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Ep 262: Hero Cosmetics - Ju Rhyu: Reversing the DTC Playbook and the $630MM Hero CPG Needs
16 ideas de marketing sacadas de «Ep 262: Hero Cosmetics - Ju Rhyu: Reversing the DTC Playbook and the $630MM Hero CPG Needs», de DTC Podcast. Sobre todo…
- 16 ideas despiezadas
- Fuente DTC Podcast
- Dura 43 min
- Publicada en 2022
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Canales de adquisiciónCuando le preguntaron dónde pondría $100K incrementales, la CEO de Hero dijo: 'Amazon ads, sin pensarlo, porque es donde vemos el ROAS más alto. Cada vez que metemos más dinero ahí, regresa más.' Después mencionó influencer marketing con una agencia que mide ROI por creador ($50K de inversión → $75-80K de retorno, 1.5x). Recomendación: aunque un canal sea 'viejito' o poco sexy, si tiene el mejor ROAS marginal, ahí…
top of mind would be putting a hundred thousand dollars to see the most growth with hero? I mean, honestly, we'd probably put it, um, towards Amazon because that's the channel where we see the highest ROAS. Um, every time we put more money into it, like we tend to see really great returns and there's still a lot that we like can do and want to do on that channel. Um, if not there, I'd probably, we work with this amazing agency, um, for influencers. They're called influencer response. I'd probably give them an extra a hundred K to find us a really, um, amazing influencer that we haven't…
Escúchalo en el minuto 39:34
Reversa el playbook DTC: Amazon primero, retail segundo, sitio propio al final
Canales de adquisiciónHero Cosmetics comenzó con un solo SKU en Amazon, puso todos sus esfuerzos (influencers, splash page, emails, PR) a apuntar a Amazon durante 12 meses. Después fue a retail specialty (Anthropologie con test de 80 tiendas antes del lanzamiento nacional, luego goop, Neiman Marcus, Urban Outfitters) y solo al final, en julio 2018, lanzó su sitio propio DTC. Esta secuencia reduce el riesgo: Amazon trae tráfico gratis y…
profitable business from the very beginning. And we started selling on Amazon. So we had one SKU, we sold on Amazon. And there are a lot of reasons for that. One was, I already knew that people were looking for this product on that channel. I, you know, I think just getting up to the go-to-market strategy, I think from Amazon was really fast. It was also, it was fast, it was cheap, and it was pretty simple. Like it didn't require a lot of money or a lot of people. And, and, you know, I mean, again, like, where else are you going to have access to hundreds and millions of millions of potential…
Escúchalo en el minuto 3:47
Con AOV de $15, los anuncios en Meta eran estructuralmente inviables para adquirir clientes
Canales de adquisiciónHero intentó agencies para correr ads en Meta con AOV inicial de $15. La economía CAC vs AOV no cerraba con dos o tres SKUs. Hasta que no expandieron la línea con productos complementarios (rescue bomb, dark spot, regimen completo) que subieron el AOV, no pudieron hacer rentable la adquisición en Meta. Recomendación: antes de escalar paid acquisition, valida que tu AOV + LTV respalden un CAC saludable. Si no…
how to run the ads. And so we worked with a few agencies that didn't work out, but to be fair, I don't think our business was set up, um, to be, to acquire consumers or users, uh, profitably because when we had like two or three SKUs, our AOV was really low. Our AOV at the time was like $15. Um, and so you can imagine with like CAC and stuff, it just, you know, it was really hard to make the economics work. And so, uh, but we still kept trying. We eventually brought that role in house so we could have someone dedicated to it, um, a hundred percent of the time and also do other things. Um, but…
Escúchalo en el minuto 15:34
Proceso de venta de una marca CPG: 12 meses, banker, due diligence progresiva, ofertas múltiples
Estrategia y decisiones de negocioHero Cosmetics tardó ~1 año en vender la compañía. El proceso fue: (1) definir trigger interno (al llegar a $100M de revenue, salir), (2) contratar un banker (Finneka, Raymond James), (3) preparar el book of materials descargando la historia completa, (4) private invite-only meetings pre-NDA con 5-10 potenciales adquirientes, (5) firmar NDA, (6) management presentation + book, (7) first round de ofertas indicativas…
like from day one or from close to it. Um, can you talk a little bit about your decision to take funds? Like what, did you first decide you needed to take funds for, or you wanted to take funds for? Um, so yes, you're, we were profitable since the very beginning, since year one, we were profitable. We didn't need the money. Um, but we wanted to raise for like basically thought partners because we knew we wanted to exit this company at some point, but none of us had ever sold companies. Um, and we wanted to make sure that we were buttoned up and doing everything right. So we wanted people who…
