The Unstoppable Marketer®

Double Your Sales by Creating a Frictionless Experience | Guest Rigden Brinkerhoff, CEO, Evora Co

Trevor Crump & Mark Goldhardt Season 3 Episode 19

Evora is a fast growing up-and-coming DTC company that is doing a lot of stuff right... But it didn't start out that way...  Evora started out just like many of our businesses. Had a good product and a good audience but was struggling to put all the pieces together.

Listen as Rigden talks about the three things that have helped him double his sales month over month. 

1) Eliminated friction from his website and from his product
2) Focused on one single thing in front of him
3) Dialed in their messaging

We hope you enjoy this episode. 


Please connect with Trevor on social media. You can find him anywhere @thetrevorcrump

Trevor:

In this week's episode of The Unstoppable Marketer Podcast, we have an incredible guest and a good friend of mine. His name is Regan Brinkerhoff. He is the CEO and co founder of a new startup based out of Scottsdale, Arizona called evil aura company. Alright, Evora makes really, really cool, unique, individual watches. That's very much tailored to the Gen Z market. And I love this episode, because we talked about three things that are so critical, we talked about the importance of being focused. So being focused on one thing and how what that can do for your business and how that can help you scale. We talked about the idea and concept around friction, and how to create a frictionless business and how that can help you scale. And we just talked about how they started from the bottom. And where they've gone over the last kind of 18 months from down here to now up here and where they're going and how they're going to scale and get there. I hope you enjoy the episode. Let's jump into it. Yo, what's going on everybody? Welcome to the unstoppable Marketer Podcast with me today. He wasn't here last time is my co host, Mark goldheart. Mark, what's going on? Dude,

Mark:

what's up? I'm doing great.

Trevor:

Did you miss this last week? I did.

Mark:

Well, where was I? I don't know. I was having fun. I was in Austin.

Trevor:

That's right. You were Yeah, I

Mark:

just couldn't get a good spot for solid internet connection. I didn't want to get on. Yeah,

Trevor:

I don't get how any city doesn't have a solid internet connection everywhere. That doesn't make any sense at all. Like if you're in Montana, or the mountains like North Dakota, I get it. Kind of.

Mark:

Yeah, it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. How is it possible that in 2023, every hotel doesn't have

Trevor:

high amazing internet? Yeah. I don't know. Like, how do they? How can you run? Hot water 24/7 in a hotel, and always have it, but not have good Wi Fi? I don't know. That's a mystery.

Mark:

I don't Google Fiber needs to have some kind of war style. Or Starlink. Yeah, that's really what it should be. I should just buy a Starlink we should buy a Starlink I think so. But yes, I did admit I did miss it. Or I got to meet him.

Trevor:

I got to meet Chris. Yeah. Austin. That was great. Yeah, we it was funny. We got off the podcast with Chris. I got off the podcast with Chris called Mark was like Chris is a great guy. You should call him and he connected with him. And then we connect out. Yeah, next day, the next day. That's amazing. We met up and chatted for an hour just had an internal podcast. Yeah, dude. I'll

Mark:

tell you what, though. Chris Hall. I'm surprised Texas can fit his personality in the state. Yeah, he is. He is the personification of Texas.

Trevor:

He really was. Yeah. Did he have cowboy boots? Yes, he did. Yeah. I thought about a cowboy hat though.

Mark:

I told him I was a little disappointed. But yeah. But his vibe made up for the lack of a cowboy hat. And I'll tell him that.

Trevor:

Yeah. I hope he's listening to this. We'll see. Well, we have an awesome guest today. An awesome name. Like your your name is incredible. Let's start with that. Monique does Rigden Brinkerhoff. So what whatever you want to do with that name? Rigdon. Brinckerhoff, CEO and founder of a company called Evora. Rigden. What's up dude?

Rigden:

Dude, how's it going, man? I'm sorry. I'm

Trevor:

sorry. We were bantering back and forth for a minute.

Rigden:

I was gonna jump in there, but I think I was allowed so I just I just stayed out of it. You know, it's funny, I

Trevor:

actually I actually kind of liked to do it because then I like to see the type of guests because like, you'll have some guests who won't be introduced who will jump right in and just like be a part of it and, and the listeners are probably Wait, who's that third voice? What is that? You know,

Rigden:

now I'm kind of mounted, you know,

Trevor:

I should have so but I don't have I don't have a water sign. I don't have a preference one way or another, you know, but do you have anything to say about Chris Hall and her soul

Rigden:

sounds like you're great. Texas are great. I lived in I went on my mission to Texas. So my family's from Texas. I know a lot about Texas. Texas is good. I don't know if I live there. Just it's kind of like I'm kind of getting sick of Arizona too for the same reasons just like I feel. There's not enough that's making it except for Austin. Austin's probably the one except Austin was rad. Austin's Great. Just kind of bland, Arizona, just like there's the coolest thing that Arizona has to offer is like Scottsdale and there's other cool things. And we're talking like industrial cool. Not like nature cool. And just like not that inspiring. You're cool. I could go there and just like these aren't these aren't really. Arizona's Do you think that

Trevor:

it's like that because you're just from that's where you live is in Arizona? Because I love Arizona. Like when I went there? I was like because I've always thought Arizona why I have no reason to ever go to Arizona because we have Southern Utah which is like St. George which is like in my I thought it was pretty much Arizona. You know and then my wife and I are no no I went on a work trip and stayed at the Phoenician.

Rigden:

Oh yeah, it

Trevor:

was supposed to say. And I was like, I have got to do this more often. And then like eight months later, I took my family there. Loved it. Yeah, we still I can't remember stay. We stayed in like the Gainey Ranch area. And now we love like Scottsdale is awesome.

Rigden:

It's like, Here's your question. I think it's a part that I'm from there. Yeah. But I also think like, and this is not a knock on me or you, but it's like we have different styles. So it's like, people are in Arizona. And I just see like, the brands that just because that's what they're around. So those people so I can merge company or like a hat company. Like, like a lot of people do. And the merge in the style that the use of graphic design use is disgusting to me really, like that's what they like I went to a screen printing store or shop the other day, and like the merch that they're making for themselves is like, Arizona flag mixed with American flag, which is great. Like, that's fine.

Trevor:

You're you're not America?

