Ep #240 Boosting Your Ecommerce Biz with Meta Ads & TikTop Shop

Someone has probably told you to "just run ads" or "get on TikTok Shop" if you have an ecommerce business, and they're not wrong, but...

There is a time and place for each of these strategies depending on the size and stage of your business. When done at the wrong stage it is a waste of time and money - two things busy entrepreneurs don't have a lot of. 

My guest on today's podcast is Ari Gordon of Like and Likes, an agency that manages CPG digital strategies to boost sales online.

I love that Ari did it himself first as a brand founder of Hone and is now helping other brands choose and execute the right strategy at the right time for their business.

Stop the endless research and overwhelm! Know exactly what each sales channel looks like for success and create a roadmap for your unique business - it's all inside the Sales Channel Challenge https://www.foodbizsuccess.com/challenge

When you are ready to make the leap, get the support and accountability you need to create a beautiful business!

• Get Food Business Success to launch and scale to $100K guaranteed
• Scale your existing business to $300K in 2025 with the financial and operational foundations and become the CEO of your biz in Master Your Business

Pick up your copy of "Key Ingredients" on Amazon here.

Check out my YouTube channel at www.foodbiz.tube for how to videos to start and grow a packaged food business.

Transcript

Sari  0:00  
Which sales channel should I focus on first in my food business? I've been hearing the same question for years from passionate food entrepreneurs, just like you. And the reality is, there is no cookie cutter, one size fits all answer. The right channel for you depends on your specific product with your unique benefits and challenges, your current life situation, your personality, and your business goals. Some of you will see the most success by going to farmers markets. Some of you have a product made for e commerce, and some of you are going to do really well getting on store shelves. And some of you would benefit from having a mix of two, or even all three of those. But what's important here is that you are making the decision based on you, and not what someone else is telling you that you should do. That is why I am so excited to announce our newest live training experience. It's called the sales channel challenge, and it's three days to build a roadmap for your food business success. If you are an early stage entrepreneur, you're thinking about launching or you have launched into one or even two of those channels, but you're struggling to manage the overwhelm and to get traction, then this is a challenge for you. Join me April 15th through 17th for a one hour call each day, and we are going to dive into each of these sales channels so that you really understand what it's going to take to succeed, what is required of you, and whether that feels like a yes. April and I are going to help you assess and really figure out, based on facts, what is the right sales channel for you right now. And here's the best part, it's just $27 and you're going to walk away with that clear understanding of each channel and a roadmap for you. Head over to foodbizsuccess.com/challenge to secure your spot today. We are limiting the number of seats, so you don't want to put this off. Go and get your spot. Foodbizsuccess.com/challenge. I can't wait to see you there. 

Sari  2:27  
Welcome to your Food Business Success. This podcast is for early stage entrepreneurs in the package food industry ready to finally turn that delicious idea into reality. I'm your host, Sari Kimbell. I have guided hundreds of food brand founders to success as an industry expert and business coach, and it's gotta be fun. In this podcast I share with you mindset tools to become a true entrepreneur and run your business like a boss. Interviews with industry experts to help you understand the business you are actually in and food founder journey so you can learn what worked and didn't work and not feel so alone in your own journey. Now let's jump in!

Sari  3:13  
All right. Welcome back to the podcast. I am really excited for today's conversation. This is a topic that I get a lot of questions about. It's definitely very relevant to almost all of you. Anyone who's doing e commerce, you're definitely going to want to listen in to my conversation today with Ari Gordon of Like and Likes. So welcome. 

Ari  3:37  
Thanks. Great to be here. 

Sari  3:38  
Yeah. So I met you a couple years ago when you were kind of back and forth from Seattle to Denver. And at the time we met, you had a matcha tea, like an adaptogenic matcha tea powder called Hone, was the brand name. And since then you, you know, you were growing that and really scaling it, and you really like went through a lot of challenges and growth through that, and then you decided to shut that down, and now you are using everything that you learned in that business as you grew it through e commerce to help other brands. So maybe just go into a little bit more of the background, like, tell us about Hone. And you got started in 2019 and like, what happened in those, you know, five years? 

