From Australia to the US: Jade Cameron's Tips on Community Building

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(upbeat music)

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- My name is Jess Servion,

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and I'm super excited to bring you my new podcast,

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The Juice With Jess.

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This podcast is gonna be about everything

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in your customer's journey.

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We're talking acquisition, awareness,

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making that purchase, retaining that customer,

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bringing them back around, and everything in between.

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This is gonna be all about delivering dope brand experiences

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and talking to some really amazing people

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who are in the customer experience space,

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marketing space, and everything in between.

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(upbeat music)

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Welcome back to another episode of The Juice With Me, Jess.

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I'm still in Vegas, y'all.

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I've gotten an IV, I'm feeling alive,

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and I am at Shop Talk this week.

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I am super excited because I have my friend Jade,

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Cameron from Australia.

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She is head of Community Experience at LSKD,

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which is a high quality functional sportswear company

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with a street aesthetic.

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She will say that a lot better than I will.

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Jade, why don't you tell the audience who you be?

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- Hi.

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Yeah, LSKD.

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So functional sportswear with a street aesthetic.

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We're all about creating amazing quality gear

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that you can wear in the gym, go for a run,

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but also feel comfortable enough to wear it to,

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you know, a branch or a cafe

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or just on your hot girl walk, if you will.

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I started with the brand about three years ago.

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My background is old community experience/customer service,

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but I spent 10 years in the travel industry

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before coming to LSKD, to the e-commerce world,

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and I've never looked back.

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I'm super excited to have you on because a fun fact,

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I also come from the travel industry prior to any of my B2B

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experience or my e-commerce experience,

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and as we were doing some research about Jade,

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we figured out that we worked at the same

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big corporate company, FlightCenter.

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For anybody who's listening out there,

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FlightCenter is a massive travel company in Australia,

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the UK, predominantly everywhere else, but not the US.

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- Yeah.

2:12

I worked for Corporate Traveler Division,

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Jade, you were head of CS at Topdeck.

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- Yes, correct.

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- Yeah.

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Topdeck is a youth touring company.

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Yeah, for 18 to 39 year olds around the world.

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- Crazy.

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- Just so crazy.

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- It is.

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- Because that culture at FlightCenter is,

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I think it's both set us both up for like community,

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CX, like all of this, you know?

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- One hundred per cent.

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- Yeah, you just deal with so many different types of people,

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you know?

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- Absolutely.

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I attribute a lot of my growth and success to FlightCenter.

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And the opportunities that I was given there,

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like not only the difficuteness of dealing with travel,

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a non-tangible product to A, sell and B troubleshoot

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when things go wrong, but FlightCenter in general,

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like really invest in their people.

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And I got given so many opportunities for like development

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and training courses in a really safe environment.

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They're all about like failing forward,

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learning from your mistakes, as long as you don't do it again.

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- Yeah.

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- Yeah, but yeah, so yeah.

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I attribute a lot of that to FlightCenter.

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- Did you ever go to Global?

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- I did.

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- How many Global's?

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- I only won.

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- Ooh, I went to Q, I think.

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- So Global for anybody listening out there or viewing N,

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Global is basically like the equivalent of President's Club.

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Right?

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- I don't know what that is, but it sounds cool.

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- Oh, okay, that's an American thing.

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(laughing)

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Okay, a President's Club is like,

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if you're really good at sales,

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you get invited to go to the President's Club.

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It's kind of like silly and like very like President's Club.

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- Very American.

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- Very American.

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That's why we call it Global.

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- Yeah.

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- A FlightCenter because it's more inclusive,

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granted you have to like earn your way into it.

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- Yes.

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- But, and you earn your way into it

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by delivering a really dope customer experience, right?

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So depending on like what positions you're in,

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but also, I'm not gonna give away all the tactics here.

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(laughing)

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- Spoiler alert.

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But airlines will pay travel industries commission.

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So it's a bit of a sales job,

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as well as like a service job.

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So anyway, but if you get to Global by

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being like the best of the best.

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- Yes.

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- So, yeah, absolutely.

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- Yeah, I went to...

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- We call Singapore?

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- Singapore.

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- My call, yeah, okay, yeah.

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I remember my first year starting at FlightCenter.

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Global was in Cancun.

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And I think like that just like had me like hooked

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on the FlightCenter dream.

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I did not make it to Cancun.

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- Yeah.

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- And then I moved from, so I was in store

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as a travel agent for one year.

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And then I moved to Topdeck Travel.

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- Got it.

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- Yeah.

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And finally enough, like I moved to Topdeck

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before FlightCenter actually purchased them.

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So, quick little history.

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- Yeah.

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- The founder of FlightCenter founded Topdeck first.

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And then FlightCenter and then sold Topdeck,

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but then bought it back, I think in 2014, 2015.

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And then we became part of the family again.

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But I was lucky enough to go to Berlin,

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I think in 2018.

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- Oh, it went to Berlin.

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- I was at Berlin in 2018?

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- Yeah, I was at Berlin too.

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- We went there together.

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- That's so weird.

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- And now we're besties.

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- Yes.

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- We just met in this moment.

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- Yeah.

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- I love it.

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- Yes.

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- Yeah, I was at Berlin too.

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That's so crazy.

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But so Global also used to always follow my birthday.

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So it would be like a birthday trip.

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- I loved that.