Rigden:

No. Yeah, it's just it's just like the typical. I don't know. I don't I don't know what the word is for the style, but it's just it's just typical. Got it? I don't know. It's hard to it's hard to describe. Okay. But Arizona is great. I love Texas, too. Like I said, but

Mark:

I wouldn't want to live in either place to be honest. So I think they're Utah. I think they're great places to visit. I don't even know if I want to live in Utah forever. I'm starting to think that I need to go somewhere a little bit more northward. Like Like, North Virginia and cold. Yeah.

Trevor:

Like Montana. Yeah, Montana.

Mark:

Yeah. I don't know if Montana is humid. But yes, I

Trevor:

but also you're thinking like Pacific Northwest.

Mark:

Yeah. We're just like go back to the swamp lands of Europe or something. Right. This the mother My skin is clearly not meant for desert weather. Really? Nor is my wife's

Trevor:

needs some a little more humid. We'll go down to Texas. Did ya

Mark:

know Texas was hot and humid. Get to Houston, I think. Yeah, I think we need like more cold him. Maybe Vermont. Or New Hampshire?

Trevor:

I mean, you're always gonna get hot, humid. It's hot and humid. But cold, cold. Cold humans bad dude. It's

Rigden:

true. Real close. Yeah,

Unknown:

like cold. Yeah,

Mark:

no, I don't exist.

Trevor:

I don't feel like I think

Mark:

it'd be better for my skin. Yeah.

Rigden:

Are you a dry skin or something that

Mark:

others? Oh, yeah.

Trevor:

I guess if that's true. Oppositely. If that's what you're basing your entire living quarters on is your skin, then yeah, I think

Mark:

better for me. And I watched The Revenant the other day and

Rigden:

fantastic movie. Yeah, I

Mark:

was like, wow.

Trevor:

But it's not like up north woods. Yeah, he's

Mark:

like, Well, yeah, I think he's like in Montana.

Trevor:

We're watching the Yellowstone right now. As back.

Rigden:

Have you seen the other 1883 1920? No. But those are better. Really? I'd say watch them in order. You're probably already halfway through Yellowstone.

Trevor:

We're really new to it like a season deep.

Rigden:

It's not too late. I'll go 1883 1920 And then

Trevor:

Yellowstone. Really? Yeah, but it makes us want to live up there.

Rigden:

Oh, yeah. I'm not a horse guy. But I would be. I think I am now after watching horses freak me out. But I do like my phone was dying the horse like a year and a half. Really?

Trevor:

I year and a half ago.

Mark:

I almost died on a horse when I was a kid. Really? Yeah, I was blocked you off. And like I did a no, no, it bucked my cousin off. She broke her arm and collarbone. And I was like five and I just held on for dear life. or years or both? Yeah.

Trevor:

I watched a girl's game scary. I watched her girl get but are like, what? Yeah, what a kick in the back. What does that called? Yeah.

Rigden:

There's a word for it. Yeah, I

Trevor:

feel like there's a word for it. Yeah, I don't know. When we walk. We used to walk through a horse pasture to get to elementary school. And we'd walk through it and i She was just standing behind it. And bump things up comes down on the back.

Mark:

Has a cattle ranch. So I used to go down there in summers and ride horses and do all kinds of fun stuff. horses aren't that scary. Horses terrifying. I mean, you have to respect them. Because if you're huge animal Exactly. Sure. You don't like go hang out behind them. You know, but yeah. All right. Well, I'd love to ride horses. I could do it all day. All right,

Trevor:

let's move on. Let's move on. Horses man. Dry skin. Arizona. Chris Hall. Let's move on.

Mark:

Let's move on to

Trevor:

Rigden Brinckerhoff

Mark:

unstoppable marketing. Yeah. With investigator Rigden Brinkerhoff. Yeah, that's correct. So

Trevor:

okay. Rigden. So, tell us about you tell us about Evora, what is evil aura. And let's just let's just get into the Genesis story, actually, first, how did we get connected? Do you remember?

Rigden:

Yeah. Solander tiktoks. Let's go do it's working. Yeah. And I reached out to because I'm like, Hey, we That's right. That's right. And then I think Just from the start, I just felt like it was a good. Like, yeah, the synergy seemed to be just connected more. Yeah. Versus other people were talking to and then yeah, I was just like, let's do it. So yeah, that's really hard you guys as you connect with your content, amazing. Okay. All right. Working Man, Eve aura.

Trevor:

Let's talk.

Rigden:

Yeah, so a little bit about me. I am 26 Right now, um, I grew up in Arizona, always been entrepreneurial. And I used to hate saying that I used to try not to use the word entrepreneurial. And I think it's because my brother at one time, I might have used the word like, when I was like, 14, or something. I was like, I think like, entrepreneurship seems really cool to me. And he was like, everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. And that's like, something I've always hated as being like somebody else. You know, I think most people, yeah, maybe more than others, I don't know. But then from that point on, I was like, I'm not gonna be entrepreneur, I don't know what I'm gonna do. Like I knew I love business. I knew I know, I'm super analytical. Also really creative. So took Nerf guns apart, modified them to make them better to have the best one out of all my friends did all this stuff. I was always doing stuff, flipping phones, fixing them, selling them for more, whatever. So I've always been that way. served a mission for my church, went to Texas, like I said, got back and then started a Christmas Light Company. Nice and did solar to kind of act as a vehicle to make allow myself to live and then I just think sales is a great way to start. Sure. Any young person's life. So anyways, that's a little backstory on me. So skipped college, when I actually went to college for a year, and I'm not one of those guys is like college is not I know you and I have nothing against it. Like people who say like college is overrated, because you went for four years. So you're kind of allowed to say that. I knew that I knew two extra

Trevor:

years. I can apologize. So

Rigden:

it's got been it does it. I think one of the biggest benefits is network. Yeah. And so that's actually one thing that I, which we might touch on. But yeah, so I skipped college, I went for a year, like I said, and not that it wasn't for me, I just was like, I just know what I'm going to do isn't going to, I'm not gonna utilize what I'm using as far as like a degree. So stop going my whole family. Like, and this is a big part of my story, which I'm not going to go into it deep. My whole family was like, look at all these examples around us. Like they all didn't go to school and look at him now. You know, it's and it's, I knew and they're gonna I say, by their names, say

Mark:

so I mean by that, like, it turned out bad for them. Yeah, it's like look at this guy. He's jumped from this. This this this this this. Okay, no worries that your family was like, stay on the go to college. Yeah. Daddy consistent path. Yep. Yeah, job.

