Lauren Fagan

If you think PMM communities are dark... wait till you see PMM subreddits ☠️ 90% of the time it's because PMMs feel like they constantly have to justify their seat at the table. Here’s what helped me SHOW value to stakeholders back when I was in-house: 1️⃣ Win/loss analysis The very first one might feel overwhelming, but I found it to be the fastest way to onboard myself and start interesting conversations internally. HOW: - Choose a specific timeframe. 12-24mo back worked well for me for a first win/loss ever. After that - aim for a quarterly cadence. - Mix of quant and qual data. Start with CRM data, compliment with interviews and call recordings. - Share what you learned. Take it to a roadshow with sales + marketing; exec team; and publish a shorter version to the entire org. 👉 Don't chase customer interviews if that feels impossible at first. But if you do the best analysis possible with the resources you do have + hypotheses and what else you'd like to find out... who knows, maybe next time you'll actually get a budget. 2️⃣ Competitive intel I don't mean how many battlecards you can whip up. HOW: - Take inventory: is the existing intel recent and relevant? - If not, identify the top players and do some more research. - Hone in on the meaning of your findings (hint: a detailed feature comparison list isn't it) 👉 By order of impact/ importance, make a wishlist of strategic projects: Playbooks, competitive campaign ideas. Share what you found and your ideas with folks in product, marketing & sales. You don't have to tackle everything alone. 3️⃣ Leverage analyst firms If you have access to them, use them as a resource, not just to get on the next wave or MQ. HOW: - Engage with your ICP's most relevant analysts - Ask questions about the market and buyers - Bring the feedback back to your product leadership and broader exec team. 4️⃣ ICP This is something you want to be on top of even if you think you know it. Doing win/loss regularly helped me to keep myself honest about it too. HOW: - Documentation is half the battle. If it isn't findable, it doesn't exist. - Don't stop at firmographics and technographics. Add details about pains and triggers. - Communicate and enable sales, marketing and product. 👉 You’d be surprised by what you can learn. I’m working on a project right now where we noticed a nonlinear pattern of success which leads me to think we might discovered a new use case. And it's not unusual - I’ve seen similar patterns at two other companies in the last year. 5️⃣ Communicate internally like your life depends on it. The more channels the better: - Roadshow in other team meetings and all hands - Internal slack channel dedicated only for updates - Internal newsletter, monthly write up (even an email) to the exec team, quarterly win/loss reviews, etc. ---- PMMs, what helps you establish credibility? Non-PMMs, where else have you seen PMMs impact?

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Why did Stitch partner with Talon.One? Three main reasons... 1️⃣ In working with Braze customers, we've seen an incredible amount of pain with their existing loyalty platforms (looking at you, Punchh & CrowdTwist, Inc.). 2️⃣ The platform is 👌. The response time and the ability to customize workflows is elite. 3️⃣ The combination of Braze + Talon.One is a marketer's dream. Scale, capability and efficiency bridging marketing & loyalty together.

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Instacart not having negative keywords as an option is the best example of what "machine learning" actually costs brands to support. The best solution I've found? Take their auto applied keywords and make their bid the lowest possible (30 cents). I built a really solid ads structure supporting each of our Target sku's and woke up to us bidding on "Ben and Jerry's" as a "optimized auto applied suggesition" for our Vanilla Ice Cream Whey. Gee, I wonder what sophisticated dev team decided "auto bid on product title". Yeah, in the world of CPG there could neeevvverrr be issues with that. Who leads this team and how much do you make. (Hint: too much). Happy Friday to everyone except overpaid leadership that don't actually understand what they're building and get paid boat loads of money for it.

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99% of DTC brands are missing out by overlooking their opt-in forms. I’d bet 95% of you are still using a basic "10% off" pop-up, collecting nothing more than an email address and maybe a name. The PROBLEM with that? You’ve got no real insight into: - Who your prospect actually is - What they’re looking for - How to tailor your messaging to speak directly to them It’s 2024—you need to start collecting Zero-party Data. You need to understand your customer on a deeper level. Now, you must be wondering: "How can I start collecting zero-party data?" You don’t need to complicate it. Add a simple yet insightful question in your opt-in forms. For example: Skincare Brand: "What’s your primary skin concern?" - Acne, Aging, Dryness, or Dullness Jewelry Brand: "What jewelry are you interested in?" - Rings, Bracelets, or Necklaces Supplement Brand: "Share the area in which you are seeking support:" - Energy, Sleep, or Gut Health Coffee Brand: "How do you usually enjoy your coffee?" - Hot, Iced, Cold Brew, or Blended Drinks Once you’ve collected this data, the key is to use it effectively in your email marketing: With this, now you can: → Personalize emails to match their preferences for targeted messaging → Use the data to speak directly to their challenges & desires → Tailor automated flows with product suggestions based on their preferences By utilizing this, we’ve 3-5x'd brands’ opt-in rates and doubled revenue from email flows. If you haven’t started collecting zero-party data yet, now’s the time. Once you start seeing the results, you’ll wonder why you didn’t start sooner.

