#385 The Future of E-Commerce: AI, Amazon DSP, and Scaling with Dan Brownsher

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Mehmet: Hello, and welcome back to a new episode of the CTO show with Mehmet. Today, I'm very pleased joining me, Dan Brownsher. Dan, thank you very much for being with me on the show today. The way I love to do it is I keep it to my guests to introduce themselves. So tell us a little bit more about you, your [00:01:00] journey,

Dan: what you

Mehmet: are up to currently, and then we can start the conversation from there.

Mehmet: So the floor is yours.

Dan: OK, first off, Mehmet, thank you for having me. It's an honor to be on the show and great meeting you. So I'm Dan Brownsher. I'm the founder, CEO of a business called Channel Key. Uh, and what we are is an agency that works with brands, uh, and advertisers. And, uh, we support them on developing their strategies and executing their businesses on the Amazon platform.

Dan: So we don't touch social channels. We don't touch other marketplaces. Amazon is the primary channel that we support a little bit of walmart. com. Um, so I run a fully remote business. Uh, there's about 83, 000 people. Three or 85 of us currently, uh, folks all over the world. Uh, we work with some of the biggest brands all over the world as well, uh, very close partners with, with Amazon.

Dan: Uh, and we run a lot of, uh, we'll probably be, probably manage, uh, over half billion dollars in in GMB or, uh, retail revenue through Amazon this year and close [00:02:00] to 50 million in media. So we run things at a, at a high scale. Um. And I've been running this business since, uh, officially January of 2017, but we spun out of a sister company that I founded back in with some partners back in 2008, 009, which was a product business.

Dan: So, in essence, we became an eCommerce business sourcing goods and Alibaba. Uh, it was an idea that developed on a. Train in Germany, uh, in Munich, uh, with one of my buddies. And we started that as a side business and that turned into a very large private label, Amazon business that we sold to private equity.

Dan: And then an agency that spun out of that organization as well. So I've been operating on Amazon either as a brand owner, as a reseller or an agency service provider since around 2010, which were the early Amazon days. So I'm super excited to be here and, uh, uh, chat with you.

Mehmet: That's fantastic. And I think, you know, Dan, like I, I'm still new to podcasting.

Mehmet: I was telling you [00:03:00] this before we start to record. So one of the areas that people keep asking me, okay, you didn't cover anything related to podcasting. to, to e commerce enough yet. So I'm happy that, so I'm happy you are with me here today because I think together we can, you know, let's say, let's say you're going to do it, not me.

Mehmet: Of course, you're the experts. You're going to kind of demystify a few things, but you know, the first thing, you know, by nature, what I'm curious about, because, uh, I follow anything related to entrepreneurship and I follow, you know, people who try to do things all the time. And one of the things that I noticed is that the Amazon business itself, like it evolved over the years, right?

Mehmet: So it's changed a lot. The platform changed. So from your perspective, then if, if you, we want like to kind of give a, um, Run the audience with a quick kind of a throwback to from beginnings of you started to Southern 10 till [00:04:00] today. So how things changed, of course, yeah, dramatic change, I believe, but the most important that I want you to highlight is You know, and I'm sure you, you help currently also, uh, people you work with in defining, you know, the strategies that comes up every time the business evolves.

Mehmet: So I'm pretty kind of curious to know, you know, how you kept, you know, with the, with the business changing and what was also like the, the, the source for that success.

Dan: Yeah, this is a great question, Matt. So I'm going to, I'm going to try and, um, I'm going to start early and try and, and try and catch, catch, catch you up or catch everybody up, at least in my, my view of the world.

Dan: So, um, I think most people know this, but Amazon started selling books, right? They were a big book retailer, um, sourcing books and selling books. And it became this anything store. Um, when [00:05:00] we started selling on Amazon, call it 2010, um, we were what's called a third party seller. Okay. So, uh, one of the most beautiful things about Amazon, in my opinion, is it has created this platform for entrepreneurs to start e commerce businesses with basically zero barriers to entry.

Dan: Okay. To become a professional seller on Amazon, it costs you like 40 bucks a month. You submit your bank bank account and. Boom. All of a sudden you're a professional seller. Okay. Obviously it's much harder than that. You've got to source products. You've got to build a brand and you've got to do all of these things.

