eCommerce Podcast

Matt Edmundson
  • 5.0 (11)
  • ENTREPRENEURSHIP
  • UPDATED WEEKLY

If you’re looking for great tips and insights into how to run your online store, look no further than the Ecommerce Podcast: a show dedicated to helping you deliver eCommerce WOW. New episodes are released every Thursday, and each episode features interviews with some of the biggest names in the eCommerce world. Whether you’re just starting out in eCommerce or you’re a seasoned veteran, you’re sure to learn something new from each episode. So what are you waiting for? Subscribe to the Ecommerce Podcast today!

  1. 10M AGO

    The 25 Questions That Make Amazon Rufus Push Your Product Higher

    Up to 40% of Amazon US sales now touch Rufus, Amazon's AI shopping assistant — and most sellers haven't optimised a single product for it. That's the gap David Balan, founder of Selluna, walked through with Matt this week. The customer who used to type "blue football" into a search bar is now asking a chatbot what kind of football would suit a six-year-old, and the products that show up first are the ones answering the right 25 questions. David has spent the last few years helping thousands of brands across the US, UK, Europe and Asia-Pacific sell more on Amazon. In this conversation he laid out a three-pillar framework — traffic, clicks, conversion — and made the case that anyone selling on Amazon without a Rufus strategy right now is leaving 12-24 months of compounding advantage on the table. Key Point Timestamps[04:29] Why the Amazon algorithm is simpler than most sellers think[05:28] The three pillars of Amazon — traffic, clicks, conversion[07:00] Rufus, the top 25 questions, and how to answer them in priority order[12:03] Traditional Amazon SEO — 80+ keywords, frequency, and the "stuffing" myth[19:30] Why Rufus optimisation now is the new 2016 SEO play[24:57] Why not A/B testing the main image is "criminal" in 2026[33:08] The conversion stack — seven images, A+ Content, brand story, premium branding[39:32] Text speaks to the algorithm, images speak to the customer The Algorithm Is Simpler Than Sellers Want To Admit [04:29]Most sellers treat Amazon's algorithm like an opaque, mystical force. David disagrees. "The algorithm is more simple than we like to make it," he told Matt. "The algorithm is trying to make Amazon as much money as they can get out of it. So once we understand their goal, if we align our goals with theirs, then everyone's going to be happy and you're going to be selling more at the end of the day." That's the philosophical shift. Stop trying to outsmart Amazon. Start asking what Amazon wants and give it more of that. Every metric David teaches — traffic, clicks, conversion — is a proxy for the same goal, putting the right product in front of the right customer at the right time. The Top 25 Questions That Make Rufus Recommend Your Product [07:00]Rufus is Amazon's ChatGPT-style assistant, embedded in the marketplace. Instead of typing "football" into a search bar, customers now ask questions — what colour, what size, what age group, premium or budget. Rufus interrogates their needs and recommends specific products. Some data suggests up to 40% of Amazon US sales now involve Rufus at some point in the journey. David thinks the real number is closer to 20%, but it's growing fast and rolling out across Europe right now. The play is simple. Rufus, like any AI, leans toward whatever it has the most data on. To make a product the answer, sellers need to identify the top 25 questions customers ask about their category and then answer those questions across every part of the listing in priority order. The most important questions go in the titleNext most important in the bullet pointsThen the product imagesThen the back-end attributesThen the reviews and Q&A Selluna's free tool at app.selluna.ai/audit will surface the top 25 questions for any listing. Sellers can also run a title and bullets through ChatGPT, or write the questions out manually based on what real customers ask in reviews and support emails. Traditional Amazon SEO Still Drives Most Sales [12:03]The SEO pillar still drives most sales on Amazon. David's team targets over 80 keywords on a single listing, with each one appearing on average three times across the title, bullet points, back-end and Premium A+ Content. Top keywords appear 35 to 40 times. And before anyone panics about keyword stuffing — David's continuous testing shows the conversion penalty is negligible (one or two percent) compared to the traffic gain (ten to twenty percent or more). "Keyword stuffing" is a fear from the Google 2012 era. On Amazon in 2026, frequency is still a seller's friend. Why Now, Not Next Year [19:30]David is urgent about Rufus optimisation, and there's a specific reason. Amazon SEO used to be like this. In 2016 to 2018, sellers were building empires on a single product image and a short title because almost no one was doing proper SEO. The brands that put in the work then are still ranking today, a decade later, on the authority they built when the field was empty. Rufus is in that 2016 moment. Adoption is on a hockey-stick curve. The questions a seller teaches Rufus to associate with their product now will compound into 12-24 months of defended position. The brands that wait will be fighting for second place, the same way most SEO sellers are today. Why Not A/B Testing Your Main Image Is "Criminal" [24:57]Once a product is showing up — in Rufus answers and on search pages — people still need to click. And 80% of click-through rate is driven by one thing. The main image. David did not soften this. "Not doing at least two or three A/B tests for a product that's doing over $1,000 per month in sales is criminal in 2026." The maths is brutal in a good way. A 10% lift in clicks is not a 10% lift in sales — it's much bigger over 12-24 months, because more clicks tells the Amazon algorithm a product is performing better than the competition, so Amazon shows it more. The compounding can be the difference between $40,000 and $50,000 in monthly revenue from the same listing. A few practical rules from David — Make the product as large as possible in the frameAdd contrast, especially heavy shadows behind white products that disappear into a white backgroundTest the image at the size of two thumbs on a phone, because that's the actual viewing surface for most shoppersAdd a label on or attached to the product showing the main keyword (a "blue football" label on a blue football). Even a 5% subconscious lift in click-through is significantDon't break the label free from the product — Amazon's AI flags floating elements Conversion — Where Premium Branding Earns The Price Tag [33:08]The conversion pillar is where most sellers leave the most on the table, because it's the largest surface area to work with. Seven product images. Premium A+ Content. The brand story, a section above or below the product description that almost everyone skips. David's principle for product images is the same as for Rufus listings — answer the top 5 to 10 questions in priority order, but visually. If a seller is selling a £60 ($75) premium product against £12 ($15) competitors, the first image after the main one needs to be a "us versus them" answer. As David put it, "a confused buyer is not a buyer." One of David's clients, Doodlebrush, sells at £60 ($75) against competitors at £12 ($15) and holds 20% market share. The reason is branding. Premium pricing demands premium branding — the same logic that lets Nike and Apple charge what they do. If the branding doesn't match the price tag, the price tag loses every time. Text For The Algorithm, Images For The Human [39:32]David's closing line is the one Matt said he'd be quoting. "The text speaks to the algorithm. The images speak to the customer." The titles, bullet points and back-end fields aren't there for the customer to read (almost no one does). They're there for Rufus and the search algorithm to chew through and decide where to rank a product. So write that text for the machine — keyword-rich, question-answering, dense. The product images are where the human meets the product. They need to be visual, scannable, and built around the questions a real buyer is asking — not paragraphs of text the algorithm could already read elsewhere. Where To Start This WeekAudit the top 25 questions — through Selluna's free tool, ChatGPT, or manual research from reviewsRebuild the title and bullets to answer those questions in priority orderA/B test the main image on any product doing $1,000+ per month with Brand Registry. Run for at least four weeksAudit the conversion stack — seven images, Premium A+ Content, brand story. Each one needs a jobMatch the branding to the price tag — premium pricing demands premium branding before customers will accept it Today's GuestToday's guest: David Balan Company: Selluna Website: https://www.selluna.ai/ LinkedIn: Connect with Selluna on LinkedIn Episode link: Up to 40% of Amazon US sales now touch Rufus, Amazon's AI shopping assistant — and most sellers haven't optimised a single product for it. That's the gap David Balan, founder of Selluna, walked through with Matt this week. The customer who used to type "blue football" into a search bar is now asking a chatbot what kind of football would suit a six-year-old, and the products that show up first are the ones answering the right 25...

