- Speaker #0
You know, I think people were embarrassed to ask for a sale. They, you know, they were scared when they had a community that they didn't want to be too salesy or their community would maybe turn on them, you know, if they were selling something. And the cool thing about right now is it's way more acceptable. You know, it's way more acceptable for you to have a community and to sell something to your community. Sometimes they almost expect that now.
- Speaker #1
You're watching Marketing Misfits with Norm Farrar and Kevin Kane. Mr. Farrar, how are you doing, man? Another great day, another great Misfits podcast.
- Speaker #2
And you know what's beautiful about it? It's 27 degrees in Canada. It's the first day I can think of.
- Speaker #1
You're talking like some other language. This is, I'm sitting in America. Tell me, America, what's the temperature in America?
- Speaker #2
America, that would be. close to
- Speaker #1
77 78 something like that double it and add 32 to get close so yeah 27 times 2 is 54. and that's 86 roughly probably more like 86 84 88 or something like that but that's a rough estimate yeah so it's hot anyways yeah that that that's that's a that's a mild day down here in texas that that's that's like a mediterranean day for us i gotta acclimate down in america You know, speaking of America, have you ever bought anything on TikTok? Well, you don't have TikTok in Canada. I mean. No,
- Speaker #2
no. We got TikTok in Canada.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, but then they closed down the offices or something. They kicked everybody out. My wife,
- Speaker #2
four hours a day, she's on TikTok. So, yes, it's here. And I don't know if she's bought anything. I haven't.
- Speaker #1
You haven't. I've never. I've bought quite a few things on TikTok. I think I had two deliveries today from TikTok.
- Speaker #2
I'm an Amazon guy.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. You're an Amazon guy. Well, you're missing the boat. You know, that's the silver, the hot thing right now for all the Amazon sellers is they're like, we need to get on TikTok because we can like create all this demand and we can do all this social commerce. And then there's a residual effect. The halo effect. talk the haleo effect they see it on tick tock and then they don't trust tick tock shop or the the vendor so they go and they buy it on amazon and you get all these this lift um but you know sometimes You don't even need that lift. Sometimes you can do millions of dollars, tens of millions of dollars. I think over maybe 21 million, I think is the number. Our guest today said that she did last year. Maybe that's on track to do this year. We'll find out. Just on TikTok. She says she's not on Amazon, not anywhere else, just her own store. Yeah. And TikTok, and I think she's got an app. But it's a fascinating story. I saw her speak at an event in Florida back in May. And it was amazing. She brought her whole team out, all of her social media girls, and all of her whole team was there, and they each had a little bit, and they told their story. And I was like, oh, this is cool. People got to hear this. It's really cool the way they're doing things. So I'm super excited to have Tiffany on today.
- Speaker #2
Okay. Well, why don't I just do my job and hit the button, and we'll bring on
- Speaker #1
Tiffany. Tiffany Ivanosky. Yeah. Hello. How are you doing, Tiffany?
- Speaker #0
Doing really good. How are you guys?
- Speaker #1
Good, good. We're lucky because Norm hit the right button. Sometimes he hits the eject button and I fly out.
- Speaker #2
As I put my dog in the face, I didn't even realize Dallas was right under my foot and got excited and kicked him.
- Speaker #1
So your story is a really interesting one. Your fellow Texan just down the road from me, just out, what, northwest of Houston, right?
- Speaker #0
A little northwest of Houston in Magnolia. So just north of the woodlands.
- Speaker #1
So when people hear Magnolia, do they think of the place up by Waco, the TV show? Do they get all confused?
- Speaker #0
You know, they want to know if we know Chip and Joanna and everything else. And I'm like, you've got the wrong Magnolia.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. So you have been, you started with TikTok about, what, 26, about nine years ago or so? Sorry, selling. Sorry, not TikTok. Yes. You opened like a little retail boutique store, like in a strip mall or something?
- Speaker #0
We did retail about a year and a half ago. Oh, okay. So we actually started first on Facebook. We're still on Facebook, but started first on Facebook. And then kind of transitioned to our own app. Of course, we have a website. And then we've been on TikTok since they really just first started that beta with the shops, which is what? Is that?
- Speaker #1
Two years ago? It's two years ago right now. Yeah, about two years ago. Yeah. Oh, wow. Okay. So you were doing commerce like ads or just organic stuff on Meta originally?
- Speaker #0
Yes. So we actually have not done any ads until the last two years. We built the entire thing just completely organically the first seven years of this business. Didn't run any ads at all, just built a big old community. And it's only been recently that we've really started running some ads.
- Speaker #1
Wow. So what's your background before this?
- Speaker #0
So we started, oh my goodness, kind of always been entrepreneurs and started blogging back in the day with the Mommy Bloggers. and was blogging recipes and about my family and extreme couponing. We did a lot of extreme couponing. We were on the extreme couponing show. And it kind of just went from there. We did a lot of affiliate marketing on our blog. So I was kind of familiar with that world of pushing traffic somewhere, making a post, getting everybody excited about it. And then I just randomly happened to hear about these leggings that everybody was so excited about. and thought, hey, I can sell some leggings on Facebook and got involved in that. I had no idea it was an MLM or a crazy cult. Went through the whole ringer with that and kind of came out of that on the better side of it. But we then transitioned to kind of a more traditional, well, not even traditional e-commerce, but we were doing lives on Facebook, kind of like a live QVC on Facebook. and we're literally writing customers names down and they're getting their email address and then manually sending them invoices and telling them they have to pay their invoice before the morning and then shipping their product to them. So we did that for a number of years and then went to our own app. And then it's just kind of evolved since then to website and then now TikTok, of course, you know, and all of it combined together.
- Speaker #1
Wow. That's awesome.
- Speaker #2
you had a question norm yeah my question was i i wanted to know you'll get a question that's it that's it all right oh so no i'm sorry i'm always busting his balls so all right now my question just happened to be and i think you've answered it but i want to know what you're selling so uh we just met and kevin came up to me and said you got to meet this lady oh she's fantastic you won't believe it she's selling 21 million dollars on tick tock But he forgot to tell me what you sold. I'm just...
- Speaker #0
Women's clothing.
- Speaker #2
It's all women's clothing.
- Speaker #0
Yes. Predominantly jeans. We kind of call it like Tiffany's favorite things, kind of like Oprah's favorite things. If there's something I love, then I'll talk about it and sell it. But what we're selling on TikTok predominantly is women's jeans. Some, you know, shoes come in, you know, second. We've got a real popular style of shoes that we do, but mostly women's denim.
- Speaker #1
And a few accessories and jewelry and stuff too, right? But that's small.
- Speaker #0
Correct. That's just kind of to compliment everything else. You know, if you're going to buy an outfit and jeans and shoes, I might as well have some tops and jewelry for you too.
- Speaker #2
And what makes your product stand out? I mean, jeans, I think of jeans or jeans or jeans. Do you do something differently?
- Speaker #0
So part of the interesting part of this too is some of it a little bit is our own brand, but we actually sell another brand out there. And, you know, we buy wholesale, we sell, you know, retail, but it's stretchy. It's comfortable. There's tummy control. There's butt lifting. I mean, all those things that I'm sure, Norm, you love in your jeans. Absolutely.
- Speaker #1
No, it's me that loves it. It's me that loves it. Not Norm. Oh, yeah.
- Speaker #2
I do that for Kevin.
- Speaker #0
Exactly. So it's just comfortable, you know, denim. They're always launching new styles. And it just, you know, it kind of just at the right time just really took off. You know, women were tired of the 100 percent cotton, not stretchy jeans. and you know you know, they're comfortable, wear them all day and don't feel like you have to change as soon as you get home.
