Passing 10,000 Customers & Tripling Monthly Revenue - Documenting the journey - Episode 17

Right, fuck it. We're back with the document. In the Journey episode, My dog is here. He was on my lap. Tokyo, who's unofficially named Ophis, was on my lap. So I'm presenting him. He's often on my lap when I'm working. He never gets to actually feature in an episode. Different background. I'm actually in York, where I'm from, in my old fucking. Well, it's not my bedroom, it's a spare room where I used to work. And I didn't do an episode last week because I was in the fucking trenches and I wasn't feeling like it, to be honest. And I was gonna do this episode yesterday, but I didn't. I won't download shit to talk about, but I'm in the middle of the fucking trenches. And I was gonna wait till later to record it, but I feel like it's more realistic if I do it in the middle of the trenches with loads of shit going on. Where do you want to go? Go on. So yeah, I'm doing a fucking episode. Not in my usual setup, but yeah, I did make a load of notes. I'm doing this at three in the afternoon on a Tuesday, which feel like it's just classic trenches time because a load of fucking shit going on. A load of agencies that piss me off with this new website going live not doing their job properly, don't watch this and get angry in the comments. But yeah, what's going on? Geez. So four and a half months in, as I was saying, I'm in York. Always feel like a kid when I come to York. Probably the same for anyone when they go to the parents house. I've been here for months and months and months. Yeah. Finally scaling after a frustrating August. So the interest of full transparency barely grew in August compared to July, which was annoying. I know August is like typically slow in Ecom or certainly slower. I don't want to use that as an excuse, but it definitely is true. I'd experienced that with both Midnight City and Neon beach and even drop shipping stuff in the past, so kind of got forgot about that. Still did beat July with August, but not by as much as I'd like. Other things improved like conversion rate, subscribers, etc. Etc. But yeah, it was frustrating for September. Probably going to 3x. What we did in August, at least 2.5 to 3x what we did in August basically nailed the creative system. Now got like 30 new creatives specifically for ads every single week, which is the biggest variable. A lot of people in media buying know that still spending like 90 of budget on Instagram over like Tick Tock and Google. But yeah, starting to see a big bit of scale there. Amazon is starting to scale quite nicely as well. It's doing like a thousand pound a day average in the past week. Running a tiny bit of PPC on there. Need to get that listing like boost it, get it moving. So yeah like revenue wise run rate like the past week's been like 2 1/2 x what we were averaging in August on a daily and weekly basis. So yeah, looking to do like 2 1/2 to 3x those numbers that we did in August similar in July in September. So that'd be good because that part of the problem has been my overheads have actually been swallowing like the ability to be profitable but haven't been profitable up to this point by the way because things everyone just assumes that every brand is like instantly profitable but after that all overheads, everything, etc. Etc. Just haven't been up to this point. I think September we will be for the first month profitable which will be good in terms of management accounts. Yeah. Hell, my brain's fried something sat in the trenches for the past seven hours and trying to speak about this and do a video. Yeah, I wanted to get to like a certain level of scale ASAP because then like overheads are just way less of an issue. That's that agency replying to me. Yeah, is off. I wanted to get to a certain level of scale ASAP because then we can actually be profitable because like overhead just be like team and agencies and like the relatively small scale I've been doing the past few months, you know, compared to where I want to be, you just. It's very hard to be profitable at that level because overheads just swallow it. Whereas overheads stay the same, we triple revenue. Obviously the margin is way, way bigger. As long as obviously we're like maintaining a certain roas on ads. Been doing a lot of conversion rate stuff which is what I'm getting pissed off on earlier. And in Slack right now we're about to go live with this updated version of the website or the first version of the updated website and as well as like a dedicated landing page been working on that sort of stuff in the background trying to figure out how we can actually, you know, make more money per visitor and actually build out like offers and landing pages for Q4 rather than just running traffic to a very basic website which I've built myself, which is what I've been doing up to this point. And it Just, it's fine but you know, like conversion rate stuff. Definitely invested quite a bit into that working with this agency and the Landing Page agency. So that's some other things I've been doing. Stock management's fucking impossible. I've got like 18,000 units of rainbow Dust in stock right now, which sounds like a lot. But where I think we can go scale wise over the next few months, I definitely to order some more. I don't really have a system for that right now. I tried like this software called Cogsy to be honest. Didn't rate it. Basically gonna go back to just doing a spreadsheet which is what I used to do. And yeah, just use that because stocks are fucking issue right now. I feel like this is a really incoherent episode because my brain is fried and there's a lot of shit going on. And you can probably tell that I'm just in the trenches because it's not very planned. But yeah, this is what's going on. Another thing I've been thinking about is I know everyone tells me make more podcasts and shit, but I actually feel like I've got so busy with the brand that every minute I spend on something else. I either poured like even doing this document in the journey stuff, but it's kind of different because it takes like 10 minutes to film every minute I spend on the podcast, you know, which is easily, you know, six, seven hours a week if I record like two episodes, it's time I should be spending on the brand. So I'm starting to think, fuck, do I really want to do the pod? Do I care as much about the pod? Do I just focus on the brand entirely? Obviously do my document in the journey shit? I don't know is the answer to that. But the brand is my absolute priority work wise and needs to be, you know, 90 to 95% of my life for like the next few years I think. So that's something I'm thinking about. Maybe I'm having a quarter life, end of summer crisis. Especially now I've decided to stop traveling and just focus for a while because definitely making a difference, getting deep, back