BRAND SECRETS AND STRATEGIES

PODCAST #135

Hello and thank you for joining us today. This is the Brand Secrets and Strategies Podcast #135

Welcome to the Brand Secrets and Strategies podcast where the focus is on empowering brands and raising the bar.

I’m your host Dan Lohman. This weekly show is dedicated to getting your brand on the shelf and keeping it there.

Get ready to learn actionable insights and strategic solutions to grow your brand and save you valuable time and money.

LETS ROLL UP OUR SLEEVES AND GET STARTED!

Dan: Welcome. In today's episode, you're going to learn a lot about one of the most important things you need to do as a brand, what every brand needs to do. And that is, develop a solid relationship with your core customer base.

Sadly, a lot of brands pay lip service to this, and what I mean by that is that a lot of brands don't take the time to really get to know and understand who buys their product. How they use your product, how they evangelize your product after they take it home, who they share it with, and what makes that customer unique.

We're not just talking millennial, female, head of household, et cetera. But how do they really use the product? What's unique about your core customer?

This is the sole focus of the free Turnkey Sales Story Strategies course. Its purpose and the focus of this episode is designed to give you the tools and strategies you need to give you the solid foundation to build your brand on.

The point is this, the better you know your core customer, the better you understand your customer as intimately as you possibly can get to know them, the more effective that you're going to be in going to retail. All your marketing, all your go-to-market strategies, everything is contingent on your success, your ability to do this well.

In today's podcast, I have the privilege of talking to a brand that is the unique exception in this space. A brand that has taken the time to get to know their core customer, to get to really understand who they are and how to best support them. A brand that goes out of their way to ensure that they're meeting the needs of their customers, and that they're producing products that their customers want.

I often joke about the fact that just because your mom likes it doesn't mean everyone else will. Now, what I'm getting at by saying that is that you've got to have a community that you build your brand around, and it's that community that's going to help you succeed. It's that community that's going to help you identify what the opportunities are for your brand to pivot or innovate or whatever, so that you can compete more effectively.

This is one of the strongest points in negotiation when you're working with a retailer. And if you can't do this effectively, then you become just another package on their shelves, and as a result, you're effectively an ATM machine for them.

What you're going to learn in this podcast are some of the strategies that I share across all of my podcast episodes. But the neat thing is, you're going to hear why this stuff matters, why this stuff works, and how you can leverage these strategies to gain a significant and substantial competitive advantage.

Before I go any further, I want to leave a quick shout-out to a listener who left an amazing review. Bill B. says, "Dan is a person who understands not only the practice of category management but also the spirit of category management. His extensive experience combined with the relentless focus on doing what's right for the shopper sets him apart for others in the field." Thanks, Bill. I really appreciate your comments. This is perfect for this episode. Developing a strategy that's built around your customer to help leverage your strengths of your customers to drive sales across every store.

If you want me to share your comment, leave a review on iTunes, send me an email or comment on any of my social posts. If you like the podcast, please share it with a friend, subscribe, and leave a review.

I also want to remind you that there's a free downloadable guide for you at the end of every episode. I always include one easy to download, quick to digest strategy that you can instantly adopt and make your own. One that you can use to grow sustainable sales. Remember, the goal here is to get your products on more store shelves and into the hands of more shoppers.

Now, here is Meghan with GoodBelly. Meghan, hi. Thanks for coming on today. Could you please start by telling us a little bit about yourself and your journey to NextFoods?

Meghan: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. I'll just go through a little bit of my background. I actually started on the advertising side, working at Starcom MediaVest Group, doing kind of what you do with ad buys of the media planning and buying, and really working in a group that did entertainment strategy. We would take the brand's challenges and try to find entertainment solutions for them that actually drove tangible results.

So it was the first kind of entrée into seeing how you could drive results using entertainment. And that got me interested in... That's a small piece of the puzzle from a brand standpoint. How can I have more ownership over the total brand versus just owning this one component?

Which got me to flip brand side and I started at a sweetener, excuse me, a sweetener company called Merisant and they owned, it's Equal in the US and in Europe, it's called Canderel. And worked there and helped, we launched a wholly owned subsidiary there to launch natural sweeteners, that are erythritol based or getting stevia or Rebaudioside A FDA approval to sell as a food and sell as a sweetener. But a key thing I did there was work on the global brand equity for Equal, to ensure that no matter where you show up around the globe, the brand has a consistent look and feel and voice, so consumers can find it right away.

And then I went for a course to course for a little bit, which was very fun. And then I spent probably the next 10 years at WhiteWave Foods, which is now part of the Danone. And while I was there, I worked on one of their first small brands, which was Rachel's, it was a yogurt and cottage cheese brand that we worked on. And worked on the Canadian business and for Canada, it was great. It was a small team, there was three of us in total and it was really more entrepreneurial of, you got to roll up your sleeves.

So from going to reviewing creative down to the mail room, to FedEx packaging, so everyone had what they needed, and really understanding a challenger brand mindset. So while Silk is a huge brand here in the US, in Canada at the time, it was the number three soy milk brand and almond milk was just launching. And how do you act as a challenger brand and then work to grow your business to become the number one brand? And we were on the verge of being the number one brand before I rotated off that business.

And then I also worked on So Delicious Dairy Free. And what I really enjoyed on that is it was right when they were purchased by WhiteWave. And I was the only WhiteWave person on the marketing side that was part of the marketing team to help integrate that team into the WhiteWave processes, while still maintaining the brand equity of So Delicious and what that team built to make sure that the consumer that they had, the engagement that they had didn't get lost through the transition into a larger company.

And then two years ago, I came to NextFoods to help grow GoodBelly and continue to get those consumers, their bellies working great and have them happy.

Dan: Thanks. I appreciate that. Let's start by talking about pre and probiotics. And the reason I wanted to start here is because there is so much confusion, so much noise out there in the industry about what a premium probiotic is, why it matters, and why people should be thinking about it.

And if you could also talk a little bit about what's out there, because again, we want to talk about what's making the biggest difference for the consumer, as opposed to where the hype is, if that makes sense.

Meghan: It does. Yes, and there is a lot of confusion, especially consumers are confused about what's a prebiotic versus a probiotic? And what is a probiotic? And so I'll start just with the definition of a probiotic.