Rigden:

Yeah. And I think I'm grateful also, to have really good and bad examples in my life. I think we all have those. But I have a lot of really good examples and very specific to like me, like my personality, like some people, what they struggle with, like, what they're bad at what they're good at. Like, it's, I'm sure people can find this in their life for them personally, but I feel like they're very tailored the people around me for like, who I am to, like, draw off of like, hey, that person is a bad example. This this person is a good example that so yeah, it was there. They're like telling me, You're gonna go to go to college, you're going to be like this guy or this guy. And I knew I wasn't going to be done the only one who knew that. Also, at the same time, I kind of doubted that right? Yes, yeah. 20 years old. They're all successful. They're probably right. But also I knew I was right. So anyways, yeah, I had my Christmas like business and I did that high school. kept it going. I brought my brother and after doing that for a year, and we started like scaling it again, just small service company hiring a couple guys. We were stopping doing the jobs and then started Evora. So I'll kind of get into more now. Being from Arizona native american jewelry is like a massive part of the culture as far as like like historical Arizona it's not like you walk around Gilbert Arizona sure people are talking about turquoise jewelry they're not but I always thought that was really sterling silver turquoise loved it wanted to find a ring that I wanted to wear couldn't really find anything that was under 300 bucks. Because it was made by like a jeweler. So I was like I'm just gonna make some myself and just like wanted to be like a little hobby I did on the side you know, whatever. Not even on the side like that. I just want to make one ring so I got some simple stuff and made some stuff to my sister's like hey, you should make some for other people. So I started making them them then later on she's like you should do this thing where people come in and they make their own jewelry. There's a place up in Utah. Yeah, that's similar. Yeah. Like that's a that's a cool concept. And so I had on the back pocket started just making rings for people knew I didn't want to do like I never wanted to be like the Crafter like That's right. But I mean, just scrap you don't have any experience. I'm just like doing whatever. And I have again, solar and Christmas lights so I'm just kind of doing it when I can but making rings selling to people and then Then I bring in my friend grant. And we're like, hey, let's do this whole green session or like this workshop thing. So we get his brother's room. He had this big house, one room, it was like 200 square feet, probably very small. And we just start marketing sessions, just like on our organic, we had like couple 100 followers on Evora. And we're just like, hey, so the concept was, pick your stone, pick all your silver options, and you can make it in three hours, we'll be your instructor will help you make it a to z, and you get a custom piece of jewelry that you made kind of an experience thing. So closely after I or shortly after that I determined like, a very important thing to me is self expression as being different kind of like alluded to earlier. I've always felt the need to be different and unique and express what makes me different, which I think is a common narrative nowadays. Yeah. But I felt like that was a common thing across human beings, like everyone wanted to express what made them what made them individual. And so that that was like, really why I wanted to start doing the whole drink jewelry session. Yep. So people could come in and make something that was unique. And then they felt fulfilled, having something that express them uniquely, why was a huge stone that tell us something about the personality of as a small black stone, that tell us something if it's really intricate, that says something, you know, so people could could make choices in their experience that told them about them. And I think everyone wants out to outwardly show who their personality is. So that was kind of like our, our message. Yep. So we do that for two years. And we get to the point where like six months in, and it's just like we're attracting the wrong people. Not that I've anything, it's just people just like moms, and like kind of blogger type people. And I was wanting to go after Gen Z like people like me, like I wanted to go after young audience like trendier people who wanted to find something in its infancy and be like the person to make it cool. And we're just getting moms like, like just grandmas and like, girls parties, like bachelorette parties, just the wrong people. So that kind of put the fire out a little bit for me, it made me less excited about it for a while. Again, I still have Christmas lights and solar. So it was like kind of occupying me. And so there's like three times where I was like, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna sell for for what I can, and just like go full on on Christmas lights, because at Christmas, my business was also scaling and we were doing good. But uh, or solar, which is one of the other Yep. And all three times I wish I wrote them down, I'm sure having somewhere but all three times it wasn't just like, I got really fired up. But like something very tangible would happen. Literally at the lowest point where like, pull me back and be like, like, I were there. I don't know what I can't remember examples. But there are three distinct times where I almost not quit because I genuinely never quit. Yeah. But just want to sell it and just like go on to something else. Something pulled me out. And so the time where I was at my lowest low, probably that I can remember was like end of 2019 beginning of 2020. Which is like I'm doing I'm just gonna sell so I started talking to a business broker. And it wasn't worth much, but just whatever I could get for it. Yeah, go down that path a little bit. And then I'm playing basketball one day. And I wore these these watches in high school, not not even wear watches, but these other watches in high school loved him. And so I saw another kid wearing when he had off by his shoes, and I looked at it and all of a sudden like an epiphany comes I'm like, why don't we do the same thing that we're doing with rings with watches? Because I would love that. Like I would love to have a watch. Like I'm wearing that's maybe designed a little bit different. You know, looks a little different has different pieces, whatever. Yep. But that I can customize and make it my own. And so from there, I was like dude, the fires like I was stoked again. So that was again, that was like January think of 2020 Okay, so start developing the watches from 2020 which ADC I didn't know what I was doing. Yep, found a manufactured contacted probably 100 different people. The typical story, you know, just talking to him. Here's our concept. Here's a minimum word as we want to do. A lot of them said no, finally once said yes.

Trevor:

And we How many do you go through? Do you remember like talking back and forth before

Rigden:

somebody said yes, realistically, probably like 3035

Trevor:

I asked that question because I think that a lot of people and sorry to cut you off but I think this is kind of like a little good learning. You know, thing for people who are listening who are just getting started with businesses is like, you hear the word no so much. And just because you hear the word no. Like doesn't mean that there is a Yes. Isn't a yes, in the future. You know, and when it comes to production, you've got something well that's called like your MOQ which is like it's pretty much your minimum or Does that sound for minimum order quantity? Right? Yeah. And so it's like, you're probably hearing like, as a new business, hey, I don't have a ton of money to fulfill the their MOQ. And that's probably the reason why a lot of these people are saying no to you, right? Or you're having to say no to that. Yeah. It might be that way, you know. And so, I think 30 is a pretty like, standard.

