Latest / Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast) / The Aussie mattress startup story; buying a $50,000 domain & the power of your network with Eva Co-Founder, Amanda Niu

Transcript

The Aussie mattress startup story; buying a $50,000 domain & the power of your network with Eva Co-Founder, Amanda Niu · Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast)

• 0:00
  This is Amanda New for Female Startup Club. Hey everyone, it's Dune here, your host and hype girl. Joining me today is Amanda New, co-founder of Eva. We're chatting about her startup story with mattresses, the power of performance marketing, and why your network is so, so important.
• 0:29
  Eva is accelerating towards becoming Australia's leading digital furniture company. What started with an award-winning mattress in a box has grown into a range of high-quality homewares and furniture thoughtfully designed in Melbourne.
• 0:43
  Eva offers same-day metro delivery and a 120-night trial to test out your sweet dreams. And while we're here, our private membership slash network is launching very, very soon. Like you'll hear Amanda talk about in the episode, building your network and surrounding yourself with people who are going through a similar journey to you is so important when building a brand and being on the entrepreneurial path.
• 1:06
  You can pop your name on our waiting list at femalestartupclub.com forward slash waitlist to keep in the loop about becoming a founding member when the doors open. The network will bring you modern mentorship from women on the show like Amanda, a network of other women building CPG brands, and access to our resident experts who can help with everything from Facebook ads to coaching and copywriting. But let's get stuck into this episode. This is Amanda for Female Startup Club.
• 1:35
  Hi, Amanda. Welcome to the Female Startup Club podcast. Hi, Dune. I am so excited to be here. I'm so excited to have you here all the way in Australia from obviously where I'm from too. Love that for you. Can you start by telling us a little bit about yourself and what your business actually is?
• 1:59
  Yes. So a little bit about myself. I've had a little bit of an unconventional background. So I studied neuropsychology. And so I was a clinical neuropsychologist for a few years before going full time to the business. So I guess how it all started was I had just come back from Sydney after finishing my master's degree, came back to Melbourne. I was waiting for my registration to be approved. And it took about six months. So during those six months, I was sort of
• 2:27
  volunteering and I was doing a whole bunch of things and Eva was one of those little projects so I was working with my partner to get off the ground and so how it all started was we were looking into you know just randomly like what's the furniture industry like at the moment like if you think about the mattress industry you go into a store and you're like I'm gonna
• 2:48
  check out some mattresses and I'll lie down on some, you know, for 10 minutes at a time while the salesman walks around, you know, looking at you and you're sort of like, I need to find some sort of comfort here with this person walking around. And then after that 10 minutes sort of test ride on that mattress, you then commit to that for the next eight, 10 years of your life. And just thinking about that in general, it's like that, that really screams sort of customer centricity to me.
• 3:17
  And I did so with my partner as well. And we're thinking, hey, how can we make this better? How can we make the furniture industry, the mattress industry better than what it is right now? And that was sort of how Eva came around because they're like, amazing. There's, you know, obviously there are other companies out in the States, like Casper, for instance, was already doing this at the time.
• 3:35
  We're thinking, oh my gosh, Australia needs this as well. Let's do this with EVA. And that's sort of customer centricity came all the way through to how the business is today with all of our unique selling points like free next day metro delivery and free returns, our 120 night trial. So you can try it in the comfort of your own home.
• 3:54
  We even built an app where you can select your delivery day up three months in advance, Monday through to Saturday. And that's like amazing. So those are the sort of decisions that we've made because there's always the customer at the forefront. Yeah, I love that. I also imagine when, well, in my opinion, when you're shopping for something like a bed,
• 4:16
  It's overwhelming, right? Like there's a million options. And then it's kind of like buying a perfume. You smell like 50 and then you're like, but what one did I actually like? There's too many. I can't choose. Now I don't know what I like. It needs to be simplified. Absolutely. And it's kind of like, think about the car sales industry as well. You're not quite sure what exactly you buy. You're not the most, you won't know what a five zone pocket spring mattress is compared to a five.
• 4:43
  other types of mattress, it's like, it seems like it's an industry that isn't very much, I guess, with the customer in mind. Like, will they understand what I put out? If I made up a word like cloudware, like, what does that actually mean? And so it's just putting the customer first and saying, it's literally this, this and this. And hey, we're also, you know, put all these bunch of awards back us up. We've got a 12 year warranty and it's all free delivery and free returns at the same time. So in a way, it's sort of customer at the start.