Dan: Thanks.

Meghan: So a probiotic are live microorganisms that when taken in adequate amounts may help provide a health benefit to the person consuming them. So there is scientific research behind it and that's why you don't always have, you don't know the number you need, which is also a confusing element. Because it's based on the research that has been done on that specific strain.

So if the strain has very strong scientific backing, it will have a claim associated with its certain number of probiotics that have that health benefits work. So there are things, so in the yogurt category as an example, consumers are really confused, because they think live and active cultures mean probiotics, which it does not. Probiotics have to have a benefit to the person consuming them.

So what we typically say is, if it doesn't say probiotics, you should question that. It will say probiotics and if it doesn't tell you if you don't know the number that you're getting, you should ask questions about that, because of the numbers matter. That's how you know you're getting the amount that you need, that gives you the benefit that you're looking for from probiotics.

From a prebiotics standpoint, the easy shorthand is, that's the food that helps the probiotics grow and work.

Dan: Okay, that helps a lot. As far as pre and probiotics, your gut biome has that in it naturally. Right? Where I wanted to go with here is that this is not some voodoo science, somebody came up with something and said, look, you need to buy this stuff because it's so amazing. You need to put it in your system. It's already in your body and you need to have the right mix.

And some of them, and correct me if I'm wrong, there are things that we do that kill it off, that doesn't support it, that hurt it, that negatively impact our gut biome. So can you explain that?

Meghan: That's a really great question. And there are actually many factors that play a role in tipping the balance of bacteria in your gut. So a few of them are aging, stress, lack of sleep, diet, exercise, all play a role. So do medications like antibiotics. When they're taken, they kill the bad bacteria in your body, which is making you sick, but it also kills all of the bacteria. So both good and bad are destroyed when you take antibiotics.

And so it can be really valuable to take probiotics to help you reset your microbiome and keep it in balance. So our gut linings shed each day just like the cells on our skin shed. So it's important to take probiotics each day to replenish what's been shed.

And we like to say that probiotics and where they sit in your gut, it's like a parking lot. So as the gut lining sheds, you want to replace as many parking spots with probiotics as possible, so your gut microbiome is in balance. And that's because when it's in balance, it helps with regularity, digestion, bloating, and it just helps you just feel a little bit better when you do it regularly.

Dan: So is there a way to make a double-decker parking spot?

Meghan: Unfortunately, there is not. So that's the other fun thing that consumers say is like, wow, 20 billion? That sounds like a lot. But whatever you don't need continues to go through your system, so it just passes through if there isn't a quote-unquote parking spot available.

Dan: I like that analogy and like supplements, I mean, no, you don't technically need them if you're eating the right stuff, but the reality is very few of us eat the right stuff, in the right balance, in the right mix. So thank you for sharing that.

I've done a lot of... Go ahead.

Meghan: If you don't mind, there was just one other anecdote that I wanted to provide when you had mentioned the voodoo science.

Dan: Please, sure.

Meghan: The way we actually found the strain that we use, which is Lp 299v, in Sweden, the doctors there in a hospital were seeing some people at post-surgery leave the hospital faster than others and they wanted to know why. So they actually found out that the consumer or the patients there, who were leaving, had more of that strain of microbiome in their gut than the others. So then they went and basically fed them this oatmeal type product that had more of the Lp 299v in it to see if those patients healed quicker to leave the hospital.

And they started to see that working, which is when they started to do more scientific studies behind the benefit of our specific probiotic in our beverages.

Dan: Very interesting. And the cool thing about it is, is they're actually able to identify that and segment it out from all the other stuff. So when they're studying that, how do they create the new strains?

Meghan: That's a really good question. The strain is actually isolated to create a mother culture. And then it's grown under highly controlled conditions.

Dan: When you say it's grown under highly controlled conditions, what does that mean? I mean, in other words, how do I paint a picture in my mind of what that means?

Meghan: Yeah, so we actually have a proprietary way that we grow it in our plant. And so it's highly controlled conditions, which to us says we can count how many are in there. And also, it's highly sanitary, from a standpoint of it's controlled, as you would expect in a manufacturing location.

Dan: So as a consumer, how do I know that that's not Frankenfood? What is unique and different about the way that you're growing this and why is it done in that fashion?

Meghan: So for us, it goes back to the science. Our strain, Lp 299v that's in our beverages is naturally occurring in the human gut. And so what we did is we isolated that strain, and then we're just feeding it as you would using prebiotics to help it grow. And then we're putting it in food, like juice, shots, beverages, so that you can consume it and help populate your gut microbiome with more probiotics to help keep it in balance with the other bacteria that are in your gut.

Dan: So correct me if I'm wrong, the process is done in a laboratory to prevent any contamination et cetera. But this is something that would be ordinarily occurring if we ate correctly if we took care of our bodies correctly, et cetera.

Meghan: Yes.

Dan: I know bodies produce a certain amount and I know that come from different sources, et cetera. And so my background, I've done work in almost every category and I've done work in the yogurt category, where a lot of brands tout their pre and probiotics. I've also done a tremendous amount of work in the supplement category, where this is a big focus.

The challenge is, the way the databases are segmented don't necessarily represent the way the consumer shops. And more importantly, and I mean, they don't actually, so I should just put it that way. But the other issue is that it doesn't segment out what's good and bad, what's different, what matters, et cetera.

So the reason I wanted to go down this path, Meghan, and thank you for sharing this, is that there's a big difference between a brand that just puts a label on a package, rather than a brand that stands behind it, that does the science that backs up what they're putting into their product.

And what I'm getting at is that GoodBelly has a reputation of being a brand that consumers can know, like and trust, over and above other brands when it comes to pre and probiotics. Because you guys have been so very diligent in the way you communicate that in the importance of this exact science.

Can you talk a little bit about that? And I certainly don't want to pick on any brands or mention any other brands that are your competitors, but what's the difference and why do you feel that is so critically important?

Meghan: Yeah, that's a great question. I think the reason that our founders got into this, and the reason that I get excited to get to work every day is we really just want to improve people's lives. And when you see what consumers say to us in emails or on our social channels, and how it has improved and made their lives better, it just makes you want to keep doing it.

