What Moves the Needle: Bridging the Marketing-Supply Chain Gap (with Adam Pearce of Blend Commerce)

All right, welcome back to Supply Chain Moves. We are in a different studio right now, not a regular studio for recording, but a tattoo studio. And I am going to be interviewing a very important guest that I met in the event here in Vietnam. And of course, as a very quick background about that event, it's mostly demand generation, AI expertise. We've had panels, we've had Buildathon, and we've learned so much about demand generation. And the supply chain part of it is the other side, which is why I really think that our participation there yesterday has completed the flow. I am here in a tattoo shop, suddenly tattooing as well. I met Adam Pearce. He is the founder, co-founder, and CEO?

Correct.

CEO of Blend Commerce. They are Shopify CRO partner. And of course, the same topic that I usually do when I'm speaking with a marketing expert is how marketing and supply chain can work together to support e-commerce brands. And fun fact, he is from London, he flew to Vietnam, and I am flying there on Tuesday to attend e-commerce expo. So we're going to see each other again, we're tattooing at the same time. I think I will never forget you anymore. Yes, yes, yes. This experience is something Very unusual. I haven't started mine, and he has started his. So I'm not sure if that face is like a very relaxed tattooing face. But let's see. First and foremost, okay, it is. I I really like the first title that Jade has come up with. What really moves the needle? Or because we are of course. trying to optimize the sales of e-commerce, and at the same time, we want to make sure that supply is going to support the demand. My first question for Adam actually is, when you onboard a client, a new client, like, do you have any conversation about that client, how their inventory is being supported in the first place?

No. And I think, yeah, this is the difficult thing because the issue that I have with e-commerce generally is that there is always a focus on the front end of the pretty stuff, the marketing side. And the realities of e-com is, is that the cash and the profit is not made in the front end of a website, is made through the operations side of the business. And, you know, the, the difficult thing is that the past few years we've gone through this kind of like dropshipping generation. Where people, you know, were just focused on totally selling more, but they didn't realize that obviously once that dropshipping, particularly, you know, in the UK and US, has somewhat gone down quite a bit, is that you really need to think about the kind of the core metrics, which are how you're sourcing, where the product's coming from, the actual cost of those products. And, you know, people talk about unit economics all the time, but it's still in a conversation about CRO. not something that would immediately come up. And it has to, you know, it has to be something that you do bring up because ultimately if we're gonna make an impact on their revenue, we need to know that they're gonna have to fulfill it or else everyone's gonna be frustrated.

So same thing with us, you know, when we do a discovery call and now we are onboarding our clients, we really don't have a lot of, marketing questions. Like, for me, I don't know what to ask. Like, and now having able to attend yesterday, I feel like I have to ask marketing questions during discovery call and during onboarding. Something like, how the— if they're using an agency, you know, or if they're using internal team members, how does our team going to work with that agency to make sure that it's gonna support. So I'm already thinking that it has to be part of that conversation.

Yeah, I mean, I think that the overarching problem, and I know we took this kind of off camera as well today, is like when you've got an organization that's doing e-commerce or e-commerce is the predominant market or the predominant revenue source for them, there is often then not conversations that happen internally between different teams. So like for us, we will be talking to the director of e-commerce, but then actually at a later stage, the CFO will be involved or the CMO will be involved. And those conversations need to happen earlier. And I think this is, you know, it's another annoyance of mine. I've been in e-commerce now for about a decade. It is the silo mentality.

Yes.

and everyone operates from their own world. And it's only until the last moment that actually people get together. Now, it doesn't matter how many times I ask, okay, look, is everyone who needs to be involved in the decision here? It never happens until right at the end. And that's when, you know, relationships can kind of make or break. But certainly I think kind of having an understanding of how all the different parts of the operation fit together Would obviously be helpful for you and obviously also helpful for me as well, because we're all part of that ecosystem that ends up delivering what the client actually needs.

There are so many parts of marketing too. Your expertise in CRO, do you find you get to talk to them also, or like the other ecosystem?

Yeah, I mean, we, you know, from a CRO point of view, we are most heavily, I guess, connected to kind of 3 different areas because The CRO side essentially looks after the website and converting people on the site. But what else do we need? Well, we need people to get to the site. So PPC or paid advertising is important. Email marketing teams are important. And then equally SEO. So all of those 4 people are, you know, the 4 ingredients for the front end of the site that we need to talk to. Now, sometimes agencies are very communicative with each other and we have some great relationships with our agencies. Other times not so much. And there is kind of, you know, again, I think the problem is especially in 2026 where agencies do feel threatened and I think everybody feels threatened by AI. There is kind of an unwillingness sometimes to have conversations that maybe will expose whether there's gaps in processes or equally where maybe another agency can come in and provide a kind of alternative service. So I think you, you kind of have to have, you have to have an agency environment where people feel comfortable in sharing and doing things together, or else again, the, the merchant or the client loses out.

