Latest / We Built This Brand / LA Trip Ep. 8 Leading with Authenticity: Building Brands That Shape Culture

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LA Trip Ep. 8 Leading with Authenticity: Building Brands That Shape Culture · We Built This Brand

0:18
Welcome to, we Built This Brand.
0:19
I'm your host, as always, Chris Hill, and with me today is my guest host Arusha.
0:23
Hi guys.
0:24
I'm the host of Conversations with Curiosity.
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I'm so excited to be here at Power.
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Forward and we have some beautiful guests for you.
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We absolutely do.
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We've got, um, Katie, Sue, and we've got my, of course this would happen time.
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Randolph, like my phone, my iPad always locks and I'm like,
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I just need to glance down and see it and then Lord, ready?
0:45
Ready?
0:45
I'll
0:45
start.
0:45
Okay,
0:46
let's go there.
0:46
Chris,
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we got some amazing guests with us today.
0:49
Yes
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we do.
0:50
We got Katie Sue, and then we've got Ty Randolph with us as well.
0:54
We're really excited to talk to y'all.
0:56
Thanks for having us.
0:57
Yes.
0:57
We're excited to be here.
0:58
So, Chris's podcast is all about brand building
1:01
and building, uh, and how we build brands.
1:04
And both of you have worked for exponential amounts of
1:08
amazingly big brands before starting your own, so Absolutely.
1:12
So please tell me a little bit about your background for our audience.
1:15
I know, but they would like to know.
1:18
Okay.
1:19
Oh wow.
1:19
Um, I started my career out with advertising and brand building,
1:23
so, um, sort of classic madmen agencies, uh, publicists, WPP,
1:29
but I was always in the digital and emerging media team, so
1:31
really redefining how brands connect and convert digitally.
1:36
Um, and that kind of naturally led me into tech.
1:39
Um.
1:40
Sony music internally, um, inside their digital business group where we
1:44
architected a platform, uh, that was kind of like a managed service Shopify
1:49
before its time, uh, that hosted over 200 individually branded artist stores.
1:53
Wow.
1:54
And so not only were we building this platform
1:56
with like a b. BA, B two, B2C proposition.
2:01
Um, but we were responsible for caring for artists, Audi
2:04
audiences and brands and partnership with the labels.
2:07
Um, that ended up leading me to Meta Long story, um, uh,
2:13
and I almost went to Lionsgate when I was leaving Sony.
2:15
So Lionsgate called me back a little while later.
2:18
Um, with an offer to help them architect a really interesting brand.
2:22
They were doing a joint venture with Kevin Hart called Laugh Out Loud.
2:25
And uh, I joined that team to take the brand to
2:28
market and really helped architect it, grew it, um,
2:31
exponentially over the course of about, um, seven years.
2:35
And then, um.
2:37
Now I'm in the process of launching my own venture, uh, but I'm also
2:41
advising, uh, a company that I'm on the board of Rock the Bells, a
2:45
local JS company, and we just took them through a rebrand, so Oh wow.
2:48
Lots of brand building.
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She might be a brand expert.
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I'm just saying just,
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just a little bit of one.
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It sounds til you
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hear Katie's Okay.
2:54
Let's go Katie.
2:55
Um, Katie Sue.
2:57
Uh, I think a lot of people probably know me from one of the first
3:00
brands I helped build and launch called Dollar Dollar Shave Club.
3:03
Um, a lot of people ask me like, oh, you went into selling razors.
3:05
That was not the dream.
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That is not, absolutely not what I decided to do.
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Men's grooming was not like at the top of the list,
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but it was such an incredible brand and story.
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I was a third person there.
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We built it from scratch, did everything.
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I mean, I wore many, many hats.
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Um, and I like to say the best thing about that job is you got to do everything.
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You know, you got to do marketing, digital, social,
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way ahead of its time in social media storytelling.
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And then from there I fell into media and entertainment.
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So early days on the marketing team for Hulu.
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Went around town, signed all the distribution deals with all the networks.
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Redefine streaming in the early days of what it was, I'm sorry.
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And then eventually from there, went to support like full screen auto portfolio,
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worked on many properties, um, that are still here today in terms of streaming.
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Was recruited by Warner Brothers, went to go help do marketing
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and branding for their entire direct to consumer portfolio.
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Um, and then worked on DC, took them digital as well.
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And then from DC I was pulled in to do one more build in
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entertainment and they were like, it's gonna be a short video build.