Dan: But when we started in 2010, um, we were a reseller. Okay. So we were a, we would go, we would go to trade shows in Las Vegas and we would go talk to Tommy Hilfiger or some brand that people know. Um, and Amazon at that point was somewhat nascent and, uh, we would go to Tommy Hilfiger. Or Kenneth Cole or to me or [00:06:00] whoever and say, Hey, uh, we're, uh, at the time, uh, cuff crazy or trend nation.

Dan: We had a bunch of different companies. Uh, we want to buy your wallets. Um, and, and what we were doing is we were reselling them on Amazon. Okay. And this was the early days, like to, to sell on the platform today, you've got to run advertising. Um, you've got to leverage Amazon's fulfillment services. It's a way more complex business than it was back then.

Dan: But back then there was zero advertising. Okay. So we were a reseller and essentially we were just trading commodities on Amazon at that time. And the business absolutely exploded because there wasn't a lot of people doing what we were doing. Uh, and we really leaned into it. And started buying very deep into certain product types with really well known brands and the business exploded.

Dan: I think we doubled every single year for four or five years in a row. We were, yeah, I'm in Las Vegas with fastest growing company in Nevada. Uh, and it was really exciting. But what [00:07:00] happened was since there are basically no barriers to entry to become a seller on Amazon, their competition started coming in and in essence doing what we were doing.

Dan: Um, and we were, in my opinion, the only value we were adding to the brands was we were, we were buying bulk, uh, and we were paying them on time. Aside from that, we weren't building their brand. We were just trading their goods on the platform. And once all these other competitors came in, it became harder to trade, right?

Dan: Because we were just competing on price. So price going down, down, down, down, down. Margin took a hit. The business wasn't protected, right? People talk about moats in entrepreneurship. Well, we had absolutely no moat, right? We were just buying and trading on the platform. So we pivoted. We said to all these brands we knew, uh, hey, listen.

Dan: Your product pages on Amazon don't look great. Um, you're confusing the customer, your prices all over the place. Uh, we, it, it should look and feel like [00:08:00] your website, but it doesn't. Um, let us fix all of those things for you. Um, and let us run your advertising on the platform with you because that, that whole program launched.

Dan: And in exchange for doing all of those things for you, uh, let us be your exclusive seller for those products on Amazon, right? So that was the first time we said, all right, we're going to provide a We're gonna do a value add kind of service. Now we're still buying the inventory. Um, but it was designed in a way to help the brand and build the brand on the platform.

Dan: So we did that for a while. We simultaneously started doing Amazon. Uh, we started doing private label where we would, uh, with tools, find all this white space on the platform where there was a lot of search demand for a product type. Uh, or a keyword and ideally there would be less, um, opportunities for consumers to buy because there wasn't options.

Dan: We would source those goods, create a brand behind it, enter that market, [00:09:00] um, and become a brand participator. So, as opposed to reselling somebody else's brand, we own the, the, we own the brand. We own the intellectual property, the trademark and the brand. And we sourced the goods directly for the manufacturer.

Dan: So we kind of split. So we had this exclusive distribution model, then a private label model. And ultimately as the business developed, both did relatively well, but the private label model, um, started performing quite well and the margins were better and it, and it gave us a lot more control. So our kind of thesis for running businesses on Amazon shifted and ultimately said.

Dan: If the protected strategy or the protected model on Amazon long term is you need to own the brand, you need to own the intellectual property. So we said, if we're going to buy any inventory on Amazon, or buy any inventory to sell on Amazon, we have to own the brand. We have to. So we push very heavily into private label.

Dan: And then we said, [00:10:00] we know how to build these really, uh, these best in class businesses on Amazon. We've done it. We've made all the mistakes. We know all these brands. Um, we don't want to buy the inventory of somebody. We don't want to buy somebody else's inventory. But we can help these brands. So why not create a service based model where the brand is the owns their account.

Dan: They own their seller account or they own their vendor account with Amazon. It's tied to their, you know, tax ID and their bank account. But we operate the store for them. We develop the strategy for them. We run their ads for them. We manage their catalog. We manage their store. We do all of that. So that was kind of the genesis of, of channel key.

Dan: So we separated the businesses, um, and, uh, we put a really large Amazon private label business. And then I, the agency is where the agency is. We've done really well. Um, and so it's evolved over time and what, what has happened is as more [00:11:00] competitions come in, more sellers have come in private label has become a lot harder, the advertising business for Amazon is.

Dan: Absolutely exploding right now. And so what's happening is, um,

Dan: brand building is winning right now. It's really hard to build Amazon only brands right now. I E where Amazon is the only channel you're selling, uh, where in the past you could do that. Now you have to build a brand. You have to develop a social media presence. You have to drive traffic into Amazon. You got to build a Shopify website.