    43 min

  2. APR 29

    The £500 Tool She Uses to Fact-Check Her Marketing Agency

    Rachel Hanretty pays £500 a month for a tool that fact-checks her marketing agency — and she has opinions about why every seasonal ecommerce founder should do the same. In this episode, Matt Edmundson sits down with Rachel Hanretty, founder of Mademoiselle Macaron, the Scottish brand shipping up to 25,000 macarons a week UK-wide. Rachel built the business from a St Andrews student flat in 2013 after training in Paris, and thirteen years on she has strong views on attribution, agency accountability, the seasonality trap, and the gulf between what Instagram wants and what authenticity actually looks like. The conversation covers Triple Whale, Klaviyo's tendency to overstate its own impact, a Pinterest wedding ads experiment that burned thousands, a Charlotte Tilbury collaboration that produced lipstick-matched macarons at H Beauty, and why Rachel feels "gaslit by her own business" every April to September. It is half ecommerce masterclass, half therapy session — and Rachel is refreshingly honest about both. In This Episode(01:30) From a Paris kitchen to 25,000 macarons a week(07:15) The seasonality trap: "gaslit by my own business"(14:00) Attribution wars — why Klaviyo and agencies overclaim(17:00) The £500/month tool that fact-checks her agency(22:00) Everyone needs an Alan: fractional CFOs and complementary hires(27:00) ROMS — return on macarons spent, and experiential retail(34:00) How do you do authentic Instagram when your niche is Paris? Attribution Is Broken, And Every Platform Is Overclaiming(Around 14:00) Rachel's biggest challenge is not product or operations — it is knowing which marketing pound is actually doing the work. Klaviyo, she says, is "way too generous" with the revenue it claims. Agencies do the same. Until she started using Triple Whale, she had no independent way to push back. "When you're being charged thousands of pounds for a service, you're like, no, I'm really sorry, but that number doesn't match up with the number in my bank." — Rachel HanrettyMatt picks up the thread with a story from Neil Hoyne, Google's Chief Measurement Strategist and author of Converted, who once traced a single pair of shoes back through 236 separate customer touchpoints. If every platform claims that sale, the maths does not work. Matt's recommendation (crediting previous EP guest Matt Putra): stop fighting about platform-level ROAS and track blended ROAS — the one number no agency can spin. The £500 Tool That Coaches Her Through The Data(Around 17:00) Rachel pays £500 a month for Triple Whale, but the attribution modelling is not actually what she values most. The real prize is the platform's AI chat — she calls it "MobiChat" — which she uses as a coaching tool. "I just say, can you explain what's going on with the Meta ROAS? Should I cut the budget? And it throws up the halo effect model of Meta on Google. I'm like, thank you so much for explaining it — because you're not paying by the hour." — Rachel HanrettyOver six to nine months she has used the tool as much to build her own knowledge as to interrogate the data. When an agency sends a report, she pastes it into Triple Whale and asks: is this right? That single habit has changed the power dynamic in every agency conversation she has. Shopify-only tool (a limitation worth flagging for non-Shopify founders)Value comes from the coaching layer, not just the attribution modelUsed to sanity-check agency claims and reduce reliance on fortnightly calls "Gaslit By My Own Business" — The Seasonality Trap(Around 07:15) October to March is the heroic half of Rachel's year: Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Easter. April to September is a different business entirely — different audience, different messaging, different paid media strategy. The same product, but the customer and the context shift underneath her. "Sometimes I feel like I'm being gaslit by my own business." — Rachel HanrettyHer Pinterest wedding-ads experiment is a case in point. The team put thousands into Pinterest last summer aiming at brides, only to realise that people already getting married that summer had booked their suppliers months earlier. Wedding customers need to be reached a year ahead — not in the season itself. Rachel's lesson: cost per acquisition, not ROAS, is the number that matters when you are used to seeing 5-8x returns and suddenly cannot. Every Company Needs An Alan(Around 22:00) Rachel started the business at 23 with very little reference point for managing people. Two leadership coaches and one fractional CFO later, she has a working philosophy: hire for the gaps in your own skill set, and do not be afraid when those people outshine you in their area. Her fractional CFO is called Alan. He builds the dashboards that link a website order to grams of sugar, the cost of a 20% off promo, and the capacity implications of a given campaign. He is, as Rachel puts it, "the adult in the room." "Every company needs an Alan." — Rachel HanrettyMatt echoes the point with Andrew Carnegie's epitaph: "Here lies a man who knew how to surround himself with people cleverer than himself." The discipline is not just hiring well — it is managing your ego when someone else shines. ROMS, Charlotte Tilbury, And The Rise Of Experiential Retail(Around 27:00) Rachel's framework for the business breaks down into three "moments of luxury": moments of celebration (weddings, birthdays), moments to impress (corporate gifting and brand activations), and moments of thoughtfulness (gifting). The middle category is where the most interesting growth is sitting. Last year Mademoiselle Macaron worked with Charlotte Tilbury across H Beauty stores, producing thousands of macaron boxes colour-matched to individual lipsticks. The end customer may or may not eat the macarons — they are often photographed and posted on social media alongside the product. Rachel coined a term for measuring this kind of spend: ROMS — Return on Macarons Spent. "Sometimes I don't even know if the macarons get eaten, frankly. I'm okay with it as long as they were paid for." — Rachel HanrettyThe Freezer Confession (And A Note From Pierre Hermé)Rachel shared an operational secret that many founders in the fresh-food space will recognise: Mademoiselle Macaron freezes its macarons. Far from being a downgrade, the French pastry chef Pierre Hermé has publicly said that "anyone who says they don't freeze their macarons is a liar — because it improves the texture." Freezing makes the texture more marshmallow-like, and it gives Rachel the operational flexibility to take pre-orders from October and ship fresh-feeling product right up to the last Christmas posting day. Authenticity vs The Algorithm(Around 34:00) Rachel's "question for Matt" was the most honest moment of the conversation: her niche is Paris, which is aesthetically beautiful, so every other bakery brand on Instagram is polished to within an inch of its life. She went to Paris in January, paid for an Airbnb-experienced photographer to shadow her for 36 hours, and hated every minute of it. Her Scottish phrase for how she feels about polished-female-bakery-Instagram: "gie's me the boak" — it makes her feel ill. Matt's advice: stop trying to be polished. The videos doing one to two million views are shot on iPhones. The accounts winning are the raw, authentic ones. He points to his own son, Zak the Nutritionist, who built 70,000 Instagram followers in six months doing 60-second IBS-help clips filmed in Matt's back garden — and has now turned that audience into a successful recipe book. "Consistency wins every single day and authenticity wins every single day. It does not have to be polished. People buy you." — Matt EdmundsonKey TakeawaysFact-check your agencies. Platform-level ROAS from Klaviyo, Meta, and Google are all overstated. Use blended ROAS and an independent tool to sanity-check claims.Cost per acquisition > ROAS when you move between seasons or audiences.Long-tail channels need long-tail thinking. Pinterest for weddings works — but the year before, not during the season.Hire your Alans. A fractional CFO (or anyone filling your skills gap) is worth more than another marketing hire when you cannot read your own numbers.Experiential retail is a real revenue channel. Brand activation work pays per unit and builds social proof.Stop trying to be polished. The algorithm rewards authenticity, not aesthetic perfection — even in aesthetically-driven niches. Resources MentionedMademoiselle Macaron — a href="https://mademoisellemacaron.co.uk/" rel="noopener noreferrer"...