4:12
And, uh, yeah, I took over the HBO now business.
4:16
Wow.
4:16
And then eventually launched HBO Max Uhhuh,
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uh, that is now still called HBO Max.
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Um, and so yeah, from there I needed a little bit of
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a pallet cleanser, went to kids and family for a bit.
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Uh, and then from there I just advised companies, advised CEOs invested.
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And, um, I still do that today and a lot of my heart
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is in supporting women entrepreneurs and founders.
4:39
That's awesome.
4:39
Yeah.
4:40
That's a great place to be.
4:42
Yeah.
4:42
I mean, dollar Shave Club, I mean, of course I've heard of them.
4:45
I mean, that's,
4:46
I hope you weren't a part of the group that
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we accidentally neglected in the shipping.
4:50
I,
4:50
um, thank, thankfully, no, I've, I've, um, as much as I'm
4:54
familiar with them, I am very loyal to Gillette, so I know.
4:58
Sorry, I can't be here.
4:59
I know I can't be here.
5:00
I podcast.
5:05
Yeah.
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But no, I mean, what, what they did with the
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Dollar Shave Club is just fascinating to me.
5:10
And, um, you know, there's a lot of growth there.
5:12
And then obviously with, um, you know, with Ty, with your brand and
5:16
everything that you've helped, like, I mean, working with LL Cool
5:18
J and Kevin Hart, I mean, those are fascinating, fascinating roles.
5:22
So what have you learned from your time in building these brands and building
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these things from concepts through, through execution and even through the point
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of closing a deal and selling the business and growing it into something bigger.
5:36
Sure.
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I mean, I think one of the fundamental things that have has
5:39
changed over the arc of my career, so starting on the advertising
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agency side and really thinking about how brands were built.
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Um, you know, sort of like one to many and how.
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Sort of eyeballs are centralized and broadcast and you know, sort of like big
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me, mass media, we've seen this fundamental shift, the rise of the creator
6:01
economy, this decentralization of influence and the rise of community.
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And when we look at the new entrant, who would've thought
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that, um, when it comes to innovation, you know, companies
6:12
like Elf would be looking at Haley Bieber, LVMH should be
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um, you know, sort of harkening back Tona or um, a Pharrell.
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And I think it's.
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Speaks to with the rise of social media, the proliferation of digital,
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um, and really the empowerment of the consumer creator, right?
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Who has a voice themselves.
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Brand building has really been democratized.
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And so I think we've been really fortunate to have a front row seat
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for all of that and really be on the leading edge of so much of it.
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Um, but you've also seen a lot of brand suffer during that time in capturing
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share of wallet and, you know, sort of share of heart and share of mind.
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Uh, by not tapping into that and so much about what I'm building next.
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So what I've been building over the last few years have been creator
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centric brands and, you know, in the next move it's how do we take
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sort of mass brand building, the rise of the creator economy and
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the rise of the new majority that we're just about to talk about
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and this new, these new influential communities that have so much
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more say, um, you know, over what happens at the point of sale.
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Sort of, um, you know, what do the new brand building pyramids look like now?
7:15
I, I completely agree.
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On the community side, I think a lot has shifted on the
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brand and consumer relationship, um, because Ty covered it.
7:22
I'll talk about it maybe from the business side.
7:24
Okay.
7:25
On the business side, I think traditionally, maybe a decade
7:27
plus ago, you would have brands really focus on the brand
7:30
storytelling and the narrative, like how it makes a consumer feel.
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And I think that that worked in a different era, right.
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Now you're really seeing this shift in brand tied to
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revenue, tied to effectiveness, tied to efficiency,
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and it almost swung too far on that side, right?
7:47
Mm-hmm.
7:48
Because you're starting to see a lot of the heart of the story
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and the heart of the brand start to fail, and as that begins to
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fail, you start seeing this rise of the creator economy again.
7:57
So I. Somewhere in the middle is where creators and brands can
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thrive because that is what we as consumers are seeking, right?
8:06
When you see a very polished Super Bowl
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commercial, it doesn't have the same impact.
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As it did maybe like five, six years ago.
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Mm-hmm.
8:13
But what you do see is maybe if you scroll through and you have a TikTok
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video of a creator that you trust, who looks like you, who lives your
8:21
life, knows the story that you, you know, grew up from and they're telling
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you about a product that they used, suddenly you feel more inclined.