Ari  4:35  
So yeah, Hone is a mushroom macho blend, right? And so kind of trying to compete with, like the mud waters and everyday doses of the world, right? We launched about the same time, in 2019 right before the pandemic, so perfect timing. And our, a lot of our supply chain was overseas, so that immediately was, was the challenge, right? And we just kind of learned it. Learned how to do it from there, right? I think that was also a blessing in a way because we were fully focused on e commerce because of it. So originally, we were just posting on socials, just trying to go viral and everything, and growing our email list and growing our SMS list, and just doing the things to get it so we could actually run ads. And then, because we were basically bootstrapping, we had to learn how to do everything ourselves. So it took a pretty intensive course on how to make meta ad successful, rather than just kind of throwing money at the ether and praying that it works. 

Sari  5:33  
Let me boost this post,. 

Ari  5:35  
Yeah, all the time, and I mean, I had to slap my partner on the wrist. So seismic. Now, don't do that. Just try to actually make money,

Sari  5:46  
How about that?

Ari  5:49  
And I mean, it's, you know, we grew our business, and we learned how to use absolutely no money to make money, and then how to have, like, a relatively big budget, because eventually we raised like 300k and then just we got into Kroger as well. So we kind of got some good touches to be able to actually grow it. We can talk about this later, but Kroger is a blessing and a curse, right? And so that was kind of a part of why we decided to shut it down, is we also got sued at the same time. So we, we were kind of over it, but it was great. We learned everything that we really could. And now I'm lucky enough to be able to have enough knowledge to help other founders and doing this e commerce agency with a lot of applying AI to basically everything, so it's faster and cheaper and better, really. 

Sari  6:38  
I love it. So you really grew this as a direct to consumer brand first. I mean, you kind of had, didn't have a choice. You launched it, and then the world shut down. And so it sounds like you were growing it. What did you grow it to? If you don't mind sharing numbers, what did you grow it to, like before you start getting into wholesale?

Ari  6:59  
Yeah, we were at about 200k.

Sari  7:01  
Nice. Okay, yeah, so you grew it from nothing to growing it through social and, I mean, Tiktok wasn't even really much of a thing.

Ari  7:11  
Which is also about me. 

Sari  7:14  
You're like, if only we had Tiktok. So then you were a, I mean, this is the challenge, right? With any CPG business is, like, cool, we got into Kroger, amazing, and then you need a whole bunch of capital to scale. The cash flow challenges are real. 

Ari  7:37  
And time. I mean, like, then you have to go and table at all these stores. And then if you have any production issues, which we also get, then everything also becomes a mess in that regard, too.

Sari  7:52  
Oh, the story of CPG. But what I loved is, I mean, you took some time off to kind of, you know, process all of that. But what you were realizing is like, oh, I actually have, like, a real skill and passion for, like, getting into meta, using ads, and using AI to really make all of this work, and I love that you have taken, you know, that's like that silver lining, one of many, but silver lining from the business.

Ari  8:32  
Yeah, yeah. And, I mean, that was what by the end, right? Because, I mean, it kind of goes stories kind of always go back to cook, but I had to automate our entire business, right? I didn't have time to to do any of the marketing for several months, right? Because I was going all across Colorado to go store to store and sampling. And then I did the same thing in Seattle, and like the Fred Meyers, right? And so I learned how to make all of our social media posts through AI, our ads through it, and that was a skill that not many people already had at that time. And with my knowledge, with doing ads like it, just became a thing where the way that I approach e commerce is from a founder's position, rather than from an agency position, which is just, how do we make them spend as much money as possible and then do okay? Mine's like, how do we actually grow your business, right? 

Sari  9:29  
Which I have not had very many, if I don't know if any like, because we're going to talk about ads, and it's not something that I've been reluctant. I am reluctant to kind of endorse or refer out, because I do find most people are agencies and and it's expensive, and it can be a big drain, and you just never know, like, do people really get it and I've just heard so many horror stories of founders that invest with an agency that makes all these promises and then under delivers, and it's so frustrating and can be a really big drain on your budget. And so when you and I reconnected, and you're like, I'm doing this, you know, you and I have been in a lot of conversations about this, and I'm seeing your business. And I'm like, okay, you actually know what you're doing, and you have the founders perspective as well and understand that budgets are tight. 

Ari  10:31  
Sure, and so, I mean, it's and, you know, like, ads aren't for everybody, right? And I think, like, that's the thing that is, I guess, a little bit different than how I approach it, right? It's like, I will tell you talk to it. 

Sari  10:43  
Because some people are like, turnkey. Just, yeah, everybody, everybody should be doing ads. Let's just throw money at it. And it's like, it's not for every business, and it's not for every stage of business. 

Ari  10:53  
Yeah. 

Sari  10:55  
So let's get into it. We can talk about it. We're like, okay, thanks. But like, let's really talk about. So when you're first starting out, what do you recommend as an e commerce brand to, like, start that growth process? Where would you invest?