And it also makes you start to be a little protective because you're correct, that messaging is confusing. And while you had mentioned the database is confusing, consumers are basically similar to that database. They don't know what's right and what's wrong, and they don't understand the difference between it and you're asking them a lot to dig into that science.

So what we did as a brand is we tried to create the science and bring it down to a level that's more digestible bites. We tend to refer to either Bill Nye the Science Guy, who takes very complex things and makes it simple. Or The Magic School Bus, which also has a teacher in it that helps simplify the science and still make it fun of how do we take something that meaty and make it fun for consumers and give it to them in digestible bites and make them aware of things that they should question?

And I think that goes back to, what's the insight of the brand? Why do we think it's really important, and then what is the benefit we provide to consumers? And then we wrap it in a very playful, fun package. And probiotics can go many ways, it can go very medicinal. In certain categories, kombucha tends to go aspirational.

And we didn't want to do either of those. And there are consumers for those different ways on go-to-market. We wanted to do it in a playful, approachable manner, and really talk to people about issues that they have, that are already uncomfortable, and make it easy for them to have that conversation and share that with us so that we can help them.

And we always talk about being like their belly's bestie and how do we help improve their life?

Dan: I like that, belly's bestie. That's funny. No, this is so important. Because again, one of the challenges, if you're a retailer and you're trying to understand what's really driving sales in the category if you're a brand, a supplement brand, it doesn't matter, garbage in, garbage out.

And so if you've got the generic pre and probiotics, which isn't necessarily coded correctly in all the different databases, that's one thing. But to understand the difference between the different strains, and there are more than one, just kidding, there are a lot. And the better you can understand what's unique, different et cetera, then the more impactful you can be in terms of planning and forecasting and driving sales and understand what really sells.

And the other thing is, there are companies that kind of sprinkle this on all their products. It's kind of like CBD today, where they put a little bit in everything and all of a sudden it's a miracle cure. But it's not.

Can you explain a little bit more about why this matters? In other words, if I'm a consumer, and I've heard about this thing called pre and probiotics, and I know that maybe my gut health isn't right, I don't feel right, I don't have the energy, I mean, there are a lot of things.

Actually, that's probably a better way to start. Let's talk about some of the symptoms people could have, from not having the right gut biome.

Meghan: Oh, there's a plethora of them. A lot of what we hear from consumers is they're bloated, they're gassy, and they're irregular. And those are the minor ones. And then you get IBS, colitis, and some more serious issues that consumers talk to us about on our website.

But we talked to our heavy users, actually about a month ago. And so we talk to them on social all the time, but we actually used our email newsletter database to reach out and find our heavy users, so we could talk to them about our existing products, what we could do, how they found us.

And what we learned is they always find GoodBelly because they're having some sort of continuous digestive issue. So again, the specificity of it depends on that individual. They go to their doctor and the doctor tells them to take a probiotic and nothing else. So it doesn't say pill, food, here's what you should know about it, just kind of go take a probiotic or maybe go have some yogurt and they're not specific.

So then the consumer goes and does that. And either the product fixes one thing and makes other issues worse, or they don't feel any different. And so if you don't feel an impact to the issue you're having, you're going to stop. And some of it is for them, pills feel like medicine, and there's no joy in taking pills every day. You just don't want to feel like you're sick, for these consumers.

And so then they look for other options. And that's usually when they find GoodBelly and they see the black, they see the pop of color, they see the name and the name tells you the benefit. It's telegraphic, which is great. And so we always say they come for probiotics and they stay because it's delicious.

And then they stay long enough that then they can feel that it's addressing the issues that they've had continuously. So it's also solving a problem for them.

Dan: Got you, makes so much sense. And this is so critically important because it's interesting, the simple things, when you get back to the basics and you understand your health, if you are what you eat, what you eat matters, I say that a lot. And if you understand the basics, the foundational things that support good health, this is something you need to be paying attention to.

And isn't it true, correct me if I'm wrong, that there are other things that could impact it? Like stress and inflammation and stuff like that as well?

Meghan: There can be, yes. There are lots of things that can impact your gut microbiome. And even if you have, so I've never had any sort of chronic issue and yet, I drink GoodBelly every day. And when I started, you went through a process and we have an actual marketing campaign that we call our 12 Day Belly Reboot. So you go to our website, you sign up, we give you a buy two, get one free coupon, which gets you 12 days of the product.

It also then enables us to be able to send you emails to educate you on probiotics and on our products. So that you know what to look for. And it gets you the 12 days so that you can start to take it more regularly and feel an impact as you rebalance your microbiome.

Dan: Interesting. And very helpful, too. And I just popped it up on the website, it just popped up and said do you sign me up or not interested? So that's a good way to get people started.

And the other cool thing is, you're also developing a relationship with people outside of your website. I mean, outside of retail, so that now you have the opportunity to educate them, that's brilliant. What other things am I going to find once I sign up?

Meghan: So when you sign up, we send out emails that tell you what are probiotics, what should you look for? We have kind of a gut health guide that helps you find prebiotics that are in naturally occurring foods, like certain fruits and vegetables, as well as then we educate you on what you're feeling. So as your belly rebalances, you go through a phase that we call grumble belly because it's rebalancing in your gut.

And so you might feel a little extra bloated for a couple of days before your belly rebalances. So we walk them through all that because if you've never done it before, you might think that something's wrong. And so we want to pre-tell them that that is normal and it's what you should feel.

In addition to that, we have a private Facebook group. And that's really, we created that because it's not always comfortable for anyone to talk about digestive issues or regularity or the fact that if they eat something, they may have to run to the bathroom two minutes later. And that's not always comfortable, and you don't want that public.

So we created a private group where people could go and talk to each other and talk to us about, what are the issues? What are they looking for and how could we help? And it's been wonderful. We launched it two years ago, to see it grow and evolve. And the consumers, when they ask questions about the product, typically, they are responding to each other before we even answer anything, because they're so involved with the brand.

Dan: Love that. I used to work for Kimberly Clark and we sold paper products and Depends and Poise and all that other stuff. And yeah, it's some sensitive, you get into some awkward conversations with people. But yeah, I think this is great. This is so fantastic.