Dan: Um, and the really well operated brands are well run brands on Amazon. Are also placing media quite well. Okay. So there's an entire advertising funnel on Amazon. Uh, and there's an entire, uh, advertising ecosystem on Amazon and you've got bottom, bottom of funnel ads that are very transactionally based.

Dan: And then you've got awareness ads. You can run TV ads via [00:12:00] Amazon. So The brands that are really doing well and really developing and really sophisticated and really have a good idea of the Amazon ad funnel, uh, are the ones that are doing well right now. Um, so it's definitely gotten more complex over time.

Dan: Um, but the market is still really, uh, vibrant and there's so much opportunity out there right now. And, um, we're right at the forefront of that, which is, which is quite exciting.

Mehmet: That's fantastic. So just one, Quick, uh, again, I'm curious by, by nature. Yeah. Because you mentioned like mainly brands that everyone knows, of course, but is it like you were focusing on the categories of like, let's say fashion or like, uh, or like.

Mehmet: It can be anything really, you know, when we, when you say, for example, creating brands, uh, because the first thing that comes to my mind, like it's maybe getting a shirt with a brand or maybe getting, I don't know, like a jeans with a brand. So when we say brand, is there any specific [00:13:00] category that you saw or from your experience that always it should be nowadays be brand rather than going with the old model, uh, that you just mentioned?

Dan: So, um, when we were running our private label business, And developing products for Amazon. We didn't really care what category it was in. Right. So we had it. We sold that business to private equity, but at the very end, we had a really large outdoor solar lighting business. We had a really large kitchen, uh, a kitchen business.

Dan: We had a really large adult, um, we sold these adult animal onesies, like Halloween costumes. If you're an adult, you want to dress up like a giraffe or whatever. It's a zip up, a massive adult animal onesie business. We were selling robes. We were selling pajamas. Uh, it was again, we didn't care of the category.

Dan: We just, the data told us where the white space was. [00:14:00] And if we felt we could source products and make money, we would enter that category, build a brand behind it that nobody had ever heard of before, but we knew there was search volume and search demand for those types of products. So we entered the market, right?

Dan: Um, which that business is, is still viable and live much harder than it used to be. Um, hold on. I lost my video. I quantified the private label part of that business, right? So for us category didn't matter. We just wanted to find the opportunity now as an agency owner where I'm operating other people's businesses Uh, there are certain categories that have a dynamic that that we like, right?

Dan: So you could do you can use soft lines, right? You do apparel you can do shoes Uh, and that's a hard that's a hard dynamic. You've got a lot of skew variations. You've got sizes. You've got colors You We do a lot of forecasting and demand planning. You've got seasonality, you've got [00:15:00] fashion, and that can be a really hard business to manage.

Dan: Um, and it's a different type of consumer. You, we work with a lot of supplement companies. Also supplements are completely different than apparel, right? That's more of a, um, continuity type business where you're trying to get new customers. There's, there's a lifetime value of that customer and you're trying to get them to purchase the first time, but then get on Amazon, subscribe and save model where they're purchasing every 30 days.

Dan: So you have to buy the business every single time. It just happens naturally. We have a big toy business. Uh, we have big furniture business. Uh, so we're generally category agnostic. We work with, with, with brands that are already at scale or that are doing some volume on the Amazon platform versus like a, like a net new customer.

Dan: Um, but what's interesting is. Every category has a different dynamic on the platform in a different way that you market to [00:16:00] the consumer in a different way to look at the the modeling of the business in a different way to look at the demand planning the business in a different way to advertise, right?

Dan: Are you running mid funnel ads? Are we building awareness? Are we doing programmatic ads? Are we just doing search ads? So it all just very much depends on where the brand is in their life cycle and what category they play in.

Mehmet: Absolutely. So you get, you kept highlighting the importance of advertising, Dan.

Mehmet: Um, and honestly speaking, you know, I know like, okay, you can utilize the ad platform on Amazon, right? So, so to push your products like, and work on that. Uh, and I'm very transparent guy. Everyone knows. So probably maybe I didn't come with the, with the term Amazon DSP, right? Which, uh, which, which was new to me, uh, I don't know, like they, they, they have something, you know, called like this, which is advertised with the demand side platform.

