Episode 291: Building an Ecom Brand From Scratch: Inside Our First 60 Days Episode Description
What does building a new ecommerce brand actually look like before you know whether it's going to work?
In this episode, Smart Marketer Agency CEO Pep Hufen takes us inside the first 60 days of Longer Together, the pet supplement brand Smart Marketer launched with partners Michelle and Tyler from Living Well with Dr. Michelle. Pep explains why the partnership made sense, the competitive advantages they had going in, and the three phases the team is using to build the business: validation, infrastructure, and scale.
From a one-page website and a handful of Meta ads to $75,000 in early revenue, subscriptions, Amazon, reviews, and returning customers, Pep shares the real numbers and decisions behind the launch. He also gets into what surprised him, including an unscripted video outperforming their polished creative and the tradeoff they discovered when sending cold traffic directly into a subscription offer.
And one of the biggest lessons from the validation phase is an important distinction for ecommerce founders:
"You can have an amazing business, real product-market fit, people love it, and not be able to profitably sell with Meta ads."
– Pep Hufen
This isn't a case study with a perfectly packaged ending. Pep is documenting Longer Together while the team is still building it, testing assumptions, and waiting for the data that will determine what comes next.
You Will Learn
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Why Smart Marketer decided to build a new ecommerce brand from scratch
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How the Longer Together partnership came together
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The competitive advantages the team wanted before launching
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Pep's three phases for building the business: validation, infrastructure, and scale
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The two questions the team needed to answer during validation
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Why an unscripted video became their best-performing creative
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How the team generated roughly $75,000 in its first 60 days
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What happened when Pep tested subscriptions with cold traffic
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Why subscription LTV and 90-day break-even data will help determine when they can scale
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How reviews, email, Amazon, Google, and subscriptions are becoming part of the infrastructure
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Why Pep is deliberately waiting for the data before going "pedal to the metal" on acquisition
Links & Resources
Time Stamps
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00:04:41 – Pep introduces Longer Together and the first 60 days
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00:05:49 – The three phases: validation, infrastructure, and scale
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00:06:30 – Why Smart Marketer started the brand and chose its partners
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00:07:14 – The competitive advantages they had before launching
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00:08:23 – Validating product-market fit and Meta acquisition
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00:09:09 – Launching lean with a one-page website
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00:09:40 – The first creatives and an unexpected winning ad
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00:10:28 – Marketing a preventative product
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00:12:04 – Early Meta performance and validating acquisition
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00:13:53 – $75K in early revenue and keeping the operation lean
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00:15:11 – Phase two: building the business infrastructure
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00:15:34 – Subscriptions and the early LTV question
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00:16:43 – Testing subscription offers with cold traffic
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00:17:52 – The ROAS tradeoff between subscriptions and one-time purchases
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00:19:01 – Why the first 90 days of LTV data matter
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00:20:12 – Building reviews and social proof
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00:21:06 – Amazon and the spillover from paid acquisition
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00:22:28 – The plan for navigating the uncertain middle
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00:23:21 – Recapping validation, infrastructure, and the path to scale
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00:24:44 – Where Longer Together stands after its first 60 days
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