And more importantly, being able to leverage that relationship with your consumer is so powerful. I always say that retailers generically don't make anything. What they do is they sell real estate in the form of space that your product takes up on their shelf. So if you have the ability to help drive... Let me finish that.

So what the retailers want is they want that unique consumer that you're able to drive in their store. So if you've got that ability to have that relationship, build a community around that unique consumer, then that gives you an opportunity to innovate and do some of the things that a lot of the other brands can't do.

And this is actually one of the big strategies that I share with brands and I try to get brands to adopt because this is so critically important. This takes you out of the realm of being an ATM machine or just another package on a retailer shelf, to be the category leader.

I appreciate you're getting into this, this is so critically important. And thank you for sharing it. And again, this is something that everyone needs to be paying attention to, because it's such a complicated issue, yet it's so important to our overall health.

And another thing, I know that my body has changed over time. I don't know how much of that would be because of processed foods, et cetera. But I can't eat lactose the way I used to. There are a lot of things that I can't do that I used to be able to do when I was younger. And so again, this is part of the educational process, helping people stay ahead of that curb.

So in terms of the information that you're sharing with people, how interactive is this group, beyond the Facebook group?

Meghan: So this group is pretty interactive. I mean, we actively post on Instagram and Facebook and are answering questions. And typically, you don't just want to sell yourself, you want to provide other elements. So whether it's a contest, sometimes it's just educational pieces of, here's a fun fact about probiotics or about your body that you didn't know, that can help you learn more.

And so we try to do that. We try to kind of throw out and ask them questions about what they're experiencing to make us better at what we do. And really kind of continue to improve what we're doing.

The other space we do is we do try to talk to registered dietitians and educate them on our brand. Because again, there's a subset of consumers that really do not enjoy taking pills. And some also just don't always love the taste of kombucha, it has an acquired taste, I like to say, just because of that kind of vinegar endnote. And some consumers really love it and others don't.

And so for us, we want to make sure that they know that there's an option that is approachable and every day for a more mainstream consumer who wants to be healthier but doesn't want to eat something that doesn't taste as good for their palate.

Dan: How does this compare to fermented foods?

Meghan: So I think the difference between fermented foods is because they're naturally grown, you don't necessarily always know the counts or the strains that are involved in those. Versus, we use ours and we're using specific strains that we now have the science and have the numbers behind supporting the digestive health statements that we make.

Dan: Great. Okay, that helps a lot. So now, let's get into the fun part. Let's talk about the stuff I love, in terms of how you're interacting on the shelf and how you're communicating with customers. You were talking about maintaining brand equity. Actually, first of all, so challenger brand, what is a challenger brand? And then how do you define that and then what would be the equivalent, the antithesis of a challenger brand? And then what's the difference and how do you help build those brands out?

Meghan: I mean, a challenger brand is anyone who's not number one and wants to be. And when you think of the kind of big brands, as you would say during the cola wars, Pepsi was the challenger brand to Coke. That's why they created the Pepsi Challenge, was a really head-on-head of, in a blind taste test, you're not always going to pick Coke to try to get people to swap.

So that's kind of the mentality and attitude is, I still have more to grow and I'm going to steal share from the guy who's building and help build the category. But the other guy is building the category and I'm going to draft from him a lot because I don't have the same funding.

Dan: Cycling term or actually a NASCAR term too, so drafting-

Meghan: I was going NASCAR. But, yeah.

Dan: Are you from the South?

Meghan: I am not. I'm just not a cyclist.

Dan: So drafting, for anyone who doesn't understand that term, it's where someone gets in behind the person in front of them, whether horse riding or something like that. And you can actually work, you can actually follow them without having to work as hard. And then cycling, they take turns, in NASCAR they take turns, et cetera sometimes. So nice reference.

So in terms of the challenger brand, that's the reason I wanted to ask that is because natural organic brands are challenging the status quo. And natural organic brands need to be nimble and quick and need to be agile, in terms of the way they go to market and the way they connect with consumers.

You mentioned brand equity. So how do you define brand equity? And when you're talking about maintaining it, how do you do that? What are some of the key things that you focus on, as you're working to develop these products with GoodBelly?

Meghan: Yeah, and I think there's a way big companies do it and then there's the way small companies that don't have the budgets to do that research, do it. So if I was at a larger company, you can build the brand equity similarly, but they do research to make sure that they understand what is the brand awareness and how to do certain metrics... that are important to the benefit. So I refer to a friend, it's the most trusted brand. I think it works the most, I think it tastes the best, and they actually measure those, and that helps give them direction on where to go.

That was a nice thing to have when you worked at a large company. But at a small company, you're not necessarily going to spend the funding to do that. You're going to get a read based on spending the time in the social channels or reaching out to your newsletter database and asking the consumers how they're doing. Or doing it at demos, at expos, various things like that, to have different consumers' touchpoints.

So it won't be as quantitative, but you'll still be able to get a read. But to go back to your initial, how do you build that? It all starts with the consumer. In my mind, everything starts with the consumer. It's critical and you really want to understand, what is the insight of why you have your product?

And so every founder is solving some sort of problem and every product is solving some sort of product problem. There's an insight into why you got to that. So what is that insight and then how are you solving that? And then from there, you can understand, what is your kind of functional benefit? Which could be digestive health, it could be anything from... and are healthier.

Annie's would be a healthier snack, versus what was out there in the kind of early 2000s, where there weren't any healthy snacking options. Plant-based milk is a better alternative to cow's milk. There are different various functional benefits, and then you can go to an emotional benefit of, how does that make those consumers feel if that's what I'm solving?

And you can differentiate there, depending on what you're seeing from consumers and what emotion are they sharing with you, from that. And then you can build your brand personality and wrapping all of that up to make it really, really unique. And in creating your brand personality, the way you do it is you kind of take your founder and who they are in mind and what was the vision and mission from starting.

You also look at your competitors. You can't create anything in a vacuum, they are doing something, they are reacting to things. So we actually, when I started, mapped our competitors, which is a broad list, because we looked at who is in probiotics? So that could be anything from a beverage to fermented foods to potentially, pills, and how are they showing up in the marketplace? And how do they communicate to consumers? And is there a white space of how we're showing up that makes us unique? And do we want to make that even stronger? Because it creates a point of difference in a personality and tone that the other brands can't own since they already exist today.

