Comrades in the Trenches

• {00:07:55} “Season 3 with Orchid came together in this way where we started talking about how everything is intertwined and everything is intermingled like subcultures and cultures and how commerce creates that, sustains that, kills that, like that whole life cycle. That is truly the core of retail planning, marketing, building a brand, and all of the things that we hope and wish to do through the analysis and the media and all the things that we're trying to learn.” - Ingrid
• {00:11:32} “Hearing your perspective on what not to do in an integration or what to buckle up for in an integration, I was able to bring my own perspective to it too. It's like, what are the four things that can ruin an integration with your brand? It felt very informative without being structured in a, "Okay, I'm going to tell you something. I'm going to give you a structure broken down and analyze this for you," which is something I'd never listened to, but instead it was people relating their actual life experience.” - Phillip
• {00:13:26} “You nailed it that fans have more power and more influence than ever before and those that ignore them are missing out on the largest opportunity that there is right now.” - Brian
• {00:24:28} “The whole idea is that the show talks about not just what we've been primarily focused on, which is consumers and brands and how do you grow and evolve and turn fans into customers. And all of that stuff is super relevant and I love talking about it, but that's 50% of what we talk about. The other 50% is how do we on the inside of organizations, how do we become good leaders.” - Ingrid
• {00:32:19} “A brand is not design and it's not a logo and it's not fonts and colors. A brand is something that has endured and stood the test of time, and that means many market cycles and that means longevity. And it's something that has, despite all the odds, somehow found a way to persist. I don't think you can do that without profitability.” - Phillip
• {00:46:36} “I'm the audience for this kind of conversational in the trenches, new insights, reframing things, highlighting things in a way that maybe I hadn't thought of myself. That is what I think I'm the most proud of with Season 3, all of our seasons, but particularly with this season, having weaved that in has been really great.” - Ingrid

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Battle for Attention

• {00:11:32} “Whether or not Threads is going to be a place where legitimate discourse happens, based on pieces written by career journalists, or if it's just going to be an echo chamber all over again of people who have limited experience but tend to amplify each other, that's still to be seen.” - Orchid
• {00:18:18} “You have to have an interesting relationship with the platform itself so that if users use it for something that is entirely different from what you intended or maybe envisioned for yourself, you have to be okay with that.” - Orchid
• {00:20:27} “When you think about the cult of personality or when you think about innovation, most of the time folks lean into, "Oh, this thing has never existed before and now it exists." And if you look at the entire model in China, it is to copy and improve and optimize. And that is a type of innovation as well, which is to take one idea and apply it into another vertical or another industry, or to launch something that's a better version of X.” - Orchid
• {00:24:58} “I really like the idea of the people who make that neighborhood Twitter what it is, if they're not treated with respect and understood that there's going to be another alternative that will allow them to have the platform that they want that they use.” - Ingrid
• {00:40:58} “Instapot had this ability to be this cult product and lead this whole band of fans that they earned and they just didn't. And that to me is like, sorry, but whoever's like running marketing or community management there, you shit the bed.” - Ingrid
• {00:41:42} “The takeaway is do not ignore your fans. Ignite that flame. Facilitate the conversations. They're going to buy the new version. They're going to buy the air fryer. They're going to buy all the other stuff if you're facilitating the larger conversation.” - Ingrid

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A Little Sus

• {00:16:03} “We think about this all the time. Which age group influencer is the individual that we're trying to connect with whatever type of audience it is? We as marketers, maybe our egos get a little bit in the way of just allowing the consumers to make those determinations for themselves.” - Ingrid
• {00:18:29} “There is no perfect answer because the category in which you operate, I think the nascency of your brand as well, all of that will actually shape the type of influencers or people you want to hear from when it comes to whatever that product is or recommending that product.” - Orchid
• {00:21:16} “I think two things can be true at the same time. But I agree. What you're pointing out is that there is this inconsistency between language and actions.” - Orchid
• {00:23:27} “I don't necessarily think anything she's doing is groundbreaking. People just like to see a pretty girl on their feed and they're like, "Everything she touches is so pretty." She's rich. That's a lot of rich girls, and she knows how to act in front of a camera. And I think she's our reality star, but instead of seeing her on a big screen, we're seeing her every single day on our phones.” - Erika
• {00:35:27} “It's really, really difficult, in my view, to change a consumer perception of a brand, and a lot of brands I think have attempted to do it and spent absurd amounts of money and didn't probably get what they were expecting to get out of those investments. But there are some brands that are doing that.” - Ingrid
• {00:39:21} “That's another new marketing thing where it doesn't have to be that people are just buying the actual product, but they're literally marketing it for you. They're showing how aspirational your product is. They're telling that story on your behalf. It's gold.” - Ingrid
• {00:45:18} “I think Succession sort of debunked a lot of what the general public would have assumed a really, really wealthy family would dress like. They're not wearing the Chanel-branded sunglasses with the big CC on them.” - Ingrid

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“Help Me Help You”

• {00:05:15} “How I think about leadership is that you can be a leader no matter your role or your rank or whatever it is. There are leadership qualities and then there are titles that indicate you're a leader of the company.” - Orchid
• {00:07:40} “There are leaders who only do things to further their own ego or further their own career. And then there are leaders who genuinely believe that you can only succeed if you work as a team.” - Orchid
• {00:10:20} “I have had a handful of leaders who were so insecure. I think, in hindsight, that's what it was. The ego thing is the surface level, so it comes across as ego, but really upon further reflection, it's insecurity at the foundation.” - Ingrid
• {00:12:13} “Leadership acknowledges the power that is within the leader who knows how to lead more people toward a better outcome.” - Ingrid
• {00:18:24} “You're not sitting there trying to draw blood from a stone. You are there to mold someone already somewhat capable but who maybe needs guidance and coaching and feedback.” - Ingrid
• {00:20:21} “What I learned was, "Oh, it's actually not about what I need. It's actually about what you need. It's about what you need to be able to do your best to support the team. And it is my job to get you what you need.’" - Orchid
• {00:33:36} “Everybody wants to be the people manager for the Dream Direct report, the person who anticipates your moves, who is so smart, so motivated, does all the things. But the reality is that that's not most people I know. And even those people that I just described, you need to help them with all these things that they're carrying.” - Orchid

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‍

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Brace yourself for bone-crushing trade-offs and discover the true costs of mismatched contenders. This year, every move is under the spotlight; so tune in for the fight of a lifetime!