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Buy that, right?
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So I think that there's just a shift on the definition of branding
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and the polished nature of it and how people convert based on that.
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And so as long as you pay attention to brand narrative, to your operating model,
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to your business model, to your revenue, and you think about those margins
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throughout, then your consumer relationship also benefits from it as well.
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So we're seeing this democratization of up brands, as you called
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it, and that's a beautiful thing for those who are out there who are
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considering starting a brand or in the middle of building a brand.
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What would be your one to three pieces of
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advice on how you break through the noise?
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Because now with that democratization, we have an influx of brands
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and you know, our attention spans are getting shorter and shorter.
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And so what is a key piece of advice that you would give
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to someone who's looking to start out a brand or who is
9:27
building a brand right now to really break through that noise?
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You know, I, I think a few things.
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Um, you know, one, because everyone has access to a microphone or a megaphone,
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I think there can be a temptation to try to go mass quickly, but I really
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believe that specificity and authenticity is more important than ever, and.
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So it's really find your tribe and find your niche.
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There is, um, you know, I believe the path to sort of
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like universal resonance is through hyper specificity.
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And if you look at the brands that are doing the best and that
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are growing the fastest, they have like landed and expanded.
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They found a core group, a community, um, advocators.
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You know, sort of fanatics almost, um, about not just
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the brand, but the philosophy and the lifestyle and
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the ethos, and you let them carry the water for you.
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So I think that's number one.
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Sort of like, be hyper-specific.
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The other piece is really know your audience.
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I mean, I'm, I'm almost.
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Overwhelmed by how much data that the average consumer has on
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social media now that we as marketers used to clamor for before.
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And so if you're connecting across any platform, really
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look into those insights and look into that real time
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feedback loop and take action based on those insights.
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Um, and then the other piece is, you know, I say this, whether
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we're talking to brand builders or creators today, you have to
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be, you know, one part artist, one part scientist, you know,
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and so I think that marriage of art and science is really.
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Where, um, there has to be this sort of scientific model approach
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like test, learn, iterate really fast and try something new.
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And so that lab like behavior, um, will get you pretty
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far very fast if you're able to, to implement that.
11:05
That's great advice.
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I would say definitely know your audience.
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You know, oftentimes when you wanna build a brand, you think that just because
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you want it and that you see the demand for it, that people feel the same way.
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But knowing your audience also means you have to listen to your audience.
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So being able to iterate on your product, um, iterate on your
11:24
company and your offering pretty quickly is very important.
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Like, speed to market is one thing, but being able to
11:30
prototype at the pace that the market is moving and the
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the way that your audience demands it, I think that is.
11:36
Probably what sets you apart?
11:37
Um, and also like consistency.
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I think the part that is very challenging is a lot of companies and a lot of
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new founders give up when they don't see that hockey stick growth immediately.
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Most people don't realize that like, you know, God, even in
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the entertainment industry, when you have people announce
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like breakout star, that star has been grinding for decades.
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Right?
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But you don't know the projects that that person has been in.
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Yeah.
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The same is true for founders and companies.
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Mm-hmm.
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Consistency is key.
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So like being out there, listening to your audience, iterating the
12:09
product, and then in addition to that, consistently providing value,
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like going on your TikTok live shop or using your e-comm buttons
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and platforms and like optimizing your website, leveraging AI as
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a tool, like constantly improving that experience puts you at.
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The front and center.
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And then I think the other thing is just hire people smarter than you.
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I mean, it's just not talked about enough.
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I think a lot of times founders can have a mentality where,
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because you're starting out, you wanna do everything because you
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know the audience, you know the product, you know the demand,
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but the reality is you get stretched thin very, very fast.
12:45
Mm-hmm.
12:46
And one of the biggest issues I have heard in
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a lot of advisory, you know, um, practices is.
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A founder, when they hit success, that's when things get really hard, right?
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So when you hit success, you wanna be able to 10 x that pretty quickly.
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And if you don't surround yourself with the right type of, um,
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defensive mode and offensive mode of people smarter than you
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in certain areas, you're scrambling in that moment to do that.
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And that's where sometimes the, the path.
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Mm-hmm.
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Breaks where you have founders who become incredibly
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successful because they've sort of optimized for scale
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and founders who still try to do everything themselves.
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Mm-hmm.
13:24
And end up doing everything maybe not quite well enough.
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Right.