Ari  11:14  
Yeah, I mean, everything is always content. And I think it's really hard as an e commerce founder to get yourself to actually do the content, and like in any regard or what that means, and I think that's what you have to try to change about yourself is how do you get yourself to post daily? How do you get yourself to film yourself if you can, how do you get to the point where you actually can do your own content, especially in this world that it's becoming like you have to constantly bring stuff out if you can become a content creator, that's essentially what the business is, right? And I know that that's kind of a hard reality sometimes, right? But that is the truth.

Sari  12:01  
Like, I just want to sell my matcha tea. Yeah, that's what I'm doing. But you have to create all this content to do that. That's part of the game. 

Ari  12:10  
Sure, and like and, you know, and don't be afraid. And I think that's just the biggest thing, right? Just force yourself to do it, and you'll get better over it, and you end up liking it. I mean, content is fun. Like, that's really the idea of it, right, even if we're not, even if we're not the young people, right? It's like, it still can be enjoyable. 

Sari  12:32  
I'll do a quick little plug. We have an incredible social media course that Kayla King came and did for us. And it's like, how do you pump out all this content and make it really fast, really easy? And we got to drop all that perfectionism of, like, I need to be camera ready all the time. 

Ari  12:53  
And you never know it's going to blow up, especially on Tiktok, like, there's the weirdest videos that just go viral.

Sari  13:03  
Could be like, four seconds long.

Ari  13:06  
I know, you genuinely have no idea.

Sari  13:10  
So you're creating content, you're putting it out on social media. Where else should you be using your content? 

Ari  13:17  
So I mean, that's the first place, right? And then, I mean, even before that, right, you need to do email and SMS marketing, right, like, I know, especially SMS, people are skeptical over now and then, and it works, right? It might take a little bit to grow that list, but it does work, and it's shown to work, and people are just kind of accepting it. The people that don't want to text will text STOP, right? So if it's all good, you're not going to lose that customer either way. But, yeah, have a pop up, set that up right now and try to get that going and try to send out, I mean, send out an email every week, right? Come up with something and have your pop up be 10% discount, right? Don't have it be a newsletter. 

Sari  14:05  
Join our newsletter list. Nobody cares. 

Ari  14:08  
Yeah, everybody gets, like, so much of it, right? Yeah, set up too, right?

Sari  14:18  
Yeah, for sure. 

Ari  14:20  
Like, you're welcome, close, get that really positive, you know, and try to do a good job on it, right? Like, I think, like, that's a thing that I would suggest hiring out for if you're not a designer, right? Just because as soon as those are done, then you have a template, and you have like, 20 emails templates that you can use for weekly and then you can do it yourself on a weekly basis that look good and everything but that initial flow setup, if you don't really know you're doing, try to get a few few k out and get something to do it for you, right?

Sari  14:55  
Yeah, and you do that in your company, helping people get those flows setup and they are tedious. And it does matter, like layout does matter, for sure. So I'm a big fan of finding who's to like make things, you know, the things that you're not good at, just hire out. Make the investment. It'll be well worth it because, well, I'm curious how did you get people on your email list? Was it just through that discount piece, like just creating interesting content, and then?

Ari  15:26  
No, I mean, we did markets too. And so we would like, we would always get people to sign up at our markets, and then giveaways are probably the biggest one, right? So we would just partner with different brands and do giveaways form and just be like, you have to like us on Instagram. You have to give us your email, right? And you have to do all this, and all of a sudden you get 1000, 2000 emails from a giveaway. 

Sari  15:52  
Okay, all right, nice.

Ari  15:56  
So you can find other brands around you. 

Sari  16:00  
So you put in all this energy up front to get all these emails, and then if you don't have a good welcome flow and things set up, then you're like, it's like, that's just such a wasted investment. And you want somebody that can work with you that's like, looking and seeing what's working, where are people falling off. Let's tweak this one, you know, change that photo or that subject line, and you're using AI for so much of this that you're able to come up with great stuff to test it, to do different kinds of AB testing and things like that.

Ari  16:36  
Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's tour that basically takes in all the data that's worked, and we find out what tone of voice has gotten the most open rates and purchases, and then we adjust it accordingly, right? And then we basically built all this out so, like, it creates really good copywriting, right? We always make sure that we check it, though, right? Because you don't really know. 