Dan: Got you. And actually, this is exactly why I created my free Turnkey Sales Story Strategies course to teach brands how to do exactly this. One of the things that I find and let me know if you agree is, or disagree, is that big brands when they're doing a lot of this research, they tend to commoditize the consumer.

So I joke a lot about, a lot of social providers think of the low loss consumer, someone who takes a couple of walks and eats a couple of salads and that's it. Whereas in our world, someone is trying to reduce their carbon footprint.

My point is that if you can get to know your end consumer, your ideal consumer a lot more than just the size of the household or the demographics, but get to know them and how they use the product, that's far more beneficial. And the better you know your customer, the better you're going to be able to market to them, to be able to support them and give them what they really need.

And this is critically important because I would say literally all big brands overlook this. And that's a pretty broad statement. But yet, I've built my career on being able to out-execute other brands, because they tend to follow the generic consumer, as opposed to that specific consumer that you were talking about. What are your thoughts?

Meghan: No, I agree with that. And it'll be interesting to see, I think that's going to shift over the next few years. Because I think you used to buy all of your media based on demographics. So you bought TV, print, and you bought it based on I'm going after a 25 to 54-year-old female, who has two kids and this household income.

And so I think if you're a big brand now, you existed then, and that's how you were trained to go after your target. And in a digital world, that doesn't exist. It's all about psychographics. So I think it was Ethan who said he doesn't even like talking about demographics when it comes to his consumer and I agree with him.

And the way we came up with our consumer is, really to kind of say there's this wellness landscape of how they exist. We call kind of our consumer group, health curious. And then we go on and really describe them. And we dug into social and we talk to them to understand their mindset. They want to seek better choices, they want to be healthier, but they're really time-starved and they're busy taking care of, whether it's a significant other or children or some, a parent. And they want to be healthier.

And then they also don't know how, and then you go on the internet and you google and you'll see one article that says a positive thing and another one that says a negative thing, and you don't know where to go, you don't know who to trust. And you're not more of that low house consumer that really understands and will dig into that detail. They're not there. That's their friend who is doing that.

But they're looking for shortcuts. They also look for shortcuts like white bread is bad, wheat bread is good. But I don't understand that 100% whole wheat actually means something different than whole wheat, because I'm not going that step far. I need someone to help educate me on that.

And the taste is a must for our consumer, taste is really important. And this is very different than how I would go about if I thought of a kombucha consumer, I would describe them differently than this. And so it's a different consumer audience.

And for us, it was really helpful to understand this, because it potentially changes your channel strategy a little bit. It helps you understand Walmart is hitting our velocity tertiles. Well, that makes sense when you describe this consumer.

And then we also talked about the whole landscape. So we had a health confident consumer and that consumer is more the natural, organic consumer, and they do consume GoodBelly and they do enjoy GoodBelly. They're more of an influencer for us to help get the health curious into the brand because they're the ones who need the most help.

Dan: Thanks for the reference to Ethan. That was podcast 129. Great conversation with Ethan Hirschberg.

In terms of what you're doing, I love the idea that you've gone to these lengths. Most brands don't think about it this way. And marketing is not a one-size-fits-all. And the more you get in, the better you understand your consumers and you understand those trends.

I liken it to the ripple at the pond. So if you pay attention to where the ripple begins, and then follow it through to, when it becomes a tsunami and ends up on a Walmart shelf, that's so critically important. So this is not just a one-size-fits-all, it's not an off the box type strategy. It requires someone like you that really gets into this and understands that unique consumer and is able to follow that consumer through the lifecycle of the product.

What else would you recommend to a brand that is listening to this, in terms of how can they leverage some of these strategies? Because I think that the Achilles heel, Megan, and let me know if you disagree or agree, of big brands, is that even though they've got deep pockets, they don't step back and think about the business, about the consumer to the degree that you're talking about.

So I always say that the big brands spend most of their time talking at us, whereas the smaller brands, what makes natural, natural is that we can have a more one-on-one, more intimate relationship with the consumers that are curious about our products, with the consumers that use our products. And again, this is where that ripple starts.

Your thoughts?

Meghan: Yeah, I agree. And again, I think it goes back to who is your consumer? And the first thing I did when I came to GoodBelly, and I still do it on a weekly basis is I go through all our social channels, including the private Facebook group, and I read all of the conversations and all of the commentary.

Dan: Wow.

Meghan: And if we're getting emails I go through and I read it because it gives me context to who our consumer is. It also shows you where you could go with innovation because they're going to start to tell you if they don't like certain things.

And also, if you know your consumer, and I think the one thing I would suggest and you may have this and if not, I mean, you can google it, I'm happy to talk to people if they have questions is making a traditional positioning statement. That is, who is your consumer, what are you solving, how are you solving it? And from a kind of functional standpoint, and then if you think you have emotional, and then what are the reasons to believe? Which could be organic, it could be scientifically backed strains, various things on that front.

That helps create a box for you to plan. So when you're talking to people about your innovation pipeline, you can say if this is our consumer and this is what we solve, we shouldn't be launching these things over here. Or, for us, we just launched Bubbles, which is a sparkling product, and the idea is it's an approachable way for you to get probiotics without the vinegar aftertaste because not everybody is looking for that.

But they want the benefit, they want them on the go occasion. So we saw white space and a need for that, and created it with our kind of fun personality, but made sure that it had the taste that you expect to come from GoodBelly. And it's our kind of version of how we would approach the kombucha category, which is different than if you didn't have this positioning, you might go and do something different, that kind of is a little slightly off from where your brand stands.

Dan: Love that. And on that note, I work with literally hundreds of brands, mentoring them and working with them startups, et cetera, as well as big brands too, established brands and this is an area that so many brands overlook. This is something that so many brands don't really put a lot of effort into.

And I mean, when it goes one step further, not just your traditional positioning statement, but what is your brand strategy, what is your business plan? And all this stuff should get baked into it.