What I noticed when we work with e-commerce brands, not everything is internal. Of course, they have so many agencies that they're getting working with. And at the same time, even the CFO, it's sometimes, you know, fractional. support. And that's very, very important because once we get the information from marketing, what's going to be the campaign, what's the target sales, then that's how— that's the start that we work together on an inventory planning, demand generation, and then PO processing. That's the finance side that we have to confirm afterwards because We fought so hard in minimizing lead time and fighting so hard with a minimum order quantity. We pay the deposit, but many times that we experience, we don't have enough cash flow to pay the balance, which is 70%. So even the 3 to 5 delays, delayed days of paying the balance, it's a huge lead time impact. On e-commerce and a 5-day delay on an active Meta advertisement, right? And everything is working well in marketing. It's definitely, you know, wasting money on that part.

Yeah, because it kind of becomes sort of a house of cards situation, isn't it? And the one sort of falls down. And so, yeah.

When you have like a winning CRO, like making, like having a very successful support to e-commerce brands, what is usually the next steps after that? How is it being like leveled up or communicated to the whole company?

Yeah, I think the main thing with CRO is that when you're looking at optimizing a site, There is often this perception that it is kind of a one-time thing, that you can make the site better and improve it. And in fact, actually a few weeks ago I was on a sales call and a guy said to me, look, you guys in this for 10 years, surely you know what the perfect website looks like. And I don't, because the thing is things change. And I think this is the problem, is that with everything that is involved in e-commerce, there is always gonna be an ongoing element. So you can have wins for a while, but certainly the winds of CRO will definitely go up and down. And as time goes on with your customer changing and their behavior changing, ultimately what you then need to do to the site in terms of A/B testing or in terms of implementing to get people to buy more, buy now, buy again, is going to be something that you have to kind of continually work on. So once it's, you know, when you say like once it's done, That's, I think, yeah, the mentality shift you have to have is that it's gonna be something that's ongoing that you continue to do. And that's, you know, that's difficult to swallow, especially when you've got lots of other costs to run a business. But unfortunately, that's the reality of it.

That is a very important key takeaway that I got today. And because that I don't have a lot of knowledge in CRO, and that's what I initially thought, like, is it a one-time thing? Like, Do we optimize now and then thank you for that, or a one-time project? And I wanted to share a story about an apparel brand that we support in Australia and also selling in the United States. In the era of injectables right now, the one that can change the, you know, lose weight for, in that matter, the sizing, the grading chart has changed dramatically from you know, having XXXL before, it changed. Like, they thought— it's like a similar example of you thought it's a one-time thing to grade your apparel, and with an ever-changing landscape of whatever's happening globally, then it has to change as well. So now they're not selling XXXL anymore until XXL, it's just until XL. So the way that they order their products, like the percentage of each sizing has changed, and even the flow of their website has changed as well. So he's a marketing expert that keeps on saying that he cannot stop from like the size grading. He said that maybe it should happen Twice a year instead of before every 2 years, something like that.

Does it, for you guys, like at the moment, like, is that, is that something you've experienced the past couple of years is that when you've got brands that sell in multiple markets, is that, I guess, that the economics and the societal changes impacts on the products and obviously the source that you have? Is that, is that a problem, more of a problem now than it was maybe 2 or 3 years ago?

So yeah, I worked for KFC and Human Nature before. It is more stable in terms of supply globally because in Human Nature, we're getting natural and organic products also in the US, in Europe. So it's like I'm not new to international shipment, but it's more stable at that time, even the pricing. The only thing I can remember at that time that was a huge disruption is the issue of rosehip oil which India is producing. And it became so evident because the smell of rosehip oil, if it's coming from different location, it differs and it's smelly. That's why it changes the product that we have. But other than that, it's kind of stable. And when I entered e-commerce, It is, you know, just last year, the tariff situation, a lot of e-commerce brands got our sourcing support where they wanted to check where else can they get the products aside from China. So one client, I cannot forget this client, they have one 40-foot container being held in China kitchen utensils that they cannot send to the United States even if it's ready, because if they send it, it will end up more negative than just throwing that products away. So for 30 days, we found them a vendor in Vietnam, here in Vietnam, and it's a lot more expensive in terms of shipment.

Yeah.