Sari  16:57  
That's the thing with AI. Use it for what it's good at but always have the human check. Yeah, exactly. So, yeah. So building out starting with your email list. I mean, that's the only way you own your customer, right? That's the only way that you're going to be able to talk directly to them. And it's really important always, always, always be growing your email list.

Ari  17:21  
Yeah, I mean, no matter what, like, one of the brands we're working with is pretty big brand, and because we're doing so much more on Tiktok now, like their email list is actually shrinking and be we're like, okay, well, we have to start running meta ads to actually continue to grow the email list, not to get anything else, just to get emails. And so no matter what the scale it's like you always want your emails because it can account for 20 to 40% of your revenue. Almost always. 

Sari  17:51  
Yeah. It's got a huge ROI. And we got to get over our fear of sending too many emails.

Ari  17:59  
I know, some brands send it every day. 

Sari  18:05  
I guess. I mean, there's a lot of brand. I just have, like, an email, email, right? Like, that kind of stuff goes to and, yeah, I get a lot. But it's fascinating. I also use it as you know, it can be very like, oh, what do they do? What are they doing here? 

Ari  18:23  
And like, if you don't have your flow setup right, and you've been running your business for two to three years, or even a year, if you go and spend 2 to 5k on designs, you will make your money back in two months, right? Like, you already have the email list. You're already there. You just, if you don't have that set up, you'll get that money back so quickly that, like, you just need to do it. 

Sari  18:54  
Yeah, it's powerful stuff when you do it right, for sure. All right, so email list is first, SMS, which I have not worked with very much, but I'm glad you have experience with that. I'm sure some people are a little intimidated. I mean, I recommend using Klavio. Is that the system you used, or what do you use?

Ari  19:17  
Yeah, for email, Klavio is the easiest and the best, right? For sure. I'd recommend One Text for SMS. They just have a good job, and they have a lot better automated system for abandoned cart and everything like that. Their kind of system is built around that, so it's kind of a new one. But if you want it simple and easy, just use crap. They have both, because they have just get it done.

Sari  19:17  
Okay, great. All right, let's talk about Meta Ads. So in the past, I've always been a fan. I've said, you know, do not boost posts that is burnt like just lighting money on fire. I'm a big fan of lead ads, and I've talked about that Zach Buckler on another podcast, and he's done a course in my program, and that's a way to get people paying some money towards ads that are specifically to get people on your email list. But we're going to talk about those direct to purchase ads, which are very scary for some people, including me. I'm like, I don't know. I don't want to do that for me. But tell us about, like, what do we need to know about direct to purchase ads, like, what's the budget? And I think some you know, where do we need to be at as far as a stage in our business?

Ari  20:43  
Yeah. I mean, I always recommend, and this is not what we did with Helen, but just because, if you really don't know anything about it, and you don't have a care to learn anything about it, like you need probably 5k a month, like that, you can go do this, and you need that for two months at least, right? So, like, assume it's a 10k investment upfront, like, if you have it, and then you can start getting people if you have it right, I can see right, then you can start making close to 5k revenue by the third month, right? The second month will be like, assume you get half of that, but essentially, like, you have to test, right? This world is about testing and testing fast and just kind of seeing what happens with the world now is, is that testing is faster and easier, right? When we were doing it, we had to really intensely test, right, and do all the thing like that. But like, we can get there a lot faster now, right? Like, our testing took three to six months to get us to a place that we had a good landing page and a good like, good ads and like, actually, like being able to monitor it, because I don't know if any guys were in business, but when the iOS update happened in 2020, I believe it just made it so you couldn't track anymore at all. And then you had to spend $500 a month, at least, on a tracking software, right? And so, like that just made it so you just had no really idea, right? And now that's changed, right? Facebook is actually pretty good for tracking again, which is great. So you don't have to spend $500 a month on the tracking software, which is lovely. So essentially, like what we do, right? And I think this is what I would recommend, no matter what is, is you want to take it a step by step process, right? So, like, look at us as, like, a scientific test, right? Is, like, first you want to test what people actually, what problem are you solving, right? I know it's kind of hard for food, right, but, like, the the example that I have is we have a seafood brand that we work with and, okay, like, what problem is seafood for people, right? But it's like, really, like, what people are looking for and why they want the best seafood is, if they want to be as fresh as possible, they want to know on that they want to taste the best, right? Like, yeah, that's simple. But, like, we were like, okay, this has to be restaurant quality. We have to do this. But until we really tested it, we're like, no, those are the only two things people care about, right? Is the fresh and taste. And so, like, as soon as we kind of, like, looked into it, the pain points became very clear. And so we scraped data from Reddit. We scraped data from like, Amazon reviews. So your competitors, Amazon reviews, you can go and do this yourself. Just look at your top five competitors. Go on to Amazon and just look at all of them. We have a tool that escapes it, right? So we have more information. And then you turn in that into copywriting. You go in and actually, like, full on test that copywriting to see what actually works and what doesn't work, what people click on. Then you turn that into headlines, right? So, like, instead of just, like, I wish I had fresher seafood. It becomes like, get the freshest seafood out there, right? Obviously, those aren't that good. 