- Speaker #1
One of the things that was really interesting is a lot of times the jeans, they go after a very specific avatar of a person, like a body shape or body size. They're either for the skinny girls or for the in-between or for the plus size, but you cover the whole range. And I remember you showed a video that I thought was brilliant. When I first met you, you showed a video where you brought, we'll talk about that in a minute, where you brought a bunch of your influencers together down in Houston did a bunch of cool stuff. And then you had each one of them, you said to like a music video, a popular song or something that's trending. And then each one of them walked up. They're all like in a line kind of against a wall, just kind of just moving around in the back. And then they all one by one walked up and they're all kinds of shapes and sizes and colors. And they like, they tugged on their jeans. They did a 360 and like, look how much they fit me. I was like, that was brilliant. Clicking marketing because every woman's like, that's me, that's me. Oh, that's you.
- Speaker #0
she's not me she's not oh that was that one's me i'm buying it was really cool so you cover the whole gamut right we sure do there's a lot of skews yeah well it is a lot of skews um and it's a lot of sizes you know size zero through size 24 uh in women so you know well we've got 13 different sizes in there and uh you know all different styles so you know the crazy thing is for guys you guys are so lucky you literally have kind of one style of jean that you typically wear If you go to the store, you buy kind of the same style. buying a skinny jean, a flare, a boyfriend, a boot cut, you know, a straight leg, you guys are buying one kind and you always are going to get the same waist size usually and the same inseam because you also only wear typically one shoe. Like you're going to wear a tennis shoe. If like you're my husband, you're going to have a tennis shoe and then he has like a dress boot, you know, so he'll wear like his boots if he's going somewhere nice. Um, and then a tennis shoe. So, but women, I mean, we're going to wear. eight different styles of jeans. We're going to wear a sandal from a tennis shoe to a heel to a wedge. And so we're wearing all of these different styles of jeans that we need different inseams for. So it's kind of, it's crazy. It's just an endless amount of SKUs that you can carry, you know, to fit that style. I mean, I'm kind of jealous of guys, you know, you walk in, my husband's like, I'll take a 36, 32, I mean, every single time. And they're always going to have it there for them. But, you know, that's kind of the, kind of the difference in the magical part about it is that we're launching so many different styles all the time. If you don't see exactly what you want this month, they're going to sell out. They don't come back yet. So that kind of gets you a little bit excited about getting something if you love, is that we typically don't recut any of those styles. But next month, we're going to have 20 new styles for you to try. So you've kind of got to grab it right now. And if you don't see what you love right now in a month or two, you know, we'll probably have it again.
- Speaker #2
So you talked about going on Facebook and starting there and then going over to TikTok. talk. How did you get started in all this?
- Speaker #0
It's kind of crazy. So, you know, from blogging, of course, you know, just built a really big community on Facebook. And like I said, we were doing extreme couponing. And so I would go to the grocery store, haul my kids all up to the store, show them, you know, this coupon matches up with these razors. You're going to get them for two bucks, stock up on them kind of thing. And I started going live on Facebook in the very beginning. Again, we got pretty lucky and we're able to beta test some of that first Facebook live stuff. So I would go into the store and do little quick videos and show ladies how to save money. And then started, you know, selling these leggings. And I thought, you know, why don't I just unbox them and show my group what leggings came in today? And if they like them, they like them. And I just started doing that. And then I was like, people were like, well, how do I buy them? And we didn't have a website or anything. And I was like, well, I guess if you want them, just comment sold. Just say sold. You want those? and then leave your email and I'll literally write your email down. And then I'm going to go invoice you through, you know, a program all night long. And it just kind of took off and, and they loved it. And it was like this feeding frenzy of purchasing online like this in a live setting where I'm literally kind of your model, I'm your personal shopper. And it kind of took off because, you know, a lot of women, they think, you know, I could never afford someone to. personal shop for me, or I could never afford someone to really show me these clothings or these clothing, or maybe they're really rural, or maybe for some of my ladies, they're overweight and they don't feel comfortable going into a store and it's not comfortable for them, but they want to see these styles. And so I'll try stuff on, or I'll talk about the fabric. I'll show them how it fits and they can just order right there live. And it's like, they have their own personal shopper.
- Speaker #1
So these were coming from Lula, Lula row, or these were. Do you know what that is, Norm? Have you seen the documentary? What's it on Amazon Prime, I think? Yes. I've seen part of it. I need to finish it, and I probably will finish it tonight after this talk because I now even want to go finish it. But it's basically like, you know Fry Festival, Norm, right?
- Speaker #2
Okay, yeah.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, it's basically the same producers that produced Fry Festival actually did this documentary on this MLM. It's a Mormon-based group, and they started. this MLM of selling jeans, you know, like Avon or one of these, you know, kind of things where you sell the jeans. And then it progressed into almost like Uber, where the Uber guy all went to his head. No, no, WeWork. The WeWork guy had all went to his head and he started doing these big festivals and these big concerts and this big crazy spending. And then it got real religious and like, he's the next coming of Christ and all this kind of stuff. And it get over the top and it kind of, they went into billions of dollars of sales and then imploded. And that was like 20, what about 2013 to 2020 or something like that?
- Speaker #0
You know, wildly, they're still in business.
- Speaker #1
Oh, they're still in business.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. I mean, they have nothing like they used to, but they're actually still in business, which is completely nuts.
- Speaker #1
And so were you getting the jeans through that or were you buying them wholesale directly?
- Speaker #0
Actually, it was really a lot like, you know, like a... uh, like a home party, like a pampered chef or something, you know, where you could buy the product, you'd go to someone's house, set it up and they'd buy it. And then, you know, they'd get a discount and tell their friends, you know, is really how it was. Um, and it was just leggings. There was no jeans involved at all, just leggings and tops. And you had to order their product. You couldn't sell anything else, but their product. And, um, it just, it took off from there. It was just, it was very unique. It was very interesting. And had they not ruined it or had there not been as much nepotism and craziness, it was actually a very cool concept. And there was a way if you, you know, for a lot of MLMs on there, it's like that, you know, that pyramid and only those people at the top make money. This one was interesting because you didn't have to have anyone signed up underneath you to make money. You could make money just by selling the product. So that was interesting. The funny part about it is I didn't know I was signing up for an MLM when I signed up for it. And I, you know, I just started this. I thought I'd sell some leggings on here. And then a couple months in, I got this check and I thought it was for damages. And I was like, hey, I got this check. And then the next month I got another check. My husband's like, why are you getting these checks? And I was like, well, I think it's for my damages. And he's like, I don't know. It didn't really add up. And so we kept trying to figure out what's going on. My husband's like, um, he's like, I think you signed up for an MLM. And I was like, what? And he's like, you literally have people signed up under you. I was like, are you kidding me right now? But we were really good at doing the live sales. People were like, I want to sign up with her because she clearly knows what she's doing. People were signing up under me. I didn't even know. And I'm like getting these checks. It was completely crazy land. And it just exploded. It just took off. And, you know, women loved it. And the clothes were good at the beginning. And then they went to total crap. And the company, just the owners would only hire their children. And they were not qualified. They were the fastest growing company to a billion dollars in the United States. And then they completely imploded.
- Speaker #2
Wow. Now, you said a documentary was called Lulu something.
- Speaker #0
Lulu Rich.
- Speaker #2
Lulu Rich. So this has nothing to do with a Lululemon.
- Speaker #0
No, it does not.
- Speaker #2
Okay. I just want to make that clear.
- Speaker #0
It's very confusing.
- Speaker #1
Do you have a decent assist notice, Norm, on the podcast?
- Speaker #2
Yeah, it's more than beeping you out sometimes.
- Speaker #1
So you did that, and then when did the jeans part? come into play? Was that the same time or did you pivot?