Rigden:

Yeah, yeah, it was a lot. And I think that out. So I think you said there always is a yes. You know, and that's a cliche thing, but genuinely, there always will be. Yes. Yeah. Whether, I mean, there's a lot to go down that path, but I truly believe there's always yes, yeah. Um, and also along that, like, you're gonna get rejected. I can't remember proctor Galloway, you guys know who he is? Another entrepreneur guy. He says, like, if you want to be entrepreneur, just be ready to eat crap, like all day, like everyday, all day, rejected all day, every day. And we all hear that about entrepreneurship. Obviously, it's true. That's why I think going back to like sales, I think sales like door to door specifically, or just sales. Like I think that's one of the best ways to start any person's career who wants to be in business because you, you learn and grow in ways you can't really learn in other ways, like you're gonna get rejected. But if you can, if you can maximize the time you get rejected in a day, if you're rejected once every week, because you have a big deal. And let's say it takes a week to kind of nurture a deal. That's one rejection. But if you can knock on 100 doors a day, get rejected 70 times in one day, like that's, I think that's like better experience than than most of the things can give you. So, yeah, I went through about 3035 of them contacted a bunch more, but 30 of them responded. And first step is to get like your mold. So that's a relatively expensive cost. To bet on my pocket. Just got the mold made. Well, sorry. Sorry. Sorry, I skipped the big step. First had to find a CAD designer, help, like, what do you want to look like whatever went through that, that took a whole year to get everything all the way to the mold made? And then they you know, injection mold injection plastic into the mold, ship our first sample like a year later, so like March, or January or March ish? 2021. Yep. And I think we're gonna launch I think, at the time, I was like, This is gonna take like six months, we can launch the end of 2020. Obviously, it took a lot longer get him on like, Hey, we're gonna order a bunch right after I get these. These are good to go. And I test the waterproof was a big thing. They needed to be waterproof, because we wanted them to be like, very versatile. Like, that's just everything I have. I use this backpack next to me every day, and I use it on every trip. I go on. I just love things that I can wear these shorts. Yeah, I can go to the gym and I can do anything, right. So want to be very versatile. So got them tested, the waterproof didn't work. Waterproof, like was broken. So I guess there was miscommunication. They're like, Oh, we thought you didn't care about that. Like that's that's not that's not what he said. So how to restart pretty much like how to read open molds. Yeah, which is a whole nother year. Yeah. So go through the whole process that and that was whatever, like I was still hyped up about it. So I'm like, you know, it's just part of it. It's a whole nother year we're still doing the jewelry stuff at this at this point. Still. At the end of 2020 I'm sorry 2021 I had a mentor or a friend a mentor tell me he's like do like you're just doing too many things like you got Christmas lights solar, any for that you don't like you don't mean anybody who especially the beginning of their career, who's doing things impactfully and who's like, they become really successful who started off by doing 234 or five things you can do that later on when you're not an operator. But right now if you're gonna be an operator, you need to pick one of them. Sounds like the clear one for me was the VOR like I had the watch is almost done. And like I wanted to give it two years I was like hey, I'm gonna commit two years just to go full in sell my equity into Christmas I business stopped doing solar and just go for it on a boil. So that was going to end the 2020 watches were done beginning of 2020 to launch them in February of 2022. And we launched just as custom watches so our delivery was come on the website kinda like Nike ID every single part so there's there's nine different pieces on the watch you could pick every single piece customize it we had that was cool. quickly learned that it wasn't as cool because it was very it was filled with friction for the customer. Right you go to a place you have millions of options, millions of combinations. It's hard to choose but uh

Mark:

and friction for you right because now you have to hold exactly views and then you have to put them together and then ship them. Yep.

Rigden:

Which turned out to be a happy accident right so we ordered so literally how we got our inventory we got the case which is the part that holds the chip. That's one like piece. Yeah, like the the bezels the pictures for those as little pieces that go around the top. Yeah, the adapters that go that hold the band and then the band had all these pieces shipped to us individually with all the colors you wanted. which gave us the flexibility to then test, we didn't have like, we have 1000 of this and 1000 of this and 3000 of this, we just we had just parts. So we could go test a bunch of different things, which allowed us to then go, Okay, we want to make a design and say this is going to be called our John B watch. So we made a design out of one watch and took a picture of it and said we had 100 of them, whatever. Yeah. So we start doing like premium designs. Those like our, our conversion rate, and other metrics started boost a little bit once we started doing that. And then did some like we talked, I talked to some guy who kind of like talk something similar, like a kit morphed his idea into what we had is like watch kits, so was like two bands, two cases and a bunch of parts, you could get the whole kit, interchange things as you wanted. So, and then again, every time we made one of these changes, there was there's a few more in between, but had a lot of instances where we like, edited the business model in a way. Yeah. And found like little successes and little nuggets of each one that worked. And to where now we just launched like, I don't know, you, you we were working with you guys at best. The Yeah. At the time when we launched it. So I'm trying to think of when it was, let's say four months ago, we launched what's called the, our bundles, which is basically a kit mix with like a pre made watch. So you start you buy a pre made watch. And you buy a bezel set or a part set which you can interchange them extra band, you get that offer discounted price. So that's like been our, our winner. It's combining literally everything we did the past year into one. So anyways, that's kind of where we're at. Now. There's a lot of things that I skipped over. But yeah, it's been awesome. And it's been a it's like it's, it gets more fun as time goes on. Like I always think it's like fun. There's obviously lows and highs still. But yeah, it's a blast. And I love it.

Mark:

I think what's interesting is that you basically have three years of pretty disappointing. Not I'm gonna call them failures, but it's like, a year you get your product, it's not the product you want, right another year, you get your product, but then it turns out that it's like our offering is actually off. Okay, let's keep testing, figuring it out. And then a year later, right you further through all these learnings, you're finally starting to see growth and now you're pacing to be you know, what kind of what kind of company? Are you pacing to be this year?