Sari  24:09  
Yeah, it gives you so many more options. I'm like, oh, that's really clever.

Ari  24:16  
And then now all of a sudden, you just know, right? Like, it's like, now you have your step process, and you can be there, you know, and then you can do it in the accurate, correct way. And then you go and make images on it. Then you put all that copywriting onto images, and then you could just test those images. And you keep on going right. Just keep on seeing what's working, what themes are working, what ideas are working, and you're just always monitoring and seeing what makes the most sense. Eventually you want to do the same thing with a landing page, like you basically get to a point where you're at a certain row as so return on ad spend, and then you can basically plug that into the landing page, because you know what copywriting works, you know what images work, you know what people care about. And then you can just basically make it. Obviously, that's very simple, but. Anybody can do it, and I am confident in that. It's just, it's an effort, and it's an effort that you kind of just have to recognize and be willing to do if you want to do it yourself.

Sari  25:14  
It's a discipline, and I'm not disciplined, frankly enough  to do each of those pieces, because you really need to be testing headlines, you need to be testing copy, you need to be testing images, and you need to be testing your audience and in any one ad, you only want to test one variable. And so you do need. This is why you know the budget is what it is. Because you need to be to, you know, getting enough people in there, and you're testing all of these different things. And maybe, I don't know if you go through one and then the other and then the other, but, you know, you need to be running a lot of ads and getting a lot of information back for it to go quickly. 

Ari  25:59  
And then, like, as you, as soon as you that's just your baseline, right? Like, as soon as you have all this, then you have a lot of data to support how you make the next set. And then you, like, really, the best way to do it is, you're doing new creative every month, right? So, like, not only are you doing what you did with the copywriting, but now you found out what imagery works or what doesn't work, and you make a new creative again, right? Which is where it gets expensive, right? You can do it without it like again, the supplement brand working with like that we do. They don't do new creative, and we're just basically taking their creative and plugging in the copywriting that we've seen work, right, and just into their imagery, and we've seen great success with it, right? Like we've on some of the ads, we've seen 4x row ads just by doing that. 

Sari  26:50  
ROAs, again, is return on ad spend. So that's a term you'll hear or or CAC, cost of customer acquisition. All these terms that we throw around, all these acronyms.

Ari  27:05  
So many acronyms that mean the exact same thing, but are just different.

Sari  27:11  
But yeah, like, sometimes I'll be like, aha, yeah. And then I'm like, in the over on the side, like, looking up, does that mean? But so for people listening, they might be like, what 5k? I need to invest that? Like, what's wrong with, you know, putting in, I don't know, $500 a month into trying out an ad. So I'm just curious, what would you tell somebody who's just wanting to just get started. But that might be a little much on the budget,

Ari  27:49  
What I think happens in this is we get to the point like that was a really good piece of content. Let's just go. Let's just go see how it does on ads, right? Which is totally fine, and I get it. It's just most likely, like, you're going to end up spending that $500 you're not going to get a single purchase. And it's like, because, like, you don't know what people actually care about yet, right? You don't know how to get people's attention quite yet, right? Like, and then, yeah, it might be a great video, right? Don't get me wrong, sometimes that does work, right? It just works a little bit better, which is all you necessarily need to get people to click on it and to do it in that way and and set up exactly where it's actually you're getting the purchases, right?

