TRANSCRIPT
This transcript was completed by an automated system, please forgive any grammatical errors.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
brands, consumers, project, partner, sustainability, customer, retention, case, purchase, incredible, opportunity, offset, shopping, huge, shoppers, ltv, man, e commerce, love, repurchase
SPEAKERS
Mariah Parsons, Dane Baker, Noah Rahimzadeh
Noah Rahimzadeh 00:04
Hey retention pros. I'm Noah Raheem today and I lead partnerships here at Malomo. I'm super pumped to continue to chat with ecosystem experts alongside Mariah, who you all already know and love, say hi, Mariah.
Mariah Parsons 00:16
Hey everyone, as you probably know, retention Chronicles likes to bring in some of the best retention focused brands in the Shopify ecosystem.
Noah Rahimzadeh 00:24
Well, we don't just feature brands, we also feature some great thought leaders in the Shopify ecosystem that serve brands.
Mariah Parsons 00:31
And because we always want these conversations to be fun, you'll hear us talk with our guests about what they're excited about and what's helped them get to where they are today.
Noah Rahimzadeh 00:40
We hope you'll stick around to learn and laugh with us retention Chronicles
Mariah Parsons 00:43
is sponsored by Malomo a shipment in order tracking platform improving the post purchase experience, be sure to subscribe and check out all of our episodes at Go malomo.com Hello, everyone, it's Mariah here. Before we dive into this week's episode, I just wanted to share that we are officially announcing our hosting of our very first ever live podcast. It's going to be with some of the top players in the shop by ecosystem. I couldn't be more excited for it. It's free. It's virtual. It's on September 7 at 3pm. Eastern. We'll be hearing from the assistant director of customer experience at broomy, the director of E commerce at Rocher chocolates, director of customer experience at Mugsy, jeans and more. So if you want to join us had to go malomo.com To get your name on the list or click on the link in this episode's bio. That's go Malomo Gio m a l o n o.com. Now, let's roll with the show.
Noah Rahimzadeh 01:50
Dan, welcome, man and welcome, everybody, all of our listeners latest episode of retention Chronicles. This one's been a long time coming. Dane Baker, CEO of eco car is joining us today. We're very lucky to have him. I think a few a few of our guests who have come on have been similar. But Dan, you are one of the top first three or four people partners so to speak that I met during my tenure or when I started out Malomo Because you and I met at shop talk in Vegas a year and a half ago now. So the last Shop Talk, not the one this year. And that was that was my second week on the job. So you welcomed me with open arms into the industry into the ecosystem. And I always appreciate that man. Thank you.
Dane Baker 02:41
Love to hear it man pumped to be here. Thanks for having me.
Noah Rahimzadeh 02:43
Course of course. We've got a ton to talk about today. So we'll jump right in. And before we get to the shop talk we like to ask our guests about one or two things that you're excited about in your personal life.
Dane Baker 02:59
Ooh, personal life. Yeah, great. So let's see. I just bought a house a lot of things actually just bought a house just got engaged and planning a wedding in 12 months from now. So like a lot a lot personally happening right now. So it's good. Like it's good.
Noah Rahimzadeh 03:13
Major, congrats is a first question first. Are you a first time homeowner?
Dane Baker 03:19
Yes. Yeah, this is the first first of mine. Yeah.
Noah Rahimzadeh 03:22
And you're in? You're in LA. Is that? Yeah, yeah. A little North Ventura
Dane Baker 03:25
County. But yeah.
Noah Rahimzadeh 03:29
So I think I was just complaining about this to somebody at Malomo. Last week during our company wide off site
Mariah Parsons 03:36
might have been me. Because I'm moving, which I just told Dane about before. Okay,
Noah Rahimzadeh 03:44
yeah. Moving sucks. Obviously worse. Pretty much the worst thing that we all like have to do every now and then. But day and I hate to tell you this homeownership is brutal.
Dane Baker 03:57
Sometimes. It Oh, it is it seems as though as soon as you take over the home and you own it for the first time, everything goes wrong. Like when you're renting, nothing goes wrong ever. It's like easy, and then all of a sudden you're a homeowner and everything breaks. I
Mariah Parsons 04:17
see I will say I've rented homes just because literally this morning I was dealing with some stuff. Um, yeah, renting is it's not treating us well at least so maybe I'll get the opposite of homeownership when I finally get there. Well go smoothly from other friends. I've heard the same narrative but also Dang, Congrats on getting engaged and planning a wedding. How exciting and getting a home but
Dane Baker 04:44
fun stuff. Life is good. Thank you love it.