Escúchalo en el minuto 25:10
Reserva promociones para BFCM como excepción disciplinada, no como estrategia permanente
Oferta y precioHero Cosmetics casi nunca está en promoción. Black Friday / Cyber Monday es la excepción del año. Esa disciplina de marca protege el AOV y enseña a los clientes a comprar a precio completo 11 meses al año. Cuando llega BFCM, el cliente lo nota y compra con urgencia. Recomendación: si tu marca tiene pricing power, no desperdicies margen con descuentos random. Reserva el descuento a momentos del calendario que ya…
Very cool. Any, uh, any Q, any big Q4 plans or anything like in your pipeline for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, is that, is that a big holiday in beauty or is that a big, a big sales event in beauty like it is everywhere else? Yeah. Yes. Yeah, it is. Yeah. So, um, we're not on promotion very much at all, but Black Friday, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, that is the one time, one of the few times that we'll be having, um, a sale on our website. Um, we're also, um, maybe launching a new product in December. So that's going to be really exciting. Um, uh, I think people are really going to like it…
Escúchalo en el minuto 42:18
Aprovecha un mes de awareness temático para lanzar tu sitio con muestras gratis y captura de email
Estrategia de contenidosHero Cosmetics lanzó su sitio DTC en junio (Acne Awareness Month) regalando muestras gratis con la narrativa de 'normalizar el acné'. La prensa devoró la historia, el sitio recibió tráfico masivo, capturaron emails y las muestras convirtieron porque el producto era bueno. Luego, en julio, lanzaron oficialmente la versión comprable. Recomendación: identifica el mes temático que más conecta con tu producto y construye…
We launched, um, kind of around a holiday, which is acne awareness month. Um, and that is June. So I found out that June, uh, is this thing called acne awareness month. And what we decided to do was give up free samples on our website. Um, and we got so much press around this. It actually was really brilliant. So, um, we created our Shopify site. Um, we actually didn't have, I can't remember if it was shoppable or not, but, um, but the idea was we were just going to give out free sample that all these samples made. We were going to give out free samples because we knew that when people tried…
Escúchalo en el minuto 12:17
Empieza en TikTok con influencers baratos antes de que la plataforma se sature de pauta
Canales de adquisiciónEn 2019, Hero contrató influencers de TikTok con ~1 millón de seguidores por $100 por post. Una campaña de lanzamiento en Target (split Instagram vs TikTok) mostró que TikTok rindió mucho mejor que Instagram, al CPM y al CPA. Recomendación: detecta plataformas con inventario de creators aún baratos y entra antes de que los precios reflejen su valor real. La curva de aprendizaje vale oro: si aprendes el formato…
um, or back then we did, we still do. Uh, we did a lot with influencers. Um, we started posting and doing work with TikTok influencers in 2019. So that was well before like, you know, everyone started adopting TikTok. Uh, and I remember when we launched at Target, we did, um, a kind of split campaign between Instagram and TikTok. Uh, and the TikTok campaign performed actually way better than the, uh, Instagram campaign because TikTok influencers back then, back then was so cheap. Like someone with a million followers back then, this is 2019. Uh, I think we paid them like a hundred dollars for…
Escúchalo en el minuto 16:25
Hero Cosmetics validó demanda en Amazon con Jungle Scout antes de lanzar al mercado
Investigación de mercado y clienteAntes de lanzar Hero Cosmetics, Ju Rhyu usó Jungle Scout (plugin de Chrome para Amazon) para estimar búsquedas, ingresos aproximados y nivel de competencia de SKUs similares en la categoría de parches para acné. Esa validación previa a fabricar o gastar en marca le permitió confirmar que la categoría tenía demanda no satisfecha antes de comprometerse con el negocio. Recomendación: usa herramientas de market…
There, there, so there were some other similar products that, I mean, like there were a few that were getting, getting somewhat known, but we also, we use tools like Jungle Scout we had used, and you can use those tools. Like they have cool plugins where you, you know, you add the plugin into your Google browser, and then you go onto Amazon and like go onto any product page and it'll show you the data for that SKU. So approximate searches, approximate kind of revenue. And so all that was really helpful in terms of getting a lay of the land, in terms of knowing like what the competition out…
