Pressure is a Privilege, Instagram is fake, Business is Hard - Documenting the journey - Episode 3

Yo. Back with another episode of Whatever the fuck it's called Documenting the Journey. I'm trying to do these on Wednesdays now. Filming on Wednesday, uploading on Wednesday. I think that makes more sense. I feel even less articulate and more tired and less. Less in a good mood than the previous two episodes. For like the first episode I was super articulate. I don't know, I think I just came across like really excited to be doing the new series and shit. And then I've been the fucking trenches. But that's the whole purpose of this series is just to a. A like number one mainly just document it for me. So in 10 years time. It's fucking interesting to look back on because like I said, I just net regret not doing this more in the past. It was so interesting to look back when I was like 2021, first in the trenches back in the day and when I was at uni and stuff. And now obviously I'm more aware of that fact and when I'm you know, 30, 35, 40, whatever. This will be mad looking back hopefully when I've obviously become a billionaire or some shit, which is obviously the plan, I guess. Yeah, I wrote like a few notes about the main things I want to talk about because I want to keep this. Well, not like to the point, but I just want to keep it. It's fucking really raw in. It's funny. Like the first thing is this seems to have gone down better with my audience in terms of views, engagement, comments. It's like general messages about it and shit than any of the recent pods. And it makes me think like, Fuck, this takes 10 minutes to do a pod. Takes hours per week per one to like plan get the guests in, you know, like be hospitable. I like get dressed and shit, make sure the flat. Flat's all clean. I mean, I'm obviously still gonna keep doing the pod. It's just funny because this is like super low effort. And yeah, I mean comment if you think I should stop doing the pod and just do this. But I'm not gonna. I'm gonna do both I think certainly for now. That's just a funny observation. What's happened the past week? So I guess we're actually bang on six weeks in now, which isn't that long, but feels like quite a while because quite a lot has happened. I'm like very much in the trenches again. Main things actually switched officially to the new 3 PL today. Like that was a weird one because like it's a classic case of I made the decision because the right decision in my mind for numerous reasons, not going to talk shit about them, whatever, but the second I switch, I send all my stock, they suddenly care about me as a customer. It's like, all right, cool, why didn't you care about it before? But classic case, that was the right decision. That happened. Bit of a faff. Cost a few grand to do that ultimately because I have to sign up, pay like new fees to sign on, whatever. Pay like fucking haulage fees. Maybe not a few grand, maybe like a grand. But it costs money and time if I have to do that. But it's definitely worth doing it. That's one thing that's happened. Another thing that's happened is I switched to Skio from Recharge. Don't you know why? I mean, to be honest, I just, I put on Twitter, is there a better subscription thing? Because basically like the first month was just data collection. Like I just put up, you know, the price, the offer, what I thought was good. And then I realized loads of things like having I had three different Shopify listings instead of one listing with subscription variants. So like that was one way I set up the website wrong. So I switched to Skio, got that set up. Much better. It looks much better. Haven't noticed a massive difference conversion rate wise in terms of having a much prettier setup. But that will come a time I think. Yeah, just been starting to like dive into the data really because you throw a lot of shit at the wall in the first month and you know, I knew I'd do that. Like particularly content like different ads, different ad channels of course still limited. I'd spend. We're still only be spending like a grand a day on ads since pretty much since the past four weeks because of stock. I launch with 3,000 units, we're rattling through them. I've got another 5,000 coming in, landing in like two weeks. So then we can start going fucking probably like double or even triple the ad budgets and obviously hopefully along with that double or triple revenue on a daily basis. Which would mean the run rate is pretty fat given I knew the how new the brand is. But like one thing I'm going to try and like keep this focus on the things I wanted to say. I'm going to fucking chop into a million different angles like I always do on the pod. The one thing I'm conscious of this time is round with this being not my first rodeo, so to speak. Not my first brand is I don't just want to throttle the fuck out of It. I actually want to be way more like, intentionally. Like, this is the goal for this month, but we want to grow every month rather than just be like, let's get to a million a month in six months, potentially, which I'm pretty confident I could do if I really throttled it and went balls to the wall and everything. I mean, that'd be fucking insane. But, you know, I'd rather go hypothetically, 100k, 150k, 200k, 250k, 300k over like six months. And then it's consistent growth. You can scale the back end and the operation, the cash flow, and like, the finances as much, which is stuff I got wrong in the past. So that's what I'm thinking broadly. But on that, Yeah, I got 5k units coming in two weeks, and then I took a pretty big pun and ordered another 