How To Turn Your Pod Store Into A Brand — Matt Simmons | Brand Strategy, Key Elements For Building A Brand, Brand Building, Building A Strong Brand Identity, Sustainability And Eco-friendly Print On Demand, Strategies for POD Store Growth (#278)

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Claus Lauter [00:00:00]:
This is episode 278 of the ecommerce Coffee Break podcast. Today we want to talk about how to turn your print-on-demand store into a brand. With me on the show, I have Matt Simmons. He is the head of business development at inkthreadtable.co.uk.

Claus Lauter [00:00:15]:
So let's dive right into it. But before we get started, a big.

Claus Lauter [00:00:19]:
Thank you to our sponsors for supporting today's episode.

Claus Lauter [00:00:23]:
Loyalty lion is a leading loyalty platform helping Shopify brands rocket returning customers with their own loyalty programs. With Loyalty lion, it's quick and easy to create a program that uses points and rewards to engage shoppers, secure more second purchases, and drive up lifetime value. Loyalty lion has been increasing returning customer rates for thousands of Shopify stores for over ten years. Visit loyaltylion.com to find out more. Find the link in the show notes.

Claus Lauter [00:00:49]:
Have you heard about partner hero? They're experts in support on the ecommerce industry, known for their outstanding team building skills. Their main pillars, quality people and culture makes them a great fit for your company. Learn more on partnerhero.com or click the.

Claus Lauter [00:01:01]:
Link in the show notes.

Voice over [00:01:05]:
This is.

Voice over [00:01:06]:
The e commerce Coffee Break, a top rated Shopify growth podcast dedicated to Shopify merchants and business owners looking to grow their online stores. Learn how to survive in the fast changing e commerce world with your host Klaus Lauter, and get marketing advice you can't find on Google. Welcome to the show.

Claus Lauter [00:01:31]:
Hello and welcome to another episode of the e commerce Coffee Break podcast. Today we want to talk about print on demand and how you can build a proper brand out of print on demand. Now, print on demand is something that I started my ecommerce journey about ten years ago with and I think it's still a great business concept. Specifically if you just get started and there's so many different angles to do it right and to grow a brand out of it. And that's something we want to dive into today. With me, I have Matt Simmons. He is the head of business development at Inkthreadable Co. Uk.

Claus Lauter [00:02:01]:
Matt has been in sales and marketing for over ten years, working with ecommerce brands from startups to household names on DTC projects. He has expanded companies into international markets and is an expert in growth strategies and post purchase experience. So the right person to talk to hi Matt, how are you today?

Matt Simmons [00:02:16]:
I'm not too bad, thanks Klaus. Thanks for having me on.

Claus Lauter [00:02:18]:
You're welcome Matt. Print on demand as I said, it's a great business concept because it makes it so much easier to become an entrepreneur, to start a business, to get your ideas out in the world. Now, from a technical side, it's easy, but to build a brand out of it, that can become a little bit more tricky. And you have done that and you are helping your clients with that. Tell me what brands or what businesses struggle the most with when they get started.

Matt Simmons [00:02:42]:
Like you said, you've done print on demand. I think a lot of people and a lot of listeners, especially if you've been on Shopify, you love flirted with print on demand in some way. And as a concept, it's great to get started. It's low cost, you're not carrying stock. You don't have the headaches of all the operational sides that you do with more traditional ecom businesses. But the main thing that I'm probably seeing from a lot of our customers and a lot of people who are moving away from other suppliers to come to us is they sort of don't set themselves out from the beginning in the right direction. And it's because when I look at pod stores, there's two kind of main styles. You have, like transactional trending stores, like pop up shops, and then you have people wanting to build a brand.