- Speaker #0
No, because we were not allowed to sell any other products with this. And then things got completely crazy. There was a lot of FTC violations. My husband and I were top sellers in the company and leaders in the company and realized they were doing a lot of things that were illegal, a lot of things that were violating stuff. And we kept bringing it to their attention. And they kept telling us to shut up, mind our own business, and just put our heads down. And I just could not do it. I have a... I just had a big mouth. I couldn't shut up, kept talking. And eventually we were terminated dramatically from the company. And in fact, it was so dramatic that we didn't even know it was us that were terminated. Everyone's talking about it. And they sent this mass email out and said, a high profile client or consultant got terminated. We're like, who is it? Trying to figure it out. I'm like, I'm going to go find out in my Facebook group. And I'm in there that's weird. I can't get into the Facebook group. Huh? Wonder what's going on. And then, uh, we had our assistant that said, Hey, you guys might want to check your email. Uh, checked our email and found out after everybody else that it was us that was terminated. Um, and, uh, you know, we had over a million dollars of inventory sitting in our house at the time. And, you know, they said, you know, you're not allowed to sell it. And we were like, it's ours. We own it. We're going to sell it. Um, and, uh, you know, we sat there for a couple days just thinking, what are we going to do? You know, this was what we had employees, we had everything. And then we were like, you know what, screw it. We're going to go to LA, go to the fashion district, find some stuff, go sell it. And best thing that ever happened to us was we were terminated by them. But, you know, it was, it was crazy experience.
- Speaker #2
So you were a whistleblower.
- Speaker #0
Yes. And the company, they did not like that at all. Yeah.
- Speaker #2
And how did that fall out? Like you, you must've, you must've had tons of friends in the company. And what happened?
- Speaker #0
It was extremely dramatic. We were out of the top 100 people in that company. 37 of them were directly on my team because I trained them to go live. We trained them how to, you know, sell stuff. You know, I just loved doing it, love training them, love going live, love selling things online, love to helping women feel good in clothing. And so LuLaRoe had me flying all over the country, training people that weren't even on my team at my own expense, which they were supposed to reimbursed me and never did. And so when we were terminated, it kind of sent a signal to the entire company where the company said, hey, we know them. They trained us. We feel like something is wrong here. This is finally starting to make sense. We believe what they were saying. And after that, we had one of the largest teams in the company. And once we were terminated, I think what they did not expect to happen was that the company just everybody was like if they left, they saw that we were successful leaving. They could see that there was another side, that it wasn't scary, that they weren't going to lose everything. And then once we left, my entire team just kind of was like, we're none too. And they bailed and then everybody else started leaving the company. So it really backfired on them.
- Speaker #2
That must have rattled you. Like, how did you handle it? It must have been an overload to find out all of a sudden you're gone. Where was your head at? Like, what was your mindset?
- Speaker #0
Well, you know, we were really concerned because not only were we in the company, I had two sisters that were in the company, my husband's sister. Our son was actually in the company selling, and he was a 20-year-old kid and was very successful. And, you know, we were really concerned about our family and our friends that had signed up for this. And we did not want anything to happen to them. And that's why we continue to bring things to their attention that said, you know, this whole company could get shut down if you don't fix this. And they didn't care. And so we were scared for them. We were scared for our business. And then once we were terminated, you know, we had people that counted on us. I mean, everybody counted on us. And so, you know, I mean, I definitely had probably about 12 hours where, you know, I sat there and thought, well, let's sell the house. let's, you know, I said, I don't know what we'll do. I'll go back, you know, I'll go, I'll start couponing. I know how to live on nothing. But, you know, it was a little bit scary there, you know, for the first initial, you know, 12 hours, the second day I was pissed. I went through every grief emotion there was. The third day I'm like, screw them. This is going to be better than what there was before. And then, you know, we were like getting on a flight to go to LA and I was like, we know where to find clothing. You know, we know what we can sell. I was like, we have a great community. I built this community. They didn't, you know, these are people are following. us for us and not because of this company. And so we were like, you know what, go do what you have to do and keep people employed.
- Speaker #1
How big was the community at that time that you had on your email list or your Facebook group or whatever it was?
- Speaker #0
You know, probably between, well, and the funny part about this company, they would not allow you to have a Facebook page. You could only have a group. which I fought like crazy. You couldn't do any advertising. You couldn't do any paid ads, anything like this. So it was just really a closed group, which was insane. So at the time, I probably had about 50,000 people in my group. Really no email list. You weren't, I mean, you had zero information basically from a lot of this. And so, you know, I kind of just immediately started collecting all that information and, you know, just trying to, you know, keep track of all my people, keep them together and let them know where we were. And then of course, quickly. got a page up and going and, you know, just continue doing what we were doing.
- Speaker #2
Now, a quick word from our sponsor, LaVonta. Hey, Kevin, tell us a little bit about it.
- Speaker #1
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- Speaker #2
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- Speaker #1
What year was it? What year was this? Roughly?
- Speaker #0
This was 17, 2017. Okay.
- Speaker #1
Okay.
- Speaker #2
This was not where I was wanting to go during this podcast. I thought we'd be talking completely different. But I'm just curious, you had the success with your MLM, that whole line. Did you market any different other than the Facebook Live? So the Facebook Live is something that you brought on and you started to teach. But were there any other differences in marketing that you were doing that you brought into the mix?
- Speaker #0
Not really. It was really just that community part. It was just, you know, not only was it. you know, the clothing and helping people, you know, feel confident and stuff. But, you know, I have a big family. I have a lot of kids. And, you know, I would just post personal stuff. I would post recipes. I would post, you know, stupid shit my husband did, stupid stuff my kids did, things I screwed up. You know, I love cats. I would post my cat. I mean, I just posted stuff that people, I think, just obviously those ways we all know how to build a community. But it was a lot more than just clothing. And I think that that's what was very important through the whole thing. And they saw the struggle that we had. They saw what happened to us, you know, in that MLM. They knew that it wasn't right. And, you know, I think a lot of people were also just curious to see, you know, are we going to get sued by, you know, LuLaRoe or, you know, all these things. So I think there was a lot of curiosity, too, that kind of came along with that. But, you know, we didn't do anything different. I just kind of kept that going. I've really you're going to. just absolutely pass out right now. I've really never focused on an email list. I've collected hundreds of thousands of emails, never done anything with it really just always had just this kind of organic, you know, Hey, do this, or these are these new jeans. You can find them on the app kind of thing. Um, and really kind of just kept that same, just community, organic community going through the whole thing.
- Speaker #2
So I guess Kevin's got a couple of things to talk to you about after the podcast.
- Speaker #1
I almost fainted. I had to stop myself there.
- Speaker #2
I saw that.
- Speaker #1
I was doing a virtual wait. I was like, I jerked back really, really quick. But here's something that I think also is brilliant of what she did. I don't know when you developed this, but you have an app. You developed a custom app for your brand or for your community. and I remember you telling me like I don't have to depend on an algorithm. I don't have to depend on, does an email go to junk or spam? If we have a new sale or we have a new launch, we just hit a button and it SMSs everybody and they see it. And then it's bringing them into this closed community that you are in a 1000% control of. And there's no gatekeepers of Facebook showing it to just 20% of the audience. And if they interact another 20% and so on. And I think, and you told me like, I think you said out of 21 million, like 10 million of it comes off the app. or something like that yes yes and now just an app you download from the apple store or from the so it's a standard app from all these little like html5 apps you gotta go into a browser or do it it's a full flash full store correct yes
- Speaker #0
so i'm at this boutique and we know i go live as well it brought when i go live and turn on that live and i'm broadcasting that it's broadcast to the app and then it also goes directly to facebook as well Those comments are scraped off Facebook and automatically carted. And then, you know, same thing with the app as well.