Noah Rahimzadeh 04:48
Do you know where you're going to do the wedding yet?
Dane Baker 04:51
To hear it locally. So like it's in a what's in Westlake is the city name. So it's like, all of our family is local. So it's great. to just, you know, keep it local,
Noah Rahimzadeh 05:02
amazing man, congrats. I'm I'm pretty much the only person I know who complains about homeownership as much as I do. So probably a me problem, I'm the common denominator, I'm sure it will all go very well for you. Also, before I forget, I'm actually flying to LA tomorrow to meet Brandon from electric and some of his buddies for a long weekend. So I will hit you up, man, maybe we can grab a drink or
Dane Baker 05:31
something. That's not like a plan, do it, man, let me know.
Noah Rahimzadeh 05:35
I'm making a note right now. Love it. So with that said, again, founder of eco cart would love to get the sort of the career background and what led you to start the company. And then once we get there, we'll obviously bring the audience up to date about what's going on at EcoCAR today.
Dane Baker 06:00
Love it. Okay, so I'll kind of speed through it quickly. So multi time founder, started a few companies in the past, they've all had a similar thread of trying to make the world a better place in some way, shape, or form. The last company that I started was an online peer to peer rental marketplace business. So think like Airbnb, but for surfboards, kayaks, snowboards, etc. And we started this because we thought that renting versus consumption was a greater benefit for the environment, if we were able to scale the the operation. That was the that was the thought over time, it became very complicated and very expensive to maintain that same sustainability focused ethos that we started the business with. We tried everything, we tried to buy offsets, we tried to hire consultants, it was very complicated, very expensive, it got to the point where we had to either choose effectively choose growth or profitability, or sorry, growth or sustainability. And that was something we didn't really want to have to choose between. So we, we, we sold that company and started eco carpet, you start with this opportunity off of this idea of this problem that we lived ourselves. And, you know, our mission at ecocard is to make the fight against climate change, easy, affordable, and accessible, so that everyone can do their part. And today, we power a carbon neutral shopping experience for over 2000 brands, all different shapes and sizes, brands all the way from Walmart to, you know, Cotopaxi and APL and Supergoop. And many, many more. So we're thrilled to power this movement. We believe what we're building is becoming ubiquitous in the E commerce landscape, and five years from now, us in this room won't be able to go through a checkout experience and not have an option to make our purchase carbon neutral. So we're really excited to be able to power this movement. And you know, in a world where this is sort of becoming ubiquitous.
Noah Rahimzadeh 07:50
Yeah, that's awesome. Man, you You did definitely speed through that. But incredible career today. And obviously eco cart. I think most of our listeners will be very familiar kind of speaks for itself. What you guys have done there, which is incredible, obviously want to get a little more into that. First, though, this, the previous startup, you mentioned, I'm dropping one in the chat. I'm curious how similar they are. There's a there's a startup in Indy called quip to, that I know the founders of and you basically described their business model, I think like Airbnb for outdoor equipment rentals, basically. So I'll have to share this episode with him after so that they can hear I think they're going through some of those same Growing Pains right now. But yeah, so on the on the Eco cart front. Super, super awesome. What you're trying to do there, I'd love to listen, or dive a little bit deeper into like, what the business model is. And, you know, to me, based on what I understand about a does seem like one of those things, it's a no brainer, right. Like you just mentioned, ubiquity. Why wouldn't you know, what's the what's the common feedback? Why doesn't every brand have this as an option? Is there like a price barrier? Is there an implementation barrier? Is it a lack of awareness? Can you sort of talk about that and how we, how we overcome it, because it is such an important problem?
Dane Baker 09:19
Yeah, thank you for the question. But I'm really glad you asked. I think really, it's I think it's a it's an educational barrier at this at this moment, right. Like, for example, most of our you know, it's really interesting nuance, right? Because normally, the challenge of an E commerce software company and the other industry is out in the industry is really to differentiate from all of the other tools that exist in the space that are for a similar reason, basically, to, you know, acquire more customers or retain your customers. Right. And, you know, there's a lot of ultimately there's a lot of similarities between tools in the industry. And so really the the challenge and the opportunities to just differentiate from the other tools for us, it's very, it's a very different challenge for us, it's actually educating that a solution like this exists in the marketplace, and then to that, educating that a solution like this, and building a shopping experience that's centered around a sustainability message can be incredible for business and actually help drive growth drive, in many cases, even profitability for a brand. Like there's a lot of incredible business benefits. So for us, it's an educational hurdle. But I like to say we never hear no, we always, always hear, you know, later like with, you know, yes, I'd love to get to this in just a matter of I have 15 Other things on my priority list, right. And for us, that's kind of that's really where our opportunity exists to educate these brands on how EcoCAR can actually drive business growth. And that is, you know, when you put it into that context, it automatically becomes a top priority for a grant.