And so one of the challenges, one of the things that I think that we do a lousy job with, in terms of natural, is we tell brands, okay, here's how to pitch to go get money for your brand. But yet, we do a lousy job of saying, here's why us, here's how we're going to disrupt the category, here's our brand positioning statement. Here's the consumer we're going after, this is how we're going to address that need, here are the retailers we are going to go to et cetera. So that's why I developed all those mini-courses and why I put out all the content, the podcast, et cetera.

But to your point, this is such a huge missed opportunity for so many brands. Now, let me back up a little bit. You guys, the perfect storm is the wrong word for it. But the fact that you've got, first of all, the fact that you're taking the time, the initiative to understand your consumers the way you do, my hats off to you, because that is so cool. I don't hear that very often, almost never.

And then to go one step further and overlay that on top of the fact that you've got consumers that are interacting with you outside of traditional retail, including online, through your list, through your Facebook group, et cetera, gives you a unique opportunity to develop what I would call a pull strategy. And a pull strategy is where you develop a relationship with your consumer, with your rabid fanbase, to put it one way, and then leverage that relationship you have with your consumer base to drive them into retail stores.

And the antithesis, as far as big brands are concerned, mostly, and the small brands today too, is that it's all about how much money can you write a check for to promote and reacquire that same customer over and over again? So I am so thoroughly impressed that you guys are doing that. It makes such a big difference.

And the great thing about it is, you're going to be able to get more runway, you're going to get the honest feedback from the consumers that you're working with, like you said, in terms of innovation. So when you're talking about Bubbles, you saw a need. How did you identify that need?

Meghan: Well, I think when you see a category grow as fast as the kombucha category grew, you know that there's something there. But you also know, so my taste palette is more of our consumer than more a low house consumer. And I like the idea of kombucha, but the vinegar notes in it are just too strong for me. So it's not something that I enjoy as much as like a Spindrift, for example, just for my personal palate.

And so I sat there watching a category balloon and thinking about a more mainstream consumer and saying there's an opportunity that they're going to want this, they don't want soda anymore. That category, while it's still huge, continues to decline year over year, because consumers are looking for healthier options.

And they're now starting to look for options that even may not have the certain sweetener components of it. So they may be willing to do kind of natural sugars or no sugar added to avoid the sweeteners. So we sat there and said, well, we have delicious juices and shots. Can we put that in a sparkling format and bring the sugar down as much as we can? Sugar does feed probiotics. So there is a need for that in our products. And how do you do that in a way that gets them to stop doing something unhealthy for them? Have them still hit that taste that they're looking for, but then they have a benefit that they need.

Dan: How's the brand doing?

Meghan: It's doing well. So it just hit Meyer. So that's off and running. And then we also came out with a no sugar added platform this year. Just everyone's trying to cut sugar down and we have really heavy consumers that love our juice courts and don't want us to change them. But there are other consumers that are looking for less sugar.

So we came out with a 50 calorie 10 gram of sugar, no sugar added courts. And that's doing excellent, both at Walmart and at Sprouts, where it's available. And it's continuing to expand as we hit resets throughout the year.

Dan: This is exciting. And the thing is that you know so much about your customer, what they want, what they're going to buy, what they're interested in. A traditional brand that would look at this would probably say why would anyone want to create another something in this category? It's so over saturated.

But yet, they're talking about the commoditized view of the consumer and the commoditizing the category, et cetera. Whereas you have a unique understanding, again, another benefit. I really want to celebrate you for what you're doing. The bar-

Meghan: Thank you.

Dan: You guys deserve it and this is so great. And I've known Alan for a while and actually, we both worked at Unilever, not necessarily at the same time or for the same division. But taking that big CPG experience, even you with Coors and with WhiteWave, and bringing those insights into natural, and being able to leverage the best of what big brands do to help differentiate the brands, small, natural brands and drive them. So again, just a huge fan of what you guys are doing.

Talk about the bars. And the reason I wanted to go down this path is because you have an interesting relationship with a big brand. And you oversee or help, can I say, help guide that brand, to not allow their brand to be commoditized, to not lose the brand's authenticity. Can you talk about that?

Meghan: Yeah, so we launched nutrition bars last year, and they're actually rolling out expanded distribution now, and that is through a licensing agreement with General Mills. And we always said we're the experts in probiotics, and they're the experts in bars. So how do we create a relationship that helps both of us?

And they have been a great partner to work with. And you're right, I am the equity owner of the brand. So they have our brand book, which is really good... that's another reason why having that helps, is it gives you a sandbox in which you're allowed to play. So it gives your brand's personality. We have design guidelines in there. So what fonts, what logos are you allowed to use? How do they show up? When do you use doodles, when do you not? How do you use our smile? All of that is laid out.

We have a social section of, how do you show up on social? Is it different on Facebook than Instagram? Because for us, the engagement changes depending on the post when we did an analysis of that. So how do you do that, what does it look like? And so that really helps bring the entire brand to life for them, so that they know who we are and who the brand is. And they have been great at doing that.

And then additionally, we've set up some approval protocols just to ensure the brand look, feel and tone through all marketing assets stays true to who the brand is today.

Dan: I'm impressed. There's a lot to that. And for anyone who doesn't necessarily understand everything we're talking about, imagine this. You have a child and you don't want to just take that child and go to your neighbor and say, hey, could you raise this child? I'll come back in 18 years. Make sure they get a good education and stuff like that.

You're making sure that everything is done properly, that you're getting the right kind of home healthcare, the right kind of whatever. A bad analogy, perhaps. But the point is that a lot of brands are so eager to get money, to start profiting, that they don't take the time to think about, how do they want their child, in this case, those bars to be raised? How do they want to see those products on the shelf, and they give away a lot of their equity, they give away a lot of the control over the brand.

And so a lot of people come up to me and ask me, they tell me that they want to create a private label product. And I always say no, no, no, you've got to have a brand first and then a private label product. And it's perhaps not the right example for this podcast, but think of, Coke was Splenda. Because that was one of the earlier brands I could think about.

Meghan: The new Coke. Yeah, that's great... Yeah.

Dan: And versus just a Coke with an interesting sweetener. And not the best example, again, for a natural organic audience. But yeah, that's exactly what I'm getting at it. If you've got brand equity, then that brand is going to help support everything else that's got that brand name on it.

So anyhow, kudos to you. Could you talk more about that? And then how do you leverage that, how are you able to remain in control? And then how do you work with them?