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- The time that I would bake in, you know?

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- Oh my God.

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- Happy birthday to you.

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- Good birthday in the middle of the year, July 14th.

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If for anybody listening out there, July 14th,

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subliminal messages.

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(laughing)

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Let me write that down.

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- Any way, great.

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Anyway, okay, so I'd love to get into your story

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'cause I think your story is really amazing.

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The fact that you worked in travel

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and then you ended up in e-commerce.

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Tell me about that switch.

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- My goodness.

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- Okay, yes, travel.

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Love, my heart will always be in travel.

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I don't know if I could ever go back

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because there was a little thing like called the pandemic.

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- Ooh, I don't know if you remember.

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- Yeah.

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So after Top Deck, I moved to a online travel agency

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called Tour radar who specialized in gruturing.

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And six months after I started there is when COVID hit.

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So for 12 months of my role there,

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we went from being in the office to working remotely,

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travel, shutdown overnight, which was crazy.

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So working through two operators

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not wanting to give refunds

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and us communicating that to our customer

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and then making sure my team were okay

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and taking pay cuts and convincing my team to take pay cuts.

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And it was a time and it was probably one

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of the most stressful times of my life.

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But what I learned and how much I grew in that time

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around, even in my leadership,

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I think I've always been an empathetic leader,

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but that had to be next level during that time

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to just be that support for my team.

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And I really changed my style through that time

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as well you had to, right?

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Like all of a sudden you can only communicate over a screen.

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And then so fast forward to,

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I think it was around November, December, 2020.

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And my boss now, the CEO of LSKD reached out to me

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on LinkedIn and he was like,

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"Hey, we have this job that looks like something

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that you'd kind of like, do you want to have a chat?"

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And I was like, "No, I have a job."

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Was my initial reaction and my best friend was like,

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"No, call him please."

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And I was like, "Okay."

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And then the more I spoke to Keith

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and then I met the CEO, founded Jason

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and then our CEO from Matt,

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every conversation I had along that journey

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through the interviews, I was like, "I have to work here.

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I have to work here."

8:12

And the main thing that drew me in was like Jason's passion

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and the fact that I could just tell that they were

8:17

on the edge of something amazing

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because Jason had been on a journey,

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he had discovered his why he was like reading books

8:25

and like developing himself

8:27

and just wanting to create something bigger than himself.

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And I was hooked.

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Yeah, I fucking love that.

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I fucking love that.

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I love that because like,

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and also why we're becoming besties in this moment

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because we actually have a really similar background.

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Like granted, like I left travel or I left Flight Center,

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I went to my first startup,

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it was to travel companies, pandemic happened.

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And then I tried to like float around

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to like cybersecurity, health tech,

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like all these places and I was just like,

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"Ah, I don't know what I'm doing in life," right?

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And randomly moved to Chicago like on a whim

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because I wasn't ready to go back to California.

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I'm not gonna bore anybody with all those details.

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But had I never moved to Chicago,

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I never would have gotten the job at festivals

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as head of CX, right?

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And that was also my first time of working in e-commerce, right?

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But I joined the company because like our old CEO, COO,

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they were all come from like RX bar,

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like founding employees of that.

9:30

And like, and they're just mission and values

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which is like, damn, like I really wanna be a part of this.

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I really wanna be like in this and like,

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and it's so crazy and I don't know if this is free,

9:42

like you as well, but like then coming into e-commerce,

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I've actually found like my kind of like way in a way.

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Like I care, I've always cared about customer experience

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and I've always cared about like the brand experience

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and like what we're delivering from a service perspective.

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But then moving into e-commerce,

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I've like really put into practice like the marketing pieces of it,

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the community building pieces of it.

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And it's like, it's just something I'm so obsessed with now.

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Yeah, you know, what about you?

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Yeah, I'm like shaking my head so dramatically.

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Like, yes, me too.

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It's so funny that you mentioned what drew you in about

10:19

festivals was like the mission and the values.

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Yeah.

10:22

Because when I met Keith, Chase and Matt,

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we had the mission which we have since changed.

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So back then it was inspiring our community to chase the vibe.

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And we've since updated it to inspiring you to be 1% better every day.

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But when I started, we didn't have company values,

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but they were on the journey in creating them.

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So I came in at this amazing time where I got to be a part

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of creating the values that we have today.

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And we are such a values led company.

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And as like being passionate about CX,

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the second value is create a community.

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Yeah.

11:02

And like that is what I am able to bring to life every day.

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So I was hired to basically build the CX team from the ground up.

11:08

Yes.

11:09

When I started, there was like two full-timers and two casuals.

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And I think we're a team of like around 20 now

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within that three year period.

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Nothing existed.

11:18

I got handed this like red folder of like passwords.

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And that was the CX manuals.

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And I was like, what is this?

11:26

Yeah.

11:26

Like they were still answering friends like with desk phones.

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I was like, whoa, I'm so excited.

11:32

Mm-hmm.

11:32

But the coolest thing was like even back then, like three years ago,

11:36

they were hiring based on that connection and values alignment.

11:43

Right.

11:43

So I was entrusted and empowered to just like go do.

11:48

Right.

11:48

So I would have check-ins along the way.

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I'd be like, this is what we're doing.

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But it all came back to community and creating a community,

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even from that first day that I stepped into the office.

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Yeah.

