- It's not my fault, our merchants stink.
- It's not my fault, my industry is dying (looking at you, catalogers).
- It's not my fault, the CFO asked me to stop spending so much money.
Helping CEOs Understand How Customers Interact With Advertising, Products, Brands, and Channels
June 30, 2025
Accountability
June 29, 2025
Doing Something Different
- Merchandise (i.e. food ... like sizzling steaks with smoke filling the restaurant at McGregor's Blink Bonnie). Good food matters. A lot.
- Scarcity that forces people to line up well before the restaurant opens because seating is limited. Why accommodate everybody then sit empty most of the time when you could have limited seating that forces people to line up at the door before you open?
- A "hook" ... something that sets one apart from everybody else.
June 25, 2025
Uh Oh
It's fifteen months after The Lemonhead was hired.
The results? They aren't good.
- Net Sales are down 12%.
- Comp Segment performance is up 4%, strongly suggesting that existing customers like what the brand is selling.
- New/Reactivated buyer counts are down 25%.
- Loyal buyer counts are down 5% even though The Lemonhead implemented a brand new loyalty program nine months ago.
- The Executive Team didn't earn an annual bonus, and that's a problem because the VP of Operations wanted to buy a new BMW.
- The Marketing Team has been gutted ... a team of eight individuals has been replaced by eleven individuals (three new people to manage the loyalty program) ... three employees from the old regime and five hand-picked mini-Lemonheads hired by The Lemonhead.
June 23, 2025
The Damage Is Done Before The Results Are In
The Lemonhead has a playbook, tried and true, tested under the most intense of circumstances.
It's the exact wrong playbook for 90% of brands, likely including the brand you work for.
The Lemonhead believes in Customer Loyalty. Of course he does ... he worked for a multi-billion dollar brand that sold addictive products on a daily basis ... so of course his formula of applying a loyalty playbook on your brand who sells sundresses that the customer only needs 1x or 2x per year will "turbocharge" your brand.
The Lemonhead immediately ends wasteful "customer acquisition" tactics, saving the brand a fortune. "WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?" The Lemonhead screams. Of course, this angers the long-term employees who know that without new customers the brand will never had loyal customers. The Lemonhead labels these employees "Luddites" ... "THEY DON'T GET IT!"
The Lemonhead celebrates three months in charge with a p&l that looks spectacular. Sales are roughly flat, maybe down a percent or two ("THE MERCHANTS DON'T GET IT!"), but profit is surging.
Everybody in Leadership is pleased with the results.
Several key employees on the marketing team elect to leave the company ("I'm not working for this stupid lemonhead"), taking a ton of institutional knowledge with them.
The damage is done before the results are in.
Next, we review results a year later.
June 22, 2025
The Lemonhead
This is a marketer (male, female, it doesn't matter) ... you've met this person countless times.
Your company is performing acceptably ... maybe you do $75,000,000 in annual sales, you've been growing at a 3% rate ... not great, but better than others. Then, somebody makes a mistake. It's often the CEO, though many on the Executive Team fall prey to the same logic ... they interview a Lemonhead.
By now you should be wondering what a Lemonhead is.
It's the unique person who is both a force of nature and is a moron. The kind of person who worked at Starbucks in 2005 when they were printing money ... the person had nothing whatsoever to do with their growth plan of putting three stores on a downtown block, but took full credit for it in subsequent job interviews. The kind of person who says that customer loyalty is "paramount" to success (yeah, people love hearing vapid nonsense like that). The Executive Team or CEO or Owner or Board are easily seduced by The Lemonhead.
That's when The Lemonhead begins a "transformation" project. More on that tomorrow.
June 18, 2025
Goat Yoga
Apparently it is a thing.
Before it was a thing, explain the best practice that existed that suggested that Goat Yoga would be a "thing"?
If you answered "there was no best practice", you are likely correct.
By the way, I asked ChatGPT to draw a picture of a person enjoying Goat Yoga. It came up with this. Apparently the fun part of Goat Yoga is AI envisioning that the goats stand on top of each other.
Always remember that when a marketing professional tells you that something is a "best practice", it likely wasn't close to a best practice when it was created and quite likely was something that practitioners sneered at.
June 16, 2025
File Power
I go through phases where I spend a lot of time talking about File Power. Then I go through phases where I read marketers babbling about nonsense ("your customers simply aren't engaged in today's complex media ecosystem") and I'm inspired to reintroduce the topic.