• 5:12
  Yeah, totally. It just makes it almost like there's just no barrier. There's no risk. Whereas buying a mattress in a store, traditionally, there's a lot of risk. You can't just take it back.
• 5:24
  So are we talking 2017? Is that what year we're in at this time? Four years ago now. Four years ago. Had you always wanted to be an entrepreneur? Because obviously you're on this path of being a neuropsychologist, you'd finished your studies, but then you've taken a bit of a brand.
• 5:45
  Honestly, no. I think I've done the traditional sort of six years of tertiary education. And then on top of that, I did a 3,000 hour registrar program to be registered and endorsed as a NeuroPsych. And so for me, I was always like, this is my pathway. But I think what I discovered was that I am always keen on learning more.
• 6:09
  And so maybe it's just that insatiable desire to be like, what's the next fun thing that I can learn? And for me, as I sort of got into my Neurosac degree, I was like, this is great. The business is so much more interesting because of the fact that, for example, marketing, everything that we're buying today, everything that we have in our house, everything that we only wear is because of really smart people in marketing that has helped you
• 6:36
  Make those decisions to get to where you are now. Your branding, your interests, like it's this huge world out there. And just thinking about that is insane. What are some examples like from Eva that you've been able to put those kind of really clever marketing things into your website? What's something that's a clear neuropsychology lesson or learning that you had that you're able to bring into the business? Yeah.
• 7:03
  Ooh, so neuropsychology, I think that there's a lot to do with statistical methods, for instance, statistical research, applying that sort of regimen around statistical significance to our A-B testing, for instance, on Facebook, and valuing that allows us to make data-driven decisions about whether or not this was a successful campaign. Is it because of A, B, C, D? And then taking that and moving on with that.
• 7:31
  So you're sort of doubling down on what you know works. The other side of that to neuropsychology is the people as well. So I think definitely having that psych background helps in terms of understanding the motivations of the people that you work with and hopefully try and find some sort of alignment between what they want to do in their career personally, professionally, and how that can align with where the company is going and that direction where we're going. It's like, where can we find this alignment? And let's hack our way there together.
• 8:02
  Totally. That's so interesting. And I hadn't thought of it from that perspective of team and culture. That's really cool. I always love to ask about the early money that's needed to get the brand off the ground and to get started. So how much money did you need and how were you financing the brand in the beginning? Great question. At the start, we've been bootstrapped
• 8:32
  around 100 to 150 K that we popped in purely because actually this was actually meant to be a house deposit. And we decided to invest it into a business instead and then our house wait for later on. Big decision.
• 8:48
  Yeah, yeah. Very risky decision as well. But I think we both really saw an opportunity here to double down on this. And because we were really, really invested, not just financially, but also really thought that this was something that could take off. That true conviction of building this brand.
• 9:07
  Yeah, I think having that understanding of your why, like why are you doing this and why is it important to you and what does it bring to you? It helps when you're making a really big decision like this as well. And hopefully having somebody else with you who shares that same sentiment can be really reassuring as well.
• 9:28
  Got it, got it. Because you're building this brand with your partner. You've got someone who you're able to share those highs with. You've got someone to share the lows with while you're going through it together. When we're thinking about 2017 and you guys have this idea, what were actually the first steps to getting started? Like how do you actually start selling mattresses? Where do you get these from? Like how does it work? How do you know what kind of mattresses to buy? Where do they come from? What are mattresses?
• 9:57
  Exactly. Well, fortunately enough, my partner, he actually had a couple of businesses beforehand. So he was actually doing lower end products that he would work directly with a manufacturer overseas, create that product based on what he's researched on the market and then bring that to Australia and then sell it on eBay or in the marketplace. Yeah.
• 10:19
  So we already had that connection there in the sense that we've done it before. We know kind of a little bit on Alibaba, for instance, start searching through there and then sort of making those meetings. And, you know, hopefully next time we can go to China, actually meeting those people in person as well to see if they're right fit for what you want to do and what you want to achieve as well.
• 10:40
  I think we were quite fortunate because we actually met a really good manufacturer early on. And there's been numerous times that manufacturers have probably not been the best fit. And then you're spending so much time and energy and money to try and get that product that you wanted.