One Leg At A Time

• {00:05:36} “Profitability is like a pant leg and then growth is like the other pant leg… In order to have one, you have to pull one leg up and kind of scrunch it and pull it a little bit and then switch to the other leg and pull it up a little bit. You can’t put both legs in and jump up and pull up the pants at the same time.” - Orchid
• {00:08:36} “It was just this very rinse and repeat playbook mixed with a really low acquisition rate that really did set a lot of these companies up for success that maybe in a different environment with different circumstances wouldn't have been accomplishable, but that doesn't mean that now that things aren't wildly easy, that the business model itself doesn't make sense.” - Ingrid
• {00:11:53} “When you make that pivot from a growth to a profitability play, now you're kind of doing a wild swing of the pendulum. How you operate in that environment is also extremely, extremely different.” - Orchid
• {00:14:33} “When you're in great weather, you're going to speed it up. When you're getting to a stormy place and some macro things happen or you need to buckle up for something, you make those adjustments while you're in flight and that is real leadership. And that's the piece that we don't always look at with such a holistic lens. At every level we tend to be really, really time-bound.” - Ingrid
• {00:24:31} “When there's a huge change in media and where people are spending their time and all of that, that's going to change marketing and how we connect to the people and get the eyeballs and the attention and the specific audiences that we want. And so the two places today that I feel are "the safest place" still are actual, really, really, really good creator and influencer marketing. And the channel in which that is the least expensive today is TikTok and potentially even still YouTube.” - Ingrid
• {00:28:17} “If you are not ever in growth mode and you're always in profitability mode, that is limiting. You're never going to be able to expand outside because you're always going to be looking at things that give you a 4X ROAS or a 7X ROAS or even a 2.5X ROAS because you're playing in a really safe, shallow pool and that's okay but know what the consequences of that are.” - Ingrid
• {00:31:33} “There's a reason why marketers have cared about engagement because it signifies that you're doing something right and you just need to do more of it to that same group in different ways.” - Ingrid

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Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Close the Loop

• {00:08:27} “How are we building {our “work love language”} into the way that we work with our teams and inform people above us, below us, and across the aisle? How do we make more of that now that we've identified that we need that?” - Ingrid
• {00:12:35} “Beyond seeing immediately what's in front of you, anticipate what are some other things that are going to happen or try to put yourself in the receiver's shoes and say, "Okay, if I were in their position…’" - Orchid
• {00:14:26} “As you go up, and whether you're the most junior person or the most senior person, I think it is always really beneficial to think about things more holistically. And I think that a quality that that really requires in a human being is empathy.” - Ingrid
• {00:19:03} “Based on my previous experiences and interactions with this person, what kind of decision are they trying to make and what kind of information can I provide them to best inform that decision?” - Orchid
• {00:22:52} “We're at this place where we need to create an environment organizationally, and we are now in the place of leadership that we can do that. And our generation is at that place of leadership that we can do that that I think will stop some of these previous stoic, unemotional, perfectionist, egotistical ways of working that I really do think is at the core of a lot of our hurdles.” - Ingrid
• {00:23:57} “A huge hurdle in the workplace today is about building relationships, is about properly communicating, and showing up prepared.” - Orchid

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Get Your Sh*t Together

• {00:02:16} “A significant trend is that retailers know they have to rethink the in-store experience, but they're not quite sure how to do it. A prime example of a fail in this is Toys R Us.” - Orchid
• {00:09:32} “This is the modern iteration of what {a lifestyle brand} is: merging the in-store experience, using the retail, having online, having all of those things.” - Ingrid
• {00:12:29} “The new trend in maximizing your square footage is the services and the experience and the reason to go somewhere physically, which actually means quite the opposite of pack more sh*t in there. It actually means really, really curate things because people are completely overwhelmed with choice anyway.” - Ingrid
• {00:18:03} “I'm convinced that if you're brought into a Target and it's a pleasant experience with a Starbucks that you can get free refills on, you're going to spend more time there and increase that single transaction over going into a crowded Macy's where you can't find anything, you feel overwhelmed and then you just turn around and head out again.” - Orchid
• {00:22:10} “There is a healthy balance of a strong work ethic and knowing that you can succeed at something without putting so much pressure on yourself that you burn yourself out.” - Orchid
• {00:23:27} “There are seasons of your work life in the same way that there are seasons in every other aspect of your life.” - Ingrid
• {00:30:00} “The age of the influencer won’t end, but brands do need to activate more thoughtfully and stop spraying and praying with influencers the way that they once did with buying TV.” - Ingrid

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Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Secret Sauce

• {00:11:11} “When we're talking about multinational corporations or larger corporations, usually you got to make sure that you've got a healthy business that you can just put your resources against in order to grow.” - Orchid
• {00:16:28} “There's a reason why acquisitions don't have the most fantastic reputation for succeeding post-acquisition. A lot of that is because too much emphasis is put on the acquirer to solve those problems after the fact. My advice is to have the founder or have the people who are running that DTC business think about what is that secret sauce of the company.” - Ingrid
• {00:17:53} “If you're a founder and you're selling, what you also have to be emotionally ready for is if the parent company starts to make strategic decisions about how to use the brand that you wouldn't necessarily agree with because it's not yours anymore. Post-acquisition is not yours anymore. That's why they paid you the money.” - Orchid
• {00:25:44} “With growth comes mass, more mass opportunities. You have to be more approachable, you have to be more accessible, unless you are a true luxury good.” - Orchid
• {00:32:03} “The people that you hire to help you be acquired, is another huge, important decision. They have to know your business and see the vision and see the purpose and be your champion just as much as the founders.” - Ingrid

