:

• 0:05 Adapting to pandemic-era customer needs at Kendra Scott, prioritizing omnichannel experiences

• 8:48 Tying customer data across multiple channels for improved brand experience

• 13:44 Using technology to improve customer service

• 19:39 Implementing chatbot technology and improving customer experience

• 26:19 Personalizing customer experiences through social media engagement

• 30:35 Diversity, inclusion, and representation in marketing and customer service

• 35:25 Internal and external perspectives on diversity, equity, and inclusion in the jewelry industry

39:53 Customer inclusivity and diversity in product development

Caitlin Elgin, Head of CRM & Lifecycle, at Fluency Firm joins Retention Chronicles to discuss evaluating Shopify transactional email and SMS by click rate. 

Caitlin, Noah, & Mariah chat about Caitlin’s background in marketing and how she’s been in the Shopify space since 2014 before they even had an integration with USPS. 

Caitlin has worked with countless brands who have upgraded their transactional emails from the ‘out-of-the-box’ Shopify experience to fully branded and personalized transactional email and SMS with Malomo. She shares a specific Shopify merchant use case where after they implemented Malomo, they doubled their click rate on transactional emails. 

You can learn more about the services Caitlin and her team offer at fluencyfirm.com or by emailing hello@fluencyfim.com. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps: 

• E-commerce Enlightenment with Expert Insights. 0:04

• Email and SMS strategies for Shopify brands. 1:57

• Travel plans and e-commerce strategies. 4:32

• Using Malomo to increase click rates and engagement for transactional messages. 8:21

• Email marketing optimization for increased revenue. 12:10

• Tracking emails and driving engagement. 18:32

• Using Malomo for post-purchase emails and tracking. 23:05

• Email marketing strategies and services for business growth. 30:04

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Josh Chin, Co-Founder and CEO of Chronos. We talk about Josh’s background in copywriting, finding good influencers to work with, finding profitability in 14 days, 3 stages of the customer experience, how to drive repeat purchases for subscribers and set the stage for repeat purchases, how to properly attribute success in marketing, and more!

Dan Brady, Customer Success Manager at PuraVida, joins Sarah and Mariah to discuss how PuraVida connects with their customers to launch new product lines that stay true to their authenticity as a brand. Dan shares his perspective on how the new IOS privacy updates continuously change their strategic approach towards focusing on their post purchase data to inform their roadmap. Dan details PuraVida’s very successful brand ambassador program, which is arguably one of the most successful ambassador programs in ecommerce. PuraVida believes in the importance of having a social mission and holding themselves responsible at the corporate level and Dan walks Sarah and Mariah through how PuraVida does exactly that. PuraVida recently updated their returns policy and Dan shares the trends they saw with that change and they might not be what you’d guess, so tune in for all the details. Don’t forget to subscribe and follow Malomo on social media to add your commentary!

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Welcome to our first episode of Retention Chronicles! On this episode, our hosts, Sarah and Mariah, discuss the top customer retention trends you need to follow, such as delivering fast support to customers, using automation where you can, implementing referral and rewards programs, as well as KPIs and tools you can use to evaluate and accelerate growth! We cover some fun stats that may surprise you so stay tuned for the fact check at the end of the episode for all your resources in one place. Be sure to subscribe and follow Malomo on social media to share your thoughts and stay up to date.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

John Gross, Founder & CEO of Fat Earth Media, and Rose Eppensteiner, Senior Manager of Lifecycle Marketing at Fat Earth Media, join Retention Chronicles to discuss founding an agency to work with mission driven brands to help with paid media, lifecycle marketing, and marketing creative. 

Making a pivot in his career from environmental sciences to marketing, John started by taking out ad space in Craigslist advertising his Google Ads consultancy. But, he didn’t just want to focus on media buying, he wanted to invest in lifecycle marketing. So, he built Fat Earth to serve mission driven brands and help with their marketing strategy. 

John and Rose don’t just detail why lifecycle marketing is important, but also how it’s related to retention, and how to make lifetime value (LTV) higher than customer acquisition cost (CAC). Not only do they tell Mariah and Noah about how Shopify & Shopify Plus brands can achieve their goals year-round, but especially during the holidays. 