Mehmet: So I'm [00:17:00] curious to understand more about like, of course, on a high level, um, how this works, like, and what would be the added value to Amazon DSP? The seller in this case, because they are the, let's say the store owner or the brand owner, because of course they're going to utilize it to, to get their, uh, uh, products in front of the, uh, the customers, right?

Dan: Yeah. Yeah. So DSP, uh, for Amazon, you said it's a demand side platform. It's, um, it's a newer ad type. Um, and it's a bit more of a sophisticated ad type. So to run DSP ads, uh, on Amazon, you either have to, to do those directly with Amazon, or you have to do them with a service provider that, that, that has a seat, right, a DSP seat.

Dan: We fortunately have a seat. So we, we operate DSP campaigns all the time for our clients. Um, the really cruel thing about. DSP is that, uh, [00:18:00] if you think about what Amazon is, okay. Yes. They, you, you sell products to their platform. Um, they also have AWS, right? So cloud cloud solutions, uh, cloud storage solutions.

Dan: Um, they have, um, they have a really large content business. You've got streaming TV, you've got prime video, and then here in the United States, they've got rights to the NFL. Wow. They just did deal with the NBA, with WNBA. So they're streaming all of this content now. Um, and so there's, there's hundreds of millions of prime members.

Dan: Right, right now, right. That have a subscription. They're paying Amazon 120 bucks a month or whatever the number or a year, whatever the number is to get access to buy products for free delivery, for free returns, for access to prime TV. So you can view all this really cool content. So what, what Amazon is doing is they're collecting your data, right?

Dan: So they have a prime member, they know exactly what I [00:19:00] buy. They know my age, they know my gender, they know what, what I buy, when I buy, they know what I watch on TV. They know what I'm into. So the cool thing about DSP is they're allowing brands and advertisers to monetize that data. So, uh, now they're not going to tell you who I am.

Dan: They're going to give you my email address or tell you my name. But if I'm selling, uh, uh, uh, pet treats, right. For dogs and I, uh, want to, um, um, uh, advertise to new pet owners. Okay. I can build an audience of a cohort that is selected by Amazon. That is targeting new pet owners. Okay. And so I can say, all right, I want to target new pet owners and I want to display ads to them programmatically on an Amazon owned property or or through [00:20:00] some other app or widget or something.

Dan: But I want to only target this cohort that are recent pet owners or new pet owners. And so you can find these, you can, you can build these audiences based on whatever criteria you want and whatever data Amazon has. Okay. So it's really cool. Um, also, um, you can, um, people think about Amazon specifically with advertising is selling products or buying products with DSP.

Dan: Okay. You don't actually have to sell a physical product on Amazon to leverage their advertising platform. Okay. So for example, um, uh, we're talking to a company that sells travel excursions, like international travel excursions. They don't sell a physical product on Amazon, but guess what? The people that are buying their travel excursions are prime members.

Dan: Okay. So how can I build an audience or a cohort of, of individuals that have a high propensity or a high [00:21:00] likelihood To want to buy some sort of travel package. Well, you can build that and you can do that. And you can advertise those people through Amazon's advertising network would be through TSP. Uh, and the conversion is a sign up on your website.

Dan: It could be a download of your app. It could be a blog signup. Right. So the conversion for advertising to the platform on Amazon does not have to be a product sale. It can be a signup of a service, which is super cool. And the way you do that is through DSP.

Mehmet: That's fantastic. You know, like I opened it, I would say.

Mehmet: Um, and because, you know, the nice thing about it, that's, I think it's applicable across the globe because Amazon prime is available in every place. They operate like I use Amazon prime myself, even in Dubai. Um, so, so, you know, The way you explain that, so it really, you know, trigger things because also like, uh, you know, the streaming service, I mean, the TV streaming service is also available in, in, in every part.

Mehmet: I think they operate nowadays, so they, you can have [00:22:00] it everywhere. Now this brings me, because I'm asking you these questions then, because people People sometimes they want to go with the entrepreneurship route and of course they say okay. I want to pick up e commerce now one thing that I have a theory maybe i'm i'm wrong with my theory is that like Entrepreneurship and you know going and starting a business in e commerce is not Okay, of course, there are like common things which all entrepreneurs, they would have, but I believe that there are some additional skills or let's say additional traits that these e commerce entrepreneurs need to have to able to succeed.

Mehmet: So, because, you know, a lot of times I heard stories like someone started, you know, their business, they tried multiple things. They even went to some. Let's put it in quotes. They went to, to, uh, consultants to advise them on how to run. And at the end, you know, they couldn't continue the business or [00:23:00] they.