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Kudos Venn Diagram

• {00:09:56} “I think of all social media platforms as different neighborhoods, and knowing the neighborhood that you're in and knowing how to navigate it and who's there and what to expect is an important way to think about, as a brand, how you want to show up to your consumers.” - Ingrid
• {00:14:05} What if TikTok could have different pillars for you based on your mood for that session, or does it already get you into different moods just by nature of the algorithm? 
• {00:19:01} “I have found that TikToks where someone is actually giving a verbatim or like taking you through the product and how you use it, that's been a huge purchase intent driver for me personally.” - Orchid
• {00:22:18} “The idea of makeup and how we use it, culturally, has shifted as well. Makeup used to be about covering things. You wanted to look flawless because you wanted to cover certain "flaws" that you had. Whereas I do think that there's been a shift in the beauty conversation about a celebration of creativity.” - Orchid
• {00:25:50} “{The} definition of what's cool and what looks good and what feels good and is trendy has expanded infinitely, which is more of a result of the people who are creating input into the new generation and hopefully expanding out more in the diversity of thought and experience.” - Ingrid
• {00:28:22} “Going to market in the modern ecosystem, it's not rules, it's tools. So here are the boundaries, here are the guidelines to a certain extent, but then be you and turn that into your own content. That is the biggest differentiator between people who ran brands 20 years ago and people who will run modern brands.” - Ingrid

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Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Tirade Against the Funnel

• {00:05:12} “There's a lot of user behavior that was adopted during COVID that was extremely digitally centric and digitally dominant, where the pendulum is swinging back a little bit. There are so many companies that you see out there that just hired wildly during COVID or scaled up, so I think there's a part of this that is a market contraction.” - Orchid
• {00:13:13} “There's going to be an aging out of how old media is consumed and how we look at journalism and how we look at journalism now. But with our generation and the generation even younger, even more so, it's so incredibly factioned off. It's very niche.” - Ingrid
• {00:17:09} “The fundamental way that marketers have been trained for decades is so broken now because there's just no way that you can get that level of awareness to then start to reduce down to the relevance of messages and audiences in order to make, finally, your way down to the conversion where you actually make money.” - Ingrid
• {00:26:28} “Ingrid: If you're fundamentally changing your go-to-market strategy, you have to document and organize the spaghetti that you're throwing at the wall so that when things stick, you know what, why, and where, and then you can replicate.” - Ingrid
• {00:28:17} “In order to make your media more efficient, you got to have better creative. If you have the right creative, the machine will make it more efficient.” - Orchid
• {00:34:38} “The question is how much novelty does your brand need to chase? Or is it just by nature of being on the platform with an interesting enough piece of creative that doesn't challenge the wackadoo creative or creators head-on but doesn't distract from it either?” - Orchid

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The Art of Simplification

• {00:02:22} “There's a lot of conversation out there about artificial intelligence and what it's going to replace and what it's not. And the reality is that marketing is human-centric. Marketing is empathy. And so I think there are a lot of things about marketing strategy that will never be replaced.” - Orchid
• {00:09:09} “We were able to fail in a very private or limited way in which this generation cannot because everything is public. Think about how many parents created a special hashtag for their kid or created social media accounts for their kid. And so this failure becomes permanent because everything on the Internet lives forever.” - Orchid
• {00:20:16} “There is a lot of nuance that is lost in this really valuable and lived advice that we are giving to the next generation.” - Orchid
• {00:22:54} “If we work together, we can build this beautiful environment where, yes, we have boundaries, but we are also committed to doing the work until it's done because we take pride in our work as well.” - Orchid
• {00:24:30} “As now rising leaders within our organization, we have the power and are gaining more and more power to influence the cultures around us to find that balance between hustle culture and not having work define who you are. “ - Ingrid
• {00:28:18} “The workplace has changed fundamentally the same way that the retail environment has changed fundamentally due to eCommerce coming out, social media coming out, and COVID happening.” - Ingrid

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Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.com, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Not Your Mom’s Private Label

• {00:08:22} “There is no DTC without social media, and there would never have been. They complement each other. They enable each other to exist.” - Ingrid
• {00:012:06} “The combination of social media and DTC really inherently sparked the change in power dynamics between brand and consumer.” - Orchid
• {00:019:21} “One of the biggest threats to DTC is private label.” - Orchid
• {00:023:10} “In terms of power dynamics in this new world where we don't have this laser focus on DTC, DTC does not equal eCommerce. DTC is a subset of that.” - Orchid
• {00:025:08} “DTC graduated to not just being a sales channel, but being a brand ethos or a marketing strategy. And I'll be the first person to admit how important that is while at the same time, out of the other end of my mouth, I'm going to say not every brand needs to touch your heart.” - Ingrid
• {00:029:42} “The people that are going to have these more successful businesses, omnichannel going forward, are the ones that just are constantly innovating. They're making their in-store experience better. They're making their online presence better. They're improving their products. And I think that's a beautiful thing.” - Ingrid
• {00:031:30} “The tide has receded. What you're seeing now is that the strongest, most holistic thinking brands will win when they view every channel as a lever that they can pull. The smartest business people who balance business and experience will win.” - Orchid

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Stay Curious

• {00:05:45} “There's a lot of existentialism in the purpose. What is my purpose? Why do I exist? And I think the greatest of leaders and the brands that endure have to go through that.” - Phillip
• {00:012:46} “Some of the best brands are the brands that are run by people who are the consumers of the brand or are solving the problem that they themselves ran into and are now realizing how many more millions of people have that same problem that needed to be solved.” - Ingrid
• {00:024:17} “The world is constantly changing and there are going to be things that are introduced that are going to necessitate me changing along with them. And I always want to be on the side of adapting to those things or trying them out and being open to them.” - Ingrid
• {00:028:11} “Some people are tearing down other people's channels so that they can prop up their own because they don't like change. And that traditional retail mindset has been afraid of digital transformation for the longest time.” - Phillip
• {00:032:53} “I'm going to hire the person who got really into the metaverse, not because they got it right or wrong, but because I now know how their mind adapts to new information and how growth-oriented their mindset is.” - Ingrid
• {00:040:47} Season 3 will be a deep dive into the DTC industry, what’s changing, what the landscape looks like now, and whether or not it matter anymore. You won’t want to miss it!