Fat Earth Media makes sure that their clients are set up for success by creating strategic content planning to look at monthly and quarterly campaigns. Segmentation is a critical piece for Shopify/Shopify Plus brands’ success, and making sure their email and SMS sends make sense is a big step in strategy planning. To do this, all teams have to be aligned and connected. 

Another area of expertise they focus on is design. An easy trap to fall into is to confuse complexity and effectiveness. A creative director may love an email, but if no one is clicking on it, it might be the best route to take. The Fat Earth Media team redesigns assets to make them better from every possible angle. 

For our holiday tips portion of the podcast, the Fat Earth Media team shares that they advise their brands to assume the consumer is very smart and don’t try to trick or be inauthentic for the extra dollar. Consumers will shop with the brands they like and trust, and the brands who know and follow that will win. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Lifecycle marketing and retention with industry experts. 0:04

• Personal lives, adventures, and remote work culture. 1:39

• Personal updates, background of Flat Earth founder, and current focus. 7:18

• Career change and marketing strategy. 9:22

• Marketing strategy and Google ads. 13:55

• Marketing agency's mission-driven approach and impact on clients. 18:26

• Marketing career paths and agency start-up. 22:15

• Marketing agency growth and lifecycle marketing. 27:47

• Retention marketing strategies for existing customers. 33:35

• Email marketing planning and design for retention. 38:44

• DTC brand marketing strategies for the holiday season. 45:30

Today we have a special episode for you! On sept 7th 2023, Malomo hosted our fist ever live podcast with some amazing partners of ours. This live podcast is broken up into two sessions and this is the second of two. Part 1 was focused on how to best prep for Black Friday/Cyber Monday (or BFCM) from both a marketing and CX brand perspective while part 2 was focused on how to best retain holiday customers from a brand and SaaS POV. A special thank you to our panelists: Colin Waters, Assistant Director of Customer Experience at Brumate, Katy Eriks, Director of CX at SuitShop, Max Conley, Director of Ecommerce at Raaka Chocolate, Ryan Powell, Group Director of Marketing & Partnerships at Ryder Ecommerce, Vaishali Ravi, Product Marketing Manager at Loop, and Malomo’s very own Noah Rahimzadeh and Yaw Aning! Malomo is currently running our Tracking Page Contest until 10/2/2023 and it is open to all Shopify/Shopify+ brands and agencies. Check it out here: https://gomalomo.com/tracking-page-contest

Mariah Parsons and Yaw Aning discussed the importance of creating a seamless post-purchase experience for e-commerce merchants. They emphasized the need to align the experience with the brand's strategy and goals, educate customers about the brand, and set goals based on the strategy. Both speakers highlighted the importance of keeping customers updated and mapping out the customer journey to build trust and transparency.

Episode Timestamps:

• 0:05⁠ Post-purchase experience optimization for e-commerce businesses

  • Expert CEO shares 10 post-purchase lessons from 5000 Shopify brands.

  • Yaw Aning advises merchants to understand their post-purchase default settings.

• 3:55 Post-purchase experiences, brand strategy, and metrics for success

  • Understand your brand strategy to choose the right post-purchase platform.

  • Consumers prefer post-purchase experiences that educate and build the brand.

  • Develop goals based on strategy to create a cohesive experience.

• 10:13 Post-purchase experience optimization for e-commerce merchants

  • Yaw Aning suggests partnering with an agency to optimize post-purchase experience.

  • Yaw Aning: Key moments in customer journey build trust, transparency.

  • Mongoose's proactive communication best practices defuse frustration, build trust.

  • Yaw Aning highlights Soylent's post-purchase strategy, segmenting customers based on their journey stage and providing tailored content and CTAs.

  • Mobile-first design is crucial for tracking experiences, as 83% of views occur on mobile devices, and customers are often interrupted during on-the-go activities.

