Hi! I’m Doone, your hype girl in business. This is your weekly source of inspiration & information on all things in the e-commerce and CPG space, read by like-minded Entrepreneurs - that happen to be women - like you. If you find value in this content please like & share above, or forward it to someone in your network. I love it when you do that!

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A Quick Recap on Industry News 🗞

Women still have a venture capital problem. Salesforce announced first integration with Slack after a $28B sale. Lifeline Aus hosting live fundraiser on TikTok. Why retailers are embracing rental. Register for the online Women Entrepreneur Series. Kate Rouch left Facebook to become CMO of Coinbase. How to fail 10 times and get to $85M on 11th. Wei Gao (used to “shadow” Jeff Bezo) will join Hopin as its COO.

🔑 Insights From This Week’s Episodes on the Female Startup Club Podcast

Directly from the women building the world’s most exciting businesses in the e-commerce and CPG space.

1. Epic Fail Rewind ↩️

EP202: Remi, Founder of Freck, is the entrepreneur we all need to learn from. She is a solid 10 out of 10, and she’s been through it all. A bad investor deal, a snub from Jimmy Kimmel himself… What are her two main learnings?

TikTok (turn back the clock ⏲️)

If you’re starting out today, dive deep, deep into TikTok.

Find your specific thing, and get super specific about what you’re talking about. Some of the videos hit, some don’t. But just be super authentic, drive the same content over and over again, and this is how you make it on TikTok. It’s best to stay super focused. Besides that:

As a brand, that’s way more valuable than your own page. It’s authentic. It’s more likely to go viral. That’s what people are looking for. Recommendations. It’s easier to get your foot in the door this way.

Howdy Partner 👯

There is a huge difference between having a goal and sharing a goal. When there are two of you, there’s a heightened sense of responsibility.

Partner up! Divide and conquer. Support one another. We all know entrepreneurship is lonely, and having a business partner can really take you a long way.

2. Buyers Be Chasin’ (3 TIPS) 🛍️

EP203: Charlotte doesn’t pitch, she gets found on Instagram. Doesn’t that sound like a dream? 💭 The Founder of @everydayhumans, the different SPF brand, shares her 3-step blueprint. ⬇️

1. Inclusivity - the practice of providing equal access to opportunities and resources.

Even your boyfriend or husband doesn’t mind using and buying it. On top of that, they champion a diverse customer range. Originally aimed at ages 25-35, they’ve found customers all the way down to 16 and up to 65. A lot can be said for finding a brand language that can be as inclusive as that.

2. Diversity - the state of being diverse; variety.

Everyday Humans champions itself on being a never-ordinary SPF brand. They’re against average SPF. No sun, no yellow branding. They really are different.

On top of that, there are not a lot of indie options for sunscreen. This is a winning formula! Stand-out brand + undisrupted category = 🤑🤑🤑

Differentiation matters. To buyers, to the competition, and to your success.

3. Sustainability - the ability to be maintained at a certain rate or level.

Charlotte is a self-confessed sustainability nerd (check out this ep for some super cool insight into her LCA {lifecycle assessment} technique and more!)

& Everday Humans is truly sustainable. It’s built into the DNA of their brand. You have to be really nitty gritty about your supply chain to make that sustainability real, but I really believe it’s worth every step.

👉 The ep also covers a nifty pros and cons list to building your brand this way

3. Tap Into Your Network 🕸️

EP204: Something the Founder & CEO of Nomadica wine, Kristin, wished she had done earlier? Tap into her network for help.

She was incredibly shy to ask for help in those first couple of years. But found that as she became more successful herself, people are constantly asking for help. & she loves it.

This is something a lot of you need to hear. Your network loves to help. Go make that phone call. The earlier on in the journey this is realized, the more stands to gain.

Biz Wins & Failz 🎢

Here’s a few crackers straight from Hype Club.

We’ve got an ongoing Biz Wins & Fails chat going in HC. But tbh… The fails are far more interesting than the highlights. This is where we can learn and hopefully avoid in our own journeys, and what keeps us feeling like we are not in this alone. A lot of us are seeing a lot of highlights, but there are so many downs and things that go wrong.

Megan Broderick from a|dash shared a fail this week:

“When reviewing invoices for the claim to be converted to the formats they’re asking for now, I found that we paid for our manufacturer’s in house boxes which we don’t use & most definitely didn’t receive. (Long story short, unfortunately this was paid before I officially came on board in my co-founder & COO role, so when it was just my sis wearing too many hats in addition to her demanding paying job). We’ll be asking for credit from our manufacturer, but just a reminder to everyone to ALWAYS check your itemized invoices before paying. So, this could be a fail, but one that hopefully turns into a win if we get credit from our manufacturer.”

Take note, folks.

Eek. We have all our fingers crossed. Megan will be updating us when she knows the outcome.

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What’s on this week? 👀

Introducing: FSC’s Greatest Hits 🎵

FLASHBACK - for the next two weeks, we’ll be revisiting some of the most inspiring, wholesome, and educational conversations I’ve had in the last 1.5 years. Let’s see what we have in store for you this week…

TUES: Ann McFerran from Glamnetic - magnetic lashes ✨

THURS: Melanie Masarin from Ghia - the new non-alcoholic apéritif 🍸

SAT: Maeva Heim from Beauty Bread Supply - haircare basics for not so basic hair 💖

Click here to tune in! 🎧

What to Read, What to Listen to 🤔

📚 Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike, by Phill Knight: a rare and revealing look at the notoriously media-shy man behind the swoosh.

🎧 The Daily, (New York Times) hosted by Michael Barbaro: how the news should sound, twenty minutes a day, five days a week.

Job Alert Time! 💼

Check out these cool job listings on our radar:

USA 🇺🇸

• We’re still hiring! We're looking for a U.S based Tiktok creator. Said creator simply needs to be a Tiktok user that understands the platform, has fingers on the pulse of trends + pop culture and has a keen interest in ExPeRiMeNtInG. No following required. Just hit reply.

NYC 🗽

• Curated by Jamie, an NYC-based brand advisory, is looking for an extremely organized & detail-oriented Coordinator/Marketing Assistant to be Jamie’s right-hand. Check out the listing here.

NSW 🇦🇺

• Meshki, the Aussie brand with a mission to empower women, is looking for a Social Media Assistant. Check it out here.

Remote 🌎

• Lil Bucks, the startup trailblazing buckwheat in the U.S., is looking for a Sales Manager to play a crucial role in their rapid growth. Check it out.

PS:

Tell me something… What would you do with $1000 no strings attached grant money? Just hit reply. 👋