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If you have an agency running ads for you, beware of "growth cowboys."   I've worked with dozens of agencies, and I've talked with hundreds.   Shocks me, but there's still plenty running the broken, "growth cowboy" playbook:   - They come in over-confident.   - They don’t listen to the brand.   - They run their playbook perfectly out-of-the-box.   - They migrate ads too quickly.   - They throw the algorithms into disarray.   - They end up getting fired b/c they made things worse.     The best ad partners—the ones who grow customers & profits—do this instead:   - They come in confident but ask questions.   - They listen first b/c you know your customers & products better than they do.   - They bake this info into the heart of their setup.   - They migrate ads as quick as they can w/o compromising baseline performance, but no faster.   - Post setup & migration, they balance knowing when to optimize & when to get out of the way.     Sounds obvious, but you’d be surprised. Beware of growth cowboys.

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What tech and agency partners are being recommended for influencer campaigns for DTC brands? Here's what I've been considering: - Pricing - Relevant success stories and clients - Team and support dynamic - Features and deliverables

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📈 High-growth agencies HIRE. 💀 Despite it crushing client results. 💡 That’s why we do it differently: I spent most of my career in-house in growth, eventually becoming CMO. I’ve worked with dozens of ad agencies—most ‘meh,’ a few good. But even the good ones had a fatal flaw ➡️ They’d eventually turn the account over to juniors with 2-4 years’ experience. The A team would sell you and build momentum, but then the B team came in. I’ve paid ad agencies over $50K/month and they still do this. Sure, these young guns can be smart with great potential. But why should YOU pay the agency to learn on your dime? It slows growth and wastes time. We hated ‘the switch,’ so we do it differently ➡️ Robbie/I don’t hire when we’re full. Instead, we build a waitlist. Yes, we’re leaving money on the table. But quality work is our North Star. And this is the # 1 way to ensure it. Clients get us—seasoned growth operators with 15 years’ experience each. We’ve started and sold VC-backed companies and scaled several beyond $50M. That’s the experience we sell you on. That’s the experience you get. Simple. 💀 Beware of ‘high growth’ agencies hiring. B/c they’re growing revenue at your expense.

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"Insight is the combination of expertise and experience." If you fire up your LLM of choice and expect it to give you the former without giving it the latter, then here's what happens: - You get homogenized ideas sourced from a collection of thinking that already exists in the world - You squander the opportunity to push your brain into corners it hasn't explored, fully fleshing out your own unique ideas and thoughts and separating your perspectives from the external information and content you absorb - You lose confidence in your ideas. If they're not truly yours, how can you own them? This undermines your ability to command respect and be your most compelling self in relationships and engagements. This is why those shower thoughts, car ride daydreams, and late-night strategy sessions matter so much. They're where real, differentiated insights are born. P.S. Magneti's latest post below dives deeper into this stuff. And if you’re curious about how Google is integrating this concept into their ranking algorithm, there’s a link to one of my recent articles in the comments.👇

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Is Wunderkind truly the savior of DTC email growth, or just a mirage? 👇👇👇 Opinions are split—while some hail it as a top revenue accelerator, others (like myself) are less enchanted, witnessing firsthand its disappointing underbelly. Enter Digioh , the dark horse revolutionizing the market right under Wunderkind's nose. I've dissected six reasons why Digioh is different. 𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀. Are you a Wunderkind lover, or on the fence about its superpowers? #emailmarketing #emailgrowth #dtcemails

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Myths about DTC eComm - You can't scale if your AOV is less than $30 - You shouldn't enter a category that is already competitive - You can never compete against established players with huge budgets Reality: - Native Deodorant has a price point of $13 and scaled to $100M in two years - True Classic entered one of the most competitive fashion categories - basic tees, and has done $250M in revenue since launching in 2019 - HiSmile competes against toothpaste giants and is set to hit $200M in revenue. Don’t believe everything you read - know your customer and your category and you can prove the rule makers wrong.