• 10:56
  you want only to find later on maybe it wasn't a good fit so we were quite fortunate with our mattress manufacturer that they took a chance on us because we were just starting out and they typically make mattresses for quite larger mattress companies in australia so they they took a chance on us and yeah it's turned out to be a really good partnership with
• 11:18
  Yeah, wow. When you're talking about mattresses, obviously they're heavy. So the shipping costs and the freight of bringing mattresses into the country, but then also getting them to customers. I imagine that's a big hurdle. Is that the most difficult part of selling this kind of product?
• 11:37
  I think that's okay. Fortunately enough, my partner is more into the operational supply chain, logistic side of things, whereas we complement each other where I'm more in the marketing psychology aspect of things.
• 11:52
  So if I were to speak purely from maybe the area that I'm more involved in day to day, I guess the challenge for us is understanding that a mattress, yes, it is heavy. And it's meant to be for the mass market. But sometimes the mass market is not a target market, really. It's trying to find that target market. And it's all about testing. And it's all about trying to find the customers that really resonate with your brand and with your product.
• 12:19
  but it might not be the customers that you expect. And so it's about taking the time to comb through all of that and being able to say, okay, let's pivot. Let's go what we thought here was completely wrong. We're going to now shift our focus over here because that's what the data says, and that's what's selling our product. And so who did you think your customer was going to be and who was it actually?
• 12:44
  Yeah, we thought it would have been people younger than our demographic now. So at the moment, it's probably somewhere between mid-20s to...
• 12:53
  You know, we thought 45, for instance. But actually, we've noticed that there has been an uptick in the older demographic as well, who has been interested in our products. And perhaps it's due to COVID, maybe, that they couldn't have gone to mattress stores and they had to shift to online. And suddenly there's been like an influx of people from this new demographic. Yeah.
• 13:15
  We thought that maybe people in the younger demographic, the early adopters, would jump onto this product as well. But actually, our product is really expensive and no 18-year-old has $900 in their bank account to spend on a mattress. They've got a whole bunch of other things they want to spend it on. So just thinking and working through that, like in hindsight, duh. But at that point in time, we're sort of like finding that along the way.
• 13:40
  Yeah, gosh, that's so true, isn't it? You build these assumptions or you create these assumptions and then you're kind of deep in the pathway and you're like, oh yeah, this isn't the case and it makes total sense. Yeah. Yeah. I'd love to switch to talk about your area of specialty, which is marketing. How did you go with the launch?
• 14:02
  Yeah, so launching marketing. So at that time, because I had just finished my neuropsych degree and I was sort of volunteering and then, you know, doing a whole bunch of things. So I spent a lot of my time just studying marketing
• 14:15
  what is digital marketing? It was a brand new kind of university subject for me as well. And so we met up with a lot of agencies, web agencies, digital agencies, and sort of tried to find a good fit for us because we knew that we can't do everything. We need help.
• 14:34
  And at that point in time, our focus was on let's build a business. Let's try and find product market fit as opposed to just putting all our ads out there without really thinking about, you know, what kind of customers will find our product valuable. So we were very much focused on like, OK, we want to make sure that this business is going to be viable in the first place. Let's launch with that in mind, as opposed to jumping straight onto billboards or, you know, huge ads that target everyone and anyone. It was very, very neat.
• 15:05
  Yeah, I think that's, I hope that answers the question. And what was the impact of that? Like, did that work immediately or did it take a lot of time to kind of test and build up that audience base?
• 15:16
  Yeah. So we actually got our first customer in, I think, within the first week. So what that said to us was, A, our website's doing okay. People are actually trusting our website to put their money. And it's not a small amount of money. It's like hundreds of dollars on a product. And secondly, that our agency, the digital agency at the time was working. Okay.
• 15:38
  And granted, back in 2017, the digital media world was vastly different to how it is now. It's like now it's a lot more competitive. There's lots of big brands on Facebook and digital marketing channels than they were years ago, right? So I wouldn't say that, you know, just go on Performance Media. You'll be fine because it was a different climate back then. But that was sort of how we, yeah, how sort of the first couple of customers came through.
• 16:07
  With your initial capital that you used to start the brand, what was the split between investing in that digital marketing agency and actually buying the product or developing and buying the product rather?