Chris Miller, Co-Founder & CRO of Flaunt Loyalty, and Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles & Head of Marketing at Malomo, discuss the importance of dynamic loyalty programs for Shopify merchants. Chris highlights Flaunt Loyalty's unique service & software model, which includes designing, implementing, and managing loyalty programs to grow LTV and profits. They emphasize the need for ongoing optimization and strategic alignment with marketing campaigns. Chris shares examples like Barefaced's Mother's Day campaign, which integrated loyalty rewards into existing promotions. They also explore the balance between subscription perks and loyalty programs, stressing the importance of personalized rewards and gamification elements like badges and leaderboards to enhance customer engagement and retention.

Episode Timestamps:

• 2:49 Introduction of Chris Miller and Flaunt Loyalty

• 4:30 Bandwidth and Expertise in Loyalty Programs

• 10:49 Benefits of Dynamic Loyalty Programs

• 13:39 Case Study: Barefaced Loyalty Program

• 23:11 Subscriber vs. Non-Subscriber Loyalty Programs

• 26:24 Gamification in Loyalty Programs

• 43:52 Examples of Effective Loyalty Programs

• 44:07 Resources and Further Learning

Today on Retention Chronicles we are joined by Zach Niemiec, Director of Administrative Services at Bariatric Fusion, a supplements company specifically designed for customers, who are also affectionately known as patients within the Bariatric Fusion community, who have undergone Bariatric surgery. You can almost feel the authenticity seep through the microphone as Zach tells Mariah about the care and community Bariatric Fusion provides their patients with. In addition to sharing how Bariatric Fusion listens to their customers with features such as access to a product recommendation email, health questionnaires, and recipe quizzes, Zach also shares about meeting the needs of his patients. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, a lot of support groups Bariatric Fusion patients relied on were put on pause. Zach, seeing the positive impact these groups provided for his patients, swiftly acted to institute virtual support groups that have stayed within the Bariatric community even with in-person events resuming. This is a phenomenal example of how to understand your customers and add value to their life so that your brand creates a community for your people. As stated in the episode, the goal should be to make a brand community that is so loved that when and if someone walks away, they feel homesick. Make sure to tune in to hear more and subscribe on all your favorite channels.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Jenny Nuccio, Founder & CEO of Imani Collective, joins Retention Chronicles for the first episode of Season 5 to discuss social entrepreneurship for nonprofits and for-profits.

Jenny has always been passionate about developing the communities she is a part of and focusing on giving back to them. After living in Kenya for many years, she and her pioneer team at Imani Collective began building their nonprofit to create opportunity through trainings and jobs. 

She realized that they had to create a marketplace for their vision so that the trainings they were providing would lead to sustainable jobs, so Jenny and her team founded the for-profit side of their company, Imani Kids. 

Tasked with running a nonprofit and a for-profit, Jenny learned the similarities and differences between being an executive director and a CEO. With those learnings, she decided to bring all their companies together under one umbrella and create their holding company, Imani Collective.

Constantly asking herself how to build a sustainable nonprofit and for-profit business, Jenny asked herself how their company would run without her and how their ethical impact could continue its legacy in the best way possible. 

Jenny also walks through how she developed Imani Kids, their ecommerce company, by using local Kenyan material and organically growing their social media profile over time. She’s learned to reduce her ad spending to focus on retention over acquisition and how to leverage organic content and word-of-mouth marketing with their brand ambassador program. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Founding and growth of Imani Collective, a social enterprise in Kenya. 1:26