in the trenches, moving the needle. Another thing I've been thinking about and this probably sounds like a classic just fucking like moaning episode, which some of these are just going to be because it's just reality. It's not always going to be super exciting. Maybe I should share some exciting shit on screen, but I can't be asked on this episode. Another thing I've been thinking about And I probably always hypothesize about this too much and should just get on with fucking building the business. Is can you have a social life and like a life outside work if you want to be retired by 30, you know, or is that people say I want to have made it by 30 and make it in my mind is like 10 million plus personally, which I think I can do by 30 for sure if I get this brand right. But I'm just like, depends when you ask me. Sometimes I think I want to have a balanced life. I want to have a great social life, you know, do more sports, do fireside footy, travel every month as well as like focusing on the brand. But then by definition am I not focusing if I'm doing that or actually is the best way to focus to have a life outside work so I feel like mentally and physically fulfilled in a better headspace and my mental health is good and my social life is good and then I can do better work when I am working. It's probably a debate I'll never fully know the answer to, but something I think about a lot, like, what's more important, you know, making all the bread I want to make by 30, you know, 30, 31, 32, 29, whatever it is, or having like a balanced approach on the way there and actually enjoying it. Does it even matter if I enjoy it on the way or should I just be like laser focused all in and then kind of enjoy my life after? Even though I do enjoy a lot of the process of building, but it's like, if that's all that's in my life, you know, there's no weekends, no traveling, then is that sustainable? I don't know, maybe I don't need to fucking think about it. Someone commented saying, like, stop thinking about work, life, balance and all that sort of deep philosophical stuff, which I love to pine about. And they said just focus on the first goal, which is building the business and making a load of money by selling it. And in many ways I think they're right. And I'll probably try. And I probably get too romantic about it, too philosophical and hypothetical about it. Maybe I just need to fucking focus on doing the work, move the needle and then see where we're at, sort of two, three years. And there's a lot to be said for that approach. I think just fucking keep it simple. Another thing I think about because often I'm like, oh, it's going to take me three to five years to get to, you know, whatever that is, that 10 million pound exit that 20 million pound exit. But then I think, fuck. Well actually if I stopped trying to have Sundays off, for example, or stop trying to have time in the evening when I'm not working, I'm reading and meditating or doing sports, whatever it is. Not that I do sports apart from running in the gym, I think, could I. Another way of like one upping myself is alright, so let's say we've got this goal, just call it 10 million quid. Why can't I get there in two years instead of four years? Like speed can be another measure as well as scale. So I'm starting to think about because in many ways it, you know, it might be easier to get to 10 million in two years than it is to get to 100 million in five years, you know, hypothetically. So that's something I'm thinking about. Well, I say a lot, but that is something that comes to mind and I'm like, fuck, maybe I should just go all the fuck in sack off like every other part of my life. Not that there is that many other parts of my life apart from like a bit of social life. Traveling is obviously quite a big part of my life. Maybe I just sack all that off and try and do it all in two years. Or is that going to leave me empty and fucking depressed at the end because I've not had any enjoyment along the way. And like I said, a lot of the changes are enjoyable but a lot of it is just hard. As anyone knows, it's in the game. So hell, does that make sense or am I just rambling as usual? 11 minutes in, but yeah, properly scaling this month. Nice to actually see the needle moving from what groundwork I've been doing. Yeah, focusing on shit that isn't just ads as well. You know, website conversion rate offers, stock management is what I'm to think about a lot more now especially we've got another SKU coming and accessory SKUs we obviously launched recently. Do I keep doing the POD or not? Something I got to think about and how quick can I get to the goal? And is the goal just to get an exit? I guess that's the first goal. But beyond that, is this something I can see myself working on for many, many years? Yeah, in many ways actually is. Especially if we ever get to the point where I'm actually selling like psilocybin rainbow dust, which I would love to be doing. But I think my problem as well is I get way too romantic about, you know, wanting to change the world or change a fucking Industry. I love the whole process. You know how all this balance hypothetically was actually I probably just need to get a bit better at being a bit more simplified just focusing on the fundamentals which is, you know, how do I put one pound in, get two pound out at 100 grand a day spend, you know, how do I get there asap? How do we scale asap? What are the levers I can pull to actually just move the needle and make this grow profitably? And who's going to buy the business? Do we need to raise money, millions of pounds in a year's time to take it to like a Huel scale or something which I genuinely believe we can. So yeah, just focus on the fundamental fundamentals of something. I'm thinking about as well because I think I over romanticize a lot of things, you know, wanted to do 1980s films and which I just love doing. But yeah, a lot of businesses like 95 of running any even cool looking brand or business is a lot of just hard yards in the trenches and isn't that isn't glamorous and you know, drive for show, putt for dough so they say. And yeah, a lot of the fancy stuff doesn't move the needle. A lot of the basic shit does. So yeah it that's an episode. I feel like I should like share my screen or something. Don't know what you can actually see on there because I'm doing front facing camera which is retarded. But that's the landing page I've got coming pretty soon. This is like a new home page thing we're testing. Trying to think there's anything on the screen I shouldn't be showing you. Probably not. It's more like a landing page style that's meant to be going live later today but I don't know what's going on. They keep fucking up the tracking shit. But yeah, a lot of stuff going on as usual. Cheers for watching Space Goes to the Moon. Catch you in the next episode. Peace.