    56 min

  3. APR 22

    Why Your Products Should Be on 60 Marketplaces, Not Just Amazon

    Most ecommerce sellers limit themselves to one or two marketplaces. Jorrit Steinz, CEO and founder of ChannelEngine, argues that's leaving serious money on the table. With over 1,300 marketplaces now available worldwide, the opportunity to reach new customers has never been bigger — or more manageable with the right tools. In this episode of The eCommerce Podcast, Matt Edmundson sits down with Jorrit to discuss why marketplace selling is no longer optional, how to choose the right platforms for your products, and why spending on marketplace ads might be a smarter move than pouring budget into Google. Jorrit also shares practical advice on getting started without drowning in manual processes, and reveals the biggest mistake most sellers are making right now. Key points from this episode: 01:49 — What ChannelEngine does and the 1,300-marketplace landscape09:17 — How to choose which marketplaces to sell on20:47 — The biggest mistake in marketplace selling25:49 — Why marketplace ads beat Google spend for organic ranking The 1,300-Marketplace Opportunity You're Probably Missing[01:49] Jorrit explains that ChannelEngine connects brands and retailers to over 1,300 marketplaces globally, handling product listing, order management, and stock synchronisation in one platform. The landscape has shifted dramatically. COVID accelerated the trend of traditional retailers launching their own marketplaces, and Amazon itself is pushing sellers from 1P vendor relationships to 3P seller accounts — particularly those under a $20 million threshold. Matt shares his own experience with this shift, noting that Next in the UK now operates a marketplace where brands sell alongside Next's own range. These "local hero" and vertical specialist marketplaces are multiplying fast. "There are 1,300 marketplaces in our network. Local heroes, vertical specialists — the landscape is much bigger than most people think."How to Pick the Right Marketplaces for Your Products[09:17] Jorrit's advice for choosing where to sell starts with a simple principle — look at the seller-to-buyer ratio on each marketplace, not just total traffic. Amazon has 600 million products listed, meaning competition is fierce. Smaller, more specialised marketplaces often have far fewer sellers competing for the same buyers. He recommends using AI tools like Claude or Perplexity to research marketplace options in your category. The practical starting point is modest — six to seven marketplaces in the first year, then build from there. One of his German customers now runs 60 marketplaces with just two people, because the right automation makes scaling manageable. "Look at the seller-to-buyer ratio on each marketplace. Amazon has 600 million products — competition is fierce."Why the Biggest Mistake Is Not Selling on Marketplaces at All[20:47] When Matt asks about common marketplace mistakes, Jorrit's answer is direct — the biggest mistake is not doing it at all. Many brands hesitate, worried about channel conflict or complexity, and miss the growing opportunity cost entirely. For established brands, Jorrit recommends pairing an agency with automation tools to get moving quickly. For those just starting out, the path is different — begin on marketplaces first, then build your direct-to-consumer shop alongside. The key is to always be where your customers already are, rather than trying to pull them to where you want them to be. "The biggest mistake? Not doing marketplace selling at all. The cost of not doing it is increasing every day."Spend on Marketplace Ads, Not Google — and Why That Builds Organic Ranking[25:49] Jorrit shares a contrarian advertising strategy. Rather than spending on Google Ads to drive traffic to your own store, invest that budget in marketplace advertising. The reason is that marketplace ad spend builds your organic ranking within that platform. As your products climb the rankings, you get sustained visibility long after the campaign ends. He also recommends driving external traffic — from social media, email, or other channels — directly to your marketplace listings rather than your own website. This signals demand to the marketplace algorithm and pushes your products higher in search results. It's a compounding effect that Google Ads simply cannot replicate. "Spend on marketplace ads, not Google. It builds your organic ranking on the platform."Today's GuestToday's guest: Jorrit Steinz Company: ChannelEngine Website: channelengine.com LinkedIn: Connect with Jorrit on LinkedIn Episode link: https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/why-your-products-should-be-on-60-marketplaces-not-just-amazon