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Beautiful Nostalgia

• There has been a big flight back to legacy brands and national brands that has escalated during times of uncertainty and turmoil, for that sense of comfort and security
• In a world of so many copycat brands that have saturated a market that used to be full of only legacy brands that were familiar and comfortable, no one wants to think too hard about what cereal they are going to buy
• It’s been hard to watch new luxury brands have the same longevity as heritage brands because memory and nostalgia compel consumers to go back to the old luxury brands again and again
• This memory concept is our brain's receptacle of the past, the means of passing our life stories to the next generation for continuity
• Food, for example, is so connected to our memories and remains a part of our lives in many meaningful ways
• If you work for a brand or have some influence with a brand that has a little bit of legacy, I think it can be a really, really powerful thing to tap into
• A lot of small brands that have successfully solved problems in their niche, but relatively few get to that level of scale
• Even if the product is wildly better than the brand there is much power and resilience that a brand allows you to have that is so much more powerful than just being a product

Associated Links:

• Check out our other episodes of Infinite Shelf
• Get ready for Archetypes, our soon to be published 240-page journal! Check it out at ArchetypesJournal.com
• Get your tickets to our Archetypes Event December 1 in Miami, FL
• Subscribe to Insiders and The Senses to read more of what we are witnessing in the commerce world! 
• Download VISIONS 2022 NOW! 

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Like a Downton Abbey Valet

• We each have a reason and a purpose we are striving for, and it’s part of what drives us as humans
• Purpose should be high priority for brands, and that includes their purpose in the world and consumers and also their purpose internally 
• After being in the beauty and fashion industries for so long where building connections and relationships with customers is so vital, Ingrid finds that her experience there adds to her work now in the health and wellness space
• Even though a lot of people understand that unsustainable practices aren’t good for the planet, do they also feel badly enough to make a change in behavior to do something about it?
• Companies like PepsiCo have changed their messaging to relate to the more prevalent conversation of health and wellness in the marketplace and also have added healthier products to their offering
• Having a sense of understanding that what you’re doing matters, that your company matters, that your manager/leaders care about you, and that you are making an impact, is very important in getting the most of our a person in a workplace
• Every level in a company needs to be treated as just as important to the purpose as any other level
• “Everyone wants to matter. Everyone wants to have a job to do and contribute to something.” - Kiri

Associated Links:

• Check out our other episodes of Infinite Shelf
• Get ready for Archetypes, our soon to be published 240-page journal! Check it out at ArchetypesJournal.com
• Get your tickets to our Archetypes Event December 1 in Miami, FL
• Subscribe to Insiders and The Senses to read more of what we are witnessing in the commerce world! 
• Download VISIONS 2022 NOW! 

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Surprise and Delight

• We are inquisitive creatures, and there is a powerful connection between our curiosity and commerce
• Free gifts with purchase is a brilliant way drive curiosity and it is a seriously underutilized tool these days
• Estée Lauder is credited with this brilliant idea of gift with purchase that would become an element of surprise and delight moving the experience from a transactional mentality to a relationship mentality
• At the end of the day, McDonald’s sells food, but with the Happy Meal toy, they’ve introduced whimsy and fun into the experience
• “Because we've become concerned about margins and concerned about profitability, we've forgotten all of these other levers that we have that inspire connectivity and loyalty and human connection to our brands.” - Ingrid
• People too often get caught up in advocating for always and only pursuing either growth or profitability but it’s actually more of a pendulum
• Amazon & Apple have been free to innovate because they’re playing the long game and have communicated where they are on the growth cycle
• eCommerce professionals are in a very fast-paced environment that requires curiosity and not everything in our industry is a hit
• Having a Test and Learn budget, a known vs unknown framework, in your strategy is helpful in keeping you from getting stuck in what you’ve always done and also holding you back from investing too much in something that may not work out

Associated Links:

• Check out our other episodes of Infinite Shelf
• Get ready for Archetypes, our soon to be published 240-page journal! Check it out at ArchetypesJournal.com
• Get your tickets to our Archetypes Event December 1 in Miami, FL
• Subscribe to Insiders and The Senses to read more of what we are witnessing in the commerce world! 
• Download VISIONS 2022 NOW! 

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

How Much is Too Much?

• The need for creativity and storytelling has exploded in the last few years and has shifted from idealism to realism
• We still need a brand team to work on vision and cohesiveness but we’re adding on every day content creators to put a more accessible spin on stories
• Consumers have gotten a lot more savvy and desire creators who can connect to their circumstances and lifestyle
• What does Gen Alpha want to be when they grow up? Influencers and content creators. This is reminiscent of kids wanting to be actors except content creation as a profession is a lot more accessible.
• In our consumption culture (or late-stage capitalism), the job of being the one to sell things is glorified and influencer culture breeds an unapologetic nature of identifying themselves as a brand or lifestyle
• How much intimacy is too much intimacy? Peloton got into trouble for getting too intimate with their customers and overreaching on how they should interact with their customers
• The human trait of storytelling is underestimated and very powerful across all platforms and within each role in any organization 
• “Who are you and who is your audience is going to really drive what kind of stories to tell and how to tell them.” - Kiri
• “Determine the boundaries for yourself and for your company and for your brands about how much creativity and storytelling and dialog is enough for your brand to remain relevant, feel connected, but not have to overstep that boundary.” - Ingrid

Associated Links:

• Check out our previous episode, Community Building & Belonging
• FC podcast - The Algorithm Made Him Do It: Vibes Over Data
• Peloton ad - A Peloton Ad Sparked Huge Controversy…
• ViralPostGenerator.com
• Broetry

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

“IYKYK”

• We use brands and social signals as a way to make decisions about what we’re going to do with/put in our bodies
• Minecraft is a platform that has generated a community and has become not just a game, but actually an identity and an activity in which families are involved and together in it
• Glossier was brilliant in creating a gated Slack channel for top 100 fans which helped them build community and also have access to valuable market research
• “When you think about these if-you-know-you-know business models, luxury has created that, but the Internet has created that if-you-know-you-know for everyone. It's democratized these niche, little communities.” - Ingrid
• You go to amazon for specific things, not for inspiration, and it serves a specific purpose
• There's some weirdness where we are social beings and we want to be in a social community, we’ve shifted from one person in a clan to Kim K with millions of followers
• “One of the challenges that we have in our digitally-connected community is that it is our community. This is where we go for belonging. But there are not always the best or clearest intentions among all the people in the community.” - Kiri
• There is a way for brands to handle reviews in a really transparent way that still drives more review volume and a feeling of community without being shady
• “There's always going to be a need and a place and a way to differentiate yourself as a brand by understanding the fundamental human need for community and belonging.” - Ingrid

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

What is Infinite Shelf? It represents the humans on one side of the shelf that’s being stocked and prepared and the humans on the other side that are buying and participating. Where has Ingrid been over these past few months? Listen in as she shares and introduces her new co-host, Kiri Masters.

Creating Space

• There is a human-centric shelf. There is a long dinner table. Human emotion, connection, curiosity, and our need for human connection are important matters
• We need to start normalizing human things in the workplace and check in with our teams to know them well enough to know how they are doing as far as what support they need
• How do we balance building a culture and getting to know people beyond just transactional task-oriented conversations, especially when we work remotely?
• Kiri’s top three hacks for creating a rich community within her team are simple to implement and yield really meaningful results
• “Whoever hasn't created some form of awareness around when their workflow is best, I would highly suggest making some notes to self around that, just philosophically knowing that you need to create space for that.” - Ingrid
• “It's not so much the balance as it is the blend, and I have permission to not be the best at everything all at once. Because it's just impossible.” - Ingrid
• “There are occasionally these moments in your life where things must get dropped in order to get through them.” - Kiri
• We need people around us who will give us nudges to touch some grass, and we need to nudge others to do the same
• The rest of this season of Infinite Shelf is going to be full of deep dives into the intersection of commerce and what it means to be human, don’t miss it!

Creating Space

• There is a human-centric shelf. There is a long dinner table. Human emotion, connection, curiosity, and our need for human connection are important matters
• We need to start normalizing human things in the workplace and check in with our teams to know them well enough to know how they are doing as far as what support they need
• How do we balance building a culture and getting to know people beyond just transactional task-oriented conversations, especially when we work remotely?

Associated Links:

• The 10 human traits 

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

• Everything and everyone is all about the metaverse right now. Brian is starting to think that the “metaverse is just the internet now.” Maybe it is, hence why some think NFTs, crypto, and bitcoin are part of the metaverse as well. 
• When we think about DTC we have to remember what the entailed vision was: “to disrupt the existing industry or category with a product that is equal to or better than the existing products that are available and make them more affordable and get them to you quicker.” -Ingrid
• Everyone is capable of doing everything because there is an audience
• “Crypto bros are basically just this generation's example of extreme couponers.” -Phillip
• A company-curated around being highly curated and centered around good company culture, and innovation will beat out money every single time.
• “The biggest opportunity in this current market is right now, everything that is going to be worth anything is entirely based on curation.” - Ingrid

Associated Links:

• Future Commerce’s 2022 Predictions Episode
• Tune into Infinite Shelf Season 2!
• Subscribe to Insiders and Senses to read more of our hot takes! 
• Listen to other episodes of Future Commerce

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

• HigherDOSE strikes an interesting balance between Wellness, Biohacking, and Tech. Their products are rooted in research to help their customers really get the most out of HigherDose products.
• We all know that the new iOS privacy updates and decrease in Facebook and Google analytics is a huge problem for marketers. Ingrid offers her advice as a three-pronged approach.
• Prong 1: Don’t just look at CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost), look more broadly at client relationship management. The iOS privacy update is not just a story about CAC (Customer Acquisition Costs), it's a combination between CAC and LTV (lifetime value).
• Prong 2: Invest in Good Influencers. In the age of tightening data and heightened iOS privacy updates, influencers are going to become a highly valuable channel.
• Prong 3: Invest in Channel Diversification. Client Relationship Management is Everything. Don’t ignore your CRM!
• How should brands allocate funds between Influencers and traditional channels such a Google and Facebook? Well, that depends, and it’s not the same for every brand.
• If you want to understand the full customer journey, you need to use a multi-touch attribution technology. You might have one-click conversions for products with a lower price point, but when you have more expensive products, customers will most likely require multiple interactions with your brand.
• Ingrid gives Katie & Lauren advice on what content she thinks would really resonate with HigherDOSE’s customer base.

Associated Links:

• Check out Yotpo
• Check out Gladly
• Check out Gorgias

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

• Gabi is an Amazon guru, and the VP of Amazon Strategy for Garden of Life, a wellness company on a mission to empower extraordinary health
• “The great thing about Amazon is it is the window into the mass market.” -Gabi
• There are some perks to selling products on Amazon. Many individuals are typing and searching for products, they’re spoiled for choice. While on the other hand, it can be incredibly hard to not just be buried in the search results
• “Amazon is moving more into this social commerce of building the brands on Amazon, rather than allowing these brands to build their websites on Amazon.” 
• By allowing the brands to build their brand on Amazon, it disrupts the sequence of a consumer leaving Amazon to go learn more from the brands website
• You don’t necessarily need your brand to go viral, you just need to have strong presence on social media 
• “Never get into a level of complacency that you [feel you always] know what's going to happen next.”- Gabi
• The algorithm is constantly changing, so be willing to change with it 
• “Have the willingness to be open to have your mind changed or have your perspectives changed, and have this collective thinking in conversations.” -Gabi

Associated Links:

• Learn more about Gabi Viljoen and Garden of Life!
• Amazon for CMOs by Kiri Masters and Mark Power

Stay in the loop with Infinite Shelf!  Let us know your thoughts on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn or Facebook. We love hearing from our listeners!