• Transitioning a nonprofit to a for-profit social enterprise. 7:03

• Nonprofit vs for-profit business models. 14:41

• Nonprofit sustainability and impact with industry insights. 19:19

• Building a successful brand for kids with Imani kids co-founder. 24:42

• Starting a social enterprise and brand development. 27:59

• Marketing to parents through social media and PR. 33:02

• Brand ambassador programs and their success. 38:49

• Social entrepreneurship and brand development with Imani Collective. 44:13

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Aminah Fawad, Director of Operations and Emma Henderson, Lifecycle Marketing Manager, at Stix. Stix is the female-founded, no-judgment health brand with the products and space you need to make confident decisions about your body. What will you take away from this episode? How marketing and operations can be co-utilized in the customer retention space, opportunities that can be left on the table if customer retention isn't at the forefront of your strategy, how to first get feedback from your customers and how to implement those findings, why post purchase is important for your business, capitalizing on every touchpoint (even packaging), and how to center your team around your brand mission.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles we’re joined by Kristen Tumasonis (Marketing Dir.) and Katy Eriks (Director of Customer Service) from the SuitShop team. Kristen, Katy, and Mariah talk about the Malomo x Loop integration and tracking returns and exchanges, customer education at the top of the funnel, educating on suit fit, having an easily accessible support team, setting up custom flows based on event dates, a 12 month email cadence for wedding planning, empowering customers to make the right choice for themselves, Malomo post-purchase emails, fashion and model inclusivity, and more!

In this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Brandon Amoroso, Founder and CEO at electrIQ marketing and Noah Rahimzadeh, Director of Partnerships at Malomo. ElectrIQ marketing is a Shopify agency located in Miami that aims to help brands improve retention and LTV. We’ll share about how Brandon and his team do exactly that and how that process differs for subscription vs non-subscription brands. You’ll be given multiple use cases and creative ways to revolutionize subscription adoption and retention as well as how to leverage information from multiple technology platforms. And speaking of tech, Brandon shares his golden tech stack that he believes every Shopify brand should have. Have you ever wondered how you can get a customer back if they have a bad experience? Or what can go wrong if you segment but don’t personalize? Look no further…

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Episode Resources: Here’s more information on Brandon’s golden tech stack as well as our Malomo x Rebuy exclusive deal!

Jay Davis, Founder of Pillow Cube, Cold Case Ice Cream, & Creatably, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss where to start when founding an ecommerce brand.

Jay has had a vast background in marketing and he focuses on one thing - what’s not going to change in 10 years, and how he can focus on that. 

Jay and Mariah talk about how easy it is to get caught up in marketing trends even if they might not be the best thing for your business. Making the (wrongful) assumption that traditional marketing of the past isn't as effective as our current age of digital marketing can lead to massive missed growth opportunities.

After founding many brands, Jay’s biggest advice to other founders of products is to know your finances and if people will want your product.

Jay shares his favorite test to run with friends and family to see if they enjoy a new product. We don’t want to spoil the details, but it’s one of those moments where you’ll reframe how you’re going about your customer testing. He also gives insight into some of his favorite customer retention plays.

Jay also discusses 2024 macroeconomics of the ecommerce industry and what founders should be cautious about. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• 1:46 Entrepreneurship, marketing, and business growth.

• 3:58 Viral marketing strategies and industry changes.

• 6:33 Marketing trends and social media platforms.

• 10:57 Marketing trends and the importance of connecting with people.

• 15:30 Entrepreneurship, marketing, and finance.

• 19:48 Product development and market research.

• 25:38 Entrepreneurship, business growth, and scaling.

• 31:36 Entrepreneurship, business growth, and work-life balance. 

• 38:02 Customer retention strategies and brand development. 

Summary43:12 Entrepreneurship, marketing, and customer retention.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Eric Bandholz, Founder & CEO of Beardbrand. Host Mariah Parsons and Eric discuss Beardbrand’s content strategy in the early days, empowering customers to love themselves and the trickle down effect on team morale, building a business around what Amazon can and can’t do well, bringing value first to customers with educational content, affiliate marketing, SEO, and organic social, & more!Register for our LIVE PODCAST: https://gomalomo.com/resources/live-podcast-bfcm

On this very first episode of Season 2, we’re introducing a new co-host, Brian Lastovich! Brian is the Head of Marketing at Malomo and he joins Mariah to discuss updates in the Shopify ecosystem as well as plenty of other topics (and yes, some tangents!). In these shorter episodes of Retention Chronicles, Brian and Mariah each pose two topics to discuss. Today, we teach Brian how to use a microphone (and become a professional podcaster 😝), what Mariah thinks of Ultra Fast Fashion, if LinkedIn stalking is ok, quiet quitting, whether hot dogs can be straws, our reaction to Shopify Collabs dropping, as well as reflecting on Gorgias’ $30M Series C.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