    42 min

  4. APR 15

    How to Start a Print on Demand Business on Etsy With Nigel Wymer

    Start a Print on Demand Business on Etsy for Less Than £15What if you could launch a profitable ecommerce business with no stock, no warehouse, and no design skills for under £15? Nigel Wymer from POD Launch Pro joins Matt Edmundson to walk through exactly how to build a print-on-demand business on Etsy from scratch. With nearly 20 years in ecommerce and almost £40k net earned last year while barely working on his stores, Nigel brings the receipts to match the strategy. In a hands-on episode framed around helping Matt's daughter Zoe start her first business, they cover niche research with AI, Etsy store setup, the algorithm game, sourcing, pricing, and realistic income expectations. Key points from this episode [04:32] What print on demand actually is and why it requires zero stock[07:28] Why Etsy beats Shopify for beginners[12:41] How to research niches using AI and why specificity wins[33:33] Setting up your Etsy store for SEO and trust[36:41] Working with the Etsy algorithm as a new seller[45:59] Pricing without racing to the bottom Why Etsy Beats Shopify When You're Starting Out[07:28] Platform choice is one of the first decisions any new print-on-demand seller faces, and Nigel's advice is unambiguous. Start on Etsy. The reasoning is simple. With Shopify, you launch to zero traffic. From day one, you're spending on ads or pouring time into social media just to get eyes on your products. Etsy, by contrast, had 86.6 million buyers last year — people who actually purchased at least one item. That's a massive built-in audience you can tap into without spending a penny on advertising. "If you want to go on to Shopify, then that's something I recommend you go on to later, once you know what sells. You've got the audience there now that you can trial it with on Etsy." — Nigel Wymer [08:10]The trade-off is familiar to anyone who's sold on Amazon. You don't own the customer relationship the way you would on your own site. But for someone just starting out, access to traffic far outweighs that limitation. And with just a £15 one-off fee to open a store, the financial barrier is almost non-existent. Niche Research With AI Changes Everything[12:41] This is where most people get it wrong. They dream up a design, create a product, list it, and hope for the best. Nigel's approach starts in the opposite direction — research first, always. And there's a common misunderstanding about niches. Dogs and cats are not niches. Sports is not a niche. You need to go much deeper. "You really want to go into these smaller areas where you are being very specific in your targeting. But also there is much less competition." — Nigel Wymer [14:40]Nigel demonstrated this live on the show. Starting with "sports" as a broad category, he used AI to identify underserved sub-niches. Ice hockey came up. Still too broad. So they went deeper — ice hockey goalkeepers, then into the specific slang, culture, and identity of that community. That's where you find products so targeted that customers feel like you made them just for their world. The obvious pushback is market size. Nigel's answer is elegant — you stack niches. Each micro-niche might only generate a small amount on its own, but when you're targeting dozens of specific communities, it adds up significantly over a year. "What you do is you're stacking up lots of different niches... you're getting a small amount of money from each, but stacking it up over the year will add up to a lot of money." — Nigel Wymer [15:58]Matt ran a live AI experiment during the episode, asking Claude for 20 underserved print-on-demand niche ideas for Etsy. The results included adaptive clothing for neurodivergent communities, grief and memorial keepsakes, and niche outdoor micro hobbies like gravel biking and disc golf. Working the Etsy Algorithm as a New Seller[36:41] New stores face an inevitable chicken-and-egg problem. No reviews means less trust. Less trust means fewer sales. Fewer sales means no reviews. Nigel's solution requires patience rather than tricks. List regularly — not ten products in one day, but one today, another tomorrow. Each new listing gets a temporary visibility boost from the Etsy algorithm as it tests whether anyone is interested. By listing consistently, you're telling the algorithm you're an active seller, which earns higher rankings. "Once you've got 10 sales, then the algorithm knows what you're about and who to show your product to. And it will then start growing." — Nigel Wymer [37:50]After that initial growth phase, you don't need to maintain the same pace. Nigel spent most of last year barely adding new products because he was renovating a house, and his established stores kept generating sales on autopilot. The key elements for a professional store that builds trust from the start include a branded banner (made on Canva), a simple logo, and a photo of yourself — since over 90% of Etsy sellers are individuals, and buyers want to know who they're purchasing from. The About Me section does double duty. It builds trust with buyers and contributes to your store's SEO. Beyond that, it's standard ecommerce optimisation — keyword-rich titles, detailed descriptions, proper meta text, tags using keyword phrases rather than single words, and alt text on images. Realistic Income and Getting Started This Week[48:23] Nigel cleared almost £38,000 net last year while barely working on his stores. That's the established-store reality. For someone just starting out, the benchmarks are different but still compelling. Nigel appeared on a Channel 4 programme presented by Scarlett Moffatt that investigated different side hustles. Print on demand came out on top as the easiest way to make £10,000 a year. Pricing is straightforward and doesn't require competing on price. A basic mug costs Nigel around £4.50 plus shipping from the manufacturer. He sells it for £10.99 plus shipping, passing the shipping cost through to the customer. For international orders, larger manufacturers have production facilities in multiple countries, so a US order gets made in the US — keeping