10,000 units this week, which is quite scary because that's like a pretty fat stockholder, to be honest. Especially at this stage when we sold like 1500 units. Again, massively transparent, but, yeah, like, it's still cool, obviously. I mean, this is not drop shipping. This is not white labeling. This is like the, you know, as bespoke as you can go. Like, bespoke formula. Like, completely, completely from scratch. Everything, of course, but even more southern stuff I've done in the past, like jewelry was ultimately like kind of just white labeling in a way. Like unique designs. But at the end of the day, it's just jewelry. Like, it's the same as every other fucking chain. Neon Signs was like, ultimately branded dropshipping because it had to be. This is obviously fully, fully bespoke. Higher barrier to entry. Took a lot longer to make a reality. Took a lot more money to make reality. So now it's actually like proving itself as a business. It's like, more exciting even though it's on a smaller scale than Neon was. Obviously, for now, it's like, well, fuck, this is something I entirely built from scratch. And people are subscribing. So that's pretty fucking sick. We've had like a 18% subscriber rate since we launched, which, I mean, I don't know if that's good or not, but it seems pretty good to me because people have never tried the product, never seen the brand. Obviously, if you know that should increase over time. If people keep subscribing, then, you know that's where you're gonna make the real money. Long term. Assuming, like, people don't cancel and ultimately Churn should be positive. So more people subscribe than unsubscribe, obviously. And you scale that up. What else did I want to say? Yes, that that big stock order was kind of scary. Not scary, but it's like I decided as well just on that to focus on the one hero skew for now. I've got a gummy in the works which I'm thinking about releasing as like an upsell slash cross sell product. I think that'd be good because the AB is still a bit low. And then I'm working on a few, a few accessories that I just think would make sense to add to like the offer. I think that'll make sense. One thing as well, I'm moaning about the aov, but I'm actually gonna, I'm actually considering doing like a Google optimized test to try out going cheaper because a lot of our competitors, particularly in America, who are massive like mud water, who are apparently doing like nine figures. I don't know where I got the number from, but it looks like they are based on similar web. They're like, they're basically all coming in at like 30 equivalent to 39 pound a month. Whereas I'm 49 and then 39 subscription, they're like 30 on a subscription. So I'm considering testing that again. It would fuck the AAV a little bit, but if it could potentially double conversion rate or you know, 1 1/2 x conversion rate, then is it worth it? That's, that's the thing I need to figure out. So starting to run some tests on that, diving into the data a bit more, that's something I'm like genuinely doing a lot. I'm rambling here already but yeah, I suppose another thing I want to talk about select UGC creators and again, I'm not here to shit on any group of people, certainly not naming any names, but I spent a lot of money on like trialing out a lot of UGC and a lot of different sort of content. Like UGC being probably the biggest one and the biggest expense because I paid for so much of it, had some really good stuff. But then there's some stuff where it's like. And you can probably relate if you run a brand and I've kind of tweeted about it a little bit, I think you'll pay someone say 100 pound a video which by the way, I think is fucking ludicrous. I think the whole market of UGC is, is a bit of a bubble, almost like a housing bubble because like agencies are trying to charge 400 quid for a UGC video. And bear in mind, this is stuff that certainly in my mind is like so disposable. Like, you know, we might test 20 of them in a week. If it doesn't hit like we're bidding it, we're not gonna use it for anything. It's not like brand content, glossy shit that's going on the website Evergreen for two years, you know what I mean? So it's ludicrous. And then even creators themselves trying to charge 100 pound a video, which is worth it if it's a good video. I'm not saying it's not. And I've had some that were that price that were really good and they're performing well on ads and whatever, great. But this is shit that I can make myself in 10 minutes. And I've done it myself. Some of the best performing ads are me talking shit, looking like crap hair not done in the morning. Do you know what I mean? Drinking my product. Because I think it's always kind of like funny and like a tradition at this point for me to make a feature in my ads. I did it with Midnight City jewelry and I got recognized in Bali by Australian guys that seen me wearing this weird shirt. So I've definitely got balls for that shit. And obviously Neon my fucking bedroom became famous. I was like, well, I'll do a few UGC ads. And I'm not saying I'm going to make my own ads all the time, but the point is it takes 10 minutes to make. I don't really think that's 100 pound a video. Like I think people are kind of naming their price because they think brands will pay it. Which is fine, I get that to an extent. But ultimately, like I'm already seeing more and more and more and more and more UGC creators and the price is going to go down because brands aren't going to pay all of them. 100 pound a video there just isn't enough. I don't think there's enough brands willing to pay that for the amount