Mehmet: You know, kind of stopped at a certain level and they couldn't be able to, you know, scale the business. So what do you think, you know, some of the things that really entrepreneurs interested in, in, in being, uh, in the e commerce, especially on Amazon need to have differently or what they need to think differently to, to be able to succeed.

Dan: Man, that's a, that's a loaded question, but I, there's like 10 different ways I could answer that. So here's, here's what I would say, um, broadly speaking, okay. Just not even considering the business type, uh, not considering whether it's e commerce or not, um, in my opinion, you have to, there's, there's so many reasons not to start, right?

Dan: There's risk, there's fear, there's, uh, lack of [00:24:00] certainty. Um, and so I think just starting is absolutely critical. Okay. And you might have a great idea or you might not. Okay. And in my opinion, that's okay. Uh, because what happens and I've seen this happen for me personally is I think the idea is this okay, but I start and I work and I learn and I make mistakes and I thought the idea was this and along the way I realized, you know it's actually not this.

Dan: This is different. Um, and if I would never have started, I would have never, uh, a tried and be realized that, uh, through testing and learning and failing and getting in my hands dirty that the business is actually something completely different. Okay. So if you're not participating, you're not trying.

Dan: You're losing the opportunity to discover, uh, whether or not the business idea you had in the [00:25:00] first place was right or different ideas that are going to naturally come to you along the way. Okay. So you gotta, you gotta start it and try it. Um, and, uh, take a leap of faith. Okay. So that's my broad outlook.

Dan: If I'm thinking about starting a Amazon business and whether that's a service business. Like, like that I run, uh, an agency or a product business. Um, I, I, I might answer that slightly differently. Um, and, and more specifically. So if, if I'm selling a, if, if I want to create a brand, if I'm wanna create a product, I wanna create a private label business on Amazon.

Dan: Again, what I said earlier is. You can absolutely do that. The barriers to entry are ridiculously low. Um, you can pay 40 bucks a month, have a professional seller account. You can go to Alibaba and source products. You can slap your brand on it and get a trademark. That's that stuff is easy to do at this point.

Dan: Okay. What's hard is [00:26:00] to understand how to drive traffic, uh, and, uh, understanding how the cash flow model works. Okay, for new brand owners, new sellers on the platform, just because you sell a thousand dollars worth of merchandise doesn't mean you have a thousand dollars in your wallet. Okay. What that means is then you've got to pay your advertising bill.

Dan: You've got to, you've got to redeploy that capital into more inventory. Okay. So, understanding how the cash flow model works with selling, Okay. Physical products on the, on the Amazon platform, especially as a new seller. In my opinion, from what I've seen is the hardest thing to do. People run out of cash.

Dan: They don't understand it. They can't float the business. Um, and then from a service based model, um, you can do it. Um, fortunately for me, um, we're playing in a, in an environment, Amazon, where there's a ton of opportunity. It's really hard. Brands want to be there. Consumers like it. The value of the [00:27:00] prime membership is super strong and I don't think that's going to change anytime soon.

Dan: And so we're playing the underlying environment or sandbox that I'm playing in as a good environment. It's got upside, it's got legs, there's opportunity. And so for me as an operator, um, what I've learned, uh, is, um, you've, as a founder, you have to be able to sell. You've got to be able to find your first customer or your 10th customer.

Dan: You have to learn how to sell the product. Uh, you have to learn how to talk to the consumer and you need to understand who the consumer is, what your ICP is. Uh, and you have to be the guy that closes deals. Okay, from my experience and at some point you need to get out of the way. Okay. So I've tried to build a business that scales and what I've learned over the years is the moment we reach a point where we're not scaling.

Dan: It's because I've become the bottleneck in the business and I need to, I need to replace myself with somebody else that can do that job. [00:28:00] Because I should no longer be doing that job. So my brain works is I want to grow in scale. Um, and I'm going to, and I'm a level up and I'm going to level up and I'm a level up and I'm a level up at each, at each point I need to get more, uh, I need to get more people involved that, that are empowered to make decisions that can operate, that are better than I am.

Dan: So I can get out of the way and not be the growth inhibitor because that's happened multiple times. And I've learned the hard way that. Sometimes I'm the issue and I need to get out of the way.

Mehmet: That's really very, very informative, Dan. Uh, and I agree with you, you know, like sometimes we need to move away.