Sari  28:37  
So for me, what I would probably recommend the order would be, I mean, like you were saying, go put your energy into giveaways. It is still an investment, because you're going to be giving away product and all of that. But you know, on the scale of investment, it's pretty small, so go focus on that, right? Go get start building up your email list, putting out content, and work on your organic content on social media, Tiktok, Instagram, all of that. We're going to talk more about Tiktok, but start there. And then again, I'm a big fan of lead ads, which can't you can do at a much smaller amount of money, and I've seen really good success. Just those aren't going to be direct to purchase, but they're going to get people on your email list. So then when you have a great welcome sequence, now you're, you know, potentially selling through your email sequence. And then it's like, then make a decision, like, okay, I'm ready to make an investment. And what I see is people just are, like, so scared, and they nickel and dime it, and they're like, well, can we just do $1,000 or can we just do this? It's like, then you end up just kind of fizzling out, and then you're frustrated, and you're like, it doesn't work. But if you actually just said, okay, I'm willing to put in, you know, essentially, maybe. Even like a 15k investment with agency fees and the budget and everything in order to over time, like you said, a 4x I know you're getting great results for your clients. Basically, that means for every dollar you spend, you're getting four back or three back. Four back. So if I found an ATM machine that I put in $1 and then I got four back, you better believe that thing all day long, right?

Ari  
Yeah, and like, it just takes time, right? And like, and like, even getting a positive of like, 1.2 right? That's super meaningful, right? Because, like, most likely that customer is going to buy again for like, probably 40 to 60% of the time, right? And then if you have good emails too then they will keep up purchasing, right? Because your email strategy essentially is just your attention strategy. 

Sari  
So now you're increasing your lifetime value of your customer, bringing down your CAC, your Customer Acquisition Cost over time. It's the whole thing, yeah, but scary, I get it. It's a big leap, you know? It's like, oh, I found this magical ATM, but I have to spend 10k or 15k to get it to work, and a couple months, actually. So not for everyone, but, I mean, I'm just curious from your lens, I mean, it's you're probably seeing you've pricing companies spend even a lot more than that.

Sari  
Sorry to interrupt this podcast, but I want to be sure you have got your ticket for the upcoming sales channel challenge. No more wondering, should I do farmer's markets? Should I do e commerce? Should I do wholesale or a combination of two or three of those? I am going to jump in with the pros and cons and what it's going to take for you to succeed in each of those channels so you can make an informed decision and build a personalized roadmap. Whether you have a delicious idea that you are ready to launch into the world, or you are struggling to get traction in one or more of those channels, and you want to grow your business, I got you. Go to foodbizsuccess.com/challenge. This is a brand new experience we are creating, and it's going to be unlike anything we've ever done. You don't want to miss this. The value is going to be incredible at just $27. Walk away with clarity and confidence and excited to take the next steps. See you inside foodbizsuccess.com/challenge, okay, now, back to the podcast.

Ari  
Yeah. I mean, we have, like, the Tiktok ads that we're spending is close to 50k a month, right? Like, and then, like, we get it pretty quickly at 10k to 20k a month on Meta, and it's just, it's kind of how it goes in this industry. I mean, people spend 3k a day on Meta Ads. So that's 90k a month. And then sometimes they spend, like, close to 50k a day. You know, obviously, that's insane, but that's kind of the name of the game. 

Sari  
Wow, I want people to hear those numbers, because I think, you know, I was talking with my Master Your Business cohort the other day, and we were talking about these numbers, and, it's like a million dollar business is actually not that big, right? Like, we're all like a million dollars, but, like, that's just a drop. And when you start getting into like, real business world, yeah, you're dropping 90k a month in ads, but if you're getting a 4x row as, right? Like, that's huge. That's coming back at you and that's really where, I'm not saying you guys, know, listening, I don't believe every business this should be your model, right? Like, it's based on your, what you decide success looks like. But for those of you who are like, I want to be a million dollar business, or $5 million business, $10 million business, this is like, getting used to big numbers is part of the journey. 

Ari  
I think like the other side too, or should do, want to point out, is, like, the sooner you can start testing, the better on Meta, right? Like, if you can either learn how to do this or, like, help show you how to do this, right? It's just you can start doing this now, even if you're just in farmers markets, right? But if you can start testing and getting everything out there right then, like, as soon as you're actually ready, right? Then this becomes so much easier, because then you have so much data to see what customers are actually there, right? And purchasing, and Meta knows who's purchasing or not purchasing over time. And so like, the sooner you can start to do this, then that'll allow your scaling when you have the revenue. And the excess cash to be better.

Sari  
Great. Well, let's talk about something I get asked about all the time, TikTok shop, and I don't know very much about it. I honestly am, like, that's a great question. Let's go find somebody who knows. So I know you become a really big fan of this. And your company are going to be doing more of Tiktok shop. So tell us what it is, what we need to know. Educate me.