Mariah Parsons, HOM at Malomo and Host of Retention Chronicles, and Madison Lee, Co-Founder & CEO of Nemah, discussed the challenges and opportunities of transitioning from a talent agency to a e-commerce brand. Mariah and Madison explored the importance of personal branding, consumer insights, and technology in developing a private label. They emphasized the need for brands to prioritize customer experience, retention, and the delicate balance between automation and human touch in e-commerce. Mariah Parsons and Madison Lee also discussed the challenges of founding a vegan skincare brand for moms and babies, scaling a DTC skincare brand while maintaining customer trust, and educating and supporting parents through science-backed content.

• 4:38 Founding a vegan skincare brand for moms and babies

• 10:30 Branding and consumer insights for a clean skincare line

• 15:54 Scaling a DTC skincare brand for pregnant and postpartum women, focusing on customer experience and trust-building

• 22:54 Using consumer insights to inform educational content and product development for parents

• 26:59 Creating a clean beauty brand with a focus on community and science

• 31:31 Post-purchase customer experience and its importance for e-commerce brands

36:57 Customer experience and retention in e-commerce

Anthony Ciavirella, Co-Founder of Manmade joins Retention Chronicles for episode 20 of season 4. Anthony and his three other co-founders started Manmade, a leading men’s essentials brand, after starting his career in banking. After a 10-month journey to designing the perfect boxer-brief, Manmade has over 120k orders with 400,000 boxers sold to 90k customers in 2 years. 

For all our Shopify brands out there, do you have a sole-founder team or do you have a team of co-founders? Anthony details how their founding team of 4 is able to move at 4x speed with their collaboration. 

Does exponential growth come from great product, great marketing, or both? Anthony shares his opinion on developing an incredible product alongside great marketing. With product development, it’s not so much about getting everything right the first time, because you most likely won’t, but it’s about listening to your customer feedback and iterating to make the best product you possibly can. 

Content marketing is foundational to the Manmade team- Anthony and his team strive to bring customers along for the journey as they’re learning. The Manmade team believes that ecommerce shoppers like seeing the faces of founders, and they’ve fully embraced that marketing strategy. Also included in their marketing is a ton of attention to organic social growth. Meta is the driver of where Manmade gets new acquisitions, whether it’s through lots of PR and interviews, radio, newspaper articles, or social media. Gorilla marketing is their jam.

Retention marketing is strong at Manmade, 35% come back in 3 months, 50% come back after 12 months. They credit that to their intentional site and post-purchase touchpoints. Listen today to hear more about the details!

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

Ecommerce brand retention strategies with industry leaders: 0:04

Founding a men's essentials brand with four finance professionals turned entrepreneurs: 1:21

Entrepreneurship, business ideas, and competitive pricing strategies: 6:05

Product quality, marketing, and iteration in business: 11:16

Branding, packaging, and marketing strategies for a men's underwear line: 15:59

Customer acquisition costs, retention, and post-purchase education for a men's apparel brand: 22:18

DTC underwear brand's use of authenticity and transparency in marketing: 26:47

Pinterest marketing for gift-giving season: 34:18

Retention strategies for an underwear brand: 37:36

Building a direct-to-consumer brand with a focus on customer experience: 42:54
Entrepreneurship, business growth, and overcoming challenges: 48:08

Liz Reyes, Co-Founder of Sols, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss recovering from a burglary by putting her customers first, establishing her ecommerce store on Shopify, starting to build on social media, & more.

When founding an ecommerce company, there are a lot of questions that need to be answered like where to host your site, what technology to add to your ecommerce platform, what to invest in, how to build out your team, and more. Luckily for listeners of Retention Chronicles, Liz and Mariah talk about Liz’s journey in setting up Sols. 

Liz walks through her decision in choosing her ecommerce platform to be Shopify, setting up their website,  shipping, warehouse logistics, and operations. 