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So you just have to, you have to be prepared
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when it's like opportunity meets preparation.
13:33
Right.
13:33
I think that that's like very key.
13:35
I, I would agree.
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I mean, I've seen that with like the clients we produce podcasts for, like
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the ones that are prepared to go viral, like they've been going at it for
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a while and then they finally see that swell of growth as a result of it.
13:48
I mean, it definitely is a matter of the hard work that they've
13:50
put in for the 60 or a hundred plus episodes they've done
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prior to that, that gets them where they are and not the um.
13:58
You know, and not the, the massive, you know,
14:00
go going viral overnight campaign type of thing.
14:04
So yeah, I think you're right there.
14:06
Absolutely.
14:07
Um, well, talking about brands, talking about growth in
14:11
brands, um, what are some of the, um, the challenges as we
14:15
look towards, you know, maybe the next year to five years?
14:18
Like what do you see as the challenges for growing communities in branding?
14:24
Yeah, I think some of those same, um, opportunities also present challenges.
14:27
You were just talking about the, the innovation clip.
14:30
It's accelerated so significantly that, you know, before we could put a campaign
14:36
in the market, you could have an idea about where you wanted your brand to go.
14:40
And, you know, we planned in, you know,
14:43
fiscal years and you know, at least quarters.
14:45
And now there's this sort of like real time
14:48
innovation that really requires, um, a much more.
14:52
Active posture and a much more proactive and, and often reactive posture.
14:57
And so I just think that, um, the, the level of agility
15:00
and sort of, um, entrepreneurial athleticism that's
15:03
required today, um, is, is just, uh, unprecedented.
15:07
Right.
15:08
And I also think when we talk about the democratization and
15:10
the fragmentation of brand building, um, sure that's a plus.
15:14
There's a opportunity for lots more entrants, but the then.
15:18
Getting to scale becomes a lot more challenging because there are only so many
15:22
eyeballs and there's so many times in the day and you know, there's only, you
15:26
know, sort of like so much disposable income and so you're re and we live in
15:30
an attention economy where you're competing with everything and everywhere.
15:34
All the time.
15:36
And so all at once.
15:37
And so I think that, and again, it goes
15:39
kind of back to that athleticism, so sure.
15:42
It's easier to get to a consumer.
15:44
It's easier to get a product to market.
15:46
Mm-hmm.
15:46
Um, you know, you can launch a podcast, you
15:48
can, you know, it's easier to make content now.
15:51
Yeah.
15:51
But to get those things to scale the same tools that
15:55
make it easier, make it easier for everyone else.
15:57
And so differentiating, um, and growing and maintaining and
16:01
sustaining attention do become more challenging in this environment.
16:03
Oh yeah.
16:04
It's definitely more of a slog to get content out, even like you
16:08
think, okay, well we're just gonna post to all the platforms and
16:11
even that takes up time just to get your marketing out there.
16:15
I would say the two things that are the greatest challenges I see is saturation.
16:19
Mm-hmm.
16:19
And globalization.
16:21
And I think saturation is exactly what Ty was mentioning, right?
16:23
If you just look at the domestic market.
16:26
Share of wallet is a very specific size, right?
16:29
The disposable income of a target audience
16:31
that you're going after is quite set, right?
16:33
So you have a ceiling and a saturation point.
16:36
So if you're launching a business in a company and you're not thinking
16:38
global, then you're already missing what your success means on the other side.
16:43
And as somebody who like advises on transactions, right?
16:46
Like if you miss that part of it, you're really
16:49
capping yourself and your ability to grow, right?
16:51
So you're kind of going out the gate with this
16:53
great idea, this great product, this great company.
16:55
With a. Top of the market like ceiling.
16:59
Yeah.
16:59
So what does that mean?
17:00
Right?
17:01
That's not enough.
17:01
So saturation is definitely a point to consider globalization
17:04
is just because with technology, with ai, with everything
17:07
happening, I mean, you definitely see it now, right?
17:11
The geopolitical landscape has a macro effect on how we produce products.
17:18
Um, in addition to that, that's the same for digital products too, right?
17:21
You are in a constant battle of what territory, what.
17:26
Area to launch in what market is the next place to go so
17:30
that you have the opportunity for scale and new audiences,
17:33
but you're also not in conflict with anything that could.
17:36
Hurt your business.
17:37
I mean, not to get into, you know, anything that was like historic but
17:40
tie in, or we're just talking about like COVID era and catching up.