Matt Simmons [00:03:20]:
And what I see a lot of times is people put their eggs in all this trending basket, like a super obvious one. In the UK, you do anything about the government and it tends to know something critical about the government, for example, it tends to go off and people will share it and it goes viral. Thing is, if you're always chasing something viral and trending, it's really hard to sort of stop and actually build something of worth and something that will grow and last. And that the idea being build it into a brand. So from that point on, I would sort of say from like a get go, if you want to build pod into an actual branded service, as opposed to just an operational model, start with that end in mind, kind of have that idea on, okay, well, if this does go well, where am I going to go? Because a lot of people always plan for failure because we're just naturally pessimistic, especially in the UK. But then they never sort of plan on, oh, this goes really well, where am I going to go? So they then get some traction and then they're sort of left spinning the wheels trying to think, oh, right, well, what can we do now? Start planning with that sort of north Star kind of direction in mind.

Claus Lauter [00:04:25]:
As I said, having this in mind, obviously a brand, we need to sort of figure out what is a brand and what kind of elements and puzle pieces do you need to look at, to build a brand. And I want to dive a little bit deeper into that. So the technical side is clear. Print on a mart, very straightforward. You get your product out there, but what makes it a brand? Talk me into it.

Matt Simmons [00:04:46]:
There's a lot of courses and a lot of talks out there around what the sort of psychological concept of a brand actually is. For me, it's a few basic things, and it's not just like a fancy logo and things like that. It's sort of two or three main things. So one, having some sort of mission. Now what I mean by this is it doesn't have to be the grandiose, we want to change the world kind of mission, but having something that you're working towards and that then sort of ties into, I think, a page that's often overlooked on a lot of ecommerce sites is the about us page. Especially with print on demand and especially with ecommerce. People think they have to be anonymous. Like, oh, I'm just some random person who's made some designs and I'm selling them.

Matt Simmons [00:05:22]:
People don't want to know about me. No. And they get very bashful. No. Because anytime I ever look at a new site, or anytime I look at a site, I always go to the about us page because I want to know, oh, who is this person or who is this brand? What are they about? Just helps form that relationship. I've worked on large scale DTC projects, startups, had a spell in the sort of b two b consulting world as well. And the simple fact of no matter the method of sales, whether it's person to person, b to b, b to c, ultimately it's just that building of that relationship. So having that sort of mission, just something about you that you actually want to achieve through doing this, it could be sharing a story.

Matt Simmons [00:06:00]:
Maybe not a mission, but a story. Why did you get into this? What inspired your designs? What excites you? Because then it gets that person buying into you or your brand, and then from there, just having a set of core values. These don't have to be shouted about, but sort of core value that you as a business operate by. Because this was on a show I was listening to a few months ago, but they sort of said if Hilton was to make trainers, we have no idea what they would look like. But if Nike was to make a hotel, we know exactly what it would look like. And that ties into consistency, which is probably the biggest thing that needs to be focused on consistency, not only in your messaging, but in your visuals, but also on platforms, like if you are saying one thing on TikTok and then another thing entirely different on Facebook or Instagram, people tend to see sort of things. They don't just look at one channel. If they're looking into your brand and they're making a considered purchase, they will do their research.

Matt Simmons [00:06:51]:
And if they're seeing things that are polar opposites apart, it then starts to build that little bit of doubt and ambiguity in people's minds. And then ultimately you risk losing sales. So, yeah, those sort of three things. Having a mission, having a core set of values you operate by then ultimately just making sure you're consistently executing in line with those.

Claus Lauter [00:07:11]:
Now, from putting that in place, from the technical side, there's more than just having someone shipping out a product in an anonymous brown bag. Tell me a little bit on how branding actually then looks in real life.

Matt Simmons [00:07:23]:
This comes back to a lot of my experience in the three PL world. So prior to joining the team at incredible, I worked with a large scale three PL company, taking them into international markets. There's a lot of content out there focused on the sort of first half of the customer journey, like getting them to buying and essentially getting their money. And then people treat the post sale experience as an afterthought. But that can, in some regards, and with some projects we've worked on, end up netting bigger results over time than just firing in new customers. Because customer acquisition, no matter what market you're in, is expensive. It's four times easier to get a customer who's already bought from you to buy again. So this is what we help with brands.