Rigden:

Oh, you asked me that. Yeah. I mean, we're on track to do I don't know, like, I don't know, this year, but like the next 12 months, probably on track to do a million, a million and a half, I'd say. And that's again, that's still minuscule, obviously, but like from what we started out, that's

Trevor:

huge drop. Well, that's, I mean, that's what I was just talking to Reagan right before as like, you know, what I love about you guys coming on this podcast is when we so we work with we work with Evora. And so we've seen a lot of their growth we saw like in the early stages of where they were at we saw this custom nightmare. You know, we saw all this, we saw it, we saw the decisions that they were making. And what I love about this episode is you know, I think there's so much relatability into you guys, you know you a lot of the you didn't you didn't have a whole ton of budget to work with. Like it was just like, let's test and let's have this internal operation manpower where we can let's, let's create pre made watches and ditch the custom and see what happens, you know, and I remember when we did that it was like, hey, logically, it makes sense. But what if it doesn't? Yeah, so yes, I was like the thing. Yeah, cuz that's what everyone was, you know, so everyone was buying, you know, but then you have this like idea of, well, friction, like could could friction be hurting us and I remember your guys's conversion rate, and I'm sure you're okay with me saying this it was like under a percent a lot of times you know, and but the moment you guys made that change now you guys are like, oftentimes well above 2% You know, which is that jump is unreal in that space. And so I love the steps you've made what are some of the like, what were some of the biggest learnings you've had especially in the last year? I want to know last year yeah, right first two years when like Mark was saying a waterproof it was just you know, last year what's been like one of your biggest lessons you've learned as you've taken Evora from you know really just like a smaller brand you know, smaller lifestyle brand to now what's pacing from an AR perspective over a million dollars and then in you know 12 months from now it's gonna be even bigger than that because I think you guys are making some massive changes what what's what's been one of your biggest lessons you've learned?

Rigden:

There's a lot and it's hard to think of the best ones off top my head but I would definitely say like and we hear it a lot. At least I do it just being willing to like throw what you think is work. are like what you think is the right path? Out the window? And just test new things? Because I don't know. I bet that's out too. That's probably one of the biggest things we did. We just we saw what wasn't working. And we're just like, hey, like we literally change our business model. Obviously, at the end of the day, we're an econ brand. Yeah. And, but that was our model, but like, we changed the actual structure of the business 12 times over the past year. Yeah, until we found what really worked. And we're still going to tweak it and change it. But we found like the bread and butter now, that's it being willing to just scrap what you're currently doing. If it's not really where you think it could be. Yeah, and what it should be. Yeah, like, we just could, I could just, it just felt the brand felt like more cheesy. It felt like, it wasn't like people weren't stoked about it. Obviously, from like a marketing and metric side, things weren't looking very pretty. They're sure. So I'd say just be willing to like scrap and like, pivot when I see things aren't aren't working and do it quick. Because I think the quicker you do it, I can be bad at that. Because I'm a perfectionist. Yeah, by nature. So I think just doing it quicker. And as fast as you can just pivoting.

Trevor:

Yeah, that's a solid. I actually really liked that. Because we I mean, Mark, and I've been in the E commerce space for over seven years now. And I can't tell you how many times we've, whether it's a friend who owns a business, or we've worked with somebody or we've consulted or it's a business we've owned, you get so many people get caught up in trying to make something that's not working work, rather than just change. What's not working? Yep. And pivot. Yep. You know, like, we spend so much time just like no, no, we, this is the right idea. I want this to work so bad for whatever that internal reason is, in the founder or marketers head, when in reality, it's like, you can just flip the switch, you can flip the script, you don't have to do it that way. You can make money and succeed in other ways, it can still be you didn't change your watch, right? You were still a watch. You were still a self expressive Watch Company. But you just made some alterations to how somebody can self Express. And that's what's helped you guys grow. This episode of The Unstoppable Marketer Podcast is sponsored by Besty, the number one customer survey platform for E commerce and direct to consumer businesses. Mark, I remember when I was a CMO, no matter what we did our attribution that never seem to be right and getting feedback around why our customers were purchasing our products was much easier said than done. Focus groups were way too time consuming, and survey tools are too complicated, limited and way too expensive.

Mark:

That is a pain point that every ecommerce brand or marketer owner is well acquainted with. And that is why best tea was created. So it simplifies customer insights by replacing those antiquated survey builders with an easy to use drag and drop interface and ready to go dashboard. So you can start getting the customer insights and answers that will move your business forward, for example of best a user found out what their customers preferences were around messaging and creative. And that allowed them to finally change their strategy and confidently scale to their first seven figure month, followed by eight more.

Trevor:

Geez, I like that. Well, I guess that's why hundreds of brands are choosing bestie to connect with well, they're besties Get started today with besties, 14 day free trial, you can find bestie on bestie app.co, or go to the Shopify app store and search bestie download bestie today.

Rigden:

Yeah, and then two other instances of that, because I really do think that's a major. I think I'll always take that into other things I do. And just, well, two things. So like, my business partner before, it's really good to just he just and I don't have a business partner now. But before with the ring stuff, he was really good at just like having an idea and just going with it before it's perfect. I'm completely opposite. Like I said, so I want something to be perfect. He taught me a lot about that, where now I get criticized by our team for just like doing stuff before it's ready. Yeah. And it's like I know, I mean, I hate to be like this, but I know I'm right. A lot of times because I know my nature is opposite, but I know it's best to do it just just go Yeah, so that's the first thing I think also just before you're ready to just go just just start doing stuff. And then the second thing like I said, so the other the other pivot we made the big pivot is like the whole ring stuff. All the jewelry stuff. I was talking to another mentor in the middle of 2021 22 last year. And he was just like dude, you gotta pick rings your watches again another another lesson I learned is just focus. Like solar because it's it vora, cut them out focus like a sniper. And then within Evora, you're doing rings and watches your your retail your ecommerce, cut one out like just just focus on solidity on the call. I decided to he told me that and I can meet it. I was like yep, we were chatting on a retail store and stopping the whole experience where you come in to make a watch or make a ring where it's going to be ecommerce brand eventually women had to retail again. Sure. But like, again, I was willing to just pivot. And I'm not saying like, Oh, I'm this awesome guy. Come on here. I just learned a lesson a few times before that, like you'd use have to be willing to change things that again, I was soaked about the retail stuff. Like I wanted to build the Build A Bear for Gen Z. Yeah, I had a lot have a big vision for that. Yeah. But just bear for gins. Yeah, I just feel like there's like, I just envisioned this, like, all these these stores inside all these malls that had like the sickest products that you could customize, right, like watches, jewelry, or like rings, whatever it is, you can just like weed, those products would change. But the concept is just build a bear. Don't think there's something there. But yeah, so those are, I'd say pivoting focus. And I think focus, again, is the can mean a lot of things. But I think specifically just not being a Shaka and not doing too many things at once not spreading your bandwidth too wide. And just focusing on and even that that can you can go layers deep. Like I said, my life was spread out between three different ventures narrowed that down to one, once it's in the one that doesn't mean your focus, because then within that within there, I was still a shotgun. So then I had to focus in there then still now. It's like, what are we going to focus on influencers more? Or like ambassadors more? And we got to pick one because we have a small team? Yeah. You know, it's like being focused on one and building it, you know? Yeah. Tell us about that.