• 16:20
  Yeah, we didn't have, I can't quite remember what the actual split was, but it was more so in the actual product because we had to get that product in stock in Australia. And so that meant a lot of outlay just to get the minimum order quantity in Australia and then also having to pay for the 3PL services, the delivery, the logistics. So a lot of that was there.
• 16:45
  We spent not so much in marketing, but it was enough that we said to the agency, can you just make it so that people who are in the world of mattresses that are searching for mattresses, that's when they know about us?
• 17:01
  But if they're not in mattress world, then they won't know about us. And that way, the audiences that would come in are already warmer. We don't need to convince them that they need a mattress right now. It's people who are already in that market. So that was sort of how we did that at the start.
• 17:19
  Totally. And so that was 2017-ish. From then until now, what have been the key moments of change or, you know, step change or leaps forward in building the business?
• 17:32
  Brand, branding. So I was saying before that when we first started, we were looking at making sure that this was a viable business. And so a lot of our efforts at the time were like, okay, we just got to make the mattress sales go. We're going to do what we can. We weren't very focused on how the brand looked or what the brand represented. It was just the brand.
• 17:55
  And so from then till now, we've actually gone through about two or three different rebrands. So of our logo, of our colors, primary, secondary colors have all changed. So what it is now is I think it's our third rebrand. And hopefully the last one, because it is a very expensive and painful exercise to change all of our collateral to this new type of branding. But yeah.
• 18:20
  Yeah, I think branding, I hope, is something that we could have done a lot earlier during this sort of business process. Because right now, I remember last year, we went to this new look where we are now. And we kind of had like an existential crisis. So we're like, who are we outside of our mattress? Because a lot of the time, even mattresses.
• 18:43
  was the product whereas what is Eva without mattress and so that's why we changed our our domain name instead of evamattress.com.au now it's just eva.com.au and now we have to think about what is Eva without the mattress why do we exist why are we here what are we doing so totally yeah it's a pretty cool url to have
• 19:07
  Was it expensive? Oh yeah. Can you share what it was? I think it was probably 50, I think 50 K roundabout.
• 19:19
  I actually kind of feel like that's kind of good for a one word. I don't know. I feel like $50,000 in Australian dollars. I'm like, I mean, yes, it is a lot of money. Let's be clear. That's a lot of money, of course. But I'm kind of surprised. Like it's a one word URL. That's crazy. Yeah, it was. We actually took about, I think, three years to try and get this URL. So even at the start, even at mattress.com.au, we were always thinking, oh,
• 19:48
  if we wanted to expand, if we wanted to diversify from mattress, can we ever get either?com.au? And so we've always been looking. And then we got, I think we started the process a couple of years ago. It was much too high then. And I think we were lucky in that during COVID, the guy who sold it to us was like, you know what, just take it for this price. We're like, okay, okay, cool. Thanks. Thanks.
• 20:11
  Oh my gosh. So you were already in touch with him a couple of years ago and just kept persisting and kept kind of, you know, checking in.
• 20:19
  Yeah, definitely. Everything is negotiable is what I'm taking away from that. We had, we actually had a number of different URLs in mind. So it could have been Eva Home. It could have been Welcome to Eva. It could have been anything. But ultimately, like Eva.com.au was what we wanted. And I think fortunately for us, yeah, we found alignment with the guy who wanted to sell. So thank goodness. But also, I mean, we couldn't have afforded $50,000.
• 20:47
  in year one either. So it was sort of stars aligning. Everything was just right place, right time as well. So very lucky that that happened. And I think that's something really important to touch on is like everything doesn't have to be perfect or the dream that you have in mind from day one. You don't have to have the best branding, the absolute key URL that you're wanting. You start with what you can afford, you iterate, you evolve, and then you just take those
• 21:17
  And also, it's probably a smarter way to approach business because imagine if you spent that, you know, more than 50K to get that URL from the beginning and maybe the brand didn't work and it wasn't the right fit for you guys or something like that. I think it's a really key thing that we all need to keep in mind is where you start isn't where you need to finish. And it's a journey and you can work towards those goals rather than being crippled by that perfection before launch.
• 21:43
  Absolutely. Yeah. I think business as a whole is an iterative process. You don't know until you try. And yeah, if you don't try, then you're sort of stuck. So in the last six to 12 months, obviously there's been a pandemic, there's been lots going on. What's been working for you recently when it comes to driving that growth and revenue? We still rely quite heavily on digital marketing.