It has to reroute In different new direction, but we were able to salvage that few PO. So the container is still in China at that time. We ordered a new one. We sent it there, and it waited until there's like a lower percent of tariff in China. But it disrupted that company so much that they have to really. Pivot and transition right there and then. So those things also this year, it's the war. So the war this year has impacted e-commerce in the sense that all shipments, even sea shipments, is 2-3x the cost before. And not only that, it's longer route because of some channels are being the strait is closed. And so, you know, if a vessel usually have 10 times a year route, it is now 6 or 7. And so they have to increase the prices as well. And then the longer lead time. And it has a huge effect on the cash flow. You know, when we give that news to them, it was like, so what's going to be the impact in my finance that Yes, you have to order more now because your 45 days lead time is now 60 to 75 days.

Yeah.

And now you have to— we have to deal with looking for more options of freight forwarder because it's very expensive. And so there are different ways, and I've seen that it's kind of difficult for them to like, where do we get that money that we need? It's not, you know, e-commerce, it's not not very easy to do that, especially if we're talking about $20,000 difference from the original plan. And so, it's getting more painful. It's so getting— it's like giving them different options in supply chain, like, do we change the product? Sometimes we have to really downgrade the product that we're getting because they cannot afford the usual, the unit economics is not doing the work anymore. So that's a very huge adjustment for them.

Is there any, you know, at the moment with obviously with all that going on, particularly, you know, I'm interested in the US brands because that's who we also predominantly work with, like, Has there, and obviously with the political landscape as well, has there been any push about, you know, from brands sort of saying, well, look, is there an option to source directly from the US or the West? Like, or is, you know, are brands still kind of saying, look, regardless of these problems, they know the price differential is going to be so big that that's not something that they even maybe consider?

Yeah, definitely. The, the, when we did the sourcing project last year. It's not just Southeast Asia. It is the nearshoring project as well, as they call it. But it ends up, for example, Mexico, it ends up being more expensive because they're also getting raw materials from China. They're producing in the US, in Canada, in Mexico nearby, but the cost is not effective even if there's no tariff because at the end of the day, they have to pay tariff for their raw materials. So if the product has a local supply in that country, then it's easier. But if it's like fabric and wood and oils that is only found here, essential oils that is only found here, fragrances, then it's the same. And when we do the sourcing, We source different— globally, we source globally, and what we do is we compute for the landed cost. So it includes tariff, duties, and taxes so that when the client sees our shortlisted vendors, they already know that, you know, whether it's coming from a near country or China, they're looking at one cost, the same cost, apples-to-apples comparison of the cost. So So based on my experience doing this for more than a year, trying to get away from China, I would say that we were successful for about 30% only. And the ending is China is still the best option, given that a lot of vendors has also tried to help. You know, they tried to extend payment terms, they tried to lower down the MOQ, they know the problem. They are aware of the political problems. And so if they don't want their clients to go away, like they don't want their clients to find other vendors, they have to support. So it's like meeting in the middle.

When you have clients coming to you for the first time, are there any kind of like regular things that they are apprehensive about or cautious about? that you kind of continually find yourself answering. So it's like, you know, I can imagine—

For you, what's that for you?

Yeah, yeah. So I mean, like, you know, it's like for me, like, I— we've been obviously talking about a business, you know, this morning, and I think that particular business, like, they are concerned about, look, what is the quality of the product going to be like in terms of the raw materials, and is it going to be legally compliant? Uh, you know, I think particularly kind of, you know, we work a lot with sort of beauty, health, and health and supplements. If you have brands that are kind of, you know, watching this and saying, well, look, we've thought about, you know, looking at a supply chain, we thought about actually trying to source from elsewhere, um, maybe I'm just kind of wondering, you know, those kind of concerns, what's the kind of— yeah, I guess what's your response really to that and, and sort of how do you handle that?