- Speaker #1
When did you start that app? How old is that?
- Speaker #0
It's part of like, well, along with the, you know, website and stuff that would have been. So probably for the first probably 2018 is when I started doing that. It's 2018, 2019. And, you know, originally, you know, trying to solve that. you know, literally someone hand recording comments on Facebook as we're live with hundreds of people on commenting like this, it's crazy. And someone would literally copy and paste those emails and whoever's name said, I want this item. You know, from that till it was scraping comments from there. Part of that too, though, is there is a website and there is the ability to do that through a company. Um, and another boutique owner's husband created that where it would scrape the comments from Facebook. So that part of it, I don't want to say that's not our part of it there. He came up with that. Um, and it just worked really, really well. Then translate it into an app because obviously you own that. I can send messages out to them. I go live in the app. I can, you know, post whatever I want to post, you know, collections, drop collections, all those kinds of things.
- Speaker #1
How many installs are on the app right now?
- Speaker #0
I think we have... We have like 100,000 customers that are original on there. I'm actually going to have to look and see how many there are.
- Speaker #2
Sorry. You know, Tiffany, what I usually do, and Kevin asks me questions like that, I just make it up.
- Speaker #1
He just says it's none of your business.
- Speaker #2
That's kind of what I said. 497,000 sounds like a really good number.
- Speaker #0
Just myself, super curious, and I feel like I just turned off my microphone. Is that okay? Yeah, you're good. Yep. Okay. You know what? I don't even know how many we have, but now I'm super curious. So I'm going to find we have 150,000.
- Speaker #1
There we go. There you go. 150 that's so when you did that in 2018, you didn't have the that was real money you had to spend to actually develop an app because now you can do this much cheaper and much faster, but you had to actually make an investment. What are the idea for that? Was that your idea or was that So this does...
- Speaker #0
So this does go back to the original for Common Sold. So the owner of that, you know, she had a boutique as well. Her husband is the one that really came up with all of this. And, you know, so he helped tie that in. Really brilliant guy, you know, kind of made all this happen. So at the beginning of that. So there's been, you know, iterations of that since then. But he was the original that kind of, you know, developed a lot of that and the idea that it could be possible to do that. It's really, really smart. Yeah,
- Speaker #1
people are just talking about it now, getting off of a website and focusing on apps. So well ahead of its time.
- Speaker #0
But you got to give them a reason to go to that. I mean, part of it is they're getting deals or they get to see you, but do you have, is there like a chat on there? Is there like a special, like, I don't know, place where they go to get girl talk or advice and makeup? Or is there other little, what else is in the app besides, hey, here's the latest jeans and here's you live?
- Speaker #2
um there isn't but there might be later on um it's really uh it's really so they can watch you live it's almost like just watching tv and that's kind of what we've tried to do with the entire thing is not just make it you know where it's like you know qvc and it's not fun at all like we get on there we listen to music and we're talking to them we try to make it a show um you know and again i'm their personal shopper and i've got usually an idea of what i'm going to show them that night. Um, and just try to make it a lot of fun. And so it feels more like they're, you know, watching a TV show than they are just sitting there watching some girl, you know, take her clothes on and off, uh, which my kids did actually say, someone said, what does your mom do? And one of my kids once said she takes her clothes on and off on TV.
- Speaker #0
So is it just you, is it just you doing the selling or, I mean, I know you have a lot of UGC people, but is it.
- Speaker #2
on the live when you chat it's just me literally sometimes twice a day sometimes lives as long as three hours sometimes they're an hour so what about fulfillment are you doing it out of your garage do you have a fulfillment center what's happening no we've got a warehouse thank goodness but gosh forever i will sometimes i almost wish we were back in our garage without all the extra people and the cost and the overhead you know we feel like 25 000 square foot warehouse no yes wow it's
- Speaker #0
a serious operation And even has like cots for sleeping so that you cannot, you know, so if you work at three in the morning to pack these extra orders, you got a place to go take a nap.
- Speaker #2
Sometimes it feels like it.
- Speaker #0
So back on what on selling, I mean, there's, I saw some stat recently, like there's 1.5 million people in the United States trying to make a living as a content creator or as a UGC creator. Most, very few of them make more than $10,000 a year. and commissions and whatever they're getting paid. Very few, but it's still the dream of every 13-year-old now. They don't want to be a movie star. They don't want to be a football player or whatever. They want to be a content creator or an influencer. But I think the fundamental some of them know how to get traffic or they know how to be personable, and they might take off. But a lot of them don't know how to sell. And there's a big, big difference between being personable, getting a big audience. And actually knowing the psychology and the marketing of selling. And I think you said you taught this with the other outfit. What is it that people are missing and what makes you special? Other than that, they identify with you and you, the personality and the fun stuff. But what, or maybe that's part of it, but what is it that takes it over that next, gives you that next extra juice to like sell that other people are missing?
- Speaker #2
Well, it's people are counting on you and it's a house payment is what it is. But no, you know, back a long time ago, I think a long time ago, 10 years ago, you know, I think people were embarrassed to ask for a sale. They, you know, they were scared when they had a community that they didn't want to be too salesy or their community would maybe turn on them, you know, if they were selling something. And the cool thing about right now is it's way more acceptable. You know, it's way more acceptable for you to have a community and to sell something to your community. Sometimes they almost expect that now. And I think that that's kind of a cool thing that has changed. I definitely think it's changing. We knew that the shift was happening, that people wanted to buy from somebody that they trusted. They wanted to buy from somebody that they feel like they know. They want that recommendation. They don't want to just go to a website that they've not heard of or hit an ad and go there without any kind of recommendation. So a lot of things are changing. It's really cool. It's making it a lot easier for people to be influencers or a creator and selling things because it's just way more acceptable than it used to be.
- Speaker #0
But still, a lot of them like you and they adore you, but most people still don't know how to actually get them. It's not just asking for the buy. It's the way you do it and the way you set it up and the way you frame it. Is there a technique that you use or is it just kind of natural? You teach it. Can you share a couple of those maybe?
- Speaker #2
I think some people are just a little bit more naturally a salesperson. I had no idea I was like that, but I guess I am. It maybe comes from just being like a scrappy kid and a hundred siblings. You kind of got to fight for everything. but um I, so... I think it's trust is a lot of things. If there's product that I do not like, or if there's a shirt that doesn't fit well, I don't sell it to them. We'd rather give it away for free than for me to sell them something that's total crap. And so I think that there's a lot of trust in that they trust me, they know that you know your stuff. I think it's a lot of confidence. I think it's knowing what you're selling and what you're talking about. And a lot of I think it's just really it's it's confidence and it's trust are the biggest are the biggest things now there's a lot of different things that go into that it's the time of day on some things i know at night on my app i'm going to push a lot of things like food comfy clothing um you know uh slippers uh comfy shoes at night i'm not going to be posting some high heels with a pointy toe because everybody's in their pajamas sitting in their bed and they're I'm not thinking about that right then. I know that they're sitting there thinking, gosh, it'd be nice if I had some comfy pajamas right now. So some of it's just a little intuition to know what's happening. I know that at three o'clock every day, there's a ton of moms sitting in car lines on their phone waiting to pick up their kids. Great time to go live because they're sitting there with nothing else to do. So there's a lot of different things that I think are a little like intuitive that you kind of can pick up on. I think a lot of it is thinking, what am I doing right now? what I if I'm my customer you know am I interested in buying sweaters in may. I'm not at all, but I might be interested in a tank top. So, I mean, that seems pretty obvious, but there's a lot of things like that, that, you know, I think people need to come back to. I tell them, think about what you would be doing right now. Are you on your phone? Are you on your phone Saturday mornings? A lot of people are cleaning their house. They're not necessarily on their phone. You know, on holiday weekends, a lot of people are traveling. They're sitting in their car. You're a passenger princess on your phone. Your husband's driving. It's a great time to be lives. So, you know, there's a lot of just. thinking about what you're doing, what you're interested in, trust part, and then the confidence.