11:59

So we really lean into that.

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And we're all about that.

12:02

You said art first science so many times in your intro

12:05

when I listened to your first.

12:06

Yeah.

12:07

And like that is like, yeah, Jason, our senior year is

12:10

voice ringing in my head.

12:11

It's like that art first science where it's like, I'm the art.

12:14

Yeah.

12:14

I'm the wanderer, the creator.

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And then I've like built my team around me to like help bring

12:19

that science to life as well.

12:20

Yeah. The data pieces, the feedback loops.

12:22

Like all of that.

12:23

I know.

12:24

I think like just as creative people, right?

12:27

Like it's like, and maybe this is why we ended up

12:29

in the travel industry.

12:31

Just like floating through space.

12:32

Like I don't know what to do, right?

12:34

Yeah.

12:34

But like it's so, but being in CX and like building community

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and building from the ground up is just such a part of like

12:43

that artist creation piece of it.

12:46

Yeah.

12:46

And then you got to put it in the structure.

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Yes.

12:49

Which is boring to some.

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Look.

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Yeah.

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There needs to be structured.

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But I mean, I think the biggest thing for me, like as I said,

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during COVID, I really changed my leadership style.

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I became a lot more relaxed as a leader and just had to put

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the trust into my team.

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And that just like changed how I did things for the better, right?

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So, you know, I think the biggest mistake that a lot of CX leaders

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make is not empowering the frontline team.

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Absolutely.

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And not giving them the autonomy to actually bring to life the

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moments that they want to bring to life and how they want to bring

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them to life.

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Just like a quick pause on that.

13:29

Like part of our whole onboarding experience at LSKD is all around

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books.

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And one of the books that Jason read that he realized that he

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then didn't know anything about CX.

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And that's where I come in.

13:42

But delivering happiness by the late Tony Shay, the exe of Zappos.

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And their model around like wowing the customer.

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And I basically built the LSKD philosophy around Tony Shay's

13:56

concepts because customer community wow moments, like it's all about

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that genuine connection that you're building.

14:04

Yeah.

14:05

That's what people are hungry for.

14:06

And that's actually how people buy now.

14:08

They want to buy with brands that they connect to.

14:11

Yeah, absolutely.

14:13

You buy because you have a dope brand experience.

14:15

You buy because you're loyal to that brand, right?

14:17

And I don't care what brand it is.

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I literally do not care if you're selling in chocolate bars

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or you're selling in a t-shirt, right?

14:26

I am going to buy from that brand because of the experience

14:28

that I'm having from that brand and the ability to deliver something

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really sick and dope.

14:35

And I want to keep coming back because of that.

14:38

Yes.

14:39

Absolutely.

14:40

I love-- I think that it's just so crazy because it's

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like literally kinder CX experience here.

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I'm feeling that.

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Because-- and the reason is, is because I also built my CX team.

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I made the entire company not the Zappos book,

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but I did an effortless experience.

15:00

OK.

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And I built-- I made the Feastables Company, read this book.

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Every single person.

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Our old CEO-- I love it.

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--read this book.

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This is why we're building the most frictionless experience

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as possible so we can then deliver a really dope community

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experience.

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I love that.

15:17

I haven't read that.

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I have to write that down.

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You'll have to send that to me.

15:20

Oh, done.

15:20

Because I'm like, books.

15:21

Like, I can stream so many books.

15:23

I love it.

15:24

Yeah.

15:24

No, effortless experiences are a really good book by Matt Dixon.

15:29

Yeah.

15:29

Highly recommend.

15:30

Man, we haven't even gotten into my questions.

15:32

OK.

15:33

Literally.

15:34

Whoops.

15:36

But I'm really curious, though, like, you know,

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one of the biggest questions that I want to ask you

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is that we talk about-- we talk about, you know,

15:44

customer experience.

15:45

Sometimes people call it customer service.

15:47

Sometimes people have this, then the other thing.

15:49

I want to know specifically why you call it community experience.

15:53

A few reasons.

15:55

So we at LSKD refer to our customer as our community.

16:00

Yeah.

16:00

Because that's what we're trying to do.

16:01

We're trying to build a community.

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We're trying to build something bigger than us

16:05

for people to be a part of.

16:06

Yeah.

16:06

So when I started, the team was actually

16:09

customer support, which, you know, that's fine.

16:12

And when I look at customer support or customer service,

16:15

they're just fulfilling a function, right?

16:18

Like, that's just my mentality around those words.

16:21

I read a book last year, which I'll go into a little bit more

16:25

if we have time, but it's called unreasonable hospitality.

16:28

I'm not going to say Will's last name,

16:29

because I'll butcher it every time.

16:31

But he basically was the reason 11 Madison Park

16:37

won Best Restaurant in the World.

16:41

And he talks about customer service is black and white,

16:44

but hospitality is color.

16:46

And like that, I think for me, community experience

16:49

is that color.

16:51

So what we're trying to achieve at LSKD is that every touchpoint

16:56

is like, how are we creating a community with this person?

16:59

What are we doing?

17:00

How are we creating a one size fits one interaction

17:04

with the tech that we have with the personalities

17:06

that we have with the autonomy that the team has

17:10

to create a fan, an advocate, like a returning customer,

17:15

because that connection is just so much more important

17:17

at the end of the day.