Yeah, so most of in my experience handling calls with clients, it's mostly that if they want to find an alternative vendor, but quality and cost cannot change lower, like they cannot downgrade. And so although, you know, it's challenging, but of course we want to support that that goal where we need an alternative vendor, but we also make sure that the customers will not observe or will not see a difference from the old product to a new product. So, for example, this client that we work with, it's a detergent sheet. So, it's made in China. And so, when we tried creating new samples, their own formulation, what the client did is they invited like the loyal customers to try the new formulation just to make sure that it's not— they don't see any drastic change on the formulation. It's still clean, high quality, etc. So especially in formulated products, it's going to be challenging because if we change the source of the raw materials, if we change the ordering cycle of the raw materials, it's going to change the end product. There are stability testing, it's going to be longer quality checks, and there's going to be like 3 months of making sure that the product's stable and still working. That is the most common challenge that we are facing. And then although the goal is ideal and that's the target, sometimes we have to be transparent to our clients and say, between quality and cost, which is more important to you? Because although our goal is to follow what you want, that's our ultimate goal, based on experience, it's not going to be like that easy. If we have 6 months, to help you, then maybe we can. But you're asking for 2 months of replacement. You know, they need speed. And so, what do you want to prioritize, quality or cost? And that's what we're going to do. And, you know, making sure that there are boundaries in terms of if they said cost is more important, then what are our non-negotiable quality checks that we do? And if the quality is important, we ask, what's the limit of our cost per unit? So, those are the kinds of conversations that we have right now. And our clients in UK, for example, we're dealing with a very wide kind of materials, like one is formulation, one is apparel, one is aluminum steel, like the high-end dry product. And so, We are not just dealing with one country to look for as an alternative. It has to be really globally and then bring back the summary to the client and let them know their options.

Yeah, cool.

And I'm curious in your side, like if there are— if you have experienced that your brand has like product changes or new product development, what usually is the next steps of, of the agency?

I mean, the, the main thing with new product development is that I think they are generally— I, I kind of feel like it can be sometimes done the other way around, is that they get more concerned about the front-end side. It's like, okay, we're gonna have MPD, um, but actually we need that they start thinking about, okay, well, like videography, photography, product descriptions, SEO, GEO, AEO, like all of that side of it before I think they've really thought through the actual economics of them bringing the product onto and being listed. And I think that's, you know, that again is, I think it's a hangover from the days of, you know, sort of 10 years ago when dropshipping was at its height and people just were like, You know, get it out quickly, sell, sell, sell, sell. And that's that's something I think there's still a problem, and it's just that kind of slowing down and saying, hang on a minute, first principles. You know, start off with okay, right? We're looking from a cost point of view and quality, getting the product right, and then we think of that afterwards. So I think that's that's the overwhelming thing that we have when we have a client at the moment. You know who is is doing the same thing? They've they're relaunching their full range. So I think they bring out another 25 SKUs. Um, see, it— yeah, it's interesting with them is that— so what they have done, um, I can't say too much because they're under NDA, I've just remembered. But with them, um, they've been going as a business now for about 8 years. And what has happened that time is similar to what I was talking about earlier on. Their customer has matured.

Mm-hmm.

And it's interesting is that they're a business where the customer has stayed with them over time, but what they now need for that particular function has also changed because they need— what effectively is a more complex, um, a more professional product, um, rather than, I guess, look more of the same. So that's what has driven them, is that they need to upgrade the product in terms of its features, functionality, Rather than I guess looking at it from a, you know, look, actually margin point of view, we need to get a better margin on this stuff.

So did they change the whole product line for margin?

Yeah.

And is it like a huge drastic change of line or just improvement of the same product?

Yeah, I mean, ultimately what they've done is they've taken their existing SKU range and they just basically made modifications to each of those SKUs. And the materials have changed in them in that there's, I guess, more quality, more resistant material than they had previously. And then some of the actual features on the products as well, they've been added to. So, you know, ultimately it's still the core products, but they've had to then go and resource then the materials for it. And there's been a bit of design work that's gone into it in terms of, okay, upgrading each of them.

Oh yeah. That is like, I am trying to remember, I had a similar experience that has to change the whole line. And that's because of one raw material is not allowed in UK. Something that is now, what do you call that? Banned. A raw material banned in the UK. So, And that is a key raw material or an active ingredient for that specific product. So, there was a major reformulation and the unfortunate side is that they have to stop selling what they have. And what they did is they transitioned selling to US. And then, while the formulation— reformulation is ongoing, Mm-hmm. That's the time that they have, they deliver it in the UK because that's not the old formula, it's not allowed anymore. So margin is actually better in that experience, but the effectivity of that product has changed.

Have you, one of the things that's happened recently in Shopify is that they have banned the selling of electronic cigarettes. and vaping. And so that's been quite a big thing for, for a few people. And look, I'm not here to talk about the ethics or the politics behind it, but I think what I'm interested in is like, have you had situations where that has happened with you guys where you've got a client that has got a product that has then become either, you know, not possible to sell anymore or has been sort of heavy restrictions put on it? And then how do you as a business then cope with that?