Noah Rahimzadeh 10:56
Yeah, yep. That makes sense. So with that, are you do you see, like, conversion rates increase, sometimes as a result of having a co cart in, you know, as part of the buying experience?
Dane Baker 11:12
We do, we have probably dozens of case studies at this point, that show, you know, improved conversion rates, improved repurchase rates on that cohort of consumers that align with that mission. And so you see certain you start seeing improved LTV over time for for a specific cohort of consumers that are introduced to the ecocard option. There's a whole host of incredible business benefits from some top tier brands that you know, other brands know and love and trust, that prove this value. And, you know, in black and white,
Noah Rahimzadeh 11:48
right, right, no, I think that, you know, I can see how that would drive. Like I said, conversion rates out for sure, especially for those more eco conscious buyers.
Dane Baker 12:00
I mean, even just thinking about it, right? Like what is, what is the goal here, right, it's to drive customer loyalty and love, especially at the most sensitive and and important part of the shopping journey, which is the checkout experience, right? If you successfully do that, if you successfully align your shoppers mission with yours as a brand, at that magical moment, it's there's there can be incredible results, right? Consumers are more willing to convert on that purchase at that moment, because they know that their environmental impact can be mitigated. They also are willing to come back and repurchase multiple times there afterwards, because they know that that brand stands for something that they care about. And so it's that kind of a mission and ethos alignment at that magical moment of the shopping experience that just creates incredible value.
Noah Rahimzadeh 12:53
Absolutely. I definitely want to, you know, I think that speaks very well to the acquisition side. And I know there are retention sort of aspects to this as well. So I definitely want to dive into that. But before we get there, I'd love to, like just understand a little bit better, how it how it is that you accomplish this huge mission of, you know, carbon offset, like, from a from a technical perspective, what is it that ecocard is doing, that allows for for brands to be more sustainable?
Dane Baker 13:27
Yeah. So what EcoCAR does, kind of in a nutshell, is we calculate the carbon footprint of a purchase, by looking at how far that order is traveling, how much that order weighs, the contents of that order, what specifically is being purchased, the category of those items, all of these factors go into, effectively an algorithm that spits out $1 amount that a consumer can be offered at the point of purchase, and to make that purchase carbon neutral. And with that dollar amount that the consumer decides to contribute. We are funding a certified carbon offset project and a certified carbon offset project can be anything from tree planting, to wind farm building to sustainable agriculture to direct air capture, there's a whole host of different project types that were funding that all equate to one tonne of co2 being removed from the atmosphere, right. So that is kind of the the quantifiable science behind it is every single project is removing one tonne of co2 and it's verifiable, it's certified. All these projects are you know, they're they're heavily vetted projects. And we're sort of hand selecting these projects to create a portfolio for our community. And we give this portfolio to our community of brands, and in some cases, consumers and they hands on Which ones that are most aligned with their brand? Right? And so this is kind of the, the entire value of ecocard? Is everything from calculating that carbon footprint in real time to hand selecting a vetted portfolio of projects that a brand can use to bolster their brand and their messaging? Got
Noah Rahimzadeh 15:20
it? Okay, that's awesome. I don't think I knew like the first for certain, I didn't know that the last part, right, like, where does the money actually go? And how do you choose those projects? I think it's super powerful that you kind of give that decision to the merchants and their customers as well. Because, you know, I'm sure one option would be like, we just raised all the money and put it in whatever we we want to sort of prioritize, but I think it's a great value add to be able to pick and choose on a merchant by merchant or customer by customer bases as well. And I'm sure that's another reason for, right, like the the business impacts that you're providing beyond the environmental impacts.
Dane Baker 16:02
That's exactly right. Yeah, a lot of it is just how can we make the brand be a sustainable sustainability champion in the eyes of their consumers, right, that's kind of the key. And, you know, everything from letting them choose the project that most aligns with them to customizing that shopping experience, to their specific brand, their brand colors, their brand fonts, their brand messaging, everything that we're doing is in service of making that brand be a sustainability champion, and making that very clear to their consumers. Right.