17:19

And I think sales are important, obviously,

17:21

but if you're building connection genuinely

17:25

and creating those experiences,

17:26

the sales are just a byproduct of everything that you're doing.

17:29

Absolutely agree with you.

17:30

And I think that philosophy,

17:32

I share that same philosophy with you

17:33

because I don't think we should look at it so siloed.

17:38

And I think a lot of times and a lot of new brands

17:41

that come out, a lot of people who are even revamping things

17:46

to think about things from a very customer service point of view,

17:50

like, oh, I'm servicing the customer.

17:52

But honestly, if you answer questions

17:54

before they become questions, your service team

17:57

wouldn't be inundated as much with tickets, right?

18:01

100%.

18:01

So think about it in that philosophy, too, is like, all right,

18:04

you think about it like, I'm answering questions

18:06

before they become questions,

18:07

but then you even take it a step further, right?

18:10

If you're thinking about it from the philosophy

18:11

that you have, like, my customer is my community, right?

18:15

Yeah.

18:15

I'm building loyalty from the get-go of it.

18:17

I'm also building advocates, right?

18:22

But additionally, though, like,

18:25

you're also treating those customers,

18:28

like, as much as they're loyal to you,

18:32

you're loyal to them.

18:33

Yes, 100%.

18:34

And I think it does come from the hospitality perspective.

18:37

Yeah.

18:38

I really do.

18:39

Like, for you and I, at least,

18:42

like, why we view this point is because it's like,

18:44

we're not, I don't know, like, in hospitality,

18:48

like, I go and, like, I check into my hotel in Vegas, right?

18:51

And I'm loyal to Marriott, specifically,

18:55

because I know I'm going to get, like,

18:57

the points and the upgrades, right?

18:59

And I walk in, and it's not about being, like, boujee,

19:02

but, like, I walk in and I get upgraded,

19:04

and my room is overlooking the boulevard.

19:06

Yeah. But it's an experience that I constantly get.

19:09

Yeah, I'm a part of that community continuously.

19:11

I love that example, and just, like,

19:13

leaning into hospitality, I think,

19:15

there's so much opportunity,

19:17

like, in the traditional hospitality world

19:20

of, like, restaurants, hotels,

19:22

there is so much opportunity to be able to create

19:25

one size fits one experience.

19:27

So, like, you know, if you are a loyal customer,

19:29

you might, you know, from time to time,

19:31

get, like, a bottle of champagne,

19:32

or your favorite flowers, or your favorite chocolates,

19:34

or whatever that might look like.

19:36

And I think that a lot of the times,

19:38

from an e-commerce perspective,

19:40

some people think that their pigeon-hold

19:42

that they can't bring to life those experiences,

19:44

because you're having an online experience.

19:46

Your CX is great.

19:48

That phrase is so last season.

19:51

We want to hear your CX is incredible,

19:53

because a customer, we believe,

19:55

in delivering incredible customer experiences.

19:57

Introducing KIQ Agent Assist,

19:59

the ultimate CX team AI sidekick,

20:02

built on our CRM to give agents

20:04

superhero capabilities and efficiency.

20:06

When building KIQ Agent Assist,

20:08

we had goals in mind.

20:10

One, get rid of long customer wait times

20:12

and increase the speed of customer resolution.

20:14

Two, provide the CX team with real-time data

20:18

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20:19

Three, delegate those mundane tasks to AI,

20:22

and four, three up the agents

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to deliver a human experience.

20:25

But listen, we didn't stop there.

20:27

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20:47

I actually just built an online training course

20:51

for the whole business on becoming unreasonable,

20:54

based off this book.

20:56

But what can I share a story?

20:57

- Yeah, cool.

20:58

- Cool.

20:59

- All the time in the world, my friends.

21:01

- So I just want to put that into context.

21:03

So we had this really cool experience recently

21:08

where two community members getting married,

21:12

they sent us their wedding invitation

21:14

and wrote a note on the back of it,

21:16

and they were like, "Thank you guys so much

21:19

"for being a part of our Get Wedding Ready journey."

21:23

So obviously, Get Wedding Ready,

21:25

they're like they're leaning into fitness,

21:28

got a little good for the big day,

21:29

and they went out of their way to send us a note

21:32

to say, "Thank you," which is wild.

21:35

And so what we did was we got two of our shirts,

21:38

white shirts that had 1% better every day on them.

21:41

So leaning into their personal story,

21:43

and we actually took them to our local screen printer

21:46

and got just married, and the year,

21:49

screen printed on the back,

21:50

and then we sent them this care package

21:51

with something new, something blue,

21:55

and water bottles for the day,

21:57

and all that, and wrote this really cool note,

21:59

took a team photo, sent it back to them,

22:01

and they were absolutely shocked

22:04

and just over the moon that we did anything really.

22:07

- Yeah.

22:08

- But it's just like a little bit of an extravagant example,

22:12

but we're just looking for those moments every single day

22:15

where we can tailor and experience for our community

22:17

and just give them something unforgettable.

22:19

- Well, absolutely, and basically, surprise and delight.

22:23

- Yeah, all of our customers want to surprise and delight.

22:25

Like, shout out to episode prior,

22:29

but Roma from Dr. Squatch,

22:32

like she's the CX manager in what she talks a lot about,

22:35

about like Dr. Squatch, the soap brand,

22:37

is that like the personalization

22:40

and like building that brand voice in that brand community,

22:42

right?