Mark:

Yeah, I think two other lessons here is patience and simplification. Yeah, because you're talking a lot about pivoting and testing. And I think a lot of people get caught up and just doing a lot of things. But the core of your business at the Trevor mentioned, this didn't change, you didn't know that personalized or self expressive watches was the company to make. But in your experimentation, right? You went too far in personalization, right? You went too far. And we often do that, as people, we make things way more complicated than they need to be because they go, personalization means everyone wants to use every little part of every little thing on this watch. And you've learned, actually, that's creating more friction. So let's decrease the friction, which is simplification, but using testing to simplify the process. Yep, yep. Right. And I think that's really the key when you're testing things is, if you're going to make a pivot, the pivot should almost always be geared towards making the process more simple, and have less friction. If you're doing that with your tests that's helping you focus in right on the customer experience, which is what it's all about, even I mean, we get lost in this idea. Like everything needs to be fancy, everything needs to look good on a website. But really, it needs to be easy, simple process so someone can get what they want. Nobody wants to sit and try to decide between 100 different things, right? It's

Trevor:

it's the Amazon like law, right? Like every I'm sure everybody here who's shopped on Amazon has been like, Why does Amazon still look the same? Like their checkout process as it did? Like 10 years ago? Just first? No, but it's frictionless. I've never had an issue shopping at Amazon, from getting from like, adding to cart to purchase, you know, and it's super frictionless. It's ugly. But they're just like, yeah, we know what works like yeah, pretty isn't always the thing, you know, and it's the default experience exactly what people expect. Yeah, exactly. It's the same way that Shopify? So if you're a Shopify store, every Shopify checkout is the exact same. It's a universal thing. Yeah. So there's a few things that you can change. Like, I think you can change. They're coming out one click. Yeah, yeah. They're doing like that. Yeah. Like, just by now. Yeah. Yeah. News. And, and they, you know, I think you can change like backgrounds and you can change, like, rather than paying out, you could say, submit their verbiage. Yeah, there's a couple of things. But for the most part, like you cannot, and they tell you not to do it, because it's just like, friction is the enemy to every single business. Like, the more choices, the more you add, the more you're gonna get beat up.

Rigden:

Yeah. And that's just a rule. I think in life, too. It's like, and if you have friction to anything, you're, whoever's doing that thing is a million times less likely to do it. So remove it, I'd say yeah. making it simpler. Yeah, removing any friction and just going going at any problem from like, a customer experience standpoint with like, How can I remove friction? I think that probably might be better answered. But like, for me right now, I think that's probably the best question to ask is like, how do I remove friction before? It's like, yeah, how do I make it? You know, my upsell better how to make it such as like, just, there's remove friction First, start from there, make it as smooth and buttery as possible, and then go for sure.

Mark:

And I think, I think a mistake a lot of people make when, when trying to figure out what friction is like, you have to define what friction is. Friction isn't necessarily a longer or shorter experience. Yeah, yeah, true. Right. Friction is frustration. So if you if you replace friction with frustration in the user experience, that is friction. So where does someone become frustrated in their journey, not necessarily making the journey shorter because sometimes we're making the journey a lot little bit longer, you can reduce that friction or frustration by letting them self answer right or self selecting a quiz or giving them the right option up front making those options Simple, right? Yes, no kind of questions are very easy to answer quizzes or whatever it might be steps, whatever steps so they can self selecting get to what they want to see quicker than going to a collection and trying to choose between 100 things, how do they? How do you show them what they actually want to see? In an easier way? Right? Yep, it's faster to send someone to a collection page. But it's not always the journey of less friction.

Trevor:

You're seeing a lot of brands right now who are using pre purchase quizzes to say, hey, like, tell us a little bit, right? Like, if you go to any skincare, you know, company right now, or any CPG company a lot of times, like, nutrition, whatever, they'll they'll ask you like, Hey, are you male, female? What's your weight? You know, what's your height? What's your goal? What's your goal? How much do you How much do you exercise? You know, and then they're gonna spit you to the sub the right supplements or the right, hey, do oily skin or dry skin like Mark, you know, it's like, oh, I got dry skin. Okay, cool. This is what you need, you know. So it's a much theoretically, theoretical, longer process. But the friction of sorting through trying to find dried skin versus moist, more moist skin stuff, you know, like, so you're spot on. Now, the thing I'll add to that is like, friction kills. And then there's, there's like an anxiety thing, which I think ties into friction. So like, it's a choice. You know, friction would be, you know, more choices that are unnecessary, or anxiety would be, I'm not getting the outcome that I anticipated. Oh, yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah, anxiety,

Mark:

anxiety, and in our world is created when you don't get feedback off of your input.

Trevor:

Yeah, I clicked here. So I thought it was gonna go here. But I didn't. Yeah, anxiety would be. I saw an ad that said, like that said, you know, the best, like, self expressive watch on the market. And then I click on the ad, and it sends me to an Apple Watch. Yeah, like, that's it like, Wait, where am I? But now I'm here, I must have done something wrong. I must have clicked on the wrong thing. That's kind of your anxiety piece.

Mark:

And I'm glad you brought that up. Because I think that's the other part of this friction is it doesn't have to be necessarily even an experience that you're building or whatever you're doing on your website. It's just simply matching what you're doing from a marketing perspective on your social media or on your ads to where people are going on your website. Right. So it's, it's as simple as that sometimes, like, instead of sending somebody to a collection page or your homepage, maybe send them to the product they're clicking on. Yeah, right. Yeah. And as simple of a journey, that is, it makes a big difference if you're sending people and it matches the experience that they are expecting. Right? Yeah, right. Yeah. So make sure that you are matching what they expect to land on, instead of sending them to somewhere out to another destination. And they're like, wait, I mean, I bought a ticket for San Francisco, but I'm in Los Angeles, like, what's going on?

Trevor:

Yeah, for sure.

Mark:

What's California but not where I want it. Right? It's close. Yeah, ish. Close ish, but very different, though. Very different.

Trevor:

What's, what's one thing that you're super excited about right now that you guys are doing? Like, what's one thing that's like, you're excited that you feel like is gonna move the needle for you guys?