Yeah, I think still the closest one is the one I shared with you. Like, it's a banned raw material and we have to help the client proceed with reformulation very quickly, as much as possible. And so the manufacturer of this client is really, really big, like manufacturing for one of the biggest brands worldwide. However, they're so big that their purchasing also have a lot of clients. And so we are in the waiting list. They know that we need it and they have other European clients as well. And finding raw material alternative for that is going to help them also. But they just didn't have the speed at that moment. So what we did is we got that raw material task sourcing away from them. We source it ourselves, we bought it ourselves, and we send it to them so that they can use it. And not because they don't want to support, but because it will take time. Like, the usual new product development cycle is 6 months, and our clients in the UK, they don't have that time because we transitioned, we delivered all our products to the US for selling. So that is the biggest one that we've supported that has like, you know, a major change that doesn't really fault anybody.

Sure.

One that I can remember is we have, not with Moov Supply Chain, but our previous agency, we have clients in cannabis industry. And it's kind of a different story because our support is still fractional human supply chain. You know, we are using AI and platforms, but the major decision maker and analysis is still coming from the human brain. So the issue is that legalities in our country is different with our legalities in California and New York. So we have to make sure that we are very cautious about dealing with our talents. It's managing the human side of it rather than the raw materials. It's like making sure that they are comfortable working with this brand because it's not legal in the Philippines. So kind of a different story, but it's something that I've learned that, you know, you have to really be flexible when you have clients, international clients.

You mentioned AI, and obviously, look, we can't do a webinar or a podcast in 2026 without talking about it. I guess, look, you know, with what you guys do, I'm sure you must now get a lot of people saying, well, look, we've looked into AI, we've found someone where we can source it from, the legalities, blah, blah, blah, blah. Does it? Is that problematic for you guys now in that people think they're experts because that they use AI? Because that's a massive issue in my world, is that people go, look, I can use Claude or ChatGPT to do CRO. It's like, you can, but there is a limit. And we're already seeing that, that loop complete where people go down the AI route and then in 3 or 6 months' time they come back and go, actually guys, didn't quite work out. So yeah, just wondering kind of if you, you've seen that sort of similar thing in that You know, look, we've tried AI and we've come back to you now.

It is very evident this year. Last year I've heard the story in the marketing space, you know, and then maybe you've experienced it earlier than we do in supply chain. But this year it has become so smart and, you know, 10x of it every month that we've lost clients because they found a sourcing app. And in the beginning, they would say, no, I can source myself easily. They have agents, they have sourcing apps, and okay, we understand. But we explained to them that the sourcing side, the communication side is the easy thing. The decision-making after that, the matrix of decision-making, what has to go into consideration is the most important part. And in our team, because we are 50+ Filipino talents in different supply chain expertise, there's, of course, a huge challenge in making sure that they cope up because we're used to doing it manually all the time. We have Google Sheets, Excel, and that's it. And although we have platforms in inventory planning, in DTC or e-commerce, you always have exceptions to the rule. And so even if you have that, you will download the data, you'll do it yourself manually in Sheets, and then come back with analysis and decision-making. So, it is quite challenging. And what I did, what we did in MOVE Supply Chain is we did an AI, like, build-a-thon thing a few months ago. We budgeted $6,000 for prizes for them. And the goal is that for them to be— to help them understand how can AI help them and not replace them. Because that's the main fear of our talents and even for us in leadership is that, is this gonna replace us? Are we still gonna have that agency next year?

Yeah, I mean, we're all the same in the same position, aren't we?

Yes, and what I found out is that it will make our work faster, and instead of one talent handling 2 clients, he or she will now handle 4 clients with the help of AI in the same time. So it's just being more effective, more efficient, faster, but at the end of the day, the team is still doing the final decision-making. How is it in your—

Yeah, I mean, it's, I think one of the things that I've said this before is that we've had to speed up and also slow down. And what I mean by that is, is that from, in terms of what we do, we, first of all, we'll analyze what's happening on the site. So we'll look at their data and say, okay, what are the visitors and the customers on your site doing? Are they buying now? Conversion rate. Are they buying more? Average order value. Are they buying again? Repeat purchase rates. Do that first and foremost. Once that process is then done, we then have to obviously analyze the data and create a plan of what needs to be implemented on the site and then implement it. Now, all of that now predominantly is driven by AI, so that side of it is sped up. But the difficult bit is, is that AI isn't perfect. And equally, because we're talking about something that is not just about a code base, it's about the language, the design, everything else, the human element of it in terms of the quality assurance, quality control needs to be massive. Now, you know, if anyone's watching this, you know, via a link on LinkedIn and you've been scrolling on LinkedIn today, you will see the AI slot that is on LinkedIn. It is exactly the same with every piece of work that could possibly be done on AI. So that's what I mean is that we've sped up certain parts of what we do, Um, but actually other parts of it have had to slow down. The net effect is still that actually things are quicker, but I think not as quick as maybe sometimes clients or people would expect them to be. And I think that's a reality that everyone needs to hold on to for a second is like, yeah, okay, it can help everybody. Um, but there are certain things where you still need that human touch. And yeah, going back to sort of your point about agencies as well, I'm sure you're saying it's like, The thing that we now can focus on is how good is our customer service, how good is our communication, and how good actually are we at being able to tell a story. Because another big thing that I hate about AI is the fact that we are now in this world where reporting has become such an easy thing to create. Reports are getting bigger, but people's attention spans are getting smaller. So there, there's a mismatch there. And I think the people, people crave that. Okay. Having someone who can write, say, look, here is a big ass long report that's been produced by AI, but what is the very simple story that means for my business and what the importance of it? So that's, that's kind of my take in it really.