22:43

But like their customers are so loyal

22:45

because in every interaction,

22:47

they're having a surprise and delight moment, you know?

22:50

And it's like, and you and I might think about it

22:53

like a PR package or this or that or like a note,

22:55

'cause like I used to do those things of like

22:57

at festivals too, but like it's going above and beyond

23:01

for the people who are like,

23:03

and you can't necessarily do it all the time, right?

23:05

But you can like, you can personalize the experience a lot.

23:09

- Absolutely.

23:10

And then people make that viral.

23:11

- Yeah, absolutely.

23:13

Like recently, so we have like a theme every month,

23:16

like an internal theme that like basically tells us

23:20

what our marketing plan is going to be linked back to product

23:23

and back to like our values.

23:24

So for February, Valentine's Day,

23:27

the theme was for the love of training.

23:29

- Yeah, so what we did was we went through,

23:33

found our top 100 customers who had spent the most

23:36

in the last 12 months.

23:37

And my team actually went through each of their profiles

23:40

and created a gift for them based on their past purchases

23:44

and wrote them like a love note.

23:45

We even got little Valentine's Day cards made up.

23:48

Got them a little love note just to say like,

23:50

thank you so much for like being such a big part of our brand.

23:53

And the feedback that we got like from those loyal customers,

23:57

like it could have been anyone,

23:58

but like I think just that something extra,

24:01

like we could have just gifted them all a new product

24:04

or sent them all, you know, flowers or our favorite tights

24:07

that we like wearing or leggings because I'm a US podcast.

24:10

But you know, I think like the thing is like you really

24:14

have to tailor those experience to each community member.

24:17

- Right.

24:18

Absolutely.

24:19

Absolutely.

24:20

I think it's like to each community member,

24:22

but like if you want to put this into practice,

24:23

like as Jayden and I are talking about these things,

24:26

like maybe you're thinking about like for your brand,

24:28

like, oh, well, I can't really do this.

24:29

My audience is this segment your audience then,

24:32

like segment your audience based off of like the grandparent,

24:35

the mother, the child, whatever demographics.

24:38

And then try to like break that down and do something special

24:40

even by like segmenting, you know?

24:43

- Yeah, definitely.

24:44

Like we have what we call our muse.

24:47

And so we have a male muse, female muse,

24:49

and we design product for these muses, air quotes.

24:53

Like people listening can't see me do that.

24:54

I don't know why I did that.

24:55

- That's fine.

24:56

It's videos.

24:57

- But we know that like our community is so much broader

25:01

than that, but yeah, we just have to find ways

25:04

to tailor the experience to each individual.

25:06

And that only happens by hiring the right people,

25:09

getting the right people on the bus,

25:10

your balance, big fan.

25:12

But also like empowering them to make those decisions

25:16

and bring their personality to life

25:18

and listen with empathy and create a genuine connection.

25:21

- Yeah, but genuine connection, man.

25:24

Like I think it's, yeah, again, community,

25:28

creating the genuine connection.

25:29

You can't, well, actually let me ask you this.

25:32

I don't even want to see this.

25:33

What is your opinion?

25:34

Do you think that like, okay, I'm starting over brand,

25:37

like I'm thinking about my service.

25:39

I'm thinking about all these things.

25:40

I know we think about things in a community perspective,

25:43

but do you think that every brand can immediately

25:47

start a community or do you have to like,

25:50

do you have to understand it first

25:52

and then build out like additional channels for it?

25:55

- I honestly, let me sit with that for one second.

26:00

I honestly don't think it's one or the other.

26:02

- Yeah.

26:03

- I think that you can take a brand,

26:08

like create a brand and create a community

26:11

that you want to create,

26:12

and then you're going to attract those people.

26:15

So there's a really cool brand in Australia.

26:17

I think they're even in the US now called Frankbody.

26:20

And I look up to them so much just from a tone of voice,

26:24

community marketing, CX, like whole thing

26:29

that just is one tone and one personality.

26:32

And they started with one product.

26:35

And they really went into Frank as this guy

26:39

and how he talks and all of that.

26:42

But they basically started their brand with that

26:46

and they attracted this community.

26:48

They didn't like, yeah, start and then create a community.

26:52

I don't know if that makes sense.

26:54

- Yeah, it's so for LSKD, for example,

26:57

like when I started three years ago,

26:59

we already had a highly engaged community.

27:02

They were, they're fanatics.

27:03

We even now have, because our brand changed.

27:06

So we were originally LKI,

27:08

which stands for loose kid industries,

27:11

which is the original brand that our founders started.

27:13

And that's what LSKD stands for.

27:16

But we even have people who are fans from like back then

27:19

that are like, oh, we've been fans since the LKI days.

27:22

But then when I came in and I was able to build this team

27:25

from the ground up and just,

27:27

I want to say, harness the energy

27:30

of the existing community and like just like take that

27:34

and run with it and just grow that.

27:36

- Yeah, so I think it's one or the other.

27:38

- Yeah, I agree with you.

27:39

- Yeah, I do agree with you.

27:40

It wasn't a trick question.

27:41

- Okay, good.

27:42

- I was just like, I just wanted to share

27:43

like somebody else's opinion because I agree with that too.

27:46

Like, you know, I know I'm like using the feast.