17:44
But COVID era was a perfect like equalizer for that.
17:47
Yeah.
17:47
Because the global supply chain was decimated overnight.
17:50
So many companies who typically had successful
17:53
businesses didn't really have a backup plan, right?
17:56
Mm-hmm.
17:56
Now that you've progressed a couple years after that,
17:58
many people have thought through global supply chain.
18:01
But now you're talking about an accelerated pace of technology.
18:04
So what are we doing and what are founders doing to combat that,
18:08
prepare for that, and also think about scale in light of all of that,
18:12
I think is a really great challenge that isn't often discussed enough.
18:16
We're at Power Forward today, and so a lot of the focus is on that intersection.
18:20
Tech with all these different businesses that we're here talking
18:23
about, if you were going to point to a founder, you were advising
18:28
and say, uh, because a lot of times when, when tech, every time
18:31
tech booms, I think for founders there's a bit of a scramble effect
18:35
where it's, it's so much is happening and where do I pay attention?
18:39
And so what's a, what is a either a. Place that you can point
18:42
to or a piece of advice to kind of break through that noise.
18:45
When you look at the emergence of tech and how it affects
18:48
each of these brands, where would you tell founders to
18:51
kind of focus to make sure that they're staying, um, ahead?
18:56
Or with the curve.
18:57
Mm-hmm.
18:57
And at the same time, not drowning in the noise that
19:00
sometimes happens when these tech explosions happen.
19:03
I, I feel very strongly about this one.
19:06
I mean, I will say like, you have to
19:08
relentlessly focus on the thing you're selling.
19:10
Right, because bear markets make incredible companies, so the polarizing
19:16
view is a lot of people get very scared in these types of markets, right?
19:19
Capital is restrained, cost of capital is
19:21
high, and not every company is gonna succeed.
19:23
These are the best markets to build companies, right?
19:26
If you have an idea and people vote with their money, that idea is gonna win.
19:32
The question is, what is that idea?
19:34
And so the biggest trap most founders fall into during these
19:37
markets is if they start to see success on one side, they think,
19:40
oh, I should go and launch those three other companion products.
19:43
It's like, no, just focus on the one thing, get exceptionally good at it.
19:49
Have that be your core business until it can fund your next thing.
19:53
'cause then you're going into multiples, then you're really
19:55
thinking about the value of the company in the long term.
19:57
But yeah, I, I. I think this is like, this is like the kingmaker era, right?
20:02
If you can carve out like X percentage of any industry in any
20:06
company today, you could technically, you could do anything.
20:10
You could do anything, right?
20:11
Then if you think about historically, some of the best founders and
20:14
best companies that we use today still we're founded in bear markets.
20:17
Yeah, so.
20:19
Anything is possible, but diversification
20:22
probably not the right time to do that.
20:24
It's more about focus, getting really good at it, and then having a strong
20:28
enough foundation that when the opportunity presents itself, then you diversify.
20:33
And the other, you know, I would just add
20:34
to that, that whatever industry you're in.
20:39
AI is going to disrupt and transform it.
20:41
And so you should be actively asking yourself even as you are
20:45
putting together your pitch deck, 'cause you're out to your investors
20:48
and founders as you're reporting to your current board, whatever,
20:51
wherever you are in your cycle, you should be actively not just.
20:53
Planning for that disruption, but preempting and leaning into it.
20:57
Right?
20:57
So thinking about how you can leverage, um, and, and, and that idea prepared.
21:02
'cause before it used to be will we be disrupted and at, at what level?
21:05
And so when the innovation clip accelerates, um, the,
21:10
the staying power of brands essentially decreases.
21:13
So what I mean by that is, you know, you look at how long radio
21:16
or television was like the dominant form of like entertainment.
21:19
So these had.
21:20
Decades long, you know, sort of like periods of, um, dominance.
21:24
And now that innovation clip you're seeing, you know, companies,
21:27
the cycle, the life cycle for companies who, unless they are
21:31
literally steeped in innovation as a business model, right, and
21:34
constantly disrupting themselves, they become obsolete a lot faster.
21:38
And so I would prepare for that disruption
21:41
and prepare to be continually disrupted.
21:43
Disrupt it and then have an orientation of being perpetually disruptive.
21:48
And so I, I would, again, it's more of this sort of
21:51
like, stay on your feet model now it's no longer sit
21:55
back in the chair and let's see what's gonna happen.