Rigden:

A new product we're working on number one. Number two, I think influencers? And like brand collabs. Okay. Talk about that. Because influencers is like a, that's a pretty broad statement. And we're not, we're not doing anything super special. Like it's just product seating. Like, I think there's so many ways to go about it. We've been doing it since day one before in 2018, where we started the ring stuff, just reaching out to people and trying to get them to post like that's as basic as it gets. And that's what we were doing for a long time. And it seems I think the standard for a starting place is product seating. Yeah, but for whatever reason, we just didn't do that for a long time. Yeah, so now we've just been hounding like crazy. Just like every single person that's a solid match to our brand. Hey, we'd love to get you a watch. Like, like no strings attached. I think that guy on your guys's pod six months ago or something said said that exact phrase. Yeah. Oh, my God. We got it.

Trevor:

But yeah, shout out Cody. Yeah. Cody, Mr. Winnick, Mr. Olynyk. can share. Exactly, yeah. So

Rigden:

um, yeah, no strings attached. And we did the amount of people and it grows as you like, we've noticed to kind of a side note, we've noticed as our brand molds into, like, if you've visually look at our brand for three seconds, you're going to you're going to like some emotions will be what's the word? Like populated for lack of a better word evoked evoked? Yeah, nice. Oh, Our emotions that we evoked a year ago are different than the ones today. And it's today it's much closer to like what I want it to be. Yeah. And so because of that, the influencers that see it the amount of people that are saying yes, to just the seating alone, people are much more attracted off in the first few seconds, we're looking at our page or our product, right, because of the changes we've made. Yeah. And so getting a lot of people to say yes, there and then they post. And then we just find like, Cody said, again, yeah, find the cream of the crop through doing that process. And then, and then you start working with them one on one, like a normal cloud, hey, we'll pay you for this. Typically, they'll probably give you a discount because they already like your stuff. Yeah, you've built some other relationship with them, you've kind of built rapport by giving them something free. So I'm gonna go more into that. But that's kind of basic, just typical products eating start

Trevor:

well, and one more thing that you guys are doing, and you can maybe dive deeper. But like the the other thing, I think it's super critical, is like, that becomes the majority of your like, ad content, right? Like a big portion of that, like, that's something that we see a ton. It's like, you guys are like, turning that seems like 60 70% of your ads are not stuff you created. No, it's stuff they created 13 birds with one stone? Yeah, it's like, it's amazing. Yeah, we get like, yeah, out of that one.

Rigden:

Out of that one interaction, or like that one channel, through influences we get, you know, 10 different things tend to benefits for us. Yep. Bear with me, we've learned and this is maybe obvious, but we've learned more and more that influencers truly is just relationship building. Yeah. And so treating it like if you see an influencer, who just does something cool, like sending a congratulate a letter in the mail. I mean, that sounds we haven't done that even but like I think I that's kind of where we're headed, just like nurturing the the influencers that we have, and building relationships with them, I think is is critical. We again, we haven't executed on that. But I think that's another layer that you can do to amplify the influencer game. Yeah. For student like a friend, I guess,

Mark:

anything on the product roadmap that you're excited about?

Rigden:

Yeah, so we have an I don't know when it'll be out. But it's nothing evolutionary, or like revolutionary. But we're developing AppleWatch cases that are interchangeable. With like, bands, adapters case, it's really slender and really slim. And it's kind of like turning your because our message now is like less about self expression still is, but it's more about adventuring daily, and finding adventure daily and creating adventure daily. And another word we've kind of picked up on is like detours. So I think a lot of times this kind of come around to the product thing. And a second lot of times I think people are disappointed when things don't go as planned. Like if I'm on a trip to California. And I have you know, we're doing this at this time. This is this time and this at this time. And so it doesn't go as planned in something else. And it's like maybe seems as like a negative. A lot of people are bummed out about that. But we're trying to change the narrative. We're trying to like I myself, I'm trying to live this way more and try and we're trying to inspire people to Evora, to live this way more where something happens, something spontaneous happens, something unexpected happens that changes plans. And like be excited about that. Because that's typically where the most exciting things happen. The most memorable, memorable, memorable things happen. And along those lines, if you go to the grocery store, I think if people live this way, I know this for a fact for me, I don't live this way perfectly, but I'm trying to if people just walk into a grocery store, and you are automatically thinking, how can I make me grocery shopping? more adventurous or like more? Just like more spicy, I guess? Like how can I turn this normal, like, mundane, mundane thing into something more exciting. If you go into everything you do with that thought it'll become second nature just to make things more exciting and your life will be a lot more adventurous and fun. So going along lines, like everything we're making is around those. That's why our watches are very poppy. And they you know, still express yourself, but they're versatile. You can take them anywhere you can do anything with them. And one inspire people by wearing the watches and remind people to live that way. And so again, going to your point Apple watches like yeah, Apple Watches are kind of boring. They have a lot of cool features that our watches don't that's not why we have the watches. But if you're gonna wear an Apple Watch, at least make it in a way that like inspires you to live in a different way. Sure. And so I don't think there's a case out there right now that's interchangeable. That will look like ours. And that's like as expressive as ours. So I'm really stoked about that but a couple other things that's probably that's the thing that comes to mind. Nice. That new product I think we

Trevor:

should have all the spice up the podcast maybe like switched shoes and interchanged her shoes you wear my shoes I wish you to do you know spiced up the podcast, see what kind of we should have, you know, more of my kids kind of inspiration.

Mark:

I did spice it up I want my kids X today.

Trevor:

You can take them off and put them on at any any given time. I'm also wearing

Mark:

my my son Is Batman inspired songs he gave me? Nice. Nothing but yeah,

Rigden:

it was incredible. You know,

Trevor:

you're very self expressive today I

Mark:

am. Yeah. Yeah, it's funny. I'm not a superhero guy. Like, really at all. I'm with you. I'll go see a movie. But I'm not counting down the day is like, I'm not seeing any movie on launch day or I'll usually wait till they're on video. That's not your thing. But when you're when you're a dad, you will find yourself wearing some superhero stuff.

Rigden:

I don't I don't doubt that a bit.

Trevor:

I haven't yet. So yeah, no, I disagree with you. Your kids have your

Mark:

it hasn't bought us some superhero socks. Now to match his Batman socks.