And actually the, what's the next steps, right? That there's a report, it has explanation, but really, who's going to decide what are the next most important steps that will move the needle? And I love what you've said about speeding up and slowing down. It's definitely the same on our side. Like, before, we have to manually do a lot of sheets in Excel, but right now, it's a lot quicker. But the analysis part is the same. the analysis part of, do we really have the money to spend this? You know, they gave us a good report on inventory planning and demand forecasting, but how are we communicating this or coordinating this with the finance? How are we communicating this with the marketing team? And so that human side of it, of coordination, communication, and working together to come up with one decision. Is something that I still see that will have a huge value because if we are only depending on the recommendation of AI, sometimes it's applicable to one brand but it's not applicable for another brand. It's a tailored fit solution for every brand. And so my goal is always, okay, here's the data. the next steps? Always next steps. How to move forward, how do we solve the problem, etc. So I think that's something that has produced a huge understanding on our end. But, you know, I'm not sure how many people are working in your company right now, but for us, it's kind of hard because there is still fear of losing their job.

Mm-hmm.

And so Right now, that's what we're trying to navigate is that we, you have to work with us in understanding how to use these platforms, make it faster so that we can give you more clients. How is it in your—

Yeah, I mean, we, with AI, we basically started off by saying, look, we need to be able to make sure we take away all the boring admin-heavy, side of things away. And that affects how we started. So my co-founder kind of led the charge on the AI front. And what we got everyone to do in the team is to basically complete a form which said, look, here are the top 3 things that I do which are very manual and very admin heavy. And what we did is that we solved those first. So the buy-in, I think, really from everyone on the team was, okay, we can see how AI from stage 1 is actually helping us improving our roles. And then I think the second stage from that then was saying, okay, well, now we've kind of like made a start with that point. Um, how can we start doing the kind of, guess, the more the sexy end of AI? So how can we start doing things that clients will love? And that's going to phase in at the moment. Yeah, that is definitely not completed, but we are definitely doing, you know, the focus now is on that front-end side of like, how do we get AI to do designs? How do we get AI to build parts of the website? How do we get AI to do the QA/QC, which is, you know, what people get excited about? And I think, you know, the thing that the team have realized is that, you know, there was definitely resistance to start off with, I think particularly our development team, because from their point of view, Yeah, that's all they hear about is that, look, developers aren't gonna be needed.

Mm-hmm.

What they've realized is actually they absolutely are needed, but the type of work that they are doing now is less actually on the actual physical development, but it is more on the quality assurance, quality control, and being able to tell that story. So it's like, you know, now our developers are doing a lot more Loom videos where they're explaining to our clients What's been done, why it's been done, the rationale behind it. And I think this is the interesting conversation we had today is obviously in our team we have project managers, we have strategists, we have designers, developers. Everyone in the team is now effectively becoming a singular entity in the sense of everyone can be a designer, everyone can be a developer, everyone can be a strategist. And it's kind of forced people to, I think, upskill. skilled themselves in areas they maybe weren't stronger on. But it's easy to do that now because they have this central tool, which is Codex or ChatGPT or Claude, whichever one it is that you're using at the time, that helps you do that.

You know, it's, it's while you're sharing that, I remember my brother. So the, the youngest brother is working for Cambridge, but remotely in the Philippines. So he was a developer for the Cambridge Cambridge, right? Did I pronounce it?

The UK. Cambridge University.

Yes, Cambridge University in— is it London?

No, it's not far.

Oh yeah, in UK. Yeah, so he was a developer before.

Yeah.