of UGC creators that are now cropping up. It's like a new little economy. But yeah, I mean that's my general thoughts on that. Like one brief example, again, naming no names paid this creator like 200 pound for three videos. So 70 pound video I gave her. Like I gave, well it's a girl gave her strict guidelines like because I wrote these based on feedback that people wanted more guidelines. So you know, do XYZ needs to be this long. Say this didn't do any of Those and then sent me an invoice. I was like come on, I sent you a bloody guideline. So that shit's just frustrating but it's part of the game. But I just for anyone watching that's UGC Cray just freaking like over deliver like people are paying you well to do something. Those one isn't that hard work like to be quite honest most. Maybe I'm too honest but that's just my honest view. But yeah, good creators will get repeat work. I've already got a few that I've agreed to work with again on like the second or third month now already. So yeah, I just think make good content is the key thing. Like don't. It's less about the price, it's more about just make good content. Like the price is pretty high anyway I think across the board right now for ugc. But yeah, that's my point. What sort of thing I want to speak about. Yeah, I suppose just like feeling it's funny because I'm doing much smaller numbers than I was two years ago like right now because fucking two years ago I was doing one and a half million a month. Had a Ferrari in the garage and I was 24. But I feel so much wiser and more experienced now in every way particularly on like the financial side to be honest. And I'm still not. That's still not my forte at all. Oh that's another thing we're trying to do. I say we Alex, one of my investors is definitely like a bit of a formal mentor to me now at this point helped me hire a portfolio part time FD basically fucking smart financial don to do like one day a month just to basically position and plan the business financially for you know, potential future investment. Like the whole financial narrative really. So beyond just like basic accounting and management accounts, this is more like planning, forecasting, strategy, all that sort of shit which is not my bag at all. So yeah getting help with that. I just feel a lot more experienced. Like I'm probably like more frugal with cash than I was in the past. Which, which to like a lot of 18 year old dropshippers they'll be like oh you're a. Or whatever. No, it's just like this is the reality if you want to build something long term and sustainable like the finances and cash flow and all this sort of stuff is stuff that no one speaks about on Twitter or YouTube because I mean neither do I because it's. It's a bit more private, it's a bit more taboo and like, you know, whatever, it's less clickable basically. But it's important because I, I learned the hard way, you can scale something too quick. You have effectively the rug pulled out from under you and stuff. You know, I had a massive scale problem as everyone knows, and shit can go very wrong very quick. So yeah, like on the financial side, I'm way more strict, I suppose now. But also I am very aware of trying to build something sustainably in every way. And granted, Neon beach was a fucking unusual case like for two reasons primarily the ridiculous scale so quick and a ridiculous level of issues so quick on the back end. That was largely out of my control. So yeah, that taught me a lot. I definitely think in like a net positive way. Obviously this business model is much more robust from the start anyway. But yeah, that's just something else I'm feeling. I guess ecom stress has come back a little bit. Like I used to joke, like the fucking, I think I tweeted like I miss the E Comm anxiety. Like anyone watching, I spoke to mates about this and like, I think everyone can relate to this to an extent. Especially if anyone building like something real, not just fucking, I don't know, drop shipping for like a week. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but you know, it's slightly different and I used to do that as well. It was definitely, definitely less stressful. Yeah, just fucking like, you know, the numbers affect your personality, don't they? They affect how you feel about yourself, your self esteem. That's just the real shit. And it's not just me or anyone that's beginner. Not that I'm a beginner, but it's not just me. It's not just you. It's not just beginners, not just experienced people. It's fucking everyone. Because, you know, I know people that run multi, multi eight figure brands that are close friends of mine and they have the same, they have the same shit, they've gone through the same shit, you know that they have the same ups and downs. You'd be surprised. Like, you may look at certain people, including myself, but probably not myself at this point because I've out of myself so much and I'm so transparent. But like, you may look at certain people on Instagram, like founders, whatever, and think, oh, they've never had a bad day or that they've never gone through a rough time or you know, they've never had a week where results were shit and they started to think is at the end or whatever. Fucking trust me, they have. Because I know a lot of these people personally. I mean, I was that guy. Probably everyone looked at me driving the cars I had, you know, living in the place I live even now and. And think and thought, oh, you know, he's got it all figured out. But trust me, like, fucking E commerce, I is real. Like entrepreneurial anxiety is real. Like, you know, just you can't escape it. Like