• 22:13
  I think the way we view marketing, digital marketing, marketing as a whole, is a holistic approach to marketing. So where you have channels like search or social, email, organic affiliates, all those kind of things, I think the way we approach marketing is,
• 22:30
  is that they all contribute to the sale. I know there's this attribution models like last click or first click or whatever, but actually you can't deny that. For instance, I would search on Google a product and I would compare it like a million websites. Maybe that's just me. But then I would also go on to cashback sites and I would talk to people about it. And only when I get served an ad on Facebook,
• 23:00
  stuff in the background, but then saying that Facebook was the only one that attributed that sale is kind of false. So I think marketing should be viewed as a whole and where every person who is on that channel in the team is working together to make that sale.
• 23:20
  Absolutely. Are you trying, are you testing out any new platforms? And I guess TikTok's not new anymore, but platforms like TikTok or, I don't know, Clubhouse, like kind of trying to find new avenues to market to new people? Yes, always. I think like we all know the iOS changes have made it a little bit tricky for attribution for anybody who's wanting to jump on and, you know,
• 23:49
  I think it's always good to try and diversify your marketing channels because at the end of the day, if Facebook didn't exist, then you need to be able to try and market yourself outside of that channel. So it's always good to diversify. Like TikTok, for instance, is definitely something that we're looking into probably before the end of the year or something. We'll look into it.
• 24:10
  Yeah, as many different channels as possible. And it comes down to testing. It comes down to setting aside a good enough budget and a good enough time to see whether or not this channel will work for your business. And it does come down to your business as well because sometimes people don't want to buy a mattress from a random...
• 24:30
  you know, social platform because there's no alignment there for them. They don't see any trust in that as well. So it is very much about testing. Cool. Where is the business today in terms of team, in terms of what exciting things are in the works, what's in the pipeline? What can you shout about? So the team is we're about, I think, about 20 people now.
• 24:54
  We were actually half the size last year. So in 12 months time, we have doubled. And it has been a very interesting journey. We've had to set up a lot of processes because new people, new processes, trying to find that alignment again.
• 25:11
  and also restructuring the organisation. So organisational design has been something that I've been looking into the last couple of months to see how can we structure the organisation in a way that will promote the best outcome, empower people to try and do their best work in a way that they also believe in the direction of the company. So that's been the whole university subject. We have...
• 25:39
  Quite a number of products coming out this year and next year. So we actually, this year we released our first sofa. So that sofa is, the fabric is made from 100% recycled plastic, which is amazing. Oh, wow. Cool. 200 plastic bottles are saved from waste and put into the fabric. So very excited about that. No way. That's awesome.
• 26:05
  And then we also just recently, I think it was only a few weeks ago, we released our coffee tables and our side tables. So we're sort of diversifying with mattress into more of a home furniture brand. And we've got quite a number of products currently in the works. And I can't say too much about it. But the idea is we want to fill the rest of the home. And I imagine...
• 26:29
  new product development and new releases is, you know, a super critical part of your strategy to increase your lifetime value for customers who, you know, yes, you can pay to acquire someone to buy one mattress, but if they're going to have that mattress for 10 years, you're not able to, you know, re-engage with them necessarily unless they're buying, you know, a mattress for a second bedroom or something like that. But introducing those new products where they already know and trust you, you don't have to pay to acquire that customer again.
• 26:58
  Yeah, that's exactly it. We were thinking about the sustainability of our business. Yes, we could double down on referrals. We could double down on trying to create that word of mouth, but ultimately it's not going to be sustainable for the long term, especially if you want to be around for the next 20 or 30 years. It is about LTV, like you said, and sort of trying to create products that can
• 27:25
  appealed to customers during that eight to 10 year window between purchasing another mattress. So that's sort of the reason why we've gone down this pathway as well. Yeah, cool. That's amazing. When you were talking about your team, I have started asking who was the first hire into the company? Our first hire was a marketing guy. So that person, oh my gosh, marketers in startups need to be
• 27:54
  hands on deck for everything. They are not just a digital marketer. They're also a copywriter. They're an SEO wizard. They're also a part-time digital designer slash videographer slash other creative. It's insane. And I think it does come down to trying to find that right person for you.
• 28:12
  who isn't afraid to try new things and learn outside of their normal nine to five. They're genuinely interested in giving things a go, learning from Google and yeah, basically rely on Google as your best friend. So yeah, the school of YouTube. That's exactly it. Yeah. So was he like one of these unicorn people you speak of or was he more like a growth marketer working alongside the agency? Yeah.