Matt Simmons [00:08:03]:
So as an initial service, we have a really strong offering in what we do. We're getting orders out consistently on time and to a high degree of quality with a very minuscule amount of errors. That's all down to our sort of digitized and automated production processes. But then when customers start getting traction, they want to actually build that branded service. Really simple things are, from a physical standpoint, your packaging is the obvious one, creating a bit of an unboxing experience, because like you said, brown paper bags, they're great because they're eco friendly and they're compostable and they're in line with what we want to do, but something a bit different. We worked on one project and what we ended up sending out was everything was in. This was years ago, so not as eco friendly, but they were in sort of black jiffy bags, the old bubb wrap bags, and they were sent out in like matte black bags. So these are quite expensive, but the amount of traction that sort of got online as far as oh, this is something different, something new, really helped build social proof because people were just naturally just posting user generated content for free because it was something, ooh, black, ooh, exclusive, shiny.

Matt Simmons [00:09:08]:
Then aside from your physical side of things, the customer engagement process, this also ties in with the rise of slow fashion and the changing in buying habits. And I'd be keen to get your thoughts on this, whether you think buying habits are now changing from I need everything now to I'm happy to wait because obviously with the rise of sustainable fashion and slow fashion, but there's a great marketing guru, genius guy, I don't know, Rory Sutherland, if anyone's ever heard of him. I think he's a vice chairman of the agency. There's a brilliant quote around Uber and it's a whole reason why Uber actually works. The uber map is like, he calls it a psychological moonshot in a way, of it doesn't make getting a taxi any quicker, it just reduces the friction and the frustration of well, where's my taxi? And it's the same thing with the domino's pizza tracker. Do any of us actually believe that it's being put in the oven, it's being made? Do we actually believe that? Probably not, but it's that, oh, something's happening. So this idea of with the about us page building that relationship and then through, once they've purchased, it doesn't have to be peppering them with emails, but just that consistent communication on hey, quick update, this is what's happening. How are you? Here's some valuable content you might find useful in between them, purchasing and then receiving that product.

Claus Lauter [00:10:25]:
And now a quick break to thank the sponsors of today's episode.

Claus Lauter [00:10:29]:
Tired of watching customer drift away after their first purchase? Then it's time to rocket your returning customer rates and drive six times more second purchases. With loyalty line as a leading loyalty platform in the Shopify space, loyalty line exists to make it as easy as possible for you to launch and manage your own loyalty program. They'll even build your loyalty page for you. With loyalty line, you unlock everything you need to engage shoppers with points and rewards and integrate loyalty data into your email, sms and help desk platforms. You also get a five star support as shown by the customer reviews on the Shopify App Store and G two. Visit loyaltyline.com to find out more and start your loyalty journey. Find the link in the show notes.

Claus Lauter [00:11:09]:
As a prominent player in the e commerce support arena, partner Hero specialize in delivering personalized customer experience solutions with a clear focus on helping you not just meet but exceed your goals and requirements. They have become experts in e commerce support. Their commitment to tailoring solutions to your unique needs ensures that your support experience.

Claus Lauter [00:11:25]:
Is nothing short of exceptional.

Claus Lauter [00:11:27]:
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Claus Lauter [00:11:35]:
That makes perfect sense. And you touched a couple of things that I can vouch for. Specifically the about us page and I did a lot of conversion rate optimization over the years is one of the most visited pages on a lot of stores. People don't believe that. But no matter what the landing page is in the first place, most likely the second page they look at is who are you? So the about us page, and that not only helps you with conversion, but as we're talking about brand building, also helps you with building your brand and keeping in the mind of a person and then going all the way through to the packaging through a letter or whatever which included in your delivery makes such a huge difference. And I think you touched on the point of slow fashion. I think it helps really to get people come back to your store and maybe just not buy as much, but buy more conscious what they buy and from whom they buy. I want to touch a little bit on the part of the economical part of it because the profit margins with print on demand can be relatively small.

Claus Lauter [00:12:36]:
How can you optimize that? How can you get people back to buy more or what kind of products make the most sense to get started with?