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Come get this week's #LinkedInGems 💎👇 • 🚀 How does a brand new app get 12% of new users to pay? 🚀 And a 70% trial conversion rate!? 😳 by Jacob Rushfinn https://lnkd.in/eJFRrjbZ    • People don't buy a product, they buy the story you tell by Andrey Shakhtin https://lnkd.in/evstWhAG    • Loops vs. Funnels: A Balanced Approach to Sustainable Growth by Sean Ellis https://lnkd.in/eBNGc_-w • Buyer Psychology applied to your apps paywall by Marcus Burke https://lnkd.in/eXzi-fXs • 5 GTM Principles You Should Know as a PM by Maja Voje https://lnkd.in/ei967Fmf

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Everyone has a hill they will die on. I have 7. 🔥Hot DTC takes most disagree with… 1. 95% of brands are too reliant on paid social. 2. Obsessing over daily metrics throttles growth. 3. Most founders SHOULD have day-to-day involvement in their business. 4. Too much time is wasted on content calendars. Too little time is spent on social listening. 5. Most brands should NOT be running a customer-affiliate cash program (sorry fellas Zohaib Noah 🤷‍♂️). 6. Branding for sub $5M revenue brands is mostly bullsh*t. 7. Heavy “discount brands” are going to really struggle in the next 12 months. Go on then… What’s your hot DTC take? 👀

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The biggest problem in DTC isn't ad costs or iOS updates. It's running out of fresh creatives that convert. After managing $70M+ in ad spend, here's our exact process to never run dry: We call it the Content Pyramid™.️ Level 1: Influencer-Generated Content (IGC) 📍 Ship products to 100+ micro-influencers  📍 30% create content naturally 📍 20% convert to paid partnerships 📍 Result: Fresh, authentic content weekly Level 2: UGC-Style Content Think TikTok aesthetics, but controlled: 📍 Work with vetted creators 📍 Script key messages 📍 Keep production raw 📍 Scale what converts Level 3: Customer Stories The Hidden Gold Mine: 📍 Offer store credit for reviews 📍 Turn testimonials into ads 📍 Share wins on social 📍 Build community proof Level 4: Branded Content The foundation: 📍 Professional shoots quarterly 📍 Multiple formats per product 📍 Focus on education 📍 Show premium quality Most brands create content and then try to find angles. We reverse it. Start with winning angles: → Problem-solution → Before-after → Day-in-life → Educational → Social proof Then produce content to fit these proven frameworks. The Math That Matters: - Test 20 new creatives weekly - Kill bottom 80% performers - Double down on winners - Repeat consistently Speed x Volume x Quality = Unstoppable Growth Your creative engine should never stop.

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One interesting trend in the conversations around the US TikTok ban I see is the assumption or implication that the purchasing party (in the very unlikely case that TikTok actually decided to sell) would be a US entity. But, from what little I've seen, it just requires divestiture and removal of control from Chinese interests. While there's a host of good and bad reasons surrounding it. It does seem pretty clear to me that the large SoMe platforms have lobbied quite hard behind the scenes to knock out their single biggest competitor. I find one aspect in particular quite interesting - namely how this might backfire should TikTok end up selling or reforming as a Chinese independent European entity. Just think about the potential harm they'd potentially be positioned to inflict on US SoMe if they sold to a British or German entity. Then fully weaponized regulation, and a pivot in alignment to European privacy and data laws against the US SoMe platforms while driving hard on pro-data regulation or restriction policies. Even at that, it could also just as easily be a Singaporean entity, or Australian one. The only functional limitation would seem to be that it needs to a) be a friendly power and b) have a scaled enough financial organization able to make that sort of purchase - which I imagine is one of the only real reasons it would ultimate be an American purchaser. At the end of the day, I doubt they sell. It's far more likely they shrug it off, challenge the case in the courts, and then litigate it out and then the process just manifest whatever the latest trends in the US/China dynamic are over time.