shipping costs and delivery times reasonable. "The answer is not, as a lot of people will do, I'm not getting sales, I'll discount it, I'll go cheaper than everyone else. That's not the answer. The answer is create your totally unique product." — Nigel Wymer [45:59]To get started this week, open an AI tool and ask for 20 underserved print-on-demand niche ideas for Etsy. Pick one niche and go deeper — ask for sub-niches, community slang, inside jokes, and cultural references. Set up a free Etsy store for £15, create a banner and logo on Canva, write an About Me section, find a UK-based print-on-demand manufacturer, and create 4-5 products to list gradually over the first week. Then keep listing regularly. Today's GuestToday's guest: Nigel Wymer Company: POD Launch Pro Website: podlaunchpro.com LinkedIn: Connect with Nigel on LinkedIn Episode link: https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/how-to-start-a-print-on-demand-business-on-etsy-with-nigel-wymer

    54 min

  5. APR 8

    The Metric Nobody Tracks That Drives 56x Subscriber Growth

    Most ecommerce operators can rattle off their LTV, churn rate, and CAC without thinking. But when Jay Myers asked a room full of subscription experts at SubSummit whether anyone knew their referral rate, only one person raised their hand — and his was zero. That single overlooked metric, Jay argues, is the difference between a business that flatlines and one that grows exponentially. In this episode of The eCommerce Podcast, host Matt Edmundson sits down with Jay Myers, co-founder of Bold Commerce, to unpack the data behind referral-driven growth — and why a tiny shift in referral rate can mean 56 times more subscribers. Jay shares the strategies that actually work, from golden ticket referrals to paid memberships, and explains why most "share and save" programmes fall flat. Whether you run a subscription box or a one-time-purchase store, this conversation is packed with ideas you can start using today. 00:00 — Introduction and Jay's background02:56 — From archery store to 32 Shopify apps11:14 — The launch of RePete, Bold's AI reorder agent14:32 — The Subscription Death Curve and the metric nobody tracks22:48 — Golden tickets and the psychology of scarcity referrals36:40 — Practical implementation for any ecommerce brand40:14 — Dollar credits vs discounts vs percentages45:45 — Paid membership vs free loyalty programmes49:21 — How to connect with Jay Why Your Referral Rate Matters More Than LTV, Churn or CAC[14:32] Jay's 2022 SubSummit talk, "The Subscription Death Curve," revealed a striking blind spot in ecommerce. He asked a room of subscription operators to name their most important metric. People shouted out LTV, churn, CAC, and ARPU. Then he asked how many knew their referral rate. Not a single hand went up. The data tells a compelling story. Doubling acquisition moves the subscriber count higher, but the business still flatlines at the same point — around month 32. Reducing churn pushes the flatline further out, but it still flatlines eventually. However, increasing the referral rate from just 0.8 to 1.2 — a difference of 0.4 — results in 56 times more subscribers by month 30. Less than 3% of the average marketing budget goes toward referral programmesA viral coefficient above 1 is needed for true viral growthSuper-referrers need uncapped ability to keep sharing "There is no bigger thing you can do to your business to change the long-term health of it than increasing customers who refer other customers." — Jay MyersGolden Tickets and the Psychology Behind Referrals That Actually Convert[22:48] Most referral programmes follow the same formula — share a code, both people get a discount. Jay explains why this generic approach rarely works, and it comes down to the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. The golden ticket strategy works on a completely different principle. Instead of rewarding the sharer upfront, the approach relies on scarcity. One unique code, no immediate reward for the person sharing, and a focus on finding the ideal customer rather than casting a wide net. Generic "share 10, get 10" codes produce low engagement because extrinsic rewards crowd out genuine enthusiasmScarcity-based referrals tap into intrinsic motivation — people share because the offer feels specialThis strategy requires no app — Jay walks through how to run it with a CSV export and any email tool Dollar Credits Beat Discounts — and Here's Why[40:14] Not all incentives are created equal. Jay breaks down the psychology behind different reward structures. Dollar credit performs best — it creates a sense of ownership ("there's £10 in your account")Dollar discount comes second — tangible but framed as future savings rather than something already ownedPercentage discount performs worst — abstract, requires mental arithmetic, feels distant The distinction is subtle but significant. Credits feel like money already in your pocket, which changes buying behaviour far more effectively than a promise of future savings. Paid Memberships and the Sunk Cost Psychology That Builds Loyalty[45:45] Jay highlights three brands that show why paid membership programmes outperform free loyalty schemes through sunk cost psychology. Restoration Hardware — $125/year membership. Their 100,000 members account for 95% of revenue and spend 400% more than non-membersFabletics — $50/month gives members $70 in credit. The monthly commitment fundamentally changes how members shopAmazon Prime — almost never the cheapest option, but Prime members rarely price-shop elsewhere. The membership creates brand affinity that makes comparison redundant When someone pays to be part of something, they behave differently. Free loyalty programmes ask nothing and, in return, tend to get very little engagement. A paid membership creates a psychological contract that drives repeat purchases and deeper brand connection. Today's GuestToday's guest: Jay Myers Company: Bold Commerce Website: boldcommerce.com LinkedIn: Connect with Jay on LinkedIn Episode link: https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/the-metric-nobody-tracks-that-drives-56x-subscriber-growth