Matt Simmons [00:12:44]:
It depends, I would sort of say on the direction and brand you're wanting to maybe go in. If you are just looking to build a transactional ecommerce store where you're just connecting up to, for example, us, we've got a range of budget friendly products where you can make a fairly healthy margin, but what you tend to aim for with those sorts of stores is kind of saturation. So rather than having not only limited, but a more thoughtful, laid out design of limited prints or limited product designs, you tend to go shotgun against the wall. Here's 1000 different designs. You sort of tend to bank on the fact that you're going to get hit on something trending. They tend to be a cheaper product, so people will sell those for a lower value because they tend to be a bit of an impulse. That's a funny t shirt, that's a funny mug. I'll buy it.

Matt Simmons [00:13:32]:
So they're really great to get started. But what I would always say is that you then want to turn it into a more of a luxury, kind of more premium feel. So one is around how you position your product. So we work with a number of blank manufacturing brands, one of them being what we classify as our most premium line being Stanley Stellar. So their products are 100% organic cotton, they're vegan verified, they're Peter approved. So that in line with how we operate as a business, we are 100% plastic free. Our printing uses water based, nontoxic organic inks. And then with things like embroidery, I think around 80% of our threads are recycled cotton.

Matt Simmons [00:14:07]:
So we're really low on sort of wastage. We don't throw anything in landfill. Clothes that fail QC get recycled and sent on to a second live. So when you're looking for that more premium line is acting as if simple things there is elevating your store. So Uniqlo is a great example of this, because people use ecom flats very often, and again, they're digital mockups. They're cheap, they're free. But if you want to then build it up to more of a luxurious experience, hey, we're a real business, either going for model shots or ordering your products, getting them worn and actually taking shots of a model with them, or going the next level up and looking at lifestyle shots. So like, oh, if you're a coffee focused kind of brand, then make sure there's a cup of coffee or some beans or something, or it's in a relevant environment, so you're building that more aspirational aspect.

Matt Simmons [00:14:56]:
If it's a fitness brand, have them doing something fitness related in some of the product photography. Again, show your product being used in that sort of scenario. It goes that extra level over what you need and then from how to make more margin. So obviously, at the time of recording this, we've just had Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and looking at just Shopify stats alone. It's been insane. But again, a lot of people, their instant reaction is, oh, we're at the holiday shopping season, here's a 30% discount code, and they're just losing margin for the sake of essentially increasing turnover. For me, I would always look to offer more for the same price than just discounting your initial product. So again, if you are building that brand, what could you offer as like either an upsell or a sweetener? So, for example, if you are a fashion brand, start to our newsletter list and get our exclusive lookbook, for example.

Matt Simmons [00:15:54]:
And that could be a bunch of model shots of them, of people wearing your clothes with other items where then you could maybe have affiliate links or something like that as a way of generating additional revenue or again just offering bundled products. So mugs are like from print on demand. Like this is one of probably the original print on demand products offering it a case of if they order this or spend the x amount they get a freebie. All of a sudden it's that people love something for free. So all of a sudden it's a case of well, if I have to spend a little bit extra to get that, I'm going to spend that extra. Because again, it's all around increasing that average order value. Not just discounting for the sake of, well, everyone else is doing it.

Claus Lauter [00:16:31]:
Makes perfect sense. I think a lot of merchants that will be a shift in their mindset because a lot of them come from a trendy product, from an idea, from a hobby. And now building a brand is a complete shift there. So you need to up the quality of your branding, of your messaging and so on and so forth. But it's definitely worth it because the profit margins will be so much better. Now you're at the forefront of print on demand. Do you see specific trends right now in the market?

Matt Simmons [00:16:58]:
Personally, we're seeing a lot of people coming over to us for a lot of our printing technology as well as essentially our sustainability credentials. There's other printing processes out there that sort of use a lot of either chemicals like plastisol or they use vinyl in their printing because ours are water based, again not intoxic, organic. The technology we use, DTG, we almost print and it dries into the cotton fibers of the t shirt. So it's a very, very hard wearing print but it's incredibly vibrant just down to our expertise of our operators and the setups that we use. So we are noticing a big shift insofar as people wanting to offer something that is eco friendly. It's not just small brands doing know. Nike, Amazon, Apple all now have net zero marketing campaigns. Whether you believe them or not is a different story.