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I wasted so much opportunity... My automations are trash. Yeah I rely on Calendly to run my schedule, Meets for calls, Hubspot to pull contacts. I was not remarketing between connections. Email (and SMS) mktg isn't for brands (alone). Do yourself a favor and keep the story moving, in between connections. Leverage your content to drive home key points, demonstrate authority. Have social proof in a portfolio, review or case? Share that. Park them in your newsletter. Just keep the conversation moving and remember... One line at a time, don't tell the story; the story is the relationship your building

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We cut 29/30 days from our onboarding process…kind of by accident. Any DTC brand will benefit, but health brands most of all. For the first 7 years, we did the standard “Free Account Audit” that every PPC/SEO agency relies on. Here’s why: - It takes an entry-level employee a few minutes to find a handful of problems. - Then a partner hops on a Zoom call, and says something like, “It looks like the last person in this account wasn’t setting you up for success.” - The brand owners tell themselves, “We trust this guy. As long as he’s on our account, we’re set.” - So they sign — and get handed to an account manager. These are great for marketing agencies… But not so much for the brands. Audits don’t give you a timeline or any real expectations. And the truth is… It only takes 5-10 hours to solve the issues we find in an audit. All the strategy work (including competitor and customer research) happens during the 30-day “Onboarding and Discovery” phase. ____ So a few months ago, we stopped “Free Audits” and started doing “90-Day Marketing Plans” instead. It’s a little risky because we’re paying the Account Manager to build the strategy before the brand commits. But the brands love it because they know: - Exactly what we’re going to do for them - Who’s actually working on the account - And how long it’s all going to take So our signup rate has more than doubled. ____ This all happened a few months ago. (When we decided to focus on health brands.) And that’s why 29 days disappeared. - We already have health, wellness, and fitness clients. And our team is 100% health, wellness, and fitness customers. So we already know the competitors. We are the customer research. - And now the 90-day strategy is set before we start. We spend day 1 fixing the technical issues. And then we’re off and running on day 2. It was an unexpected win for all involved. And a great confirmation that we made the right call on our focus and our strategy.

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This is so obvious yet so difficult to change in many organizations.

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I've worked with 5 enterprise B2B SaaS brands, 3 major media companies, 4 agencies, and 2 consulting/service businesses over the past 3 years They've all had one thing in common: the need for visibility via SEO Their pain points usually revolved around: —> Need for new content to grow organic traffic and attract leads —> Help with execution after developing a strategy —> Thought leadership pieces to support service or product pages —> Bottom funnel content to improve organic conversions To tackle these challenges head-on, they needed a writer who could deliver on all these fronts. Someone with the skills, experience, and strategic mindset to help them level up their game. Out of hundreds of writers, they chose to work with me. While I was fortunate, I'd be foolish to say it was all luck. I worked my ass off to get to this point. And while I can’t teach you to replicate my results, you can steal these tips from my positioning playbook: 1. Don't be a generalist; develop deep niche expertise. My primary niche is cybersecurity/IT, having written 150+ pieces in this field. As a result, it's difficult to encounter a concept that I haven't already written about or am not familiar with. Plus I'm well-versed in HR, finance, and SMB content, allowing me to serve a diverse range of clients. 2. Have a central focus. Everything you do should revolve around this. For me, it's translating technical topics into clear, concise, and readable content. This allows me to excel in any niche that requires this skillset. 3. Know your advantage. A lot of clients need writers who can execute pretty good pieces with speed. I'm one of them. In fact, a head of content recently praised my ability to 'deliver high-quality pieces at a really solid pace". 4. Experience compounds. Working with big-name companies and earning bylines leads to more opportunities. Clients want to work with writers affiliated with well-known brands—it's all about that social proof. 5. Don't just be a writer; be a strategic partner. I've said this before and I'll say it again. Don't just fill docs with words. Be part of the process (if you can). Work with cross-functional teams. Proactively suggest ideas and solutions. Push back when necessary. This shows you care. 6. Have a strong personal brand. I can't quantify how instrumental having one has been to my freelance success. Make sure your online presence screams, "I'm the writer you've been looking for!" When clients see you know your stuff and stand out, they’ll want to work with you. But then, becoming an in-demand writer isn't just about ticking boxes on a playbook. It's a tough gig that requires a thick skin and a relentless work ethic. There will be days when you question your sanity and wonder if you're cut out for this freelance life. But if you can push through the tough times, even when you don't feel like it, then you just might have what it takes to make it in this crazy, competitive, and insanely rewarding industry.

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