Mariah Parsons 16:41
Cool. Good. I have a question for you. Dang. So I love that you brought up like, sometimes consumers are seeing the reports of what the projects are. Up to two parter question. So is it like up to the brand that oh, you can, like show a consumer? This is the projects that you're like the additional dollar amount that you'd be paying? Like, that's what you can choose that that project that it's going towards? Is that the brand who's making that call? Of like, what you're surfacing
Dane Baker 17:13
it? Yeah, in many, many cases. Yeah, that is the case. Some, some specific platforms and partners of ours are giving their customer that option, if they have an app, for example, right, where the consumer can actually go into the app, they can like choose their settings, right. And one of those settings would be like the, their your default project that you want to fund. So there's different ways of doing it. But in the vast majority of cases, the brand is the one that is selecting that project.
Mariah Parsons 17:42
Okay, and then that's awesome. Second parter. Have you seen ever any brands that like match what their product is? To like a certain project? So like, say, I don't know, I didn't even think of an example of this. But say, say like, you sell footwear? And then I don't know, like you're planting trees on a long hike, right? Like where there's some, like symbiotic relationship there. Do you ever see like that level of intentionality? With the brands that you're working with?
Dane Baker 18:14
We certainly do. Yeah. And we actually encourage that level of intentionality like you're mentioning and deliberateness, because there's such an opportunity, right? If you're tailoring the message, and the action directly to that to that brand, and that shopper and what they care about, there's so much power in that. So we see a lot of our brands that have that level of of intentionality behind how they choose projects. Yeah.
Mariah Parsons 18:37
Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. Because I imagine a lot of consumers, obviously, if they're shopping with a certain brand, that you're gonna assume they're passionate, or at least someone that they know if it's a gift is passionate about whatever realm, whatever industry it falls in. So the symmetry there. If someone say wasn't going to opt in for a, maybe more random or not as aligned carbon neutral project, then maybe that would be the trigger that someone would say, oh, like, now, this is more relatable to me. Now. I want to fund this project, go with this option Use the tech that you will employ on a checkout page. That's, that's cool. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Dane Baker 19:17
Yeah, you hit on an important point.
Noah Rahimzadeh 19:21
I'm curious, like, what? Well, overall, what percent of merchants would you say like, care about the environment enough that they would actually, you know, they would actually take the time to implement something like EcoCAR, which I imagine is probably not super heavy on the implementation side, but still, you said day and there's 15 projects going on at all times. And it does require some, some thought, at least right. And are there any particular verticals that you've seen recently do a much better job of, you know, caring about the environment and employing tactics to To decrease their footprint, maybe some others who you wish might, you know, might come along for the ride on this and could be doing a much better job. And ultimately, like, how do we, how do we evangelize this sort of opportunity for brands to do a better job? Here? Yeah,
Dane Baker 20:19
yeah, walk there. That's good. So let's see, I guess, firstly, we have to answer that, I guess that first part of your question. brands come to us for different reasons, right? Some brands come to us and say, Hey, we, sustainability is within our ethos, it is why we started this company to begin with we, we stand for it, and are very clear about that message to our customers. And we want to do more. And so that's, you know, some subset right of brands, I'd say, the majority, right, it's probably a minority, the majority of brands come to us because they want to speak to their consumers in a way that is differentiated to all of the strategies and tactics they have tried previously, they want to be able to stand out to their customers. And, you know, some really interesting tactics that we've done in the past, involve running like a carbon neutral sale, for example, for a day or a week, in addition to or in exchange for a 20% off sale, right. And there's some really interesting brand benefits that that exists because of this differentiated tactic and strategy. And so that a lot of brands come to us for that reason that we want to speak with our consumers in a way that drives growth that isn't played out already. And so that's kind of where we shine. Right? And then vertical wise, I would say, we have some incredible brands within probably three or four main verticals, right. So clothing and apparel with kind of a kind of a sub vertical about an outdoor is key for us. And then of course, you know, beauty and cosmetics is another big one, right? Third would be CPG. In general, so food and beverage brands. And then, you know, lastly, I would say, categories, like baby are big for us as well. Right. So those, I'd say, are probably our four most kind of adopted categories thus far. But you know, we work with all different shapes and sizes. I mean, we were Walmart, for example, right? So there's not like that's a category in and of its own, that, you know, so so it's really, it's really sort of mass marketable, but it's those are kind of the most adopted categories that we have today.