Meghan: Yeah, that's a great question. I mean, they're really great partners and they're highly respectful of our team and our brand and what we've built. And I think that's another reason of why we chose that they would be a good company to do the licensing agreement with. Because there is that mutual respect.

So we have meetings right now, just because of where we are within the launch, about every other week, where we go through and understand where they're at, where we are at, where are things that are overlapping, that we may need to talk about. So on them launching bars impacts our social channels, because they're going to want to post on that. Or if we're going to be doing certain advertising tactics, you need to make sure that you're not fighting against each other, and you're not really working together, but at least understanding each other's strategies, so that you understand what's happening. And you're not kind of hurting the brand that has the lesser budget, which would be myself.

But they've been great to chat with and keep us up to date on what's happening with what retail acceptances had been, what they're thinking more from a shopper and advertising standpoint. And because the total brand and bars are a great complement to our beverages. It's a different needs state, it's a different occasion and day part. So it's a great complement to what we're doing.

So how do you continue to build that and grow that, so consumers especially when they travel, because it's hard to... it's impossible to take beverages or a quart or even our shots with you when you travel. It's a great way for you to still get your probiotics in delicious food, but while you're on the go, because it doesn't require refrigeration.

Dan: Love it. And one of the reasons I wanted to bring this up, Meghan, is because big brands are demonized when they buy small brands, or rather small brands are demonized when they get acquired by big brands. Happens all the time. And sometimes it's for a valid reason. There are some small brands that have worked with, that have just been acquired by big brands. And the brand has lost its soul, because in a sense that the big brand tried to make it a smaller version of itself.

But the fact that they've got the distribution, they've got the relationships with the industry, they've got the deeper pockets, and they can help support a brand like yours at a higher level. But the neat thing is, is that you're in the driver's seat.

And so anyone listening, if you can negotiate the type of relationship, which as you said, is based on respect, then that's a win-win. And those are some of the things that smaller brands need to be thinking about, because of the bigger brands, they're struggling, and they need natural organic consumers, and they need natural organic products to help fuel their growth. And this seems to me like it's the best of both worlds.

And like you said, this is a category that they're expert in. What other things would you like to share? What other products specifically or concepts would you like to talk about?

Meghan: I mean, I think our goal and what we're trying to do is create as many, not as many, but the right food and beverage products to help as many bellies as possible. And we're going to continue to do that and we're going to look to leverage what our strengths are. And then in certain cases, find partners, for their strengths, in an instance like the bars.

So another example was, we did an additional licensing agreement with General Mills to launch GoodBelly yogurt, a low fat lactose-free yogurt. And so that will be launching in July.

Dan: Fantastic. And again, the relationship you've got with them as a strategic partner, that's exciting, because that's really going to help you get in front of more customers. But then again, you're still going to own that relationship with a customer on your website. So hats off to you, guys.

I don't remember if we talked about this, but in the podcast toward the end, I've been giving my guests an opportunity to ask me to help solve their most pressing bottleneck. Do you have one that I can help you with?

Meghan: I do. I have-

Dan: Yay.

Meghan: One we already covered, which was kind of the explosion of probiotics in the category, but not all have science. And your perspective of how do brands... because we have our perspective, but I always like listening to other perspectives of what are ways that we could manage through that when we know that consumers may not feel an impact and they may not work?

Dan: Got you. To answer your question, I know you said that we already talked about it a little bit, but you've got to be able to identify what that unique attribute is, what is unique about your product. And I think it goes back to the customer, to the consumer, as you said. Everything begins with the consumer.

So if you think about it, one, if retailers went away, well, you've got your consumer base outside of retail. So that's good. I know that's unrealistic, but the fact is that you've got that relationship. And because you've got that relationship with your end consumer, you can now understand better what they're thinking about, what's important to them, what drives them? That ripple in the pond. What is causing them to move toward that ripple, what's causing that ripple to grow?

And so if you can understand that, and then bake that into not only in your selling story, back to having the position statement and some of the other stuff you were talking about, your brand story, your brand personality, et cetera, excuse me, your brand personality. But as you're able to bake that into your selling story, now let's take a look at the resources that you're using to help guide you.

And so I make this comment a lot and we mentioned it a little bit that big brands rely heavily on focus groups. Well, focus groups sometimes tell brands what they think they want to hear. I remember when I was working even for Unilever, we came out with a product that was supposed to revolutionize the category, a category that wasn't in, but it was such an obvious compliment to what we were doing.

And because we didn't take the time to understand the retail environment, the consumer that was going to buy it, et cetera, the product failed miserably. And the point is, the Achilles heels of the big brands is that's the way they do stuff. They do it that way because that's the way they've always done it because they believe it's the best way to do it.

However, conversely, the ability for a small brand to step back like you do, Meghan, and pay attention to that consumer and how the consumer shops a category and understanding, not just the functional benefit, the emotional benefit and all that other stuff, that's so critically important. But more importantly, how does each and every consumer, how does that impact them? How does that affect them?

And then you take that information, and we can modify or impact the databases that you're using at retail. And so back to the statement, I made about, retailers generically don't make anything. If you can help guide the retailer to grow category sales by providing them these insights and insights that they're not getting from your competition, this is how you stand out on a crowded shelf. This is how you become not just another brand on the shelf, but a valued and respected category leader. Again, a brand that's willing to help the retailer drive sales.

Does that help?

Meghan: It does. Yes.

And then I do have one last one.

Dan: Sure.

Meghan: So a lot of kind of natural organic, smaller brands focus on one category, and actually even big companies. So a lot of the brands I worked on, it was like, go to the ice cream aisle or go to where the milk set is to find your plant-based milk. So it was very easy from a messaging standpoint.

We have a little bit more of a complicated portfolio because we have our juice which can be found in juice, we have our shots, which can be found in yogurts, sometimes in the kind of supplement set or the HBC, health, beauty care set. And then we have our new single serves that are typically in the more grab and go kombucha set.

And so with limited marketing spend, and you had mentioned this on several of your podcasts of, make it easy to find, findability, and I've always been a message where to go to find it. But we have multiple places in the store where you go, depending on the solution to find it. Do you have any, from your kind of background and management of larger portfolios of how they simplified and address that issue for consumers?