27:49

I don't actually, I don't even want to use

27:50

a Feast of Wholes example.

27:51

Like I, I sit across like quite a few other brands

27:55

and like their wellness brands, right?

27:57

And I, and I won't name like any names,

28:01

but like, you know, with wellness comes a community, right?

28:05

There's like a whole, and there was all,

28:08

there's also like another creator brand

28:10

that has like a peril, right?

28:11

- Yeah.

28:12

- And so like I kind of help them out sometimes

28:15

and they had a community started

28:19

before they became out with the apparel brand.

28:21

So it's like really doubling down

28:23

in the community previously

28:25

and like developing out that voice

28:27

for your marketing pieces of it.

28:28

Like I, my point is I agree with you,

28:31

but like if you are like a just starting out,

28:34

you're going to attract the community that you want.

28:37

- Yes.

28:38

- You know?

28:38

- Yeah, absolutely.

28:39

- I don't know, just lots of opinions,

28:43

just lots of opinions about it,

28:45

but okay, I would do when I get into like a little nitty gritty.

28:48

- Okay.

28:49

- A little bit of a nitty gritty.

28:50

What channels are your community on?

28:53

- Like what, sorry.

28:54

- So like SMS, email, like how are the people

28:57

who are communicating to you?

28:59

- All of them.

29:00

(laughs)

29:01

- I think what's really cool about like our brand is,

29:05

as I said, we have our new years

29:06

but our community is so broad.

29:08

So like from a CX perspective,

29:10

we try and be where our community want us to be.

29:14

So, you know, I mean, phone calls aren't huge for us,

29:17

but we have that function where they can call in,

29:20

live chat is growing, which is awesome,

29:22

that like instant response type thing.

29:25

My team also look after everything reactive on social media.

29:28

So we're replying to comments and DMs.

29:30

Yeah, so basically all of those platforms.

29:35

And so I've actually started to like segment my team

29:38

a little bit and I've created specialists in those areas

29:41

to actually like lean into like,

29:43

creating that live chat space,

29:44

creating the social space, creating the email space.

29:47

So yeah, we just try to be where they want us to be.

29:50

So they dictate that, which is fine by me

29:53

because absolutely.

29:54

- Yeah.

29:55

Question about like live chat specifically,

29:59

actually I have just several questions hit me.

30:01

It's what topic in my brain at the moment.

30:03

So okay, okay, we'll come back to that.

30:06

Actually, we'll come back to that one.

30:08

Social because it's gonna lean into other questions.

30:10

Social, do you utilize any like sort of listening tools

30:14

or are you just like, stouring the internet?

30:16

- Do you know what?

30:17

No.

30:19

Oh girl, but you need to know what it is.

30:22

- Okay.

30:22

So like as like my socials are split.

30:25

So we have our social media coordinators.

30:28

We have our content team, which they sit under

30:31

and then we have CX.

30:32

So our social coordinators amazing,

30:36

shout out Gracie and Robin.

30:37

They're doing all the posting and creating

30:39

and then we're doing everything reactive.

30:42

And it's kind of been a bit of an afterthought

30:45

for our platforms, but we're on, I think, Sprout Social.

30:49

And we use that in CX,

30:50

but they're not even using that as their scheduling tool.

30:52

They're doing everything locally.

30:53

- Interesting.

30:54

- And we're whole with them literally last week.

30:56

And I've spoken to them previously about social listening

31:00

and so it's something that we're gonna do.

31:02

- Yeah, it's cool.

31:03

- So I know it and I'm like, why aren't we doing that?

31:05

- Dude, Game Changer.

31:06

- Yeah.

31:07

- Straight up, Game Changer.

31:08

And I'm actually telling a lot of my brands

31:10

that I advise to to start now because,

31:14

and I think there's a lot of social listening tools out there.

31:17

I'm not, this is not, this segment is not me selling

31:20

a social listening tool.

31:22

This is literally me selling like the why you need this, okay?

31:25

So here's the jam.

31:27

You cannot scour the fucking internet.

31:29

Enough, okay?

31:30

I'm sorry.

31:31

And so like the brands that I have worked for

31:35

and including Feastables, okay,

31:37

large community here,

31:39

we've had to look at negative and positive things

31:41

like constantly, right?

31:42

And we also would want to always like respond

31:45

to the comments, but you can't catch all of them.

31:48

And the listening tool will help you kind of just like

31:51

understand the overall sentiment.

31:54

And what's really cool is like a lot of these tools now

31:56

have like AI and like all these other pieces of it.

31:59

And then also adding it into your CS reports every week.

32:03

- Yeah.

32:04

- So adding it into your CS reports,

32:05

not just on the tickets that I get an email or this and that.

32:08

Like an overall sentiment analysis of what is fully happening

32:12

in the voice of the customer is really interesting.

32:14

- I can nerd out about this.

32:16

- I love that.

32:16

I feel like, yeah, so my team respond to like every single

32:19

comment usually.

32:21

- Yeah.

32:22

- We're still at our size now that we can do that,

32:25

but that is not sustainable like long to know.

32:27

- And we don't ever want to lose that one-to-one contact

32:30

with our community.

32:31

- Yeah.

32:32

- But obviously you need these types of tools

32:34

to scale and grow.

32:35

- Yeah, yeah.

32:36

- Absolutely.

32:37

- It's a balance, isn't it?