Ari  
Yeah, sure. And so I think the first thing that I just want to point out is, don't be afraid Tiktok shop shutting down, right? I really was, and the reason for that is, if Tiktok shop does get shut down, Meta is building the exact same platform. That's what they're doing right now. By the end of the year, it'll basically be Tiktok shop. So I think, like all those creators, if Tiktok does get shut down, which it likely won't at this point, then they're all just going to go to better, and then you're going to have the exact same situation, right? Because a lot of them are influencers on both. So like, this is here to stay. It's called, like, social commerce, right? And so I think the sooner you can kind of jump on that, the sooner that your business can drive. TikTok is it is a essentially a platform where influencers are selling your product directly, right? Which is, I am a little bit upset that I wasn't there at the beginning our business. Because instead of sending all of your product to influencers that you have no idea really if you're making any money off of them, because discount code, URLs don't work, website links. Now you directly know if they're selling your product, because it's all tracked through the Tiktok shop app, right? You can see what people are actually buying or not buying from that specific influencer or not, from what specific post, right? And people of all ages, well, hit by now directly off TikTok, right? And that's just crazy, right? There's nothing else like that, like, you have one influencer that's really good at selling a supplement, right? That he's not even an influencer, right? He has 5,000 followers, but he makes one video that is way better than any video that you've ever made. I was trying to sell you a product, and you make 30k in a day. You're like, what? That was crazy, right?

Sari  
Kind of like, it's almost like QVC meets social media.

Ari  
It's an infomercial. 

Sari  
It's the average Joe. Like, you don't have to be

Ari  
Yeah. It's, that's it, right? And like, and so the name of the game is just mass outreach to influencers, right? And like, and that's sick. I mean, obviously they're smart to order everything. But like, you give them a commission, right? And like, how you commission up off the sales, and you don't have to pay them a retainer, right? So you don't have to pay them any money to post because they want to make money too, right?

Sari  
It's a little bit better than kind of the current, like, influencer model, where they're like, yeah, I'll make you one video for $8,000 and, you know, but like, it's not based on actual sales.

Ari  
For sure, yeah, yeah. And so it's like, oh, man, now you can just, yeah. I mean, because we built a program, right? We had, I think we had, like, 250 influencers that we, like, reached out to send product to, and it helped, right? But we had no idea if it was actually coming from that right now. We had just genuinely, like, our sales boosted, but we were doing so many things, we're like, I don't know.

Sari  
Yeah, the insight, the analytics weren't great. So I've been getting really excited, and I have been talking about, you know, you helping people with Tiktok shop. So because you do know the influencer world really well, and you understand how this thing all works, I'm still just like, I'm so barely on like, I don't, I just don't spend time there. This all just blows my mind.

Ari  
Yeah. I mean, that's kind of part of why I was, like, reluctant, right? And so, I mean, but it's just not, I mean, I think I told you that there's something I'm working with just made 150k last month on off of Tiktok alone, right? And it's like, and that's not abnormal, right? Like, obviously it took time. Like that probably took us three to six months to get there. But, like, that's crazy, you know. 

Sari  
It's insane.

Ari  
Like, and like, we're not doing crazy amounts of ads, but I said 50k but it's like, good range is from 20 to 50 depending on it, right? 

Sari  
So how are you going to help people with Tiktok shop? What's the process that you go through with Like and Likes?

Ari  
Yeah, so we will help set up the whole process, right? Anything that you guys have done, right? We'll take what you have, and then we'll move it from there. We'll do the, all the mass outreach ourselves, right? And so we also have a creative community that we also work with. So what that means is, it's GMV, it's how much money they've made over time, right? If they've had more than 100k of revenue over the course of theirs, that's who you want to look for. Or 50k. We have like, a community that we plug into, and so we can basically reach out to them to try to do that. And we'll also just reach out to people that have a high fulfillment rate, which means that they'll actually sell their product, right, and they'll actually do it, and they'll actually post their product. And so we'll just make sure that we are accounting for this, we use an AI software right to do these mass outreach, but we're again, always checking to make sure that it sounds real, and then the first response is always with a human. And so, we always look at it like we kind of have to do a mass outreach to get there. There's too many. It's not as effective to do it yourself anymore, even though we all want to say that it is and so we will make sure that it is accounted for and we try to make sure that the groupings make sense when we do this. So we'll set up basically these GPTs, like scripted data, and find out, like, make sure that the conversation is good, and we'll just handle all the conversations right, make sure that your product is sent out to the right, and run people. How many will talk to you about how much product you have available to send to them? And we'll monitor and monitor everything ourselves.

Sari  
That's a really good point. Like you got to be ready with product, if something blows up, when this thing blows up, with the right the right influencers. 