And then instead of maybe— instead of losing the job, the change is it became a QA. So all the apps being done by— I'm not sure how— in Cambridge now, he is the one testing it all the time. So he's testing and testing. And so I then realized that when it happened, it's like he has a little bit of pride losing the development because he really coded manually and now his doing other things. But I think the important lesson that he got is that he tried to resist AI in the beginning, but then with that change of responsibility, he is now more open to learning more. And he's learning while doing the job, and he's still there in Cambridge doing a lot more different job, but still, at least you still have work. And so in my part, maybe I have 8 working apps that I did myself. I am not a developer, but I'm using my expertise in supply chain to create the user interface of that app. And then after I create that in a no-code environment, like for example, Base44, I'm going to show that to a developer now. Make this usable for different clients because I only did this because I— for me, like for me as a supply chain manager, but it cannot be used by 100 e-commerce vendors. So that's the goal. Right now we have developers working with us because they are now transitioning what I did cleaning the codes because it's so messy when you do that vibe coding. They just told me. Then once after cleaning up, they will make it like more, what do you call that, for the benefit of using it more with other users, I mean, because right now it's being used by one user. So it's kind of what we're— and it's currently happening. in our company right now. It's a huge transition because me as a CEO, instead of doing sales discovery calls, I am also coding on weekends— or sorry, not coding, vibe coding on weekends. So yeah, I think what I've— a good way to summarize our conversation, because we've met in a very good event here in Ho Chi Minh, and you've spoken, um, as a panel as well. Um, like, how are you envisioning to move your company with AI and, and considering the mission of your company as well to support e-commerce brands?

Yeah, I mean, the, the main focus at the moment with AI is to create a more sustainable way to be able to continually be tracking the performance of that site and equally then making decisions quickly because the, the, the whole, the whole benefit of CRO is about trying to increase the revenue that site brings. And the quicker you can do that, the better. But in order to do that, you need to make sure that decisions you're making are robust based on the data that's available. So everything that we're doing now, the tools that we're creating internally, Are to be able to A analyze, B track, and C implement. So those are the three I guess pillars that we're we're trying to do now. What that means in practical terms is is that although we're an agency, we are then building apps and services that allow us to automate that part of that process because you know the the the models that are out there you know yes you absolutely can do CRO with them. But what they don't contain is, you know, the fact that we've done over 4,000 different tests with the Shopify brands that we've worked with. And also the fact that our, I guess, internal brain, if you want to call it from an AI or AI second brain, contains the knowledge and expertise of our teams and based on the feedback and the QA/QC that they've done. So it's about saying, well, look, how do we, how do we take what everyone's done in our team, the experience, combine that with AI as part of our second brain to then make sure then we can be even stronger. And I think that's how we can sort of still maintain that competitive edge. Because, you know, again, look, I like with everyone, the advent of AI again means that we are all going to have many more competitors within the market, and I just don't see that dissipating. So that's, that's what we're trying to do to, um, or are doing rather As time goes on and obviously into 2027 as well?

Difficult part. I think it's the same with us. I mentioned that we have a physical lab in the Philippines where we formulate products. We also have an app for that. You can share, I want a Korean moisturizing cream for men, and it will give you the usual formulation for it. So basically, anyone can be a formulator right now. But what sets it apart is that the real formulations that our formulators have done is there. And so it's more intelligent than just Claude or ChatGPT. Because Claude and ChatGPT can give you a formulation.

Oh yeah.

But, you know, the real thing is the 20 years of experience of our formulators is in that app. So, you know, it's combining the experience with AI and the very important information to make it quicker. And I think that's what the AI needs still is that, as you've mentioned, your experience, that is something that AI cannot overpower and the combination of it. So we're also like in our company, Right now, we're doing changes in training our talents to use it and be comfortable, really comfortable using it. But at the same time, we're also like— Jade and I are doing our very best to get more clients because to retain all of them now that work is faster, we have to get more clients for them. So that's the biggest challenge and goal of our leadership right now, is to get more, to acquire more clients. That's why we're here in Vietnam and we're going to UK, is just so we can keep all of them. Otherwise, some of them has to pause and wait for new clients to come in. That's our, our, for us, our biggest challenge because we don't want anyone to go. But also, you know, we have to face the reality that it's so much, you know, speed has changed. Yeah.