Let's put this in the simplest terms possible.
Say you have 100 customers. In the next year, 30% will buy again, spending $200 each.
Meanwhile, you acquire 70 new/reactivated customers each year, each spending $100.
Here's how you generate business:
- 100 Customers * 0.30 Rebuy Rate * $200 per Repurchaser = $6,000.
- 70 New/Reactivated Customers Spending $100 Each = $7,000.
- Total Sales = $6,000 + $7,000 = $13,000.
- Next Year's 12-Month Buyer File = 100 * 0.30 + 70 = 100.
- 100 Customers * 0.28 Rebuy Rate * $200 per Repurchaser = $5,600.
- 50 New/Reactivated Customers Spending $100 Each = $5,000.
- Total Sales = $5,600 + $5,000 = $10,600.
- Next Year's 12-Month Buyer File = 100 * 0.28 + 50 = 78.
- 78 Customers * 0.30 Rebuy Rate * $200 per Repurchaser = $4,680.
- 70 New/Reactivated Customers Spending $100 Each = $7,000.
- Total Sales = $4,680 + $7,000 = $11,680.
- Next Year's 12-Month Buyer File = 78 * 0.30 + 70 = 93.
Even when the brand reverses direction, sales do not get back to prior levels, and customer counts are short of where they used to be.
This is File Power.
The decisions you make today have a lasting impact. They don't just impact 2025, they impact 2026 and 2027.
June 15, 2025
Catalog Review
I'm going to have some time in August for something different. Normally, I analyze catalog businesses via actual customer transactions. Those projects are a bit more costly ($15,000 to $30,000 ... as you already know).
If you'd like me to look over your existing reporting and existing segmentation for the past several years to see what trends I can identify ... and how those trends impact the future, contact me (kevinh@minethatdata.com). This would be a week-ish (timeframe) review and would cost considerably less than the normal month-long project that you're familiar with.
June 11, 2025
Making a Delicious Omlette
Last month I told you about Fallow.
Today, I share with you one of their videos ... how to make an omelette like a chef.
First of all, I followed the instructions ... and the omelette was SENSATIONAL! My goodness. I was enthralled with the folding process ... you fold the omelette by one-third, then fold the remaining two-thirds over the top of the one-third, and then you turn it over, hiding any sins associated with the folding process. Just like that the omelette has five layers (egg / filling / egg / filling / egg), which makes it both fluffy and elegant at the same time.
They teach you how to do this, for free.
They teach every competitor how to do this, for free.
They don't lack for business. They are using Customer Media Marketing to fill their restaurants.
What is the parallel for your business? Discuss.
June 10, 2025
Northwestern Steak House
In Mason City (Iowa) there is a century-old restaurant that has the formula for success nailed down. The restaurant? Northwestern Steak House (click here). It's not located in a modern building ... or a large building.
They break rules. You cannot make a reservation until 4:30pm of the day you want to eat, and guess what? If you make a reservation, you'll eat late, because there is a line outside the door. On the day of our visit, the line formed at 3:45pm.
When you enter at 4:30pm, you are pointed to a table. By 4:31pm (I checked on my watch), the restaurant is full ... those still in line are asked to go to the upstairs lounge where they can enjoy a beverage and wait for a 5:45pm - 6:00pm seating.
Our order was taken at 4:37pm. By 4:50pm they were taking reservations for 8:00pm.
They serve the classic tiny salad with pickle wedge and hard boiled egg ... in this case with French Dressing ... the same salad they served me in the late 1980s.
Why do people keep coming here? They serve a buttery Greek mixture that they pour on top of the side of pasta or rice you get with your meal (along with some parmesan cheese) - they also serve the buttery greek mixture with your steak. It's to die for!!
By they way, that's the petite filet pictured ... the walleye had to be the size of Lake Erie.
They embrace tradition ... same food they've served for decades, they have a hook that is different than everybody else (buttery Greek mixture), and they break rules by not taking reservations until they open ... meaning they have a line out the door that forms at 3:45pm.
What is the "hook" that makes your business special?
Is there a way to ignore the omnichannel nonsense of always having inventory in stock in all channels in an effort to create urgency?
I mean, this business is 100 years old and they're packing the place. Your business has traditions, right? Use 'em to your advantage!!
P.S.: One of the blatant errors of the omnichannel era was the concept of having products always available, in all channels, at all times. There are times when that is a valuable concept (i.e. you have a check engine light and the Ford dealership has your part in stock). But there are times when you need to sell out of something valuable ... quickly ... and the customer needs to know that, prompting the customer to act immediately.