Escúchalo en el minuto 4:50
Elige influencers por habilidad de contar historias y engagement, no por tamaño de audiencia
Canales de adquisiciónAntes se elegían influencers por reach (Kardashian-style). Ahora, la marca busca creators que cuenten historias asombrosas, tengan engagement alto y audiencia con voluntad de compra. Reach sin engagement = audiencia fría. Recomendación: cuando audites influencers para una campaña, pide tres datos: (1) engagement rate, (2) conversión medida de campañas anteriores con códigos de descuento o links únicos, (3)…
influencers too. Whereas previously you were looking for the biggest name people, you know, who had the biggest reach, the Kardashians and so on, but your focus on, it sounds a lot less about their individual reach and more on their capacity to tell great stories and be great creators. Is that accurate? Or is it also a real balance of their individual reach and their sort of creative style? Uh, I think it's both. And I think it's creators that really, like, because they tell amazing stories and they know how to create the content. They have really amazing engagement and they have people that…
Escúchalo en el minuto 40:56
Retención y relación con el clienteLos tres fundadores de Hero se quedaron después de la venta a Church & Dwight. Razón: 5 años de institutional knowledge sobre producto, clientes y equipo; si los fundadores salen inmediatamente, el equipo no se queda, y el deal pierde valor. Recomendación: cuando vendas tu compañía, negocia 12-24 meses de founder transition. No solo por dinero, sino porque la probabilidad de que la marca sobreviva y crezca (y por…
Yep. And then you popped the champagne. I popped a lot of champagne. Yeah. Yeah. That's so cool. And then I don't know if you can talk about it, but now, but you're still leading the company and I don't, is there, do you, can you speak of whether you have an exit plan to leave, whether you're staying, what's it also like staying at a company that you have exited still leading it? Yeah, I am sticking around. So, um, you know, hero's only been around for five years. So I think for, um, for everybody is really important. The founders stay for continuity. Um, you know, there's a lot, there's a…
Escúchalo en el minuto 30:02
Construye productos complementarios para crear un regimen que suba el AOV con narrativa
Oferta y precioHero no solo vendió el parche: construyó una narrativa de 'ciclo de vida del grano' (patch → dark spot treatment → rescue bomb para rojeces). Cada producto introduce al siguiente, y la historia los vincula. Resultado: AOV sube sin necesidad de descuentos agresivos. Recomendación: diseña tu catálogo como un storyline donde cada SKU tiene su rol en la secuencia de uso, no como una lista de productos aislados. Esto…
And then as you add more SKUs, it's, it's sort of the bundling strategy that gets your AOV up essentially or just people filling their carts more. Well, so yeah, as we introduced new SKUs, we talk a lot about how they work together. So we talk, um, a lot about how we make products from entire life cycle with pimple because you use a patch when you have a pimple and then we have all these products for after the pimple, like you have the dark spot or you, we have a rescue bomb, which helps with the, um, the redness and, um, and so that really helps, um, that helps introduce other products to…
Escúchalo en el minuto 17:36
Apunta toda tu PR, influencers y lista de email hacia el primer canal que elijas durante 12 meses
Canales de adquisiciónLa razón por la que Hero ganó en Amazon fue porque era su único canal: cada influencer llevaba a Amazon, la web era una splash page con CTA a Amazon, cada email llevaba a Amazon, y cada artículo de prensa enlazaba a Amazon (los periodistas aman Amazon porque convierte mejor y les da comisiones de afiliado). Concentrar 100% de tu marketing en un solo canal durante 12 meses permite dominar su algoritmo en lugar de…
have done differently maybe when you launched now? I mean, we only had one channel. So I think that helped because I think there are a lot of brands where, um, they launch Amazon later. And so they have a hard time sacrificing, for example, DTC for Amazon. Um, but because it was our only channel for a while, like a good 12 months, it was our only channel. Um, we put all our marketing efforts towards winning on Amazon. So, um, you know, if we had influencers that were talking about our product, we had them linked to Amazon. We had like a splash page. Um, I mean, we had, you know, kind of a…