Mehmet: So to, to, to let the business grow and not become the, sometimes, you know, the middle, middle, uh, man that always stop things and delay things. So 100 percent on this now on another side also as well, Dan, like, because I [00:29:00] know. you know, you and you mentioned in your intro also as well. So managing remote workforce and managing remote teams.

Mehmet: So how, how, how have you seen, you know, like, uh, this affecting productivity, how this affects, you know, the culture, um, and, and what are like the best strategies to, to make sure that we don't lose sight when it comes, especially to the culture and remote environment and of course the productivity. Yeah.

Dan: This is a great topic. Um, and I love this. I love talking about it. Um, so we weren't always remote. Okay. So I live in Las Vegas. Um, we had, I think, 3 offices in Las Vegas. Okay. I've been operating the business officially since January 2017. And in that time we had three separate offices. So, um, I've run an in person environment.

Dan: Um, we were tinkering with remote or like a flex remote [00:30:00] policy pre COVID. Um, and then COVID hit and we were forced to go remote and. Um, I, we just made the leap of faith and we, we did it. And we said, we're not going to renew the lease of our building. Um, we can operate this business type in a remote environment.

Dan: Like we're in the people business. Uh, I don't own trucks. I don't know inventory. I don't know machines. Literally our business is contracts and people and technology. Um, and so, um, And we operated it in a people first way. Okay. So we're in the people business. Our clients are people, our staff are people and that's it.

Dan: And so what I, my theory on this is it's not all that different than running an in person business. Like the fundamentals and principles around building a culture and building a team, uh, whether you're running an in person [00:31:00] environment or a remote environment and my opinion are very much the same. Okay.

Dan: So From a, uh, overall perspective, I trade, I try to create alignment with my team. Okay. And we use, uh, something called EOS, uh, which is a, a model or a system, uh, on how to operate your business. You can read a book, there's a book called traction, retraction, talk to you about EOS. And so we're very transparent as an organization.

Dan: We have the, our team knows our values. They know our business. They know who our customer is. They know our process. They know what our business financially is going to look like, uh, at the end of the next 30 days at the end of the quarter, and then over the next three years, and they know subjectively what the business is going to look like.

Dan: What are the things that we're working on right now? And what is the business going to look like in three years? And so we communicate that vision to the team. [00:32:00] Okay. So that's one. So ideally, the team is kind of rowing in the same direction. Um, and then along the way, um, my objective is to create an environment where my team wants to be a part of.

Dan: Okay. Like, they're enjoying each other. And so. Uh, we try to make sure the team is, uh, there's, there's these collisions happening, okay. Uh, where people are seeing each other. And so one of the rules I put in place at the very beginning that we've never strayed from is that every single meeting that we have as a business, whether it's an internal meeting or an external meeting, it's cameras on every single time.

Dan: And I've heard about zoom fatigue and I've heard of all of these things. And I don't know if I necessarily agree with that. Okay. Um, and the reason is, is because so much of communication is nonverbal. Okay. And I believe that running a remote business [00:33:00] with cameras on, uh, creates an honestly more intimate environment than, uh, than an, an office environment.

Dan: Okay. So I'm talking to you right now. You're in my home. You can see I'm in my office. You can see what I have on my background. Uh, there's, you might see my child run into the office. You might see my cat jump on the desk. Okay. I'm in my home and you're in my home with me. And I think that's really powerful.

Dan: And so we've created this setup where we're cameras on, people are seeing each other. And we are colliding daily. We have daily huddles. We have a team that creates events for the staff, uh, where we get together and we have fun. It could be a painting class. We've they're doing we, I think there's a karaoke event today that the team is doing.

Dan: So, like, we are very. Intentional about creating these collisions with each other in a remote environment, cameras on where we're in each other's homes together. And [00:34:00] so I think the intention around that is what's absolutely critical. And I think we've had a lot of success, um, productivity wise. Um, we're not micromanagers.

Dan: And I don't want to be a micromanager. And so we run EOS. Our team has scorecards. Uh, it's very clear to them what they're being measured on. And ideally we give them the tools. We give them the resources to execute to those scorecards or KPIs, and we just get out of the way and let them go. So, um, that's how we're handling it.

Mehmet: You know, like a couple of things just about, you know, being, uh, you know, opening cameras and being in, in the other place also as well. So for me, I consider all my podcast guests as my colleagues, because actually they are the owners of the show, not me, because they come and share their experiences. And to your point, like every time, like, and most of the time, you know, my audience knows, like the guests are.[00:35:00]

Mehmet: Not from the same country where I live. They are not living in Dubai, right? They are not in the UAE. Actually, they are a majority of the time either in the US, Canada, the UK. But, you know, and this is why I don't insist, but I prefer, even sometimes we have to do, for example, an audio only recording, right?