- Speaker #1
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- Speaker #1
your first campaign stack influence.com i like to hear more about your tick tock shop experience so this is something that a lot of people are interested in you
- Speaker #2
were saying that you've been doing it for two years yes correct so how did you get involved with that and where is it going well on tick tock you know i just had a regular account i was having a lot of fun doing the same kind of stuff posting, you know, about my cute cat, whatever it might be on there. And, you know, we got contacted by our ad. So we had just started doing some Facebook ads. And the company that we're doing Facebook ads with said, Hey, you know, you could also do some ads, maybe on TikTok or something, why don't you create a TikTok shop. So we created a TikTok shop, which, you know, kind of sucked, because it you have to switch from more of a personal account to a business account, you know, and you can't you can't do all the fun things. You can't have the fun music. So I was a little bummed about that in the beginning. But we were able to add all your product in there. And since we were some of the first ones doing TikTok shop, man, we really, we took a beating for everyone else. I just want to say everybody owes us a big thank you because we got every violation every day, you know, slapping us down with everything. We were locked out. I mean, we had to, we really had to go through it. Like everything we did was wrong. Like, I mean, it was just, you know your constant violation after constant violation after you know shipping issues with them not with us uh going through all these crazy rules they had tick tock shops is very customer centered it sometimes can be a little bit hard for the shops on there and people selling because we have so many rules that we have to follow but it can be very worth it and very lucrative um you just got to play you know the game follow the rules on there i'm sure like you do on amazon um and you you know, you'll you'll be fine but you also have to you know hold tight to your margins and uh you know for us a little bit of it is you know a lot of people on tiktok want to you know drop the price and be you know flea market and we just had to decide in the very beginning you know we're proud of what we have to offer um you know we can help you find the perfect fit for your body i'm your personal shopper and i don't have to have everything at a discounted price and so we just kind of had hold firm to you know what our standards are in our shop and you know you can still you can still be successful on there.
- Speaker #0
So are your customers mostly the mom crowd, like the 25 to 45? Or do you cater to the kid sizes and to senior women stuff as well?
- Speaker #2
Well, since I just turned 50 the other day, I feel like I'm a senior woman now. No,
- Speaker #0
that's not even mid-age yet.
- Speaker #2
You'd be extremely surprised. So when we first were on TikTok, you know, I thought it was going to be this young crowd. I thought it was gonna be 20 and 30 year olds. Like I'm having my daughters on there. I'm buying all the distressed denim. Um, and then we quickly realized we you're really attracting some of the same crowd. Now I have different customers on Tik TOK than I do Facebook. Um, but I, I still have a really solid 35 to 55. And then what we started noticing that was completely insane is we opened our brick and mortar. Um, and I would post a lot about our store there. I would, you know, tag Magnolia, Texas. And, you know, I was telling this story at the, at the conference. I had this woman come in. She was 78 years old. She was buying her first. Well, actually my other woman was 92 in there buying her first pair of jeans, but my 78 year old that was in there walked in and, uh, you know, she said, I've never had a pair of jeans like this before. I'm interested. Can you show them to me? I said, why'd you find us? You know, I kind of always ask, she's like on Tik TOK. And I was like, Oh. Did someone show you TikTok video? She's like, oh, no, I was on TikTok. I was like, really? So I started asking everybody that comes into my store. Overwhelmingly, new customers that come into my store over the age of 55 found me on TikTok. And I am just blows my mind.
- Speaker #0
So you said an important thing that I think a lot of people don't realize is that your audience on TikTok is different than on Meta. So do you have to market differently? Do you have to say different things in the live? Do you have to treat it? differently because a lot of people just say they use especially with ai tools now that i just split this up into 68 pieces and make the format for each thing and just push it out there and you can you can you can do that because you never know what's going to take off but i'm telling you i'm
- Speaker #2
a facebook girl because of you know i've been on there forever but i took talk so much more fine I can say whatever I want to say. And I, you know, I have a lot of fun on there and, you know, people on there tend to be more fun, lighthearted. You know, I post something on Facebook and I've got everybody, Donna and Karen on there critiquing everything that I'm doing, telling me I'm total crap. They hate my hair. They hate this. They hate that. And I'm like, whatever. And then on TikTok, they're like, hell yeah, girl, rock that short. You know, they're just so much more fun on tech talk. you know, and you can do whatever you want to do. And it's stuff goes viral that you have no idea why. And I mean, it's just TikTok is definitely a ton more fun. But you don't have the control that you have on Facebook. And so it's a little bit of the Wild West still, you know, it's only two years old, but you still have that tremendous organic growth that you can experience on TikTok like you can't on Facebook. But you do get a lot less information on your customers than you do... on Facebook. And so that's still important to kind of keep that in mind. Stuff still has, I mean, just yesterday and today, my videos have gone completely viral on TikTok and they hadn't in three or four months. So it's such an enormous up and down on TikTok. You have to be prepared for that. You know, you might have a million and a half dollar month, one month, the next month is $400,000. How do you purchase inventory for that? Those massive swings like You know, you could just completely run out of inventory or you could expect to have a few more months like that, but everything you had into buying inventory for it and you could have a $100,000 a month.
- Speaker #1
How do you handle that?
- Speaker #2
It's stressful, but it's crazy. And I think having owned our own business for such a long time and knowing that there's going to be these wild swings and everything is still being a little conservative, taking a few risks. kind of pressing yourself a little bit, you know, always having a little more inventory than you think, but being prepared that should this not sell, what am I going to do? And just kind of always having that little bit of that plan and, you know, and, and being able to coupon and live on nothing if you have to, right? No. But it's, you know, TikTok has been successful for us, but we have to be very careful. I've seen it put some people out of business.
- Speaker #0
What do you do if you have? $400,000 worth of inventory and something goes viral, like something you just said went viral, and you could have sold $2 million worth, do you put them on a wait list? You just stop? I know you can't take the sale on TikTok, but can you say, hey, because it's got to ship within whatever the rules are, would you say, scan this QR code and we'll put you on an email list, and when they come back in stock in two months, we'll notify you or we'll notify you on the app?
- Speaker #2
You can't in a video. They'll take that down. You know, you'll get in trouble for that. Yeah. You literally go in a room and sit down and cry and wish you had a million dollars worth of inventory. That you you can, you know, reorder it in time and get here and cut the gene again. It's going to take you four months, but you could you can go back to those old videos like we just did. My videos that just took off the last couple of days, of course, was a product that went viral for us previously. And we was able to go back. What I'll do is go make some videos replying to comments on that. you know, video that says, when are these going to be back in stock again? I'll go reply, make new videos and say, girl, there you are. We're back, baby. Let's go. And kind of those kinds of things and try to get that going again. So, I mean, it's playing the stock market.
- Speaker #1
There's a lot of people that are having problems with TikTok shop, one reason or another. Can you tell us a little bit about the do's and the don'ts? What should people do? What shouldn't they do?
- Speaker #2
So, so for TikTok shop, especially if you're selling on there, you follow the rules, you know, go on there, read everything, see how quickly you have to ship everything out, make sure that you have the ability to ship it out. And then get your stuff listed correctly, you know, photograph it like they're asking you to photograph it, your descriptions like they're asking you to describe it, make sure it's a great product. And then, you know, just follow the rules and start making some videos and, you know, see what happens.
- Speaker #0
All right. How are the returns for you in clothing? I mean, I think... Sucks. Yeah. Yeah. What do you do with returns? Are you able to... Do you donate them? Do you resell them as gently used? Or what do you do with the return?