21:57
Let's, at the top of the boardroom, those days are gone.
22:02
What you mean?
22:06
That is, that is crazy.
22:07
So some something that's something that I'm thinking
22:10
of as we're talking about community and stuff.
22:12
Do you all ever find the community to be wrong?
22:15
Hmm.
22:17
That's a hard question.
22:18
I know, but like, have you ever found yourself in a situation where like.
22:22
The community doesn't know what they're talking about here.
22:24
They're telling us something, and I'm not saying like from an arrogant
22:27
standpoint that you eventually come around on, but like how do you
22:30
defend your brand or your vision when you're trying to be hyper-specific
22:34
and you have to fight the community, so to speak, within that.
22:40
You know, I wouldn't say that the community is wrong,
22:42
but I would say that you can misread a signal, right?
22:46
And I, and I would say you don't take a signal as, um,
22:51
a mandate, you know, so you may have a community that.
22:55
You know, giving you a specific reaction or feedback
22:58
loop to a product experience or you know, to an
23:01
experience itself or you know, to a leader in a company.
23:05
It doesn't necessarily mean that you have to throw the baby out
23:08
with the bath water, but I think you take that into account, you
23:10
know, if you're sitting around and the same way you would, if you're
23:13
sitting around, you think about your community as stakeholders, and
23:15
if you're sitting, if you're having an all hands and you're talking
23:17
to your team, or if you're sitting around a boardroom and you have.
23:19
Someone who dissents, you're gonna say like,
23:21
okay, that's a valuable piece of feedback.
23:22
I should take it.
23:23
But it's not necessarily representative of the whole.
23:25
Or you could have a lot of folks giving you information, but they may not
23:29
have the context, for instance, of like what your p and l looks like, so
23:32
that they don't understand why you're making that particular decision.
23:35
So I think we have to take these signals
23:37
and this feedback is valuable and valid.
23:39
You know, like, you know, my mom would
23:40
always say, if it's real to you, it's real.
23:42
So it's like you're having that.
23:43
Experience, you know, with, with, with my brand, with my business,
23:48
you know, whether you're an employee, whether you're a board member,
23:51
stakeholder, investor, if you're a follower on social media, it's real.
23:55
But it doesn't necessarily mean that that's the thing that I have to action.
23:59
Yeah.
23:59
In isolation, that exact piece of feedback.
24:02
And I think that a lot of brands then find themselves
24:05
in Hyperreactive states because it's a very scary
24:09
place to be publicly exposed and having a conversation.
24:12
But we also see the attention span of audiences, and we know that
24:16
in many of these cases, there'll be a piece of feedback and it'll
24:19
be very rich in charge, and then it's sort of like onto the next.
24:23
And I think the, the idea is how do you create a flexible
24:25
feedback loop so that you can take that in, action
24:29
it, and constantly improve and be transparent, right?
24:32
Like, I think if, if your brand knows that you're listening and that you're
24:35
taking that feedback, if, if your audience knows that you're listening,
24:38
you're taking that feedback into account, they're more likely to give grace,
24:42
right?
24:43
I'd also say it depends on your conviction
24:45
and what your long-term plan is, right?
24:47
Um, I tend to ingest all feedback as data.
24:50
Uh, and if the data gets to a point of critical mass,
24:55
then you almost as a person developing a product, whatever
24:57
your offering may be, you almost have to reevaluate.
25:01
Does this make sense?
25:01
But I agree with Ty.
25:02
I mean, like, you can't be in a place where
25:05
you're constantly iterating based on every.
25:08
Tweet comments, social media, video, you see, because if you
25:11
do, you inevitably dilute the quality of your offering and I
25:16
think you start to lose picture of your longer term roadmap.
25:19
Right.
25:19
And you
25:19
lose some sleep.
25:20
Yeah.
25:21
And, and strong brands solicit strong reactions, negative and positive, right?
25:25
So I think if you are going to prepare to have a brand that's very well loved.
25:30
That same brand maybe also, um, you know, polarizing Exactly in some audiences.
25:36
So I think if you are a brand that is, um, you know, eliciting emotion from
25:40
your audience, you should expect there to be reactions, you know, on both sides.
25:45
Again, take the feedback in, you action it, but I, I don't think it's,
25:49
tell me a brand today who isn't getting signals that says there's something
25:53
serious that you need to change, or, I'm having a reaction to that.