    52 min

  6. APR 1

    How I'm Using AI in My Ecommerce Businesses Right Now

    With 56% of CEOs reporting zero ROI from their AI investments, Matt Edmundson takes a refreshingly honest look at the four AI tools he actually uses across his ecommerce businesses right now. In this solo Slingshot episode of the eCommerce Podcast, Matt breaks down his monthly AI spend of roughly £350 and explains exactly how each tool fits into daily operations at Aurion, from deep research sessions to product photography and building what he describes as a digital second brain. Rather than chasing every shiny new tool, Matt shares how his team culled their AI subscriptions and settled on a focused toolkit that delivers real results. He also tackles the thorny issue of team adoption and offers a practical challenge for anyone still sitting on the AI fence. Key Points: Claude Code and Obsidian as a Second Brain [00:05:00]Deep Research with Perplexity [00:13:00]Learning Smarter with Google Notebook LM [00:16:00]Making the Tools Work Together [00:23:00] Claude Code and Obsidian as a Second Brain [00:05:00]Matt’s primary AI tool is Claude on the Max plan at around £150 per month, and he pairs it with Obsidian, a note-taking app that stores everything as plain markdown text files on your computer rather than locking them away in someone else’s cloud. The real magic happens when Claude Code connects to this system. “Think of the difference between texting a plumber for advice versus having the plumber in your house with their tools.”That’s the difference between using a chatbot in a browser and running Claude Code in your computer’s terminal, where it can see your files, run commands, and make changes directly. All company information, branding documents, playbooks, and scripts live inside one Obsidian vaultClaude reads thousands of notes and even learns and updates its own files over timeMatt describes the result as “more like having a team member who has spent six months reading every document you have ever written”Everything stays local on your machine, which is a significant security advantage over cloud-only toolsThe migration from his previous app (Craft) to Obsidian took about two days, and the system has been running for roughly three months Deep Research with Perplexity [00:13:00]For research tasks, Matt turns to Perplexity at around $20 per month. Unlike a standard chatbot, Perplexity provides sources with clickable links so you can verify everything it tells you. The narrative binding episode (episode 274) came from a full-day Perplexity research session that produced a 30-page documentMatt uses the voice chat feature during his Wednesday morning walks, turning exercise time into research timeThe sourced approach means you can trust and fact-check the output rather than blindly accepting AI-generated claims Learning Smarter with Google Notebook LM [00:16:00]Google Notebook LM, part of the Google Gemini suite at roughly $20 per month, takes a different approach to AI-assisted learning. Instead of drawing on the entire internet, it restricts its answers to the sources you upload, with a limit of up to 300. Matt used it to study negotiation techniques, uploading both Getting to Yes and Never Split the Difference and then asking questions across both booksThe audio generation feature creates 20-minute podcast-style conversations from your uploaded sources, making it easier to absorb material on the goBecause it only references what you give it, there’s far less risk of hallucinated information creeping in Making the Tools Work Together [00:23:00]The real value comes not from any single tool but from how they connect. Matt outlines a workflow where Perplexity handles the initial research, Claude Code turns that research into playbooks and frameworks, and those playbooks generate prompts for other tools like Nano Banana (Google Gemini’s image generation, used for product lifestyle shots). Nano Banana has been used for product photography, including an Omega-3 bottle lifestyle shot with dolphins, though Matt still works with his photographer Lindy for key shootsAI supplements the creative process rather than replacing itThe system stays current over time because Claude updates its own reference files as new information comes inTeam adoption has been gradual. Even the dev team were slow to pick it up. Not everyone needs the full setup, and the admin team use Claude with project files and specific prompts tailored to their rolesMatt’s challenge to listeners is simple but pointed. Pick one thing, give it a proper go for two weeks, and remember that AI is a co-pilot, not a replacement Episode link: https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/how-im-using-ai-in-my-ecommerce-businesses-right-now