- Speaker #2
It's just like any store would. You know, if the return comes back in, clearly it's brand new. All the tags are in it. There's no odor. Someone obviously has not worn it. um you know you can resell that product just like a store if it comes back in and is damaged um you know then we have to file an appeal with tick tock to not refund that person because you know they should not have been allowed to return that we donate a lot of stuff um on there you know we we have a bucket of stuff people in the warehouse here can take home if they want to take it home um but you know it's kind of the same as any store would really do but you know returns suck for clothing. But the benefit about the way that we do this, though, is I'm making a video. I'm putting the clothing on. If you, you know, between our good description, which we have, and between me verbally describing the product as I'm wearing it, as like a personal shopper, you should have a better idea of how that product is going to fit you. Now, of course, we know nobody listens or reads crap. um and you know they're like i thought this was you know a capri but it's you know a flare and i'm pissed and you're like well if you'd read anything or watch the video or listen to me you would know exactly what it was but you know nobody does so you know that's the hardest part about clothing clothing is a very high return item on there you have to account for that um and the better you are at photographing your product doing your video and your description the better off you know the customers are gonna be i don't want people to have to return stuff it's a hassle I don't like to return anything. I want them to be happy the first time they get it.
- Speaker #0
I wonder if you could integrate the new Google technology you just announced two weeks ago, the try-on technology into your app or something where you could do an API and actually let them, I think that could cut the returns in half probably.
- Speaker #2
No, absolutely. The interesting thing about this is the cool part about what we do on our app and my lives, we have a less than 3% return rate for clothing on my app, which is insane. Um, it's amazing because I, my customers listen, they watch the show, they know the sizing. We're good about explaining it to them on Tik TOK. We have a 19 to 21% return rate. So it's, you know, your customer is your customer. Um, you know, and my app customers are my favorite people in the whole world because they know me, they listen, they know the fit, they pay attention and, you know, they trust what I'm selling them because they know me. And so that's why I love, you know, my app so much and those customers. TikTok, like I said, is the Wild West. You know, you've got someone at work watching TikToks, not reading or listening to anything randomly, ordering stuff on there, you know, who doesn't know me and doesn't understand sizing. And that's why we have such a high return rate for TikTok. But it's typical across the board for clothing. So it's not, you know, that's I think Amazon has a very high return rate for clothing as well.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, they do.
- Speaker #1
You know, I've got a. give a hats off to anybody who does live selling any creator out there that's doing it live. But you're doing this on Facebook, you're doing this on Tick Tock, what are the the tools and the setup or a get like we talked about it a little bit before even the mindset to go out there and just to do it live.
- Speaker #2
um it's a performance so it's funny because my my husband and my kids they call it you know live tiffany or not live tiffany there's definitely a switch that goes on you know i can literally be like miserable falling asleep don't want to do this i like you just don't and i will turn that camera on and i'm like hey how are you guys doing tonight everybody jump on say hi norm how are you Yeah, it was the temperature there in Canada. That kind of thing. And you just go and you go and you go and you go. And then you turn it off and it's like 1130 at night. And you're like, I'm wired. Like, I cannot go to, like, you just gave a whole performance. It's like, you've got to come down off this eye of performing before you go to bed. But it is, it's, I think it's, I think it's just so much fun. I love it. But the setup's crazy. You know, I could. I'll show you about, you know, I have a TV. I broadcast to this TV so I can see the comments larger because I'm old now and I don't want to read them off the computer. So I actually mirror it to a big, large TV so I can see and control everything. I've got big ring lights and it's really just my laptop. But you know what's crazy is, you know, we had a hurricane last year that came through. We didn't have power at our building for three weeks. I still had to work. You know, we'd throw stuff in something, go drive out to where we could get some power. we've gone live from everywhere from hotel rooms when I go on vacation I take a suitcase with me because all I need is my phone literally all I need is my phone to make money and go live my husband was in Times Square with my son had seen the Conor McGregor fight and had a whole suitcase full of stuff in Times Square and went live and sold it and that was just kind of for like the fun factor of the whole thing but you know they can expect kind of crazy stuff like that from us and I think that that's why they love it too is, you know, I can be at my house or I can be up here at the warehouse i can go live on vacation i can i go to market and go live with vendors literally at market um and uh it's it's it's kind of a cool thing and you know i think that's why people follow that because they love it what's
- Speaker #1
up everybody your good old buddies norm and kevin here and i've got an amazon creative team that i want to introduce you to that's right kevin it's called the house of amz and it's the leading provider in combining marketing branding with laser focus on Amazon.
- Speaker #0
Hey Norm, they do a lot of really cool stuff if you haven't seen what they do like full listing graphics, premium A-plus content, storefront design, branding, photography, renderings, packaging design and a whole lot of other stuff that Amazon sellers need.
- Speaker #1
Yeah and guess what they have nine years active in this space so you can skip the guesswork, trust the experts there's no fees there's no retainers you pay per project
- Speaker #0
So if you want to take your product to the next level, check out House of AMZ. That's HouseofAMZ.com. House of AMZ. Why is live not as big a deal in the U.S.? I mean, you're obviously having success with it, but you go to China, 70% to 80% of the they won't buy unless they've talked to a person or they've seen them live versus here. It's hard. QVC just opened up something on TikTok shop where they're doing like 24-7 QVC now on TikTok shop. And there's a lot of people that have tried it like on Amazon. And there's a few success stories, but the vast majority, it's just not working.
- Speaker #2
You know, and TikTok can't figure out either. We try to tell them, but they don't listen. They can't. TikTok honestly can't figure it out either. And truly, I wish they would a little bit listen to us because I feel like we know we've been doing this for so long. People on TikTok are on there to scroll. They want short form video. They want to be entertained for a few seconds and then they want, they're not going to sit there and watch lives. The reason why lives have taken off in a lot of other countries is because of access to everything. You know, in China, which my parents lived there for 12 years, so we've been there quite often. You know, there's so much that's rural, there's access to things. And now it's opened up this whole world to people in other countries that they never had the ability to purchase these things. So they're purchasing everything live because they can get it now. In the US, we're used to just all this independence. You know, we jump in our car and we go to the store. We touch and feel everything. We have the ability to do that. We have the ability to drive somewhere and go get it. And we still love that independence. We're always going to shop online. We still get stuff online. But we aren't the online shoppers that people are everywhere else in the world.
- Speaker #0
So how do we counter that? I mean, what... You're doing it, but how does someone listening to this, like, what do they need to be doing?
- Speaker #2
It needs to be personable. It needs to be why, why purchase from, from you? I can, I mean, if I can jump in my car and go get it at Target, or I can get it wherever, why do I want to sit in the comfort of my own home and on my phone, go ahead and order it from, you know, Tiffany. And part of that is obviously that community, it's going to be that I know, you know, it's going to fit you. I'm bringing stuff that you don't have access to. That's part of it. I can show you a whole world of, you know, different things that you can't go get at Target. It's got to be different. It's got to be unique. You have to give them a reason to purchase from you. Um, and you know, it, they have to, they have to trust that. So China also, um, there's a lot of skepticism. People don't want to purchase from someone that it's not done correctly. That doesn't feel familiar. So a lot of times you have a lot of Chinese sellers that try to sell to Americans and it's, it's not right. Like people, the wording's not right. The images aren't right. It's wrong. And every, and people feel that they're like, they don't trust it. And so they can't quite figure out how to overcome that yet.
- Speaker #1
Now, I guess part of what you're doing as well as keeping your energy high. I mean, it's I don't know, Kevin, but it looks like, you know, Tiffany has a little bit of energy. So when you're out there and you're selling and you're selling yourself, you've got this big community around you. What happens if one of those days you wake up and you just don't feel like you're burnt out? Put it that way.