• 28:39
  So when we first started, we had an agency and then we decided to stop because we wanted to have that in-house. So it is different for each business, whether or not you want to keep marketing as a separate company or if you want to have that bought in-house. And we made the decision that in order for us to execute faster, we want to have things in-house. We want to make a decision about sending out an email at 2 p.m. that day.
• 29:05
  we will just do it. So it was largely around execution and speed to execution. Yeah, and being able to also react to what's happening in the market, what's happening in the news, what's happening in your industry, and also being proactive for when those kind of random opportunities arise versus only being able to respond, you know, maybe the next day or a few days later or potentially weeks later. Totally get that. That's really interesting and definitely a good point to make.
• 29:33
  What advice do you have for women who are on the entrepreneurial path, but, you know, earlier on in the journey? What's the thing that they need to know? I think this is something that I read from somewhere or heard from somewhere. The quote is, your network is your net worth and vice versa. Your net worth is your net worth.
• 29:56
  And so I think ultimately businesses are all about people. And so, and also, you know, humans are naturally sexual animals as well. And the biggest businesses in the world, they're run by hundreds of people and not just one person. And so if you can start building your network
• 30:13
  a lot earlier in the process, asking questions, reaching out to people who you admire or are just really, really smart. Just do it. Because ultimately, that's the quickest way to getting a business off the ground, learning from someone who's done it before. I say that even though I am the biggest introvert ever, and it can be very daunting, even for myself, to be like, hey, can we chat for a coffee? Like, I find that daunting, but I feel like
• 30:42
  Ultimately, the reward is that you will be able to better yourself and hopefully pass it on to the company and better the company as well. So kind of weighing the pros and cons of that and just doing it. I love that you say that and I love that you talk about network. It's something we hear often on the show from the women who are coming on. And something that Female Startup Club has been working on is we're launching our very own private network or digital membership for women in e-commerce who are...
• 31:11
  building D2C style brands and having what we're calling a modern mentorship program within that. So I'll have to follow up with you after and I'd love to have you there part of the program, sharing more of your wisdom to women who are, you know, looking for that mentorship. I do my best. At the end of every episode, I ask a series of six quick questions to wrap up. So question number one is what's your why? Why are you doing what you're doing?
• 31:42
  My why is I am a stickler for doing things better and faster and smarter. And so applying this to the furniture industry, I just see it. It just bugs me. So this is sort of my why. I want to make it simpler. I want to make it a much more customer-centric kind of approach to buying things that
• 32:05
  everyone has in their home. I love that. Question number two is, what do you think has been the number one marketing moment that made the business pop? Ooh, that's a great question. I can think of maybe two moments ago
• 32:23
  We actually, I think within four or five months of launching, we actually won an award for our mattress. And it was one of those review sites that sort of helped put us on the map. It kind of gave us that additional authority or social proof that we needed because at the time there was nowhere else people were talking about even mattress. And then suddenly a review site started talking about us. And that was amazing because now it's like, here's somebody else who also believes in us. And then...
• 32:51
  Um, yeah, that really helps in terms of our traffic because now we've got backlinks. Now we've got people who, um, could come in through there. And so that, that helps. That's so interesting. Before you move on, did you have to pitch yourself to the company or they just out of the blue, give you this award?
• 33:09
  They actually contacted us. They said to us, hey, would you mind if we reviewed your mattress? Could we please have one? And at the time, we were like, oh, I'm not sure. Because I remember talking to my partner. I'm like, oh, I'm not sure if they're real. Like, I don't know. Should we? Should we not? What was the company? It was Bedbuyer.
• 33:28
  Oh, okay. Yeah. So we started with them and then since then until now, we still have this ongoing partnership, sort of them reviewing our mattress and giving honest reviews and yeah, basically helping the mattress industry become a lot more transparent than I guess what it is now. Oh, that's really cool. Really clever. Yeah. And the second? Yeah.
• 33:51
  Oh, yes. The second one is totally a vanity metric, but we got our blue tick on Instagram, I think a few months ago, and we've been trying to get that for four years, right? And we finally got it the other day. And I think that was just this huge wave of relief, like, oh my gosh, we've accomplished the blue tick. We are now verified and people can look
• 34:20
  That was a great moment for us. That is a great moment. Congratulations. Thank you. How do you get verified? I'm moving away from the six questions briefly, but how do you get verified?