Noah Rahimzadeh 22:54
Got it? Right answer, I just threw a ton out you. Stick with me? On the Walmart piece, that's obviously super exciting. Congrats. So it's obviously not, you know, a lot of the merchants or partners that we have on merchants we have on our on Shopify, or are built purposefully for Shopify. Sounds like you took a slightly different approach. Can you serve? Is there any limitations to like platforms, you can support types of merchants you can support beyond Shopify?
Dane Baker 23:25
There's not actually so we have, of course, a Shopify integration, you know, like we're mentioning, but we also have a non platform API that can integrate into any, any platform. And that's it. And that was really much more of something that we developed only because there was such a strong market pole for that, right? I mean, when you have Walmart knocking at the door, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta make it work, right, in some capacity. And we have got to answer. Yeah, and we have to the same sort of, you know, story that happens with tons of other brands and retailers that exist that are, you know, just of incredible size, right, we're about to launch with a really, really big one in the shoe category in the next couple of quarters. And, you know, a lot of these larger brands are just, you know, some of them are are on other platforms, right? And we have to and want to be able to service those brands, we are, our mission is to offset and our vision really, is to offset all carbon emissions from consumer purchases on the on the internet, right? That's a very ambitious goal. And we have to get there by way of various kinds of channels and have really strong channel penetration regardless of platform. So although most of our brands today are on are built on the Shopify ecosystem, we do have the capability of going beyond that.
Noah Rahimzadeh 24:44
Awesome. Awesome. Yeah, that's very cool. We have a similar sort of situation. Like I said, purpose built for Shopify, but open API, if any brand wants to connect outside, which nobody's really taken us up on much yet. cuz, you know, open API isn't doesn't make mean that it's super easy or plug and play like it is on Shopify, but the opportunity is there. And I think to your point, when you had the some of the biggest retailers in the world coming to you, like, you'll go a bit beyond and beyond, and I'm sure to make that to make that work. Another question I had, and I think it's something that I've talked to you and maybe your partner team, about as well is like, obviously, the cart is the most obvious use case. Right? But like, Where else should merchants be talking about highlighting giving opportunities for their customers to partake in their sustainability programs? On beyond just the car? And what does that sort of look like from a use case? Perspective?
Dane Baker 25:51
Yeah, it's a great question. So we, so maybe, hopefully a little bit historical context, my co founder, and I were inspired by brands, like Patagonia and brands, like Cotopaxi, that speak about sustainability in almost every customer touchpoint, it's in the fabric of their of their brand, right. And that's obviously like the kind of North Star right in a lot of ways for for sustainable brands. But there's a huge opportunity for brands of all shapes and sizes, to talk about sustainability in nearly every customer touchpoint. And so, yes, eco cart, sort of core, you know, Cornerstone product is a carbon neutral checkout experience, we also encourage and offer solutions and features and product that decorates the entire shopping experience, right. And it's key to really lean into that, if you do so in an educational and transparent way, I think that's key. But doing so at nearly every customer touchpoint, all the way from pre purchase to post purchase is is key. And that's really where the brands that see the most value from this type of initiative, in general, that's where they get the most value is there's a strong correlation between number of touchpoints and value that a brand receives with regard to, you know, sustainable messaging. So yeah, I would say is a huge opportunity. And many brands, even the ones that we've worked with in many cases aren't, aren't leveraging it to its full potential because of just that, that nuance of, you know, thinking that just a carbon neutral checkout experience is enough. And a lot of cases it is and there is value there. And you know, they that'll keep them around. But there's just so much more, right. And that's where kind of the partnership value that ecocard provides the success managers that we provide to all of our brands at No, no cost. This is what kind of helps them charter a path towards sustainable messaging and kind of that Northstar of what is what will drive the most value for our brands.
Noah Rahimzadeh 28:08
Right? Yeah, my wheels are spinning. And I know, I know that I've talked about this before with you. But I think it's a no brainer use case to partner up on some tracking pages, especially for our shared merchants, which I know we've got dozens of I'm sure. And I love the use case of highlighting the sustainability program post purchase in the tracking experience. The obvious use case is just hey, did you know about our program, like here's, here's what we're raising money for? Here's how we're offsetting. But we could even do more sophisticated stuff like segment the experience based on whether or not a customer paid extra for the for the program or the branded. And, you know, if they did provide them a different experience, if they didn't make sure that they're aware so that the next time they buy, they enroll or whatever that that, you know, you might have some additional ideas on top of that, but what are your initial thoughts?