25:56
And so the idea is, are you resonating with your core?
25:58
You know, are you unnecessarily polarizing?
26:01
And, and I don't think that's just, you ask about feedback in general.
26:04
I don't think that's just for social media.
26:05
I think it's in your boardroom.
26:07
I think it's, you know, the folks who are on your cap table,
26:10
all of those folks, you have to, you know, digest that feedback
26:12
well.
26:13
And one other thing I'll add to that too, is.
26:15
Any feedback if that strong is positive, right?
26:19
That means there is enough of your core audience
26:21
paying attention to what your brand is doing.
26:23
Yeah.
26:24
And so that in itself is a very positive thing, right?
26:27
You can, there are a ton of tactics you can deploy, right?
26:30
You can find focus groups, you can evaluate your product, you can
26:33
do a bunch of different things to evaluate what that signal is.
26:36
But generally speaking.
26:38
If you get a visceral reaction, positive or
26:40
negative, that means it's hitting something right?
26:44
So I would still take it as a positive sign.
26:46
What you do as a founder though, sort of sets the tone for how you
26:50
run a company and how you manage your investors and your board.
26:53
And so knowing how you pivot in those moments and
26:57
if you pivot at all is also a very important thing.
27:01
Understanding those core values and, and what matters
27:03
to you as a founder, I think is important there.
27:06
And yeah, I mean that's what I was really curious about.
27:09
'cause it is very challenging, especially for smaller businesses
27:12
and startups, when everybody has an opinion on what you should
27:16
do with this technology, this idea, this concept, whatever it is.
27:20
And it just puts you in this position to go,
27:22
well, I should just be everything to everybody.
27:24
I mean, we'll just be, we all know how
27:25
that goes.
27:27
That'll, that'll fix everything.
27:28
Um, but yeah, that's, that I think is the inverse of the challenge with
27:32
all the great community feedback you can get that can help you improve.
27:35
So yeah.
27:36
Thank you for that.
27:36
That's awesome.
27:38
Um, well this has been a great conversation.
27:40
I've really, really enjoyed it.
27:41
Um, Ty and Katie, thank you both for coming on.
27:44
Thank you.
27:45
Um, thank you.
27:45
Before we wrap.
27:46
I'd like to ask this one last question, um,
27:49
which is, which brand do you admire the most?
27:52
And, and when I say that, it's like in, in terms of like influencing
27:55
even you as a leader, I can't wait to hear you in your decisions.
27:58
So
28:00
this is so hard.
28:00
That's like picking a
28:01
baby.
28:02
Yeah, I know.
28:03
It doesn't have
28:04
to be your favorite, that's be one of yours.
28:05
It's just
28:06
like a brand you admire.
28:07
Yeah.
28:07
Uh,
28:08
something that's been influential in your decision making or,
28:12
and I are like, Hmm,
28:14
I know that's really like, how do you change?
28:18
They're in it, Chris.
28:19
They're in it.
28:19
I know.
28:22
You know, I, I, this, I won't say which brand I admire the most,
28:24
but because it's just top of mind, we were just talking about it.
28:27
What I find the, the elf acquisition of Road Yeah.
28:30
Really compelling was at this moment in time, Uhhuh because um, you
28:34
know, I think it was a company who's getting it right already, who went
28:39
out and said like, how do we disrupt ourselves and how do we look from.
28:43
At non-traditional innovation sources and how do we not just bet
28:46
on this person, but how do we bet on this audience that is another
28:49
audience that is akin to ours and we have to proactively outreach.
28:52
So they didn't do it on the back foot?
28:55
They do.
28:55
They did it after, I think they had had experienced something crazy.
28:58
I don't remember how many consecutive quarters
29:00
of growth they've experienced and co their CMO.
29:03
Brilliant.
29:03
But the idea that they would, you know, go out
29:06
and proactively say, this means something for us.
29:09
And I think, you know, and it's a testament to road how fast that
29:12
brand has grown by being hyper-specific, creating a lifestyle.
29:16
And you know, while it's a celebrity helm brand, I
29:19
think there's so many takeaways that like big Behe.
29:22
You know, brand holding companies and you know, sort of like baby
29:26
brands that are just starting can learn from both of those examples.
29:28
So it's not the one, I, I won't say who I admire the
29:30
most, but I found that partnership very admirable.
29:34
Okay.
29:35
I am, I'm gonna go even a different direction and I will
29:37
say not a brand that is a traditional consumer brand.