• Joe Fisch is the CEO of Wine Access, a web platform that makes it easy to discover wines through expert curation and their satisfaction guarantee.
• Wine Access is all about curation, content, and customer service. Joe believes that these three things are the core to Wine Access and everything else builds around it
• “Any time I'm meeting with anyone on my team, I always ask how they see the world? Is it through numbers? Is it through sounds? Is it through words? Is it through feelings? And have always tried to guide people in that way.” -Joe
• How they took a fast approach to scaling, and the appropriate steps they chose to follow from where they were going top line, how many bodies they would need, and how looking at a variable method could sometimes damage the infrastructure.
• “We said, OK, if we keep beating the drum and we hit the same core things of curation, content, and customer service, and we hit those over and over again, we can be a really successful company.” -Joe
• Joe and the Wine Access team are looking at the future on how to continue scaling and working with a new structure, so it’s time to workshop!
• To begin workshopping, it's important to look at the organization rationally, taking out the names of people in the positions, and just looking at the position
• When looking at each role independently, you can start to see the gaps in where an employee might need more help, or where they can create a separate new role in a different position, and bring on another strategic employee to fill the gaps
• “As your company grows and as your priorities change, it's really important on both sides, the employer and the employee, to take an honest look and determine whether what the company is doing is serving both parties.” -Ingrid

Associated Links:

• Learn more about Joe Fisch and Wine Access
• Think Again by Adam Grant

Stay in the loop with Infinite Shelf!  Let us know your thoughts on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn or Facebook. We love hearing from our listeners!

The Forever Changing Landscape of eCommerce

• {00:06:20} “But there's a language also in the thought process and the way that we address problems. And I think that there's a similar but distinctly different language that founders and retail merchants have to create and cultivate on their own.” - Ingrid
• {00:11:36} “The communication, while having that communication actually be more compelling, which is what conversion requires.” - Michael
• {00:19:16} “So like your brand, people probably are brand people because they care about the brand. Conversion people are probably conversion people because they're going to kind of lean that way, so that they'll acknowledge the other side. They won't necessarily see the other side, as the main reason or rationale.” - Michael
• {00:26:49} “So conceptually, I think eCommerce companies will have to key into something bigger than just everything that they've done so far. So is that their storytelling? Ok, great. Well, that's going to have to ratchet up a few notches.” - Michael
• {00:34:31} “They should be thinking about brand. They should be thinking about the future. They should be thinking about the human side. But, I think anybody in development in eCommerce knows that back end dev is not really a thing anymore, it's more front end dev.” - Michael
• {00:40:58} “There's lots and lots of incredible agencies, so many that I look up to and aspire to be more like, honestly. But I think that having the alignment between the merchant and the agency is the main thing that takes that from being dysfunctional and completely amazing.” - Michael

Associated Links: 

• Learn more about Michael Bower
• Check out the Nyla app
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

The Impact of Culture and Leadership 

• {00:09:21} “But I think some of the things that I always tried to stay mindful of, that I think really made that difference and that impact for Nuun as a brand is look inside before you look outside.” - Arielle
• {00:10:47} “But I think the magic really happens when an internal team that's working together to collaborate, to create a brand, it's like when they have that kind of brand and culture internally, the way that they bring it to consumers is just incredibly, incredibly authentic. And it's not a mission to make it seem authentic to consumers.” - Arielle
• {00:17:30} “And I think that the culture of giving people, like celebrating people trying their best and scaling up versus, like everything is for the win has actually created a safe environment for people to try new things without being afraid of failure, and I think that that has been a major game changer and enabler…” - Ingrid
• {00:24:03} “So if as leaders were going to ask our teams to, you know, launch programs successfully and achieve results and do more faster, better, that's what we're all always asking, then the utmost servant leadership approach is in order to do all of that, your team needs something from you as well.” - Arielle
• {00:33:17} “And I have to say that in almost all cases, that has served me and the team really well because I think that it is so much easier to teach a candidate or a new person joining the team, "This is how we x y z," because the reality is for most job functions, every single company, most companies, are going to do things differently.” - Arielle
• {00:39:44} “And so to really think about how your brand functions internally before you think about how it functions externally is the right order of operation to make sure that the team is sound and that the culture and the brand and the mission really, really are scalable.” - Arielle

Associated Links: 

• Check out the latest on Arielle Knutson
• Learn more about Nuun Hydration
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

What’s Bigger Than Trust? 

• {00:11:31} "Hey, maybe we should do something together. We still have great chemistry. We love working together, we respect one another..." - Isaac
• {00:20:58} “Because the match means everything and they're not going to be happy and you're not going to be happy. And then on the other side, when there is a match, then that's really where the magic happens. I think that's really important.” - Ingrid
• {00:21:09} “And a lot of it just takes trust, right? And which is a whole other conversation that we'll dig into, hopefully when we talk about, like the founders and the brands that we work with.” - Isaac
• {00:27:10} “When starting a brand, you have to be passionate. It has to be a reflection of who you are as an individual. And so with that comes great responsibility of all the partners to make sure that they're seeing the vision through.” - Ingrid
• {00:32:49} “I'd say the last thing, and I tell this to everybody and I even tell this to prospects where I'm like, I'm 90 percent sure we are not going to work together. Speak with recent references. It is so critical.” - Isaac
• {00:35:53} “Yes, totally. Yeah, with teams and things like that, you're not doing anyone any favors by keeping someone on who isn't performing and the same thing with agencies as well.” -  Ingrid
• {00:39:35} “Yeah, I mean, it's all about, in our opinion, differentiation and storytelling. Really. And also being authentic. So if you can find the right balance of those things, that's where the future is.” - Isaac

Associated Links: 

• Learn more on Pattern’s website
• Learn more about founder Isaac Newton 
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Halftime Reflection…”What’s Going on Everyone?”