Dane Baker 29:09
Yeah, I love that. such it's such a great opportunity. I mean, again, empowering brands to speak about their sustainability initiatives in in any touchpoint is to provide such a huge opportunity, right? It's, it's there's a very, very strong and growing population of consumers that deeply care, you know, about how their individual actions impact the environment at large. And purchasing decisions are actually made because of this affinity. Right. And so given that there's just such a huge opportunity to increase the number of places where you talk about that to your consumers, if done in the right way, leaning into education and transparency. So absolutely. I think that's an fantastic idea, you know, tracking page and then we can obviously supplement that with everything pre purchase, and just that'll, that's a that's a wonderful use case right there. Yes,
Mariah Parsons 30:06
I also know now you got my wheels spinning, like so say in that example with someone segments and experience. Dane Have you ever seen like, so you segment post purchase communications and then say like someone chose to go with a carbon neutral offset, then they get, like added or they can sign up for a loyalty program in which they get like points back on their account or anything like that. Because I feel like that. Like, while I was thinking, I feel like whenever I see like carbon neutral offset, I'm like, oh, yeah, like, I kind of feel obligated because they gave you the choice to make that choice. And go with that option. So I wonder if there's like any play with like, oh, the more times you do it, it just reinforces the flywheel. And if you've seen any use cases with that
Dane Baker 30:54
totally get loads, he's a big advisor, asset loyalty is a big use case. And and like, you know, kind of gold star use case in many cases, because it's, yeah, if you if you can talk to that consumer in an individualized way, and give them rewards for you know, taking an action. And if that action is making your order carbon neutral, for example, is a lot of there's a lot of power in that right. And so yeah, we partner with a bunch of different loyalty programs, folks like loyalty, Lion and Jaco and many more to kind of power this at at scale. And, and our brands love love it, right? Because they just, it's an opportunity for them to speak about their sustainability initiatives in more places, but specifically for that subset of, of shoppers that are most loyal to the brand, and are sort of product inherently and driving sustainable messaging in general, leans into building customer loyalty and love. And if you work that into a loyalty program, it's just the it's probably the best possible, you know, MCS and partnership that you can have. Yeah.
Noah Rahimzadeh 32:11
Are there any other like tools or, you know, categories of tools that are just no brainer use cases that ecocard sort of partners very closely with and complements from? From like a product, our joint value proposition standpoint?
Dane Baker 32:27
Yeah, well, loyalty is a probably one of our top. In addition to that, shipping and logistics partners are big for us as well, anything around like even returns partners, for example, right, there's a big carbon footprint, a tangible, you know, carbon footprint that's associated with, with those activities in those platforms. And, you know, us being there to add value to those platforms as well. And their customers is, is is important. So that's kind of one that that comes to mind. But there's just so many, right, I mean, the beauty of of sustainability, right, is that there's everything that we do us being in this call right now has a carbon footprint associated with it, right? Even just me sitting here breathing as a carbon footprint associated with the rest of everything that we do, has that direct tangible connection, and can which therefore means there's an opportunity there, right for a brand to extract value from that if you if you talk about it in the right ways, right. So all different partnership use cases are you know, it's a big part of our strategy.
Noah Rahimzadeh 33:34
Yep. Okay, we, you know, podcast here is called retention Chronicles. So you've got to ask about it. Obviously, I would, I would definitely argue that the loyalty use case does fall under the category of how ecocard helps with retention. How do you think about retention at ecocard? Because a lot of the use cases we kind of talked about before have been more acquisition focused, and how does he what what role does sort of ecocard play in in driving retention for for the brands that you serve?