Escúchalo en el minuto 7:45
No seas la cara de tu marca: usa un mascot o narrativa para que la marca sobreviva al fundador
Marca y posicionamientoJu Rhyu comparte la filosofía de que cuando el fundador se vuelve la cara indisociable de la marca (founder-led brands), el negocio adquiere un riesgo de longevidad: si el fundador se va, se quema o tiene un escándalo, la marca se hunde. Ejemplo: Sun Bum creó al mono Sunny específicamente porque 'Sunny nunca puede ser arrestado por DUI ni cancelar'. Recomendación: si construyes una marca aspiracional a vender o…
But when you are the brand, it actually increases the risk, I think, for the actual products and the brand that you are marketing. You do need to advocate for your brand and really tell the story and share the story, but you're not going to be the face of the brand forever and the economics probably change. We've seen some cases where the founder does become the brand, which I think increases the risk. And when I see brands so intertwined with one person, I just question the longevity of that brand because what happens if that person goes away for some reason? Does the business suffer? I…
Escúchalo en el minuto 0:07
Investigación de mercado y clienteJu Rhyu argumenta que Hero Cosmetics va a sobrevivir bien una recesión porque su producto es 'need to have, not nice to have': la gente quiere quitarse un grano aunque la economía esté mal. Apoya la tesis con el 'lipstick effect' de Leonard Lauder: belleza y pequeños placeres accesibles crecen en recesiones. También: si el producto está en el rango medio de precio (no premium como La Roche-Posay, no barato como…
Um, I view, okay. So I think beauty, there's still a lot of tailwinds with beauty in general, because it is that sort of affordable luxury, you know, and I think it was Leonard Lauder who coined the phrase, the lipstick effect, um, to end recessions. Beauty tends to do really well and be very resilient. Um, I think there could be some trading down from more premium brands too, cause we're priced more kind of like Mastis. Like we're not as cheap as a, I don't know, clear sell, but we're not as expensive as a La Roche-Posay, for example. So we're kind of in that middle. So I think we'll be okay…
Escúchalo en el minuto 37:41
Investigación de mercado y clienteJu Rhyu argumenta que Hero Cosmetics va a sobrevivir bien una recesión porque su producto es 'need to have, not nice to have': la gente quiere quitarse un grano aunque la economía esté mal. Apoya la tesis con el 'lipstick effect' de Leonard Lauder: belleza y pequeños placeres accesibles crecen en recesiones. También: si el producto está en el rango medio de precio (no premium como La Roche-Posay, no barato como…
Um, I view, okay. So I think beauty, there's still a lot of tailwinds with beauty in general, because it is that sort of affordable luxury, you know, and I think it was Leonard Lauder who coined the phrase, the lipstick effect, um, to end recessions. Beauty tends to do really well and be very resilient. Um, I think there could be some trading down from more premium brands too, cause we're priced more kind of like Mastis. Like we're not as cheap as a, I don't know, clear sell, but we're not as expensive as a La Roche-Posay, for example. So we're kind of in that middle. So I think we'll be okay…
Escúchalo en el minuto 37:41
Canales de adquisiciónAntes de Hero, los parches para acné eran un producto de nicho importado principalmente por marcas coreanas. Hero invirtió en educación de la categoría en USA y se posicionó como la marca original, llegando a 80% del market share y siendo el player #1 antes de que Johnson & Johnson (Bandaid, Neutrogena) y otros grandes entraran. Crea categorías: es más rentable ser el inventor que el participante tardío. Cuando…
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this, it, we are a category creator because, um, I mean, the acne patch didn't really exist in the U S really until we created it. Uh, there were a few products that were foreign products by foreign brands. A lot of them were Korean brands, uh, that sold in the U S. So, um, yeah, I mean, a lot of them did sell on Amazon, but they were never good at doing the education or the marketing to really, um, uh, yeah, to do the marketing and education for the product category. And that's what we did. And that's what we continue to do. And I mean, we're like 80% of the category or…
Escúchalo en el minuto 6:01
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