• {00:02:14} “He actually listens to the episodes with a pen and paper and a notepad next to him so that he can write down some of his thoughts as he's listening so he doesn't forget when we are talking about it later.” - Ingrid
• {00:05:32} “What struck me here is it reminded me of a conversation that we had in a simpler time, Brian, of the The Age of Clienteling and how digital can bring clientele to anyone. And yet so many brands don't even bother.” - Phillip
• {00:11:59} “Yes. Ok, so the next one was my favorite episode. That's why I wanted to do it. So I think that the episode with FindMine and Michelle was so eye opening to me about how organizations actually accomplish innovation.” - Brian
• {00:14:54} “Yeah, that might be some of the best advice I've heard in a long time, too. It's great, great, just like teasing out of the details there with Michelle, Ingrid. Nice job.” - Brian
• {00:22:07} “That's the other thing I think we always miss for every twenty great marketing interactions, they're only meaningful if you have a great product at the end. Ingrid, always great hearing you sort of lend your expertise in the context of another conversation.” - Phillip
• {00:34:57} “Like literally everything happens because people can't stand being bored. And so by the time when we kind of cycle through technology and we've done it long enough, we have to do something new. We have to. We literally cannot even.” - Brian

Associated Links: 

• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Your identity is in your back pocket 

• {00:04:53} “What it means to me at its core is essential that rather than being based largely on private servers, Web3 is largely, the idea is to largely base it on public Blockchains. That is the core fundamental difference between where we've been and where it could go.” - Michael
• {00:07:38} “And as I walk into stores, they welcome me because they know who I am and what I am, because my identity is sort of like splayed on myself without me explicitly saying, ‘Hey, here's who I am, and here are the things that you should know about me.’” - Ingrid
• {00:13:48} “And so, in my opinion, it's like everything else with new technology. The technology's awesome. But until you find creative people to use it in really interesting ways, it doesn't do a whole lot.” - Michael
• {00:21:39} “So now you can buy an NFT and remember, because it's in your wallet and because it's on a publicly distributed Blockchain, you can take it wherever you want.” - Michael
• {00:34:47} “…if you look at their screen time, they are spending between school and private life and all of that, they're spending 10 hours a day having screen time. They already live in the Metaverse to some extent.” - Ingrid
• {00:43:16} “And so you, Michael, are someone who enjoys and thrives in the positivity and happiness that connectivity can bring. And I think you're going to find that place in the physical world and in the Metaverse.” - Ingrid
• {00:50:04} “And you also really touched on something that is very, very core to this whole notion of Web3 and decentralization and things like that, which is you had mentioned like interacting with government and taxes and things like that.” - Michael

Associated Links: 

• Check out Michael Janiak’s work on LinkedIn
• Learn more on Pattern’s website
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Building a Brand fit for Amazon 

• {00:04:16} “And one of those things that I've been interested in following is just all of the consolidators and aggregators and just the amount of, frankly, money and capital that's being poured into these companies that are ultimately buying up smaller mom and pop shops on Amazon and brands and then consolidating them into a bigger machine for profitability and just understanding what is growing.” - Ingrid
• {00:08:02} “The real question is like, I'm like, struggling, like, OK, so how do you build your labels? What is your branding like? How do you build brand awareness?” - Garrett
• {00:13:54} “Rule number one, two, and three in any type of consumer facing business is please don't assume that your consumer is stupid.” - Ingrid
• {00:17:53} “And what that means is that the trends that are happening on Amazon are going to directly reflect everywhere else.” - Garrett
• {00:20:25} “It really comes down to focusing on your products and your brand and being differentiated. If you're a brand that is hoping that your Alibaba white labeled product with your logo on it is going to be there forever, you're not thinking clearly because that is not going to last longer than that life cycle of when that timeline happens, right?” - Garrett
• {00:26:21} “And this is why we're seeing tons of investments starting to flow into incubators into what are like traditional accelerators, where they invest in a brand that's small and then they provide services to kind of help them grow. I mean, that space is booming right now.” - Garrett
• {00:34:35} “The ones that are driven by consolidators are probably going to see lighter discounts. They'll probably continue to do them. Subscription's a big thing.” - Garrett
• {00:36:21} “There's just so many. We keep saying this, but capital has become a commodity, and it's just so true. And so that's why there is all this competition for being an aggregator, consolidator.” - Ingrid

Associated Links: 

• Take a look at the Drafted Commerce website
• Check out Garrett Bluhm’s LinkedIn
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Can I gain value in this purchase? 

• {00:06:00} “But I love the concept that you're sort of taking the brands away from this pattern of create something, sell something, create something, sell something. Where it's like, create something and then sell it. And then sell it again.” - Ingrid
• {00:11:15} “So clearly, there is so much benefit to creating something once and selling it more than once. Dear CFOs, if you're listening, that's where your ears perk up. But now to the brand marketers and the people who are trying really, really hard to develop this unique brand connection with their consumers, here's another really rich place to mine for those moments.” - Ingrid
• {00:16:38} “I mean, I just shared that anecdote, but also if a brand is going to encourage and promote resale on their site, that is such a vote of confidence from that brand that their products are going to last and are going to hold up. So it's just a subtle but really strong way for brand to stand behind their products and their quality. We also talk about this idea of sort of de-risking that initial purchase.” - Wilson
• {00:18:22} “I am probably going to buy something new, but I'm going to pull the trigger even faster because I know that when I'm done with it, I'll be able to resell it.” - Ingrid
• {00:26:41} “And so this one to one relationship and the authentication component, is also, I think, really important. Because me, if I'm buying something second hand, I want to make sure that it's real. And so the fact that you can only sell something from this history of buying it from the brand is a really big stop gap.” - Ingrid