It’s a very unfortunate situation, but Liz shares a vulnerable moment in disclosing that Sols experienced a burglary in December 2023 and how she and her team have tried their best to recover and communicate with customers about the delays in their orders. After experiencing a lot of emotions around such an event, Liz speaks to the frustration of having to take inventory and match it to orders manually.

Liz also shares about her decision to break ties with a 3PL so that Sols could enhance and own the post-purchase experience. Like many brand founders, Liz knows the importance of communicating often and accurately with customers while they wait for their orders.

Starting out on social media can be a daunting task, but Liz breaks it down but just having fun with posting on Sols’ social media and nailing down who you are as a brand and who you want to be with.

Harry Willis, Director of Partnerships and Business Development at Relo, joins Retention Chronicles to discuss increasing repeat orders and subscriptions for Shopify CPG brands.

For Shopify and Shopify Plus brands, it can be difficult to know how to exactly tailor your customer experience when trying to motivate your customers to purchase more with you. Decisions like which day to target, which product to cross sell, who to show something to, and so many others are difficult to make without data and predictive analytics. 

Harry WIllis, Director of Partnerships and Business Development at Relo, explains how Shopify brands are building their customer experience with the smartest tools around and how they’re hurdling the biggest retention challenges of the year. 

For instance, one problem brands face is with increasing reorders and cross sells is that different products have different reorder times. But with product and customer tendencies, Shopify merchants are working around this with predictive analytics and making sure that their email marketing and SMS marketing is well-placed based on that order. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your personalized mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your free design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• 6:00 CPG brand retention strategies using data analysis. 

• 11:43 Personalized reorder reminders and cross-selling using Shopify data. 

• 17:07 Using Klaviyo's predictive analytics for cross-selling and replenishment. 

• 21:44 Using AI to optimize subscription marketing. 

• 27:19 Using Klaviyo and Malomo to increase repeat orders and subscriptions for DTC brands.

  32:48 CPG subscription-based brands and problem-solving.

This week on Retention Chronicles, the Malomo Sales & Marketing team hosts Jesse Bern, founder of Red Beard Conversions and overall expert in email and SMS marketing. This was such a fascinating conversation all about email marketing and SMS marketing. Jesse walks us through his process in capturing your audience in a subject line to spur curiosity and then rope them into a story in the body of the email copy. He is a master at using conversational, humorous, and even sometimes riskier language to entertain and intrigue customers. We also discuss how to pivot and bring new experiences to your work to keep things relevant and fresh. Jesse shares he is trying to focus on sharing more about himself and his story on social media to connect both with the brands he works with and their customers and his own following. Jesse and Spencer bounce off of each other about the concerns they hear from brands on the marketing side and on the sales side, which is fascinating to hear. Last but certainly not least, we discuss the differences between email and SMS marketing and wonder if and when boundaries that are native to SMS will be broken. Be sure to tune into this amazing episode and share your thoughts with us on your favorite social media channel.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, Yaw and Mariah chat through whether or not they like to have questions beforehand for presentations and podcasts, procrastination, Google Multisearch, TikTok as a search engine, and shopping on TikTok because it’s entertaining.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Chelsea Jones and Rachel Saul, Co-Founders of Chelsea & Rachel Co, a women-owned agency specializing in eCommerce strategy, UX/UI design & Shopify development. On this episode we specifically talk about how Chelsea & Rachel started their company and how their professional background influenced how their agency stands out. We also talk about choosing a subscription program, the biggest trends in ecommerce for 2023 such as serving customers holistically and breaking down different digital channels, and understanding the crossover between Amazon and Shopify.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Tim Masek, founder of 1-800-DTC and Director of Growth at Storetasker. 1-800-DTC is a directory for ecommerce brands when they’re considering all their tech stack possibilities as well as a community around identifying trends between brands. In this episode you’ll hear about Tim’s Under the Hood interviews that dive into the operations behind a brand to give a technical approach to success, how to turn a one-time purchaser into a subscriber, whether having a subscription only business model is right for you, how to have a streamlined tech stack, what patterns have emerged after looking at a ton of brands, how to outshine competitors, and driving exclusivity through memberships, gated communities, dark stores.