Mehmet: But I tell the guests, Look, I would not publish this on, on YouTube, but I prefer when I speak with you to have the camera open so I can interact better to your point. So a hundred percent, I agree with you on this. And the other thing, but I believe also Dan, you know, the more you make this inclusion with the team, you know, to let them feel, Hey, yes, we are, we are working remotely, but actually we can interact anytime we want.

Mehmet: We can have this, you know, visual eye contact, even over zoom or whatever. Uh, but just out of curiosity, like, but still you, I think you do kind of this, um, gatherings from time to time, maybe once a [00:36:00] quarter or so, right?

Dan: Well, so we have a, our cadence right now, where we bring the entire. Company together, uh, is we have an all staff meeting.

Dan: It's every two weeks. Everybody's together on camera. We have huddles, uh, every Wednesday and Friday in the morning. First thing where we all together, we're doing announcements. We're doing celebrations. We're gonna do an icebreaker. Okay, so that's the recurring cadence. Like it is a operational cadence that happens.

Dan: And then via our what we call our acts team or culture team. They plan other events that will happen every quarter or every six weeks or whatever. So, we've got an operational structure in CADIS where the team is coming together and seeing each other all the time. And then there's always department meetings, there's other meetings.

Dan: cameras on, but the culture engagements, uh, via that team are every six, six weeks, you know, every quarter or something like that. [00:37:00] So it's a blend of, it's a blend, but it's always cameras on.

Mehmet: Great. That's, that's amazing. Um, You know, one thing which I want to return back to the e commerce part, uh, a lot of things, you know, are changing and tech is changing and I'm interested to know, of course, like people gonna still buy things, right?

Mehmet: So, so this is why, you know, as, as e commerce. You know, from concept perspective, it's here to stay. We know this. But are you seeing like some emerging tools, trends that you believe are, you know, uh, candidates to, to shape, you know, the industry for the next couple of years from now and how, you know, if yes, how business can prepare for, for this shift.

Dan: Um, yes, absolutely. Um,

Dan: I think it, there's a lot of things we met, but the one [00:38:00] thing that is super hot right now that is relevant to any business type, uh, certainly to my business is AI, um, and how that proliferation is going to affect any type of business, my, specifically my type of business. Um, and it could be in so many different ways.

Dan: Uh, it could be around tools. Uh, it can be around. Um, um, how we're doing content, how we're doing graphic design work. Um, Amazon is rolling out this, this AI search, um, function, or it's called a, a, a, a virtual assistant or shopping assistant called Rufus. So the way that people are going to find products, uh, or products will be served up to them is going to be via AI.

Dan: Uh, I mean, it's just an absolute explosion right now. And so, uh, [00:39:00] I think businesses in general are trying to figure out what their AI environment looks like. And it's not a moment in time. It has to become a muscle, like an AI muscle inside your organization, where you are constantly innovating and trying to find ways to become more efficient.

Dan: And so that's what we're doing right now, whether that's through tool sets, whether that's through how we're finding new customers, how we're doing personalization and outbound messaging for, for go to market, uh, how we're creating graphic design or, or videos for our clients. Um, there's so many different ways that it touches the business and it touches the consumer.

Dan: So that is the topic right now, in my opinion, and I don't think it's going anywhere anytime soon. And, um, we've I brought some speakers in on this topic and one in particular mentioned this concept of just making like 1 percent improvements. Either every day or over [00:40:00] time and as you're doing that like you might not know what the road map is But you have to try and you have to test and you have to learn and you have to iterate And if you're making these one percent improvements over time Eventually, you're going to have a completely different looking business and that's what we're trying to do right now

Mehmet: Fantastic, and I agree with you on the AI part, but you know what?

Mehmet: What I have figured out because I talked to a lot of people who are in this space, um, you know, trying to leverage a I to to get it. Into different, uh, parts of this whole chain, because, you know, when we say e commerce and you just, you know, explain it, uh, during, uh, you know, this, uh, this conversation today.

Mehmet: So you have the supplying part, you have also managing the stocks part. You have also like the branding part, and then you have the part to let it reach to the end user. And you know what I'm fascinated by is like, people got it. So they are [00:41:00] going and specializing when I say AI in one specific aspect of this whole chain and working on enhancing one thing at a time, which I think it's very good because at the end of the day, who's buying like all of us, like we are, we are the customers, like we're going to go and to Amazon or even to a Shopify website, uh, uh, whatever it is, you know, the platform and we're going to interact and the AI is helping.