So we're a team of 14, so we're quite a small agency. And the reason for that, I guess, is twofold, is that A, we started out life as a typical design dev agency. Where we were building websites from scratch or we redesigning websites. And then probably about 6 years ago, we transitioned to being a CRO agency. So we went from sort of being very broad to very specific. And that was scary as hell at the time because it was kind of, you know, we were turning away jobs that ordinarily would have gone, yeah, absolutely, we'll do. But it's definitely, you know, I think, look, made it easier for us to sell. Because they're very clear on what we do and what we don't do. Um, but also sometimes very painful when you go, well, that would have been some nice cash, and technically we can do it, but do you want to? Um, and I think that's what we've learned, you know, the hard way, is like sometimes that you take jobs on that actually then mean that the impact on the other clients of the core thing that you offer, which is actually more profitable, that then goes away. So yeah, that's kind of, I would say, one of the things that we've, we've, we've learned along the way from doing that. And yeah, we've, people have said to me before, you know, look, you've got other agencies that are younger than you, have got double the amount of people, and they're right. And I think, you know, look, we, maybe we could have grown more in some respects. But I think the, the other thing for me is that you always hear people talking about, you know, particularly e-commerce agencies, once you get over 25, 30 people, It becomes a lot harder to manage. And I think also the kind of the team morale. And the reason I mentioned this is because also when the morale of a bigger team then starts to wane and fade, you then get more account managers leaving, project managers leaving, people leaving in general. And that's the thing that means that actually people leave agencies in terms of merchants. So we, when we, when we actually, you know, recruit new brands coming into the business, many times they've come from bigger agencies and it's not because the quality of work is necessarily, you know, not good. It's the fact that the communication they've had and the way they've been treated is actually doesn't feel in, you know, the best way for them. So, and I always find it super interesting, you know, it's like Ultimately, our services are being bought as agencies to do a technical thing, but the technical thing a lot of the times is not actually the reason that why people leave. It's the, the actual, the day-to-day, the communication, the handholding. And I think, you know, again, in this era that we're in with AI, that's what we're trying to set as our competitive advantage because everyone can do the same thing pretty much with the tools. But it's how you communicate it and how you, you know, treat people that actually is the basic thing, the human touch that people will want and respect more.

And you can ask this to me as well, like, how can supply chain help you in your agency to do your job better in the CRO?

We've started. I think from a supply chain point of view, we need to be able to understand if there are any limitations in terms of volumes and inventory, because ultimately, you know, we're trying to pull 3 levers. We're trying to do the buy now, the buy more, buy again. And if, say for example, We have, say, a beauty brand, and our intention is to make sure that the typical bundle is now not 2 moisturizers, but is now 2 moisturizers, a cleanser, and also maybe a face mist. Then actually, if we don't know, if we don't know, for example, that there is actually an 8-week lead time on the face mist, and currently inventory is showing at 100. That's information that we are not always then privy to. And I think, you know, the the thing is like whilst there are lots of inventory management apps that are out there, this is not information that brands would generally share. So I think, you know, it's probably not so much. I think, you know, you as a company or as industry in general, but more the fact that brands need to share more. about what the actual situation is with the products. So yeah, I think that's what it'd be. And I guess, look, I guess flipping the question to you from the front end in terms of the marketing side, you know, the website side, what do you need more of to help you guys manage supply chain better?

Yeah, I think it's very similar to what you need from us. It is, giving us information if there are projects being done, even with a forecast of change. Like, of course, when you do projects of optimization, you're expecting change. That change is what we need as information because what we want to do and what we want to support you on is how can we speed up everything in case, you know, there's an uptake of this percent. So that's why the app that I created and presented yesterday is more of like making sure that, you know, you're aware, the marketing side is aware if the inventory is able to support it. And, you know, there's— it's not very important that your forecast Is correct. It is important that you're letting us know because it's alerting us that, okay, something's going to change, and whatever that change is, we have to adapt. Is it going to— we need shorter lead time, we need bigger margin because the discount is so high, or the uptake of the sales is so high? So I think that's— That's a part. And as for what you've shared earlier, I'm super agreeing to, you know, never-ending optimizing lead time and MOQ and costing. But at the same time, what's very important, what I want to share is like, we see supply chain disruptions ahead of time. And we see that ports, like for example, one port in China is on fire right now, and so a lot of vessels are are on hold. And so the future effect of that, 2 months, 3 months impact of that is you're, even if you're coming from a different port, there's a possibility that your product will not arrive on time because the products in that port that is on fire, it's going to reroute. And so all of that information is being kept by the supply chain expert and not reaching marketing, Finance, everyone. So I think that's a maybe a dashboard or a shared channel where these informations are are woo are saved. Yeah, that's the word. All right, that was how many minutes? I'm almost done. Really? Oh my gosh! Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Adam, for doing this crazy podcast. I I have to remember. Can can can you? Kong Fai Dim Sum. And thank you, Kong Fai Dim Sum, for hosting us today. You know, I just mentioned. I just asked and messaged them yesterday, and now I have an appointment. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. What is thank you in Vietnam? Cảm ơn, cảm ơn. Come on, come on, come on. Thank you, Adam.

Thank you.

See you next week. Yeah, absolutely.