Trevor:

He hasn't. He wouldn't think like that, man. He's about nice enough, I guess. Yeah. Yeah, he's nice. He's great, though. Not thinking I actually remember those things. He listens to every one of these episodes. Yeah. Why don't you Why aren't you buying your dad any Batman socks? You know, save your money, dude, save your

Rigden:

things I

Trevor:

will do this has been awesome to your mom. Oh, by them. It's not your money. Let's, let's maybe let's end here. What's like, what's one piece of advice that you would maybe give to somebody who's either just getting started or who's like, struggling to figure it out? In the entrepreneur, space, paranormal space.

Rigden:

If I if I was thinking about it for a little bit, I'd probably come up with a better answer. But top of my mind is just I don't know, the first thing that came to mind on your ass is, like I said earlier, and this is probably the most common advice you hear. But just like just get going, like just just start. I don't know, like if most people are perfectionist by nature, or I think the hardest thing to do is starting. And so I think, again, that's the most cliche advice, and I want to give something better, because I feel like there is. But I think it's also still underutilized. Like I felt, I still think people don't live that as much as they should. So yeah, I'd say just just frickin starting, you know?

Trevor:

Well, it's not even just getting started, like, yes, like, I think that's super cliche. But you could also like, I feel like, you could also take that and say, you know, for people who are already starting, who are already successful, who are, you know, or I know, right now, there's a lot of brands who have found a lot of success. But the last couple years have been really challenging in the E commerce space. So it's like you can implement that mentality, even though you're still successful. If you're seeing like, something happened, where your your Downward where your Trend is maybe either flat or more downward. Just do something different, start something new, try something different. Take a different angle. And you can use that same kind of like, just get started, just get go kind of mentality. And I think

Rigden:

every every brand, if there is someone who's already rolling in, they have a team or whatever, even if it's just themselves. Like, I think every person who's running something in some way has 15 things on the back burner that they've been I do like where it's like, I gotta get started on this, but I just never had the time or it's like, almost like it's like, I still fear failure at times, like I catch myself being like, like, even now it's like, I'm, like scared that like we're gonna grow and it's just gonna fall and crash down. So I'm like, man, like, I don't want like, maybe I shouldn't grow at all. Yeah, it sounds I never understood when people said that, like, this sounds like the stupidest thing in the world. But it's like, I catch myself at times all the time. But I catch myself at times having that fear. And so but I think everyone's got something in the backburner, where it's like, whether whether it's fear that's preventing them from starting it, or it's just like too many things going on? Yeah, I think just just like, picking one of those things that you feel has the most upside and just rolling with it. I can use that advice. Now. Just the things we know will move the needle. Yeah. Apple watch stuff was one of them. Yeah, we just we had this idea. And we kept pushing it off. And we defined I just started, like, didn't really know where to go, but we just started with it. Whatever. Whatever resources we had. I know we're gonna we're never gonna regret it because we're gonna get them launched sooner than later. A lot of people a lot of times people just never do it, obviously, as we know, but yeah,

Mark:

love it. Yeah, people. I think what you're saying to spot on that was like if you just get going but there's there are fears rooted in that for a lot of people and I don't think it's perfectionism for most people. I think that certainly is in there. And maybe it's people wrap up their fears as perfectionism but a lot of people are just scared of success. Yeah, and for failure. It's really they're either scared of success or fears but it's really Yeah, but yeah, it's real. And guess what, like all of us are because guess if you have more success, you have more attention or you might have more opportunity to fail. Yeah, right. So if you the higher you climb the ladder the fall, the farther you can fall. Yeah. And I know it sounds weird, but everyone goes through those fears. So if you do have those fears in your life, just realize that the people up further along than you also have those fears.

Trevor:

The other thing that's cool about that, or the other thought that I want to tie into this like fear versus success versus just now not starting as I remember, I remember when we had our first kid, you know, it's like, That was scary. Like, that was a scary thing to have a kid, right? And then, you know, like, having a second kid thinking, oh my gosh, my life is gonna be so different. And, and it was like it was. But I was already so used to be a parent that it just like, integrated easy. And then I had a third kid and I was like, crap, now we're outnumbered. How am I going to do this? And then he figured it out. Yeah. And so now it's funny, I get people who have either never had kids, or they're having a second kid, and they're like, Hey, what should I expect? Like, which was gonna be and it's like, I think people forget that we are hardwired to just figure stuff out. So like, if the success comes and you're like, how am I going to handle this? Or what am I going to have more work? I'm gonna, you know, my marriage or what it's like, worry about those were height. Yeah, like your heart. Like, yes. Be careful in life, you know, and think about it and process things. We're not just saying like, just willy nilly, like, if you're on top of a cliff, and you want to Cliff jump, and you there's water underneath, and you don't know if it's four feet deep or 40. We're not saying jump, but you know, do some assessing as much as you can. But I think we just like don't give ourselves enough credit to understand that, like, humans are built to figure things out. And no matter what situation you put yourself in, whether it is a failure or a success, like you're going to figure it out, you know? Yeah. And that's just that's just how we're hardwired. Yeah, you know,

Rigden:

last little thing. And as, I think figuring it out, we hear that all the time, too, but I think most people aren't. Like, they don't think that they can. Yeah. And also people underestimate, like, people think that there's a path, especially when starting out, I think I kind of thought there was you know, but like, at the end of the day, it's literally just figuring stuff out as you go. And so, yeah, it's the time that like, I agree. 100% just just figuring stuff out is the name of the game,

Trevor:

I think. Just do it. Nike knew it with that, you know, Phil Knight man he knew he knew it was goodness. Alright. Regan, where can people find you more?

Rigden:

So Instagram Ebor company and then tick tock Evoko. Website. You've worked company.com Nice, dude.

Trevor:

What about you? You my personal

Rigden:

is rigged nips? I'll start building stuff. I'll become a Trevor Crump. Yeah, there. Yeah. Come on, Rick, next.

Trevor:

I love it. All right. Did we appreciate it? Thank you so much. And thank you for all the listeners who join us every single Tuesday. We appreciate it. We love you guys. And we'll see you next week. Thank you so much for listening to the unstoppable marketer podcasts. Please go rate and subscribe the podcast whether it's good or bad. We want to hear from you. Because we always want to make this podcast better. If you want to get in touch with me or give me any direct feedback. Please go follow me and get in touch with me. I am at the Trevor Crump on both Instagram and Tiktok thank you and we will see you next week.