32:38

- Yeah.

32:39

- It's absolutely a balance.

32:40

So actually going back to live chat, okay,

32:43

so going back to live chat, like,

32:45

are you utilizing any sort of,

32:47

like you just started using live chat?

32:49

- No, we've had it the whole time.

32:51

- Okay.

32:51

- It's just been more of a focus.

32:52

- Got it.

32:53

And are you utilizing any sort of like AI into that?

32:56

- No.

32:57

- There is more to that.

33:00

- Yeah, yeah.

33:01

- No, but so yeah,

33:05

AI I am back and forth with, it has its place.

33:09

- Yeah.

33:09

- Absolutely.

33:10

- But as I said, like we're at that size

33:12

where we have like so much control over the conversations

33:16

that we're having with our community

33:17

that like I don't need to find efficiencies at the moment.

33:21

Like I want to invest in more people

33:23

to build more connections with our community,

33:26

but I think there is absolutely a place for it.

33:29

In our team, it's going to be a very small space really.

33:33

But how we're using chat at the moment is like more

33:37

proactively so trying to recreate an Insta experience online

33:42

by like engaging and reengaging community

33:44

moving through the website like,

33:45

oh, hey, you've added those leggings to your cart.

33:47

Like what about the matching sports bra?

33:49

Like that kind of thing to kind of generate revenue.

33:52

Yeah, but I mean, you're fulfilling

33:55

what the community actually needs as well.

33:57

- Yeah.

33:57

- Like it's not a sales tactic for me,

33:59

although I know it's going to generate-

34:00

- It can be.

34:01

- It can be.

34:02

- Absolutely.

34:03

But that's not my main focus.

34:04

What are our community missing out on?

34:07

And how can we fulfill that need for them?

34:09

Because if you think about,

34:10

if they were to walk into one of our retail stores,

34:12

that's exactly what's going to happen.

34:13

You're going to pick up the leggings, try them on.

34:16

And one of our educators is going to take

34:18

like the matching top or the sports bar or a T,

34:20

like to complete the whole fit.

34:21

So that's kind of what we're trying to do at the moment,

34:23

is how we like having that true omni-channel experience

34:27

from a community perspective.

34:29

- Yeah, absolutely.

34:30

Well, okay.

34:31

So I know this is like speedy, but like I,

34:35

and not really speedy, but like I want to know,

34:38

why did you guys open this brick and mortar store

34:40

in San Diego?

34:41

- Okay.

34:42

- Being an Australian company, and then in San Diego,

34:43

I'm curious.

34:44

- Yeah.

34:45

So we have a US store, like online store.

34:48

We have a shop of buy store at UNUS.

34:51

So we've been kind of nurturing a small portion

34:54

of the US community for quite a few years now.

34:57

And we've had team based in the US since I think like 20,

35:02

okay, don't quote me on this, but like 2021, I think.

35:06

Or maybe a little bit longer, actually.

35:09

So we invested in partnerships,

35:13

a partnerships team based in the US, and I was scattered around.

35:17

And we decided that we actually wanted to hone in on one community.

35:22

- Yeah.

35:23

- And try and recreate what our founder did.

35:25

Like when he started the brand in that one community

35:27

and grow from there.

35:29

So we decided on San Diego, Pacific Beach.

35:34

And I think the retail store, like while we love it,

35:36

and it's a great space for our community to come touch feel,

35:40

it kind of just happened because of the space that we went into.

35:43

- Oh.

35:44

- I think, I think that's what happened.

35:46

So we found this really cool office space that had a great kind of like

35:50

storage area, but also this cool little room,

35:52

which we've now created a community room.

35:54

So if you're in San Diego, you can actually go to the store,

35:56

but then go hang out in the community room.

35:58

There's like recovery gear in there.

36:00

There's ice baths, there's a lounge, there's a TV.

36:03

Just hang out and have a chat.

36:05

But yeah, it's got like a cool showroom at the front.

36:07

So we have a small retail store, which is awesome.

36:09

- Dude, I want to come to San Diego.

36:11

- I'm just in Diego.

36:12

- Do it.

36:13

- Like, absolutely.

36:14

- Do it.

36:15

- But only when you're here.

36:16

- Yeah, well, I'm here.

36:17

I'm there for a week from Wednesday.

36:18

So come on down.

36:19

- Yeah, well, let me Chicago.

36:20

So we're gonna have to, we're gonna redo this trip.

36:22

- Yeah, sorry.

36:24

I'm not sure if there's any other US stores on the horizon at the moment,

36:27

but like our community in San Diego is, yeah, it's pumping.

36:31

- It's awesome.

36:32

- Yeah.

36:33

So between like Australia and the US, right, and like being on the channel at

36:37

this point,

36:38

do you have, well, actually, actually, this kind of question just came to me.

36:43

What's like the difference between the different like, like localized

36:48

experience?

36:49

Is it a localized experience like different?

36:51

- I mean, it depends kind of like, what do you mean though?

36:55

Like localized in our stores or on the website or...

36:57

- Localized by like US and Australia.

36:59

- Yeah, so I mean, we do a couple of different things like just from an online

37:03

perspective.

37:04

Like the seasons are different to start this.

37:06

So we've got to make sure that we've got the right content on both stores.

37:10

So, you know, summer content in the A.U. and then winter in the US.