- Speaker #2
It definitely happens. It happens a lot. You sure can. You should absolutely get burnt out. And, you know, but the other part of that, too, is just that responsibility that this is this is my job. And I have people who count on me. And if I don't go to work every day, they don't have anything to do. If I'm gone and take vacation for a week and I don't sell anything, what are the people in my warehouse have to pick and chip? So there is a responsibility that's on me to make sure that these people have it. have a job. And I take that really seriously. And so, you know, I wake up every day thinking if I don't go to work today, people are unemployed. So I, you know, that's part of it. The other part of it is, you know, just having been through a lot with always being entrepreneurs in our own business. You know, we've been in places, like I said, when we've couponed that we went for a whole summer where I literally couldn't feed my kids anything but scrambled eggs because I couldn't afford anything else. And I hated that feeling. I hated it. It was so terrifying and so scary. And we've, you know, we've been through so much like that, that I don't ever want to feel that again. And so some of that is just a drive that I'm terrified that that could happen again, or that to have that feeling again, or not to be able to take care of my family or the people that work for me. And it also is just what I'm lucky that I get up and get to do something that I just love every single day.
- Speaker #0
And you're doing You're reselling other people's stuff now. Are you trying to make a move towards more of your own brand and leverage this audience and this community and your own brand where the margins are a little bit better? Maybe you have a little bit more control and someone's not going to cut you off because they're like, we're going to go direct now and we're not going to sell to you anymore? What do you say?
- Speaker #2
Yes. And we've done that in the past. We had our own clothing line for a little while there back in the very beginning when we got out of LuLaRoe. and you know and And we're going to bring that back again. But, you know, part of the appeal for some of my customers is that I'm launching 40 brand new products a day. I can't source all that or I can't produce all of that on my own. And so, you know, part of the appeal for our customers is that there's going to be something different constantly. You're never going to see the same thing. But also with that, it means my margins aren't as great. you know I'm dependent on other people or, you know, always sourcing those new products and new and stuff all the time. So, you know, there's definitely a move to do that. I think for us, the balance, there's going to be a little bit of a balance where it's going to be our own stuff. But then also, of course, bringing in those other things so that I can have a big variety of things.
- Speaker #0
And besides yourself, you have other creators that are out there posting videos and they're basically affiliating in. Do you have quite a few of those? Are they volunteers? Are they paid? Do you do something special for them?
- Speaker #1
It's a program through TikTok. So TikTok has their own affiliate program that. you can, you know, offer a commission on, that you can offer samples on, they can buy samples from you. And then it's up to you to kind of nurture that program. Now, we got really lucky in the very beginning of that. And when we were all trying to figure out TikTok, I mean, I managed our TikTok, you know, by myself and you, everybody can do their own shop by themselves. We just kind of started in the beginning of, you know, us sitting around a table, getting violation after violation screaming our heads off at tick tock trying to figure out what to do and uh a couple of us just jumped in and we're like, okay, you, you managed the inventory on Tik TOK and, and signing up for like the campaigns, you know, you, you know, to Skylar, how about you just kind of pay attention to the affiliates right now? I'm going to worry about the violations and let's see if we can figure out how to work this because it was brand new. Skylar just took it upon herself to just really create this very cool affiliate program that we have within Tik TOK. And then we've made it our own. Anyone could do it. But Skylar has really nurtured it. You know, most brands don't spend the time that Skylar does personally texting the girls that post stuff for us or the ladies that post stuff for us, thanking them, you know, making sure they're getting the right sizes, you know, sending them thank yous, this kind of stuff. I think brands are, honestly, I've heard horror stories of how they treat, you know, the people that want to be affiliates. But I think as a blogger, me being an affiliate and me being kind of an influencer back in a day. You know, I started in 20 on 2009. You know, I was an influencer for Dole, I created recipes for them way back in the day, where they pay me per post. So I think having had that experience and actually being where the creators are now, you know, and just kind of relaying that to Skylar, she's just done such a beautiful job of really nurturing that affiliate program for us and really creating that community within our affiliate program. So if they have other people that they could work with other people who sell the same thing as me. Why do they want to post mine and not someone else? Well, because, you know, we actually care and we're going to send them the right size and we'll follow up with them and, you know, make sure that there's nothing else that they need.
- Speaker #2
That's what I like. The community is not just your customers. It's that loyalty to those creators as well. So your vendors. I do have another question for you. This is completely outside of TikTok. So I've got a couple of friends. I've got Well, I've got Kevin, but I do have some friends that did, I think, completely opposite of you. And that is they've had retail outlets, the bricks and mortar. They started to sell online. This is years ago, and they're no longer with the bricks and mortar. They just went all online. So if I heard you correctly, you've done the online. Now you're starting to build the bricks and mortar. and
- Speaker #1
isn't that a money pit we kind of do the opposite of everybody else i think um so you know i never had a dream you know these girls have dreams of having this beautiful brick and mortar store of a boutique i never did i don't like people in person i like being online i don't want to have to talk to anybody like unless it's this i'm cool with this but if i have to talk to you in person i'm so awkward and i always say the wrong thing and do the wrong thing and i would just prefer to be online. But right in front of our warehouse, there was a strip center, old one. They tore it down, built a new one. There was a store spot right there. We were like, why not? I would love it if local people had a place. I didn't even care if it was cute or not. I was like, I would love it if they had a place to come in and try denim. So men might not experience this, but for women, buying denim online is terrifying. You never know how it's going to fit. You don't know if your butt's going to look big or not. You don't know if you're going to look cute or not. So, you know, if you can try them on in person. uh it's such a better experience so i thought you know what i don't even care if i make any money at this i just want a place where women can try on denim in person and then they'll be confident to know what size they wear and they'll want to purchase online that is my whole goal is to get them to go on my app or to go on my website well you know we put the store in i didn't never done retail i didn't know that i built a huge massive store i had no idea i just thought that's what i thought the space was great so we ended up with this massive retail store um and it's taken off and exploded and it's a fantastic business on its own but you know we like to use it as a funnel a little bit you know we tell them we don't we can't put all of our denim in there we can't put all of our shoes only about three to five percent of anything ever makes it over to the store so you know if they want you know all of everything we have to offer and we launch everything first on the app come on to the app you can do local pickup um but shop the app i just want them to be confident in the size jeans that they need they can try them on in the store. And then when we launch something on the app or online, they're more confident purchasing it there and they have a wider variety.
- Speaker #2
Ah,
- Speaker #0
you have about 20,000 SKUs, right? Something like that. Is that what?
- Speaker #1
Div right now, we have about 9,000 active, just different things.
- Speaker #0
And then you're doing with these creators, like what you were mentioning a minute ago, you're kind of lucky because a lot of people that are product selling, especially from the Amazon world, they don't have these creators. They don't have a brand or something that people know. So you're having to use software tools or... companies that go out there and recruit for them versus you have a built-in audience that loves the product and so they're going into the tiktok creator center and like how can i do this product for myself so that's a major advantage where they're coming a lot of them a lot more of them are coming to you probably than you go into them it's
- Speaker #1
overwhelming i also say though i tried to tell everybody. It is, TikTok is, I mean, it is. All anyone wants to do is be a creator on there. So if you have a product on TikTok and you make a few good videos and they see your product, people will come to them. They don't have to use software. They don't have to use the company. Now, there's a ton of companies out there that want to charge you a ton of money to go find these affiliates for you. And you could do that for a little while or check it out. But honestly, if you've got a decent product on there and you're making some decent videos, there's going to be people coming to you.