Associated Links: 

• Check out Recurate
• Learn more about Wilson Griffin
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Building Successful Innovation Teams

• {00:02:41} “So most brands and retailers have more products than they can produce high quality content for.” - Michelle
• {00:07:36} “Because a lot of innovation teams don't have budget, and then they either expect a free pilot, which sometimes that works for the startups business model. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you just can't give away a free pilot.” - Michelle
• {00:16:55} “Oh, the second one is really about kind of organizational structure in terms of like breaking down silos because we're a small company, we don't have this problem, and so it's very easy to stand on my pedestal and say ‘You shouldn't have silos in your organization,’...” - Michelle
• {00:20:03} “And so you have to set up your organization in order to be where the customer is. And the customer frankly, is just everywhere, especially in this post-COVID world.” - Ingrid
• {00:28:03} “Yeah, I think that the difference is organizations that view tech as a means to an end and then organizations who treat them like they're the end in of itself.” - Michelle
• {00:32:33} “So you're going to still have to go to marketing, you're still going to have to go to retail, you're still going to have to go to the email teams and the eCom teams and the merchants all kind of separate. And the innovation team members know those people really well. They understand the organization. They know who the power players are.” - Michelle
• {00:35:39} “So it's really important to just keep them in mind that how someone's relationship with their boss can make or break whether they want to use your software in their day to day. And I think so often software sales teams forget about that that it all comes back to human behavior at the end of the day.” - Michelle

Associated Links: 

• Check out Michelle on LinkedIn
• Visit the FindMine website
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Discount Double Check?   

• {00:04:09} “First, brands are trying to get away from discounts as much as humanly possible. They recognize it brings in the lowest lifetime value customers the first time... So how do we get away from this, but still drive sales is question one/trend one. And then trend two, totally separately, is that consumers are demanding some sort of purpose driven activity from brands.” - Andrew
• {00:09:30} “I will take a discount, right? But it's not necessarily that I need that three dollars off or something like that. Like, it's going to make the difference between like pulling the trigger or not. And it's become, I would say, like a game for internet savvy people of just not being fooled.” - Ingrid
• {00:12:59} “I mean, once you buy something at 70 percent off, your perception of that brand in terms of value that is created, there's just no chance that you pay even 20 percent off ever again on something like that.” - Andrew
• {00:16:25} “But at the end of the day, what we see in the data is that people want to feel good about their purchasing and they want to shout about it, and this is something that can get them over the hump in terms of buying something.” - Andrew
• {00:24:52} “If you're saying one percent of revenue or 10 percent of profits goes to this one specific charity, and maybe you've been doing that for a long time, I guarantee you 80 percent of your customers don't know that or don't know the cause or don't really, truly resonate with that cause.” - Andrew 

Associated Links: 

• Follow Andrew on Twitter
• Follow Givz on Instagram
• Visit the Givz website
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

Out with the old, in with the new.  

• {00:03:28} “So I really wanted to figure out how we can use artificial intelligence and other technology to really build this meaningful connection with younger generations? So, yeah, that's kind of how it came about.” - Madison
• {00:04:03} “So, you know, my age group is the first one to grow up with access to the world in their pocket with their iPhone. So we do have really high expectations, and we're very savvy, and we're used to having access to everything. So I think that really the first place to start is by delivering very relevant and meaningful experiences.” - Madison
• {00:011:55} “We just have way too many choices, and it makes you feel like when everything is a choice, you don't have any choice because it's just this confusing wave of everything.” - Ingrid
• {00:18:34} “And I think what you're seeing with this new rise of videos and what's trending is it's actually like you're bringing a lot more real life to it. You're not going to grow on Instagram anymore if you're providing this picture-perfect life. Like people want real conversations.” - Madison
• {00:25:48} “And I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but if, like the younger generation and the trendsetting generation isn't, you're not relevant with them, you're in a tough spot.” - Ingrid

Associated Links: 

• Follow Madison on Instagram
• Follow the Mada App on Instagram
• Download the Mada App 
• Love your new host? Check her out on LinkedIn
• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

Have any questions or comments about the show? Let us know on Futurecommerce.fm, or reach out to us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. We love hearing from our listeners!

“It gets lonely at the top”

• {00:06:03} “A lot of young entrepreneurs moving at the speed of light, you know, kind of that move fast, break things, don't ask for permission and apologize later mentality, which is just not the world that I ever grew up in.” - April
• {00:011:16} “But ultimately, it started to be a little bit like, ‘Hey, collectively wear so much more powerful if we help each other.’” - April
• {00:020:20} “Are they sustainable? Are they doing something better for the planet or society on a whole in terms of potentially giving back or supporting certain communities?” - April
• {00:026:21} “Because it all kind of goes back to something that you said earlier, which is identifying your superpower. Having a really honest conversation with my team and myself about what are the things that we know how to do really, really, really well?” - Ingrid
• {00:038:08} “Exactly. It's just an honest conversation that sometimes we're just too polite or even too busy to have.” - Ingrid 
• {00:040:13} “It's really this idea of almost an advisory, but you know, a monthly call with this curated group of people, depending on your business and your needs where you really can have a safe space, a little bit life coach, a little bit strategy, venting, connecting, leveraging networks, ideation, kind of A B thinking and help founders and CEOs in that space between where it's really lonely, where again you have to kind of manage your investors a certain way.” - April
• {00:045:34} “Because like you were saying, it gets lonely at the top. You can't be super transparent with your board, your actual board, And then you have to keep up this appearance with your employees.” - Ingrid
• {00:048:03} “It's really like, how do we support you? What are your challenges? What can we take? What can we do together? What can we help you think through differently? And so we want to work in a different way and we want to really immerse ourselves not only just with the senior leadership, but whoever is touching that project.” - April

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• Check out other Future Commerce podcasts

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