    51 min

  7. MAR 25

    Why Your Best Customers Leave After the First Order

    Most ecommerce brands know everything about their customers but communicate like they know nothing. That’s the observation at the heart of this conversation with Max Beech, founder of Athenic and former product manager at Revolut and Yahoo. Max has spent years building personalisation features at scale, and he has a clear view of where ecommerce businesses consistently lose their best customers. In this episode, Matt and Max explore why the first 14 days after a purchase are the most important — and most wasted — window in the entire customer journey. They discuss why sending a discount code on day three might be doing more harm than good, why asking your customers one simple question beats months of behavioural tracking, and how smaller brands can turn their size into a genuine competitive advantage. Max also shares a story from the Ritz Carlton that became a Harvard Business School case study, and leaves listeners with a 20-minute audit that could shift the way they think about every message they send. Key timestamps [03:43] The first 14 days and why silence after the sale is costing you[09:57] Why one question beats months of data tracking[13:02] How to be personal without needing to scale[34:19] The Ritz Carlton giraffe and the power of being human The First 14 Days That Most Brands Waste[03:43] There’s a window after someone places their first order — roughly the first 14 days — that most brands either ignore completely or fill with exactly the wrong thing. Some treat it as dead air. The order’s been placed, the product’s on its way, and so there is nothing to do until next time. Others jump straight into selling mode (any sound familiar?) — a 10% off code on day three, a cross-sell email on day five. But the customer hasn’t even received their order yet. “Don’t try and sell them anything. Everyone’s been in that experience where they’ve been inside a store and that salesperson is just nagging them trying to be too salesy. It’s exactly the same experience that a lot of customers feel when they’re online.” — Max BeechThe irony is that this 14-day window is the moment of highest trust. The customer has just handed over their money. They’ve made a decision. They’re open, engaged, and paying attention. And most brands respond with either silence or a sales pitch. Matt draws a comparison with his favourite coffee shop in Liverpool. Everything is designed to get you to the counter — beautiful decor, a glass case full of pastries, a well-designed menu board, and friendly staff who take your order with a smile. Then you pay, and everything changes. You’re directed to stand in a formless queue with no sense of order, nothing to look at, and no engagement until someone shouts your name. “Everything is geared to getting your coffee order. And then of course they want to make you a good coffee. But at the end of the day, the experience while they deliver is rubbish.” — Matt EdmundsonThe parallel with ecommerce is hard to miss. Beautiful websites. Clever ads. Everything is engineered for that first purchase. Then the order is placed and it’s crickets. Why One Question Beats Months of Data Tracking[09:57] Most ecommerce segmentation is based on what customers bought, not why they bought it. Max uses a simple example to show why that matters. Someone buys a pair of running shoes. Standard segmentation puts them in one bucket — “bought running shoes.” They’ll get emails about running shoes, probably some socks, maybe a water bottle. But why did they buy those shoes? They might be training for a marathon. Or they might have just got a new dog and need something comfortable for walks. Two completely different customers with completely different needs, buying the exact same product. “If you’re trying to segment customers, you’re probably putting those two people into the same bucket, whilst in reality, it needs to be a very different experience.” — Max BeechThe fix isn’t complicated. A single question in a post-purchase email — “Why did you buy this?” — gives more useful information than months of behavioural tracking. And yet most brands never ask. Matt raises a fair concern about response rates, especially for smaller stores. Max’s answer is reassuringly practical. You don’t need statistical significance. Reaching out to about 10 customers is usually enough to spot a trend.It doesn’t need to be a formal survey. A WhatsApp message or a phone call to your top customers can work just as well.With tools like Claude, you can collect free-form answers and then analyse them in bulk later for patterns you’d never spot manually. Being Personal Without Needing to Scale[13:02] There’s a common objection to this kind of personalisation and it’s the belief that it doesn’t scale. Max’s response is straightforward — it doesn’t need to. “If you stick a handwritten letter in your next product delivery, then the open rate is going to be 100%.” — Max BeechMax references Stitch Fix, the personal styling company that built a billion-dollar business on the premise that your personal stylist remembers you. Every profile update, every kept item, every returned item, every note — it was all stored and used. Their algorithm wasn’t really an algorithm at all. It was just being incredibly organised with customer data so that a human could use it at the right moment. The same principle applies at any scale. Even without investing in software, ecommerce founders can build a better understanding of each customer by being more organised with where they store data and knowing where to look when someone reaches out. Max also shares his own experience at Yahoo, where the finance app sat at 3.5 stars on the Android Play Store. He spent at least an hour every single day replying to every review — reading them, responding personally, feeding the insights into the product roadmap, and even going back to update reviewers when a fix had been deployed. It wasn’t scalable. He managed it for about a year. But it transformed his understanding of what customers actually wanted. “It’s where ecom businesses have such an opportunity to be more personal and to try to find those opportunities that the bigger brands aren’t able to fulfill.” — Max BeechThe Ritz Carlton Giraffe and Why Being Human Goes Viral[34:19] A family stayed at the Ritz Carlton. Their child left behind a beloved stuffed giraffe called Joshi. The parents told the boy that Joshi had stayed behind for a holiday. The hotel staff found Joshi and ran with it. They photographed him by the pool, in a spa robe, driving a golf buggy, lounging with sunglasses. They created a full photo album of Joshi’s extended vacation and returned him to the family with the album. It wasn’t efficient. It wasn’t in any brand guidelines document. But it went viral and became a Harvard Business School case study — because it was human. “There are lots of examples where a company just allows either themselves or their customer service team to be human and to break the rules. And that’s where you can really change it.” — Max BeechThis connects directly to the advantage that smaller ecommerce businesses hold over the giants. Amazon can sell on convenience, but they don’t know their customers. Large brands with centralised customer service teams and templated responses can’t do what a founder who picks up the phone can do. Max’s parting challenge is disarmingly simple. Go into your email platform and look at the last five messages you sent to customers. For each one, ask yourself whether it’s about what the brand wants or about what the customer needs right now. “If the answer is mostly what I want — and it probably is — then you’ve got a really clear brief of what to fix first. It takes probably 20 minutes. Most brands will never do it.” — Max BeechThat 20 minutes might be the most valuable thing an ecommerce founder does this week. Today’s GuestToday’s guest: Max Beech Company: Athenic Website: getathenic.com LinkedIn: Connect with Max on LinkedIn Episode link: https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/why-your-best-customers-leave-after-the-first-order