Dane Baker 34:05
Yeah, it's a it's a big topic, actually. And, you know, I think I think I mentioned it briefly, but I think it's worth stating, again, it's at the most important part of the shopping journey, the checkout experience, if you align a shoppers interest and mission with the brands, and you do that, at that, at that magical moment of the checkout of the other shopping journey, you know, not only will that consumer be more willing to make that purchase in real time, but also more willing to come back and repurchase. So we see increased repurchase rates for our our shoppers that make their purchases carbon neutral for our brands, and so it increases the LTV, and that just means that it's I mean that's kind of the Holy Grail, right is because you can spend In order to acquire that customer, you can hire more, you can do all of these incredible things with the business. Once you're that sort of LTV quantum goes up and every lever should be B, B, B being pulled right to increase that LTV, metric and ecocard. And General sustainability messaging is critical in that in that, in that endeavor, it's just another lever to pull to enhance and increase LTV. So I'd say that is kind of the first and foremost area with which we help our brands with regard to retention. But also, there's some other incredible things that we can do. For example, we partner with clay VO, to and direct our brands and kind of help them set up campaigns that reengage their consumers based off of that sustainability action that they took. And so what we can do is, is segment those shoppers into an affinity segment, right, and then create these these email drips that reengage that consumer back to the website and get them to repurchase right. And so there's some really great tactical things we could do there. Also, you know, given that consumer affinity that they've already they've elected that to be their their affinity, we can do some really exciting things. And so can the brand. Like for example. Give an update about the project that they funded and all centered around. Remember this purchase you made with X brand, have that be front and center, here is the update to the project. You're a rockstar keeping, keep doing that work? Because it's it's incredibly important to our to our world around us. Right? And having that all be wrapped in around the brand, specifically right increases that touchpoint brings them back to the site. Thanks. You know what, yeah, I do, I do need that pair of socks again, like that I bought, you know, a year ago because they're super comfy. And so then they come back and repurchase. There's a lot of really great tactical and strategic ways to even lean further into that, that retention and LTV element.
Noah Rahimzadeh 37:14
Those are awesome tactical examples, appreciate you diving in and also kind of validates the use case that we were talking about, then on the on the Malomo order tracking pages. Because if we're able to send those customer attributes from EcoCAR, to clay VO We can segment based off those alone. So like really common use case for us is splitting up subscribers and nonsubscribers for subscription brands. We could do virtually the same thing, I think here and just provide separate experiences based on the behaviors we want to drive from each cohort, right? The the environmentalists versus the non or however you however you sort of quantify that.
Dane Baker 37:57
Yeah, love it. That's great. Yeah. See, just so many use cases. And I love love to hear that our wheels are already spinning here. This is good.
Noah Rahimzadeh 38:05
For sure. Okay, one, one of the reasons we had you on now is because Black Friday, Cyber Monday is coming up. And I would imagine, maybe you have some data around this, but I would imagine is probably one of the biggest hits on the environment throughout the entire year, because of all the packages that are being shipped and all the products that are being created and put out. Are you guys won? Like how do you think about that from, you know, from your perspective? And then to are you doing anything exciting around Black Friday, Cyber Monday to sort of incentivize brands to think about their impact over the holidays and the crazy shopping time? Or any sort of like cool campaigns? Just curious to get your thoughts Given the timing here.
Dane Baker 38:53
Yeah, we certainly are. So we you know, like you mentioned, Black Friday, Cyber Monday is is a huge shopping time, which means, you know, there's the unfortunate reality that there is a an impact to the environment. But it also means that's a huge opportunity. Right? So for brands specifically, and what we do, what we'll do, I'll say two things, one of which we are doing this kind of new campaign right now, where we are giving our brands that that partner with us in advance of Black Friday, Cyber Monday 2023 We're giving them a co marketing budget, and that is, you know, a calculated dollar amount that's based off of their volume. And it could be anywhere from you know, 1000s of dollars up to $100,000 plus depending on what your volume is right? And so what we have had done in the past is really clever things. We partner with LSVT a huge athletic, you know, athleisure wear company, based in Australia, growing all around the world, gave them a amount of money to for any thing that they wanted to do any initiative, they decided to do in collaboration with us kind of brainstorm this together is purchase a Tesla and give it away to their shoppers in a giveaway style. And not only did this drive incredible customer acquisition, because by making a purchase and making your order carbon neutral, you're entered to win that giveaway, of course, increased acquisition because everyone wants a Tesla. And it also drove some incredible brand affinity, right. And that that those those consumers came back and repurchased at a higher rate than those that debt that were even before the giveaway started, right because of such a huge brand affinity booster and customer loyalty booster. So we're doing this campaign for brands this year in advance of Black Friday. And then we also every year we kind of dub it internally green Friday. And what we do is we partner with our brands, and in many cases, we'll offset all of their emissions for their entire Black Friday, Cyber Monday on us. So we're covering that cost. It's simply to spread awareness that commerce can be a force for good. And what a lot of brands do is take advantage of this because they should, and they'll run like paid social media ads that center around green Friday shop with X brand and your order will be carbon neutral, for example. And it drives some incredible results, right, like way more than you'd even really expect in comparison to a 50% off sale, or whatever that looks like. So there's some really great things that we're doing both with the CO marketing campaign and budget, which is just cash that we're giving to our brands. And as well, putting our money where our mouth is in covering the cost of offsetting emissions on behalf of our brands, so they can make a big splash about about that. So again, yes, there's a ton of, you know, amazing, you know, activity that's happening within the E commerce world in space, which has an unfortunate reality and impact to our environment, but to huge opportunity. And that's kind of where we come into play to partner with these brands.