June 09, 2025
The Peak of the Omnichannel Era, in One Simple Graph
Nordstrom became a private company several weeks ago. I saved the multi-year trend of their stock price. What year was the peak of the "omnichannel era"?
If you answered "2015", trust your instincts.
From 2016 and beyond, the loss of traffic in stores became untenable.
- It was too easy to buy online.
- Amazon absolutely mulched everything in their sights.
- Generational shopping differences cut off younger customers from older brands (I'm looking at you, Macy's).
- What I now call "Customer Media Marketing" began to take shape in this timeframe.
- Startups need funding from VCs.
- VCs need to get paid via IPOs.
- Banks lend when Publicly Traded brands fail to grow or need to grow in an expensive manner.
- Private Equity scoops up the remnants when brands begin to die, allowing banks to get paid while not having to publicly publish failures anymore.
- Private Equity (sometimes) loads the brand up with debt, pumps the numbers, and then sells to a "less smart" buyer, who is left holding the bag.
June 08, 2025
Sometimes Consultants See Things ...
There are times when several of you within a vertical hire me in a similar timeframe (thanks to ChatGPT for framing the situation).
These instances were far more plentiful twenty-five years ago. In the catalog world, your list broker knew what your competitors were doing, and they couldn't tell you what your competitors were doing. If they ever let anything slip, they were done.
Talk to these folks AFTER you leave a vertical (i.e. apparel or home), and yeah, you realize how blind every single company is. You also realize the absolute genius that every single company possesses.
There are "genius situations" happening in 2025. Work your network over, and figure out what is happening. Business challenges frequently lead to genius solutions. Some of you are cooking with gas right now!
June 04, 2025
Beachwaver
Under ten second video of guy in the distribution center packing products (liked 73,000 times). When is the last time you bothered to say anything about Ralph and Charlene in your distribution center? If you think it is hard to get employees to work (#peoplewontwork), how much easier might it be if those employees are featured in your marketing efforts?
Ambassador Community (click here).
This sure smells like Direct Response Marketing. Yet it is different, isn't it? This looks a lot like Customer Media Marketing.
Also - it bypasses traditional search/social ... the model ultimately uses the organic nature of each channel to benefit the brand. Yes, they're paying the gatekeepers ... but it isn't the core of the business model, is it?
June 02, 2025
An Imbalanced Ecosystem
Back to our working hypothesis.
If you think about Customer Media Marketing as a YouTube / TikTok / AI centric video/search platform fused with Community, you immediately see that "traffic" has to flow into those avenues and ultimately flow out of Direct Response Marketing.
This flow out of "traditional search + traditional social" creates an imbalanced ecosystem.
Think about it this way ... pretend you have 100 customers in the old ecosystem. 10 of the 100 customers leak out into YouTube / TikTok / AI, leaving 90 customers in the old ecosystem. The marketer notices that response is 10% worse because the marketer spends money but 10% of the traffic is "gone", driving down ROAS, driving down profitability.
The marketer has two responses here.
The marketer likely notices that certain responsive keywords are "more expensive" ... and they are more expensive because every other marketer decides to go after the responsive keywords, de-emphasizing low performing keywords. The competition is good for the old ecosystem, in that the old ecosystem has pricing authority, but is bad for the marketer, who now pays more and gets less.
As long as the marketer fails to realize that Customer Media Marketing is "a thing" ... a fusion of Video / Community / AI ... problems exist in the p&l. If the marketer is "advertising dependent" (and many of you are), performance is bad, the top-line contracts, and most importantly, it becomes terribly hard to find new customers because customers have leaked out of the old ecosystem into the Customer Media Marketing ecosystem.
The imbalances in the old ecosystem will correct over time, but the correction process can be painful.
Many of you (look at your new customer counts) are dealing with this correction process.
P.S.: If you want to see an example of a company dealing with this correction process, read this email message ... show me where the merchandise is? Or the community? Or video? Or any way to create awareness?
- In their defense, they are directing you to Insta and some of their Reels have a reasonable number of views. They're leveraging a decade-old style of social. Better than not leveraging it, sure.
June 01, 2025
The Four Pests Campaign
For whatever the reason, I wasn't aware of this "Great Moment in Political Leadership" (click here).
- If you kill the sparrows, considering them a "pest", you might not realize that locust populations will grow, creating an even bigger problem.
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