Matt Simmons [00:17:46]:
But they're all pushing, hey, we are caring about the environment. Apple have been doing it for years and they're doing a lot of work on their supply chain. For example to remove carbon and make the MacBook that I've got right now is 100% recycled parts. So it's not just small brands doing this. So we are seeing obviously a lot of big brands out in the industry pushing a net zero because it is, whether you like it or not, it's happening and we all need to do our part. So to speak. So that would be the biggest thing I would say is trending in a product point of view. There's no major movers in that space, but it's more seasonal.

Matt Simmons [00:18:21]:
So again, a time of recording. It's very cold here in the UK, so hoodies and sweatshirts are way up. Well, t shirts are sort of Evergreen, but then obviously the warmer months, t shirts tend to outsell, obviously, hoodies quite often. And that can then obviously come down to how you position on your store is moving. Featured products know, having seasonal favorites as like a collection on Shopify, for example, again, just goes to show that you're doing things and you're adapting to the time of year.

Claus Lauter [00:18:47]:
Okay, let's talk about your solution and the platforms that you support. So you not only support Shopify, there's others as well. Tell me a little bit about that.

Matt Simmons [00:18:56]:
We've grown quite steadily to quite a large level over the past ten years. That inkfurble has been around when Alex and Amy first set up the business. And it's grown for two reasons, really. One is just a really consistent high quality of service, and then two, just word of mouth from happy customers, which when I've come in as head of Biz Dev, it's nice and easy, right? Because we've got lots of happy customers. So insofar as that, we're all about making things as easy as possible for customers. So we integrate with the major e commerce platform. So Shopify, obviously the big one. And then you have woocommerce, wix, squarespace, big cartel, and obviously Etsy, which is again such a very big marketplace platform.

Matt Simmons [00:19:38]:
What we tend to see is Shopify is the overwhelming, vast majority of our customer base. And not to, obviously, I know we're on Shopify podcast. I don't want to talk too much about Shopify, but it's kind of for a reason, right? It's a really good platform. Then through the integration, the idea that we have is ultimately store owners want to do one thing, which is have a few things, have fun, grow your brand, grow your business, and make money. So they don't want to be bogged down in operational admin of doing things. So through our integration, for example, with Shopify, we can offer personalized products, things such as names and dates. So customers can like a really easy upsell is like some sort of feature on your Shopify site, an extra two pound. Have this product personalized with your name.

Matt Simmons [00:20:20]:
Because our process is digital, there's no additional cost. On our end, it's a printed a print, but you get a little bit extra margin out of your customer for a personalized product which does have value. So with our marketplace integration, once the customer is checked out, the order then comes to us, for us essentially to start production. So again, to cut down on admin time, customers can have a standing balance with us. So once the order comes to us, we can draw down automatically from that balance. So you don't have to remember to log into our platform to pay for it. It can be done automatically by drawing down from your balance. Boom, we start production.

Matt Simmons [00:20:57]:
It goes into print or embroidery. It's then QC'd, providing everything's AOK. It then goes to dispatch. And then what we do is we then pass that information back to Shopify to say, hey, this order has now been fulfilled. And then it's back onto our customers to then have their probably automated email follow up sequence done. And there's a really big reason for that is we feel it's really important for customers, in that case, the brand owners that we work with to maintain that customer relationship. End users don't want to hear from some random person at ink threadable about their order. They want to hear from the brand that they purchase from.

Matt Simmons [00:21:29]:
And that is, again, the idea being for us, we're automating as much of our end as possible so customers can do again, brand owners can do one thing, which is grow, have fun, win new customers, and build strong relationships and loyal fan bases.