Dan: Yes, I do. I love this question. Okay, so big brands, again, we commoditize things, we look at how do we sell more toilet paper? How do we sell more soap? How do we sell more whatever it is, ice cream? And we think about that as being the product, the category, the thing we're trying to solve. Some of the language you used earlier, the problem we're trying to solve, period.

So we go to a retailer and we say we're a great company, whatever and this is how we're going to grow category sales within that category. We're going to promote the heck out of it. We've got deep pockets and that's the old push strategy.

Now, what's cool about what you guys have is that you guys, in my opinion, should position yourselves to be the go-to probiotic experts in the industry, period, across the board. And what I'm getting at is that when I'm... First of all, when I'm a consumer, I walk into a store, I buy your product and I take it home. And without your online capabilities. You don't know anything about me, you don't know how I use the product, et cetera. So you've got that.

So now you want to leverage that with the retailer. So getting back to what I was saying is that focus on the market basket of the consumer. So instead of just saying you're a commodity, you're another box on the shelf or a bottle on the shelf or something like that, what does the consumer purchase when they purchase your products?

My guess is that your consumer is going to be a lot more conscious about what they're buying. And they're going to spend a super premium, they don't mind spending a super premium to get the products that meet their needs. So they're not going to be price driven. And so my guess would be that your consumer is going to be more than happy to buy super high-quality products throughout the store.

In other words, why would I want to buy a probiotic product and then buy something that's going to destroy my gut biome at the same time? So the point is, if I can understand what's in that consumer's market basket, shopper's market basket, so the market basket is the sum total of other purchases when they check out of the store.

So there are a lot of ways to get that information. We'll get to that in a minute. But if you can start there and work your way backward. So a customer of yours goes into the juice category, goes into the yogurt category, goes into whatever category, what are the other things that are complementary in their shopping basket?

So I mean, think about organic, that's an easy one. So organic produce, organic dairy, organic spread, organic whatever else. So anyhow, getting back to how do you measure that, you talk to your consumers. The fact that you have the ability to connect with and talk to the consumers that you have online, you can do some very unscientific polls through Facebook, et cetera. But it's going to give you some really good insights.

And then if you get some, you start uncovering some trends, then you can spend the money to go buy something that's professionally done, that can say here's what my consumers buy. But the reality is, retailers need anecdotally to know what's going on. So I did a project for a brand many years ago and it was a small brand and they hardly had any money. They were, I think they did about $175,000.

So I had them do a very informal Facebook survey, and I baked some of the comments that their customers were sharing into their presentation. And they went from getting into a few stores within a retailer, to nationwide. And they were able to leverage that to get into more stores.

Now, the point is that by being able to tell that story, here's my consumer, here's why my consumer buys my product when they buy my product here's what else they buy, these are the things that retailers need to know, Meghan. And these are the things that are going to differentiate you from other brands. This is how you become a category leader.

So in this instance, let the big brands spend tons of money to become a category captain, they do the schematics, et cetera. But if you're a trusted and valued resource to that retailer, then that retailer is going to bend over backward and say, does this schematic make sense? Where do you think you need to belong on the shelf? How many facings do you need to drive sales in my category?

And they're going to also reach out to you and this is at the crux of all my podcasts and thanks for being a listener, they're also going to reach out to you and say, hey, I've got a promotion I need you to fill, or I've got an end cap or something. And they're going to give you the first opportunity, because they know, like and trust your brand. And they know that you're going to perform as a brand at a much higher level.

And this is the greatest opportunity that any natural brand has to differentiate itself. So my mission is to make a healthy way of life more accessible by getting your products on more store shelves and into the hands of more shoppers. And the way you do that is by having that relationship with the consumer, that you're doing such an amazing job with, and then leveraging that at retail. Does that help?

Meghan: It does. Yes, thank you.

Dan: Anything else I can help you with?

Meghan: No, I think you've covered it. But I will reach out if I have other questions.

Dan: I'd love to. I would love to continue the conversation and a huge fan of what you guys are doing and thanks again for taking the time to get into the weeds to talk about pre and probiotics and understand this. I've had the privilege of working with brands where I've had to really get into the weeds and understand this stuff. And it took me a while, and even working with some of the biggest experts in the industry.

And you think about most people like you said, they want something simple. They don't want to take the time to get a Ph.D. in probiotics to be able to understand why it matters. So anyhow, thank you for going through that and thanks again for your time today.

Meghan: Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Dan: I want to thank Meghan for coming on today and sharing her insights. This is so critically important. Every brand needs to do this and you need to do this well. Think about it. The better you know your customer, the more impactful you're going to be at being able to help the retailer understand how to market to that customer.

It's going to help you with your brand positioning. It's going to help you identify where do you belong on the shelf, and be able to justify that. It's going to help your broker, it's going to help your entire sales team more effectively sell your product, to get your product on more retailer shelves and into the hands of more shoppers. And this includes online.

Don't take this for granted, leverage these strategies with retail. This is exactly why I created the free Turnkey Sales Story Strategies course to help you identify and answer these important questions. What does your customer look like? How did they use your product? And so on.

I'll be certain to put a link to GoodBelly on the podcast webpage and on the show notes. One of Meghan's bottlenecks had to do with market-basket. Understanding your market basket and how that relates to your product and the customers that shop a retail store is so critically important to your success. This is far more important to the retailer than slotting or any of the menu fees or any of the promotional fees that they charge you.

Again, helping that retailer remain relevant, helping that retailer compete more effectively in their market. That's the way this game is won.

To help you understand why this makes sense and how you can leverage this strategy to grow sales, I'm including on today's free downloadable guide my 11 Key Strategies To Increase Your Market Basket Size And Grow Sales. You're going to want to check this one out. You can get this free download and see the show notes at brandsecretsandstrategies.com/session135.

Thank you for listening, and I look forward to seeing you in the next episode.

GoodBelly https://goodbelly.com

This episode's FREE downloadable guide

Your market basket includes all items shoppers purchase on each shopping trip. Health conscious shoppers spend more than regular shoppers. Learn how to leverage the importance of your shopper to drive sustainable sales and increase shopper loyalty.

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