Noah Rahimzadeh 42:15
Amazing a thought you'd probably have something up your sleeve that is certainly going above and beyond, I'm sure that there'll be like brands who are listening to this who will want to take advantage. So are there any requirements from them? Like, for example, with the with the marketing budget, like does that does that only apply to new customers of EcoCAR? Or like certain types? And then for the for the other one, like anything else that merchants should know ahead of time?
Dane Baker 42:48
Yeah, no. So there's, there's really minimal requirements here. I mean, you can be obviously new, new new partners of ours, new e commerce brands, but even existing e commerce brands can be eligible for this as well. And, you know, our team, our success team is having tons of conversations. I mean, this is like, you know, buzzing around the office right now internally is like, how, you know, how can we make all this happen for all these brands and all the interest in the demand that we're seeing? So yeah, new brands, existing brands already partnered with us and everything. So it is it is it is something that we're really excited to make a big splash with this. This bfcm
Noah Rahimzadeh 43:29
Very cool, man. Always think outside the box. Mariah,
Mariah Parsons 43:34
yeah, real quick. Do you like highlight those brands that are doing really cool initiatives, like on your company page, or like any anywhere else? Because I imagine like me sitting here, I'm like, Oh, that would be so cool. Just to seal that, like, you mentioned, you all are doing the green Fridays in which like, you're covering that. And then the brand runs ads around that. But is there also that, like that sharing on your side where it's like, oh, look at all these cool initiatives, brands of ours, that we're partnering with are running these, you know, discounts or these promos, or whatever they are?
Dane Baker 44:12
Yeah, so it turns out that, you know, consumers that get introduced ecocard by shopping on their favorite brands, they want to keep doing that, right. And so they actually find us, whether it be on social or on our email lists, and they follow along and they're really really interested in really engaged and so we'll actually highlight these brands directly through those channels in an effort to enhance the kind of top of the funnel acquisition that we can do for our brand. So we we do all that we can we just lay out to make our brands get as much value as possible. And you know, and that that usually just just makes for a really happy really happy ecommerce spread. Love it.
Noah Rahimzadeh 44:51
Awesome. Okay, coming to the end here day and this has been incredible. Lots of great tactical stuff here as well. and super educational for me cuz it's always good to sort of get the refresher on everything you guys are doing and, and the impact that you're having. So multi time founder, I think we're around the same age. So it's always, you know, humbling when I talked to what what's one tip or trick or resource that you've sort of been guided by through your, through your awesome career so far?
Dane Baker 45:29
Wow, it's a good question. I, I've always just been kind of guided by the idea of just giving everything my all whatever it may be, right. If it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing. And I kind of live by that in a lot of ways. And so I'm, in general, a very passionate individual. And, you know, that just kind of shows through with, like, everything that I do, and it's, I think it's, it's, it makes for a really fulfilling life I think, in general, so I love the fact that I somehow it just, I don't know, it's ingrained in my brain somehow. And, and, yeah, it's, it's a I like being guided by that principle. Yeah,
Noah Rahimzadeh 46:15
absolutely. I think that's a great one one we haven't heard and for what it's worth, every time we've seen each other in person I've seen that kind of show show through. You're always super energetic and positive and it's it's contagious, man. So I appreciate those moments and maybe we'll get another one here in LA this week.
Dane Baker 46:35
There we go. Sounds like a plan I appreciate the compliment it's really good to hear from from you and and the entire Malomo team which is one of my favorite my favorite partners to work with. So I appreciate that
Noah Rahimzadeh 46:45
force thing thank you so much man. Again maybe see this week but until the next time really appreciate you stopping by and Mariah thank you for all that you do as well.
Mariah Parsons 46:56
Oh, thank you. I would be jealous if you guys get to meet up in LA for sure. But I'll cross my fingers that some somewhere in the future maybe Vegas again next year.
Noah Rahimzadeh 47:05
We'll send pics here we go.
Mariah Parsons 47:07
Oh yeah, that always makes you feel better. Love it. Thanks. Thanks