Claus Lauter [00:21:44]:
Makes perfect sense. Very straightforward. I think the process shouldn't be too difficult. And implementation as it is, the Shopify app is also very straightforward. Before we come to the end of our coffee break today, is there anything that you want to share with our listeners that we haven't covered yet?

Matt Simmons [00:21:58]:
Have a plan for success, which sounds a bit dramatic, but when you're getting set up with your store, you're always so focused on the here and now, what you need to do right now for me, before you even get started, if you are started, just take a step back for a few hours and go, okay, well, if this does get the traction, because if you are going to put the energy in, success will come. Like consistency and persistence beats talent. And going viral on TikTok every day of the week for me. So just have that idea on if you want to go somewhere, where is that going to be? Because you don't then want to be two years down the line. You're doing designs and things that you're not passionate about because the brand kind of got away from you and you just ended up following trends. Think about this as a business. Again, if you wanted to be successful, there are a lot of people who have lifestyle stores great. They're just nice and easy ticking along.

Matt Simmons [00:22:48]:
But if you want this to be a business, treat it seriously like a business just because it's ecommerce. Again, the amount of huge ecommerce brands, this is a serious, real business. Act accordingly. Have some substance behind your decisions.

Claus Lauter [00:23:00]:
Yeah, I can vouch for that. If you have a vision and you know where to go, it's much, much easier because it's so easy to get lost in the thousand things that you have on the plate as a solopreneur, as an entrepreneur in the daily business, and then really losing focus. And that's the worst thing that can happen to you. So where can people find out more about you guys?

Matt Simmons [00:23:19]:
Our website, so it's incthreadable co. UK. So there will be some links obviously in the show notes and they can also contact me directly either by your email or through my LinkedIn. So it's just matt s at Inkthreadable Co. UK. My approach is you have any questions around Printondemand, if you even want to just scope out is printondemand a viable solution for you? I'm more than happy just to have a chat and give you some advice. My whole approach to dealing with customers is I'm not interested in shoehorning you into our processes. If it's right for you, I'll give you the honest answer.

Matt Simmons [00:23:50]:
If it's not right for you, I know other people in the industry or other providers or other solutions for you and I'll happily point you the right direction. So the idea being, if you have any questions around print on demand at all, just get in touch.

Claus Lauter [00:24:01]:
That's a great offer. I will put the links in the show notes, then you're not just one click away. Matt, thanks so much for the time today. I think direct to customer and print on demand is a good combination and gives anyone out there a chance to build a proper business. Thanks for your time today.

Matt Simmons [00:24:15]:
Yeah, thank you.

Claus Lauter [00:24:16]:
Hey, Klaus here.

Claus Lauter [00:24:17]:
Thanks for joining me on another episode of the e commerce Coffee Break podcast.

Claus Lauter [00:24:20]:
Before you go, I'd like to ask.

Claus Lauter [00:24:22]:
Two things from you. First, please help me with the algorithm so I can bring more impactful guests on the show. It will make it also easier for others to discover the podcast, simply like comment and subscribe in the app you're using to listen to the podcast, and even better if you could leave a rating. Secondly, please take a moment to check out today's episode sponsors. They play a crucial role in keeping the show and our newsletter available to you for free. Thanks again and I'll catch you in the next episode.

Claus Lauter [00:24:45]:
Have a good one before you leave.

Claus Lauter [00:24:47]:
Don'T forget to visit the sponsor of today's episode. Have you heard about partner Hero? They're experts in support on the e commerce industry, known for their outstanding team building skills. Their main pillars, quality people and culture makes them a great fit for your company. Learn more on partnerhero.com or click the.

Claus Lauter [00:25:02]:
Link in the show notes Loyalty lion is a leading loyalty platform helping Shopify brands rocket returning customers with their own loyalty programs. With Loyalty lion, it's quick and easy to create a program that uses points and rewards to engage shoppers, secure more second purchases, and drive up lifetime value. Loyalty lion has been increasing returning customer rates for thousands of Shopify stores for over ten years. Visit loyaltylion.com to find out more. Find the link in the show notes.