• 34:32
  We had to submit documents about who we were and explain why we were important to be verified. So we had to send them articles about us, why the public might be interested in us. And so it took four years for them to say, cool, maybe now you're probably important enough for the public to know you're real.
• 34:53
  Persistence pays off. I love that. It does. It does. I love that for you. All right. Question number three, moving back on. Question number three, where do you hang out to get smarter? What are you reading or what are you subscribing to? Are there any newsletters that you love that you can share? There are a lot. And honestly, I subscribe to a lot. But the thing is, I realized that
• 35:17
  my inbox gets really cluttered to the point where even I'm not sure which ones to read. I found that instead I've been moving to LinkedIn and I've been trying to surround my page, my homepage with people who I follow and people who I connect with and people who I think are really smart. So it's kind of, I guess the short answer is hanging around really smart people.
• 35:45
  learning what they have to share, what articles they recommend, the things that they've done, and then just hitting them up if you've got any questions. I think going from there has been really helpful for me. Totally. And that comes back to, again, network and, yeah, community, the power of the people around you. Absolutely.
• 36:04
  which is great. Which is great. Which is great. Question number four is how do you win the day? What are your AM or PM rituals and habits that keep you feeling happy and motivated and successful and productive?
• 36:19
  Yes, I think people surround yourself with really good people. I guess ultimately it comes down to also hiring the right people in the first place. But I think if you'd form a genuine connection with people who believe in your company and the direction, then ultimately you're able to trust that they're doing the best that they can and we're all striving towards a singular goal. I think that's...
• 36:44
  The other thing is I'm also very driven by deadlines and I think it's just like it's just me. I'm very driven by deadlines. So when a team works together and you see that they're working together so well and hitting that deadline together, that's like the biggest win I could ask for. Because not only do they feel satisfied, like the whole team feels satisfied. This is collective satisfaction because they've done this together as opposed to just one person.
• 37:09
  Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Question number five is if you were given a thousand dollars of no strings attached money, where would you spend it in the business?
• 37:20
  I am biased because I'm in marketing, so I would say performance marketing, partly because when we first started, we didn't have a lot of money to pop into marketing in the first place. And so what we did was be very targeted, very niche with the money that we did have, so that could help invest into more return on that particular amount. So I would use it and reinvest it and make more.
• 37:49
  Totally. And question number six, last question, how do you deal with failure? What's your mindset and approach when things don't go to plan?
• 37:59
  Well, I think it's always good to have a little bit of a cry, at least in the initial stages. I have a story about this. I was thinking about this the other day. Back in uni, I remember I got, I think it's like 57% of one of my assignments. And that was the first time I've ever gotten like a 50 something. And I just bawled. I was like, why? I'm not good enough. Like, oh, my God, I've never received this. I must have done something really, really bad. I must not be doing this properly. Yeah.
• 38:26
  And so I had a little bit of a devastating moment. And then after that, I remember I then emailed my tutor and I said, hey, can we set up a chat? Can we talk about the things that I didn't do so well here so that I can do it better the next time?
• 38:42
  And then I also then called up my friend who I knew got like 80 or 90 percent on that same assignment. I was like, hey, would you mind just looking through my assignment and give me pointers around why you thought that, well, not what you thought, but why I got this particular mark?
• 39:01
  And that was really helpful because he was really honest and he spent the time to actually read my entire assignment and gave me notes as to, you know, this is what you could have done better and so forth. And he also sent me his assignment and I was sort of like comparing the two and I could understand why. And so I think.
• 39:17
  That experience. You're able to learn from it. Yeah, definitely. So I kind of took that experience of sort of failure in my eyes and I was like, let's get up and move on with this and not past it because everybody starts from somewhere and taking failure as just one part of your entire learning journey, just normalize it. It's going to happen, but it doesn't mean that your learning stops.
• 39:43
  Totally. Totally. Amanda, thank you so much for taking the time to come on Female Startup Club and share your journey with Eva. I have loved learning from you. It's my pleasure. You made it so easy. Oh, thanks.
• 40:01
  Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
• 40:26
  And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
• 40:48
  As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that.
• 41:05
  Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
• 41:29
  And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
• 41:52
  As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that.