when it's good, you feel really good. When shit's not as good, you don't feel as good. And that's something you have to deal with, an entrepreneur. Right. And yeah, I just think like a broader point on that. It's just everyone is. Everyone is really doing. Trying to do something legit and is in the trenches and has been in the trenches. Can relate to how you feel because I'm sure a lot of people watching this starting out and so on, it's fucking hard. And everyone feels the same. Even people that been doing like seven years like me. I still get, you know, I'm still. My emotions are controlled to an extent by how well the business is doing. Of course they are. It's probably less so than it used to be. And because I've got experience and context on, you know, like a bad day, whatever. Like, I don't look at shit as granular as that now because I know that the bigger picture is more important. And again, I got the experience to back that up in terms of I've had these days before, I've had good days, bad days, but it's still there. The fucking, you know, it affects your mental big time. Big time, for sure. So, yeah, I think trying to get away from the screen and not looking at your numbers all the time is my advice on that. Because that's what people will be thinking, is that how do I improve that? For me, it's just look at the numbers once or twice a day. Don't be fucking sat there staring at your Shopify screen because at any level of the game, that is not healthy, even if it's going really well. So, yeah, I think a lot of stuff going on. Just one point I want to mention, and this just came to mind because I think people can relate. Like, I was chatting to my brother the other day on text and he's like a civilian. He won't mind me saying he's a civilian. My twin brother, we're very different. He has a great job and shit, but he's just not an entrepreneur. And that's fine, by the way, but it's just so different because he was in London. And he, like, was like, on a Monday, I was like, do you want to go out for dinner and shit? And by the way, I'm not a fucking incel. Like, I go out for dinner probably three times a week. Like, one like Thursday, Friday, Saturday, usually, to be honest. But, like, Monday to Wednesday, usually Monday to Thursday. Like, there is no such thing as, like, an evening. If you're trying to build something, at least in my view, that's not. So you can't have that. But I think if you're truly obsessed, particularly in the early stages of something, you feel like you're doing yourself a disservice if you're not passionately working in the trenches. And I'm not saying don't enjoy any of it, but even right now, it's like, I'm so driven again to, like. Because I know how painful it was when I lost the opportunity to work on what I loved last year, that now I'm back doing that again. I'm so protective of the opportunity I have ahead of me now, and I really think it's a big one, so it's fine. You know, finding that balance is hard. And it's an art form more than a science for sure, that. That balance between, you know, do I work all the time or do I have a life as well? And for me, I found that balance. That works for me at my age, and I'm 26, and I'm older than a lot of people that watch this and younger than some. But, yeah, like, it's just different because a lot of people from the outside in, it's funny because including my own brother evidently, like, maybe didn't think that that was a reality. And it doesn't. Doesn't have to be, but it's how I want to work because I don't want to leave any stone unturned because, like I said, like, it's kind of deep, but I really felt like I was never gonna be able to do the shit I loved again when everything went wrong last year. And, I mean, ultimately I knew I'd find a way back, but, like, to actually be back in the game is, like, the pressure is a fucking privilege for me now. And I really feel that. I'm so grateful to be able to be in the trenches again. Like, honestly, don't take it for granted. Like, so many people, you know, particularly in third world countries or whatever, would fucking love the opportunity to grind and build something. And if you've put yourself in a position to do that or you're trying to do that then particularly with something you enjoy, which I hope it is, then yeah, take it with both hands and fucking send it because. And enjoy it as well, but fucking send it. And you know, don't, don't lose sight of the. How privileged we are. You know, probably anyone watching this really to be in a likely a first world country with an Internet connection and the ability to do this shit, to build shit online, to build creative shit, because it's easy to lose perspective. But like, honestly, I guess to summarize, it's a privilege to be in the trenches doing, building some cool shit. And I probably more than most at my age, I'm very aware of that because of how, how south my shit went. And I thought I wouldn't have the opportunity to do it again in the back of my mind at one point. Now I'm here doing it again. So I'm not gonna take it for granted and I'm gonna fucking make it work. Do you know what I mean? So that's how I feel. It's an exciting but scary but like powerful place to be, I think, like mentally so, yeah, I guess with that said, I'll wrap up. Yeah, I got loads of shit to do. I'm gonna drop this like literally 20 minutes. I'll fucking edit it myself and upload it and drop a comment on what, what you want to see. Maybe I'll just start doing some screen screen some screen share stuff and add a few comments about that. But yeah, for now, cheers for watching. Subscribe to the POD.