37:14

So it's a little bit of a juggling act.

37:17

And because like we love our US community, but it's still quite small for us.

37:22

So we just, we've invested in team that our US focus, which is really cool.

37:27

Like not just based in the US, but also based in our A.U. office in our digital

37:31

marketing team

37:32

who are just looking after the US so that they're able to nurture it a bit more

37:36

So like we create like specific ads for the US community.

37:39

We try and stay relevant for like US holidays.

37:43

And then locally, like if you go to San Diego, you can actually get a t-shirt

37:47

that you can only buy

37:48

from the San Diego store and a water bottle, which is pretty cool.

37:52

- Oh, yeah.

37:53

- And we've even like brought one out in like the Padres colors.

37:55

- Oh, cool.

37:56

- Yeah, localized experience again.

37:58

- Yeah, exactly.

37:59

- Yeah.

38:00

- So each retail location has a t-shirt that you can only get in that retail

38:03

location.

38:04

- Yeah.

38:05

- So that's kind of how we've started to personalize her retail store.

38:09

- Awesome.

38:10

- Yeah, that's cool.

38:11

- Yeah.

38:12

- Personalization.

38:13

- Yes.

38:14

- Of it.

38:15

- It's awesome.

38:16

And we need to do more of that.

38:17

And I think, yeah, I think there's some really exciting things coming.

38:20

- Yeah.

38:21

Okay.

38:22

- I'm excited to learn more.

38:24

- Well, my friend, we are reaching the end of the road.

38:27

- Oh, good.

38:28

- I know.

38:29

It goes really quickly.

38:30

- That was like five minutes.

38:31

- I know.

38:32

Well, technically it was because like we did get started a little later.

38:35

But I do have a, I just have a couple of questions though.

38:37

- Yeah.

38:38

- And just going back to travel.

38:39

- Okay.

38:40

- Or the coolest place you ever travel to.

38:42

Iceland.

38:43

- Yes.

38:44

- Yes.

38:45

- Me too.

38:46

- Okay, cool.

38:47

As like a country and like the overall experience, Iceland.

38:51

My favorite city though, can I do too?

38:53

Am I gonna do it?

38:54

- Yeah.

38:55

Fuck you.

38:56

- Oh, what's so random?

38:57

And it was just one of those stops on my itinerary where I didn't know anything

38:58

about and I didn't

38:59

care about it until I got there.

39:00

But it was L'Oupliana.

39:02

- L'Oupliana?

39:03

- L'Oupliana?

39:04

- Yeah.

39:05

- Where's that?

39:06

- Can you sing that right?

39:07

- I have no idea because I've never heard of it.

39:08

- L'Ouplania.

39:09

- Oh, interesting.

39:10

- Yeah.

39:11

- Cool.

39:12

- Yeah.

39:13

- Okay.

39:14

- Editor, it was just like the vibe, the food, the wine.

39:17

- Yeah.

39:18

- Yeah.

39:19

- I love that.

39:20

- But I'm sitting here going like so many different like Switzerland.

39:22

- I know, right?

39:23

- I know this happens when-

39:25

- Well, one, this happens when I think when you're Australian because

39:28

Australians do love

39:29

to travel.

39:30

- We do.

39:31

- But two, when you work to flight center.

39:33

- Yeah.

39:34

- There's so many things.

39:35

- I'm mad.

39:36

- All those deals, girl.

39:37

- And I don't talk about travel much anymore.

39:38

You know what I was talking about travel.

39:39

- I love that.

39:40

Like I still catch up with like the people that I used to work with.

39:43

But it's just like, you know when you catch up with people you say, "I can just

39:46

talk about

39:46

everything funny that happened when you worked together."

39:48

- Yeah.

39:49

- And that kind of thing.

39:50

But yeah, actually sitting down and talking about travel, I miss it.

39:53

I travel so much still.

39:55

- Yeah.

39:56

- Like it's so, it's so insane.

39:58

But I'm here Vegas and I actually live in Chicago.

40:01

So there's, here's an example of that, my friend.

40:03

- Yeah, very good example.

40:06

- Here can everybody find you?

40:07

'Cause it's been so lovely and I want them to continue talking to you.

40:10

- Oh my God, thank you.

40:11

You can find me on LinkedIn, Jade Camera.

40:13

And I think there's not that many, but L.S. Katie, if you go on to there,

40:16

LinkedIn.

40:17

- Yeah.

40:18

- Absolutely.

40:19

- Well, thanks Jade for coming on.

40:21

And I really agree.

40:22

- Thank you for having me.

40:23

I'm coming to Australia.

40:24

We're gonna do this again.

40:25

- Yes.

40:26

- Okay.

40:27

- Absolutely.

40:28

- Come visit us.

40:29

Out of us, we do tours.

40:30

Might put you through like a little yoga session of Pilates Festival.

40:32

- Yes.

40:33

- Let's try work out.

40:34

- Let's go.

40:35

- Yes.

40:36

- Cool, thank you.

40:38

And to everybody out there, thank you so much for tuning in to another week of

40:41

The Juice.

40:42

And we'll see you next Thursday.

40:43

Hey, wow, you made it to the end of the episode.

40:49

That means that you like me and I like you, which also means you should

40:53

subscribe to this

40:54

show.

40:55

Bye.

41:03

Bye.

41:04

[silence]