Ari  
And, like, I mean, ideally, we're sending out 20 samples a day to different influences, right? So you also have to be ready with samples, I mean, like, if you have excess product and no cash flow, this is where you should go, right? Because now you have an ability to basically send it out to influencers, and you can see how much people are purchasing or not purchasing. 

Sari  
That's just incredible. And all of these things are, of course, investments, but this is Marketing 101, like, this is part of running a business if you really want to grow it beyond, you know, the farmers market, or some local wholesale, if you really want to do e commerce, I mean the numbers, it is a numbers game, and we need to get a lot of people into the net, into the funnel, to start selling them, whether it's on email, whether it's through ads, whether it's through influencers like Tiktok shop. 

Ari  
Yeah, I mean, you sort of right. Like, it's a funnel, right? And that's why, like, you got to start with email, right? Because, like, you don't want to spend all this money on getting a new customer and then having your retention strategy not good, right? Because a lot of the time, like, you're basically at one, right? You're about you, when you do these ads, when you do Tiktok, when you do everything, when you break it all down, a lot of the time, you're basically breaking even on that. But the idea is that you have these new customers, right? And they're always going to come back, and they're kind of like your product, and then they keep purchasing from you, right? And so like, if don't have good email, then sometimes that can be a waste, right?

Sari  
You do all this effort to get them on your email. You don't have good emails. Oh, it kind of breaks down from there, yeah. I'm sure you're like, oh man, if I had all these things back in 2019. 

Ari  
Yeah. And, I mean, that was a part of the bit, right? Like, I did it, and I've come from just bootstrapping businesses in the past, and so I didn't really necessarily know e commerce, and had to learn it all. And super useful now, right? If I go start another brand, and I'm ready to know exactly what to do.

Sari  
Absolutely. And you've been getting new clients and really showing great returns on investment. So really excited that you were able to come on the podcast. You're going to be our Fuel VIP guest in April, so members in there will be able to ask you specific questions, and we're going to put together a really great offer for members, but I'd love for you to share where people can find you. And hook up with you if they're interested in talking about any of these services.

Ari  
Yeah, sure. So the website, the agency website is likeandlikes. ai. And then my Instagram is my full name, Arial Gordon, A R, I, A, L, G, O, R, D, O, N, and LinkedIn is Ari-Gordon, and feel free to email me too. It's ari@likeandlikes.ai

Sari  
Perfect. I'll put your info into the show notes as well, and let Ari know that you heard him on the podcast and you want to make some investments to grow your business. Because, it's possible. It's possible to, like, really transform your business through these platforms. 

Ari  
I mean, at the end of all this, I'm just here to help. So if you guys have any questions, just feel free to reach out and we'll have a conversation. Just want to see you guys succeed, because it's hard out here. 

Sari  
Yeah, well, Ari's, you know, one of the best around, and you're just easy to work with. And you'll tell people what's you know that's not right the right time or a good fit. 

Ari  
Yeah. 100%. I appreciate that.

Sari  
Love it. Well, thanks for the conversation. I certainly learned, like, okay, Tiktok shop. It's blowing my mouth. Okay, yeah, that's amazing. So really appreciate your time today, and I hope you have a great use of your day. 

Ari  
Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Sari  
Wow, mind is blown. Oh, what a great conversation with Ari. And if you are curious about the email piece, the Meta ads, or Tiktok shop, definitely go reach out to him. He'll totally have a conversation with you. And he's a really great guy. And frankly, if it were me, if I had a product, I would absolutely, a 100%, go and find the money to start on Tiktok shop and also with good emails, of course, but that is incredible. That is an incredible platform that I would be 100% taking advantage of. 

Sari  
And if you want to have that conversation with Ari, what are you waiting for? Come join us in Fuel. You'll need to go to foodbizsuccess.com and join us in either Master Your Business or in Food Business Success, and both those programs will get you access to our call with Ari in April. So don't wait, make an investment in your business. Come and learn this stuff, and until next time, have an amazing week. 

Sari  
The smartest thing you can do as an entrepreneur is to invest in a who to help you with the how to speed up your journey and help you skip the line. When you are ready for more support and accountability to finally get this thing done, you can work with me in two ways. Get me all to yourself with one on one business coaching, or join Food Business Success, which includes membership inside Fuel, our community of food business founders, that includes monthly live group coaching calls and so much more. It's one of my favorite places to hang out, and I would love to see you there. Go to foodbizsuccess.com to start your journey towards your own food business success.