    47 min

  8. MAR 18

    You Get Three Thumb Scrolls Before They Buy or Leave

    Mobile shoppers decide to buy or leave after seeing less than a third of your product page. Adam Pearce from Blend Commerce has seen it happen across hundreds of Shopify stores and shares the fixes that consistently lift conversion rates by 30 to 50 percent. Episode SummaryIn this episode, we dig into the gap between how ecommerce sites are designed (on desktop, in boardrooms) and how they are actually experienced (on a phone, in three scrolls). Adam Pearce, co-founder of Blend Commerce and organiser of eCom Collab Club in London, shares the data-backed changes that move the needle most on mobile from a single search bar tweak to trust signals that boosted one client's average order value by 34 percent. He also covers mobile apps, on-site quizzes, heat mapping, and why knowing your North Star number matters more than any individual tactic. Key Point Timestamps: 05:06 - The mobile experience problem 06:00 - The exposed search bar (30-50% conversion lift) 10:22 - Three thumb scrolls and mobile decision-making 19:54 - Accordion menus, sticky CTAs and product page structure 22:46 - Trust signals: the car parts example 34:43 - What consistently works across sites 43:51 - Data tracking and your North Star number The Exposed Search Bar (06:00)Most mobile sites bury search behind a small magnifying glass icon. Blend Commerce has spent the past couple of years running one simple test: make the search bar visible. Always. The result is a conversion rate increase of 30 to 50 percent, consistently, across sites of all sizes. It even works for small catalogues. Working with a US crisp brand that had just eight SKUs, the team discovered that customers were searching for ingredients which told them the information existed but was not easy to find. One change opened the door to understanding how customers were actually navigating the site. The broader principle is that people are lazy. Not in a negative sense but in the way that every one of us, given the option between effort and ease, chooses ease. Making search visible is making it easy. Making it easy makes people buy. Three Thumb Scrolls (10:22)Using heat-mapping tools like Microsoft Clarity, Adam's team can see how far down a mobile product page visitors actually get before they act. The number is consistent and striking: between 23 and 30 percent of the page. That is less than a third and after that point, the visitor has either bought or gone. As Adam explains: "People will agonise about all these wonderful sections. But a lot of the time, they have kind of made their mind up already." The practical takeaway is simple: the top 30 percent of every mobile product page is where the focus needs to go. Every element competing for space in those three scrolls has to earn its place. Everything else, style suggestions, lengthy brand story, people-also-bought, is largely unseen. Trust Signals Below the Button (22:46)Blend Commerce worked with a car parts brand whose About page was full of compelling reasons to buy. Their product pages had none of it. Surveying their top LTV customers revealed two things customers valued most: a 90-day returns policy and a one-year warranty. Neither was on the product page. They added both directly below the add-to-cart button. The result was a 15 percent increase in conversion rate and a 34 percent increase in average order value from that single change. In a three-scroll window where decisions are made fast, trust signals do the heavy lifting. The question for any brand is: what are your best customers actually worried about and is that visible in the moment they need it most? What Consistently Works (34:43)Beyond the headline changes, Adam shares several fixes that recur across sites. Instagram-style navigation circles, four or five top collections shown as visual thumbnails at the top of the page rather than a hamburger menu, give immediate visual signposting and work on desktop as well as mobile. Replacing swipe-indicator dots beneath product images with actual thumbnails means customers can see more content at a glance without swiping to discover it. And for categories where customers feel uncertain, supplements, beauty, food, an on-site quiz not only guides them to the right product but feeds data directly into segmented email flows. Sticky add-to-cart buttons are non-negotiable. As Adam puts it: "Yes, needs to be visible at all times." The data does not argue with itself on that one. Today's GuestToday's guest: Adam Pearce Company: Blend Commerce Website: blendcommerce.com LinkedIn: Connect with Adam on LinkedIn Episode link: https://www.ecommerce-podcast.com/you-get-three-thumb-scrolls-before-they-buy-or-leave

    47 min
See All (200)

5
out of 5
11 Ratings

About

If you’re looking for great tips and insights into how to run your online store, look no further than the Ecommerce Podcast: a show dedicated to helping you deliver eCommerce WOW. New episodes are released every Thursday, and each episode features interviews with some of the biggest names in the eCommerce world. Whether you’re just starting out in eCommerce or you’re a seasoned veteran, you’re sure to learn something new from each episode. So what are you waiting for? Subscribe to the Ecommerce Podcast today!

Information

  • Creator
    Matt Edmundson
  • Years Active
    2019 - 2026
  • Episodes
    200
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Aurion Digital
  • Show Website
    eCommerce Podcast