Be sure to subscribe to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com. Try our free trial today!

Episode resources: 1-800-DTC Yellow Notes Newsletter, Oddit Newsletter, and Indie Hackers Newsletter.

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we’re joined by Dane Baker, Co-Founder & CEO of Ecocart, who’s proprietary algorithm gives brands the ability to not only effectively communicate their sustainability story to shoppers but include them in it with engaging activations. Our hosts, Noah Rahimzadeh & Mariah Parsons, talk to Dane about the current educational barrier to affordable sustainability software, building a shopping experience with sustainability at the center, calculating the carbon footprint for each brand and each package to offset all carbon emissions on the internet, talking about sustainability in almost every customer touchpoint, rewarding via loyalty programs for choosing carbon offset, how aligning a brand & shopper’s interests makes the customer come back & increases LTV, Ecocart’s Green Friday initiative to offset green emissions during BFCM for the brands they work with & more. Register for our LIVE PODCAST: https://gomalomo.com/resources/live-podcast-bfcm

Blake Imperl, former VP of Marketing at Carro and current VP of Marketing at Digioh, joins Retention Chronicles for episode 21 of season 4. Noah, Mariah, & Blake kick off the episode with Blake’s birthday running tradition, starting his career consulting for digital marketing, and working with paid media across multiple brands to drive $13 million in email & SMS retention marketing. 

Now of course, we recognize the ecommerce community is probably very familiar with Blake Imperl, but if you’re not, we highly recommend you tune in to hear his opinions around how the Shopify & Shopify Plus ecosystem works and is constantly changing. 

Blake shares how the Shopify & Shopify Plus ecosystem is currently seeking more of an emphasis on retention because now it’s difficult to be profitable whereas before, brands could make up the difference on the backend. Blake provides examples of how Carro helps brands increase LTV (lifetime value) and AOV (average order volume) while lowering CAC (customer acquisition cost) by getting in front of customers in a more efficient way. 

Humanizing the shopping experience so there’s a deep connection with customers brings an element to DTC brands that retailers don’t often experience, and there’s a lot that goes into it. It might be a difficult thing to measure, but it’s worth pursuing. Blake shares how showing up in the social feed and having something interesting to say captivates a lot of attention, and it’s valuable attention. 

We’re in the thick of the holiday season, so Blake shares his BFCM brand must-haves. He recommends brands set up their transactional emails and SMS marketing campaigns in a smart way. Don’t risk it all, SMS automations are expensive, so be intentional with your segmentation and design and don’t bombard your customers. Every unsubscribe in 2023 is lost revenue in 2024. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

Running, ultra-marathons, and personal limits: 4:07

Career path and e-commerce experience: 7:25

Unconventional career path in marketing and partnerships: 13:27

Applying b2c marketing strategies to b2b marketing: 16:29

Humanizing B2B content through authenticity and emotion: 22:01

Leveraging collaborative commerce platform to increase sales and reduce costs: 25:12

Using marketplace to drive sales and growth: 30:05

Using marketplaces to test new products and increase revenue: 32:55

E-commerce marketing strategies and customer retention: 40:25

Black Friday and Cyber Monday marketing strategies: 43:53

LinkedIn strategy and content creation: 49:16

On this episode of Retention Chronicles, we welcome Noah Rahimzadeh to chat! Mariah and Noah chat through BeReal and how brands are experimenting with it, B2C and B2B marketing strategies on TikTok, and the BFCM holiday rush in ecommerce.

Be sure to subscribe to our pod to stay up-to-date and checkout Malomo, the leading order tracking platform for Shopify brands at gomalomo.com.

Today on Retention Chronicles we’re joined by Greg Meade, Co-Founder & CEO of CROSSNET and Good Sport. Greg and Mariah discuss the founding story of CROSSNET, scaling a business, game development, team management, the experience of going viral on social media, using word of mouth marketing to grow, being a thought leader in the ecommerce/DTC space, the stages the CROSSNET team went through to develop and improve their products, how he think about retention, marketing a game with the right branding, and finding the right balance of technology for your team.

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