Mehmet: At the end of the day, our experience as end users, which is personally, I'm excited about it. Um, yeah, thank you. So then we covered, I think a lot today. Now, usually what I do is, you know, I have like this kind of famous question, like any final words you want to leave us with today for, you know, fellow people interested in starting business in e commerce.

Mehmet: And also what I always want. I guess to do to let us know how they can get in touch with you, you know, to know more about the services and, you [00:42:00] know, maybe start a conversation. So tell us

Dan: more. I'll start there. So, uh, to, to find me, uh, uh, or my company, I'm very active on LinkedIn. So you can look me up on LinkedIn, Dan Brown.

Dan: She can find me. You can look up channel key on LinkedIn. We're very active. Uh, go to channel key.com. You can sign up to be, uh, to receive our blogs. We put out a lot of content related to a lot of topics, mostly Amazon based. Uh, but we're easy to find. You can go to our YouTube channel, uh, where you can search me, you can search channel key.

Dan: Um, so that's the best place. Go to LinkedIn, go to YouTube, Google us. Go to our website, sign up for our blogs, get our content. Message me on LinkedIn. I'd love to chat and connect, um, from a final word perspective. Uh, and I'm speaking to entrepreneurs, right? Uh, here's what I'll say is entrepreneurship can be a really.[00:43:00]

Dan: Lonely journey at times and the life of an entrepreneur is uh, it's One day you're on top of the world and then the next day you're like man. I am I don't know anything I'm clueless. What how did I make this mistake? Right? And so there's a yo yo of emotion. And so what I've, what's helped me is to have, um, people around me that are in a similar position as me that I can talk to.

Dan: Okay. Help me help you with mindset, help talk you through certain situations, experience, share with you. Um, because the reality is, is how do we know what's good or bad, right? Things happen and it's, it's either a blessing. Or, um, uh, or learning experience. And if you have this mindset where you're going to get up and you're going to keep going and the [00:44:00] sun's kind of coming up the next day and it's, you know what, it's really not as bad as I thought it was, but it's also never as good either.

Dan: And you just keep going. All of a sudden you've, you've, you're, you're generating results for yourself. And so what I would say is, uh, stick with it. Keep going. Start. and build a network of people around you that are doing what you are doing. It doesn't have to be the same business type, but they're dealing with the same types of problems you have that you can go to when you need it.

Dan: Cause it's important.

Mehmet: Absolutely. And, uh, I always advise entrepreneurs also, you know, like if, if you really, believing in what you do. So you should expect, you know, ups and downs, but never leave. Right. So, so thank you for reminding us, uh, uh, Dan about this, because, you know, this is the message that you need to stay resilient.

Mehmet: [00:45:00] You need, I'm repeating things that everyone knows, but you know, I feel like we need to repeat this. Yeah. The journey,

Dan: it's not a linear journey. It's not a linear journey, right? Ups and downs, good days, bad days, but

Mehmet: Absolutely. Absolutely. So, and just want to say to the audience, They don't have to memorize anything from what you mentioned about the website and how to find you.

Mehmet: I will make their lives easy Again, I put the links in the show notes So you can go and directly connect with Dan or link it in or you can find his company His website also as well. So Dan, I really enjoyed the conversation with you today. I learned a lot Um, and, uh, it was very, uh, informative for me at least.

Mehmet: And I'm sure it will be for many people who are interested in e commerce in general and interested in, uh, starting business in, in e commerce and Amazon specifically. So thank you very much for sharing your expertise and knowledge with us today. And usually this is how I add my episodes. This is for the audience.

Mehmet: If you just discovered this [00:46:00] podcast, thank you for passing by. I hope you enjoyed it. If you did so, give us a thumb up and subscribe. We are available on all podcasting platforms and we are available on YouTube as well. And please share it also with your friends and colleagues and whoever you think it will be beneficial for them.

Mehmet: And if you are one of the People who keep listening or watching us. Thank you very much for you know Keep coming back to us and you know, even sometimes sending me your notes and messages. Thank you very much for doing so Keep them coming. Tell me your feedback whether it's good or bad I like always to hear feedback from people and if I can enhance something i'll be more than happy to do that Thank you very much for tuning in and we'll meet again in a new episode very soon.

Mehmet: Thank you. Bye. Bye