29:41
I will pick an IP brand because we all also came from the entertainment world.
29:46
I am absolutely obsessed with K-Pop demon hunters.
29:49
Yeah.
29:50
Oh
29:51
my gosh.
29:51
And number one, it's incredible.
29:54
Like my son can't stop singing the songs.
29:56
It is the only thing that plays in the car.
29:58
And the thing that's appealing about it is not only is the IP incredibly.
30:03
Attractive and appealing to a multi-generational household.
30:06
Uhhuh.
30:07
It also has so many legs for sequels, prequels, product, consumer products.
30:11
Um, you're talking about a very rich universe that has suddenly been created,
30:16
exploded overnight, global, tapped into K-pop, tapped into music, tapped into
30:21
pop culture, and has defined this next chapter for a young adult audience.
30:26
Think of how many children watch that.
30:27
Mm-hmm.
30:28
And that has become a core memory.
30:29
And for the rest of.
30:31
All of us parents, we will be buying those toys and products.
30:36
Right.
30:36
So to me, I feel like if you can generate a brand or an ip Yeah.
30:40
That has that longstanding effect, that hits that many notes
30:44
and that many genres, I mean, that's incredible, right?
30:47
Like if you think about it, think about that pitch.
30:49
It's about.
30:51
Like demon hunters who are K-pop bands saving the world.
30:53
Right.
30:54
I know
30:55
if I, if Ty and I were to go and pitch that today, we would, we'd be great.
30:59
But like still, but still needs to be like that.
31:03
Yes.
31:04
But the fact that it landed and it worked to me,
31:07
I feel like that's what brands are supposed to do.
31:09
They're supposed to affect you, not just emotionally.
31:12
There's a lasting impact and you vote with it and you pay for it.
31:16
Like.
31:17
I know I'm gonna buy a lot of that now.
31:19
I mean, I already have those songs living
31:20
in my head wrench absolutely free right now.
31:22
Right?
31:22
Absolutely.
31:22
So that to me is an incredible universe that just
31:25
got created hyper relevant and all of us are in it.
31:29
Like that moment I said that, all of us knew exactly what that was.
31:33
Uhhuh.
31:33
Yeah.
31:33
That is a powerful brand in ip.
31:35
I,
31:36
I just, um, showed my wife the trailer the other night.
31:39
'cause it was our first night in a long time
31:40
to just sit down and watch something together.
31:42
And I was like.
31:43
I know probably not tonight when you have a billion other things to
31:46
finish, but check out this trailer and the minute we got through it, the.
31:49
She was just like, that's amazing.
31:51
Like, yeah,
31:51
they did job.
31:52
My wife and I were like, okay, when are
31:53
we gonna watch this movie?
31:54
Yeah.
31:54
So,
31:55
yeah, it's, it's a, it's a really cool brand and it has
31:58
been crazy to see the zeitgeist and how fast it's gotten.
32:01
One of my favorite musicians, I shouldn't say favorite, I really enjoy his
32:05
music, so I don't wanna like downplay now that I've said it, but baby, no money.
32:09
His big thing on TikTok has been cost playing.
32:12
And so he started to coplay, he did a gender bend coplay for, for.
32:16
The demon hunter stuff and yeah, it's crazy.
32:19
Okay.
32:19
And tap
32:19
and tapping into all those, all those
32:20
verticals and getting them when they're young.
32:22
Exactly.
32:23
So brilliant.
32:24
You've old school Disney moves.
32:26
Exactly.
32:26
And that's exactly it, right?
32:28
The playbook could, could have been done before.
32:30
Mm-hmm.
32:30
But how they executed it was flawless.
32:33
Like if you look at the number of wigs that are being
32:35
created uhhuh, these different revenue streams and businesses
32:38
popping off of it that aren't even wholly owned by Netflix.
32:41
Right.
32:41
Like.
32:42
I'm blown away.
32:43
That's the kind of thing that all of us wanna do.
32:45
If we can build a brand like that, that'd be powerful.
32:48
We should work on that.
32:50
We should look.
32:51
There's an elf crossover there too, somewhere.
32:53
Kpop
32:53
K-Pop, vampire Slayers.
32:54
Coming next.
32:55
Guys, thank you so much for being with us today.
32:58
So much for having us, so much for coming
32:59
on.
32:59
Incredible.
33:00
Thank you.
33:00
All right.