- Speaker #0
Hey, Kevin King and Norm Farrar here. If you've been enjoying this episode of Marketing Misfits, thanks for listening this far. Continue listening. We've got some more valuable stuff coming up. Be sure to hit that subscribe button if you're listening to this on your favorite podcast player, or if you're watching this on YouTube or Spotify, make sure you subscribe to our channel because you don't want to miss a single episode of the Marketing Misfits. Have you subscribed yet, Norm?
- Speaker #2
Well, this is an old guy alert. Should I subscribe to my own podcast?
- Speaker #0
Yeah, but what if you forget to show up one time? It's just me on here. You're not going to know what I say.
- Speaker #2
I'll buy you a beard and you can sit in my chair too. And we'll just, you can go back and forth with one another. Yikes. But that being said, don't forget to subscribe, share it. Oh, and if you really like this content, somewhere up there, there's a banner. Click on it and you'll go to another episode of the Marketing Misfits.
- Speaker #1
make sure you don't miss a single episode because you don't want to be like norm one thing i do like to tell people is i'm like everybody's on tick tock your your spouse's friends are on tick tock your children's friends are on tick tock they all want to be creators go make some videos Have them make some videos or have them come be an affiliate for you. Have them sign up with you and have them post some videos. Get started that way. Kind of get the ball rolling with that. And, you know, people will come to you on TikTok.
- Speaker #2
All right.
- Speaker #0
So go ahead, Norma.
- Speaker #2
I was just going to say we're coming up to the top of the hour. And I was just wondering what's next for Tiffany and Emma Luth?
- Speaker #0
Gosh.
- Speaker #1
Wow. You know, some of our own. products, of course. And, you know, we've even talked about another brick and mortar. You know, we have dabbled in having other people live sell for us. It's very difficult to train and have somebody do that and to find people. It's a very, you know, not everybody wants to sell live, you know, and it's not, it's not for a lot of people, they're not interested. So, you know, we've, we've tried for so long to really, you know, find other people. hard, but we're really going to kind of dig in this year, you know, so that I get a little bit of a break and, you know, train some people to do, to do that as well. And just kind of see how that goes. But, you know, really it's just kind of taking care of our customers, taking care of our affiliates and, you know, just seeing what this year kind of, you know, we're still, we're up well this year, which I'm excited about. I'm very proud of this business that way, because a lot of people are not. I know this has been a struggle this year for a lot of people, especially in the boutique world that has. So we are just very we're very grateful the spot that we're in and that, you know, we're holding tight and growing when a lot of people aren't. So it's you know, we're just kind of taking that really seriously and just digging in and, you know, doing what we need to do.
- Speaker #0
Awesome.
- Speaker #2
Anything else, Kevin?
- Speaker #0
No, this is yeah, I could keep going and talking to Tiffany for a couple more hours. This is this is fun. This is this is fun stuff. But no, we'll have to bring her back. We'll have to bring her back after she gets the private label lineup and a few other things. And we'll talk about how things are going then.
- Speaker #1
That'd be fun. Thank you.
- Speaker #2
And the hundreds of thousands of emails that she's not using right now.
- Speaker #0
Exactly. Exactly.
- Speaker #2
All right, Tiffany, I've got one job and that is to ask our guests if, well, our misfits, if they know any misfits.
- Speaker #1
You know, as far as another business maybe that I really admire that I think is fantastic who busts her ass, is that kind of the, is that what you're asking me, Norm?
- Speaker #2
Sure.
- Speaker #1
Um, you know, I have, um, somebody that I grew, grew up with in the blogging world. Um, her name is Lori. She has passionate penny pincher. Um, I've really admired this woman. She's very, very unique. Um, she has built an empire for women and helps so many people with her daily tasks and things that you do at home, like planners and menu plans and recipe books and things that just save you money, save you time, make your life easier. or I've watched her, really admired her for so many years. And she just, everything this woman touched turns to gold, in my opinion. I just have always just really admired what she does.
- Speaker #2
Oh, that's great. So we'll be reaching out to her. And thank you so much.
- Speaker #0
Your website is Emma Luz Boutique. Emma Luz Boutique.
- Speaker #1
Yes.
- Speaker #0
Awesome.
- Speaker #2
Oh, cool.
- Speaker #0
Appreciate it, Tiffany.
- Speaker #1
Thank you.
- Speaker #2
All right, so I'm just going to remove you for a sec, and we'll be right back. There we go.
- Speaker #0
That was cool. You know, that's Dragonfish, you know, the company that you and I are about to announce to everybody, where we're combining marketplaces and AI and social commerce, and that's the future. I mean, what she's doing, especially with the live stuff, I think... I don't think it'll ever be as big as it is in China, in the U.S., for a lot of the reasons that she said. But there's plenty of wide open space in that. And I think the merging of those three things is going to be something that everybody's got to be paying attention to and setting themselves apart. And it's really cool to hear her story.
- Speaker #2
Yeah, very unique. Lots of energy. Loved it.
- Speaker #0
Yeah, just imagine when you were done trying to do your little live experiment, if you had that energy, Norm, you might still be doing it.
- Speaker #2
Oh, yeah, right. Really? Yeah, for sure.
- Speaker #0
What was that challenge you had? It was like you set yourself.
- Speaker #2
100,000 followers in a year. We got to 10,000 on one. And it was just a lot of work.
- Speaker #0
This is on Amazon mostly, though, right? Amazon Live. Because you set up that whole little studio. And this is like just to prove it to yourself kind of thing, right? Yeah. Yeah.
- Speaker #2
and i think we could have achieved it but it was so much work i got it it's just it wasn't my full-time job and uh we were trying to do something really different and unique but um if you put your mindset to it this is a field that it and just like tiffany was talking about you know create some good videos good content be consistent and you can make a living. You can definitely make a living doing it, and if you're good at it, it's a solid living. But all of a sudden, like, take a look at what Tiffany did. She's going out there. She's buying product. She's reselling it like a wholesale model. That's pretty cool.
- Speaker #0
You could do that with cigars.
- Speaker #2
What's that?
- Speaker #0
You could do that with cigars. Every night when you go out for an hour, you could do story time with Norm. and you're smoking your cigar, and you're like, oh, this is a really good Padron. This is the anniversary edition. The link is right down below in my bio. If you like this, it's got a little chocolatey flavor. Just imagine how much free cigars and how much free stuff you could get normally.
- Speaker #2
Maybe I should start doing that.
- Speaker #0
You just got to do it when it's 27 degrees, not when it's negative 7.
- Speaker #2
And that's Celsius, by the way.
- Speaker #0
Oh, cool, man. Well, if you like this podcast, feel free to share it. You know, if you like Tiffany's story or you think someone will inspire them or they get some good stuff, definitely hit that forward link or share this podcast with someone that might benefit. Or at a bare minimum, make sure you subscribe to this channel here on YouTube or on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. You know, we're here every single Tuesday with a new episode. So hopefully you'll be back with us next Tuesday. And you know what? There's about... 55 or so, 60 maybe, episodes that we've done since we launched this a little over a year ago. And there's some awesome guests in there. So make sure you go back and you check that out as well. And if you know sometimes some of you are a little busy and you don't want to do an hour-long podcast, you should, you know. But if you don't, we have a new shorts channel, right, Norm?
- Speaker #2
That's right. Over on YouTube, it's Marketing Misfits. Marketing Misfits Clips. And those are three minute and under. These are just nuggets that we take out of every podcast.
- Speaker #0
Awesome. Well, I think that's it for this week. We'll see everybody, I guess, again next week, right, Norm?
- Speaker #2
I hope so.
- Speaker #0
I hope so. You better be here. We're sending Tiffany after you. All right.
- Speaker #2
Okay. That's it for today. We'll see you Tuesday, next Tuesday.
- Speaker #0
Take care, everybody.
