Outsmart the Black Friday Email Frenzy

[00:01:20] Brian: Hello, and welcome to Future Commerce, the podcast at the intersection of culture and commerce. I'm Brian.

[00:01:26] Phillip: I'm Phillip. Brian, I was thinking, we probably have one of the more seasoned experts in well, not just in email and marketing and all things messaging communications these days for brands, but also a veteran podcaster.

[00:01:41] Brian: Oh, yeah.

[00:01:42] Phillip: Here, I think between the three of us on today's show, we have probably 1000 episodes of podcasts under our belt. It's my pleasure to welcome back, it's been a long, long time since we talked mister Greg Zackowitz, over at Omnisend, the ecommerce expert in residence these days. How's it going, Greg?

[00:02:01] Greg: I'm doing well. Thanks for having me. This is really fun, and out of the three of us, I am by far the least experienced podcaster here.

[00:02:10] Brian: Hmmm. Maybe. {laughter}

[00:02:13] Phillip: With hundreds of shows to your name, we'll get into some of that here today. And I think we also, I wanna touch on right off the top that we have a small window still between the time you hear this and the time that it's actually Black Friday and what is the latest possible Black Friday that is even possible in the world. So there's a small window where people can still activate, and I know that we've been partnered with Omnisend here for a number of months, and we're really proud to be partnered with you guys. So I'm really looking forward to hearing what's top of mind for you, what you're seeing in the ecosystem, what people can still do. So maybe we can just kinda break into that, but what is top of mind for you over Omnisend these days, Greg?

[00:02:57] Greg: We're like everyone else. Right? We're looking at how email really compares to these other channels that everyone's using, and they're kinda mainstay channels. So paid social, paid search, things that aren't really going anywhere. Paid search. Yeah. I mean, we could probably argue about that maybe in the next couple of years. But paid social, right, every company is doing it. It's still good, still useful for them. But where email sits in here, we were kinda chatting offline about this like, "Well, does it really change a lot?" And it does to a degree, and it also doesn't to a degree. And we're just finding performance to be very consistent. And I look back at performance 10 years ago, kinda seeing the same thing now. Right? It's just you can kinda predict what you're gonna get from it if you do it well. And if you, you know, aren't just buying lists and stuff like that, your ROI is somewhat prescriptive.

[00:03:49] Phillip: So is the truth from five or six years ago still the same truth where send more frequently, segment better, and understand your customers so you have better offers? Is that kind of the pillars, or is it more complicated than that these days?

[00:04:06] Greg: I think if you wanna, like, 10,000 foot view it, you're right. That's probably it. I think segmentation is the one thing where every branch should be doing it. It could be really simple. It could be super complex too.

[00:04:19] Phillip: Sure.

[00:04:19] Greg: And I think that's the one thing where everyone's got a million things at their plates. Can you consistently do segmentation? Because if you can't consistently do it, it's kind of like, "Hey. We'll throw a dart here. We'll hit it. We'll get some success. And then next time, we're gonna hit a one instead of a bull's eye." Right? And you're kinda going back and forth there. So I think to me, segmentation is the most interesting part of email. And I've worked with really large brands that have 10 people dedicated email, and they had trouble segmenting consistently the way they wanted to all the time. And you get a mom and pop brand like, "Hey. You should segment every send." It becomes a lot more complex than that.

[00:04:59] Brian: What are some tools that people can use to help with segmentation? I'm assuming AI is starting to play a larger and larger role and being able to do that. A mom and pop might be able to use, they are they going out to Claud and running their email list against it? How's it working?

[00:05:17] Phillip: I think Europe might have something to say about that. {laughter}

[00:05:22] Greg: {laughter} I think what we're seeing from smaller companies or even small to midsize companies is they're relying on the email provider to do that kind of form. And what I mean by that is not only have the segmentation capabilities there, but suggest them. Omnisend does this. Other platforms do this as well. It's like, "Hey. Here's some prebuilt segments. You wanna use it? Click and we'll copy it over for you and apply it." And I think they're relying on the providers to provide the expertise to them. They're like, "Here's how easily how to do it in a couple clicks. Now it's up to you to kind of execute upon that." But I think they're relying on the providers more than maybe they used to back in the day.

[00:06:01] Brian: Makes sense.

[00:06:02] Phillip: Brian, remember there's a once upon a time, there was some discourse in this ecosystem about selling empty software.

[00:06:09] Brian: Oh, yeah.

[00:06:10] Phillip: Well, we're selling you an empty platform, and then you put your stuff into it, and you could do anything with it. I think that ship has sailed a long time ago. I think whatever best practices is what the platform recommends to the user, right, to the consumer of the platform, and that's why I think we see such an interesting opportunity where you can be two and a half, three weeks out from Black Friday and still have something that you can execute because you don't have to build something from scratch necessarily. What do you think that there is time left to do still at least on the messaging and marketing automation side, Greg?

[00:06:49] Greg: Yeah. I'll give the thing you should be doing year round. But the thing I'm really stuck on right now, I go through these things where I'll hammer three things for a year. I'm like, "This is what you should do," and then I kinda move on from it keeping those in mind. This year, I've been talking about value adds a lot, and I think this is especially important for smaller businesses that are competing against larger ones, whether it's Amazon, Walmart, whatever. You know, really hone in on your messaging about why should you buy from us and not them? Because a lot of times the small businesses are not the cheapest ones on the block. They might be comparative, but they're usually not the cheapest. And I think that's where we're really honing in on if you can offer free shipping just as much as them, great. If you can't, what else can you do? Is it product quality maybe is better? You can mention things about being like a mom and pop or a small business. I think it's only gonna go so far there, but it's worth mentioning. Return policies, can you extend your returns to 60 days or 90 days to account for gift giving, make customers feel more comfortable? I think those are the things that you got three, two, one week out from Black Friday, those are the things to put in your messaging. Throw them in your headers. Throw them in recovery sections. Throw them on your website. And other than that, I would say plug away. Keep sending the emails. Keep sending SMS. Keep doing those things, and just stay top of mind for them because there's going to be lulls. And I would say we only have a couple of them left because it's the nature of the the calendar. But every single year, I pull all Omnisend's data. We do these stat reports. We try to pick out kind of the interesting parts of it. And I would say the one thing that I see year after year after year, not that it happens throughout the course of the whole calendar year, but especially around BFCM time is people send a lot fewer emails on Saturdays and Sundays, but conversion rates don't go down. Some go up. You look at Adobe's metrics on the reports they put out. They're still spending $3-4,000,000,000 a day on these weekends. So you're seeing fewer messages send. You're seeing conversion rates. People are obviously still shopping across the ecosystem. I think that's an opportunity where they send a little extra on Saturday and try to get in the inbox there because people are still shopping. But just plug away.

[00:09:04] Phillip: That's so interesting. For sure. I asked someone at a dinner, Brian, that we had in Chicago a few weeks ago. I asked them what the best, they were a retention marketing manager. I said, "What's the best time to send an email?" And they're like, "Oh, so we have face wash. Right? So we try to time it when you're taking your makeup off at the end of the night. You might be out. 10 PM." 10 PM time to send is the best time to send an email, which is different than the best time to send an email for your foundation because you put that on at 7 AM. And I was like, "Woah. Okay." So, like, really understanding that the best practice and, like, alignment to who's actually getting the product.

[00:09:53] Brian: Product usage. Yeah.

[00:09:54] Phillip: The customer is highly dependent on what that business is trying to do. Yeah. People use products on weekends too, Greg. {laughter}

[00:10:04] Brian: Yeah.

[00:10:04] Greg: I use like two. {laughter}

[00:10:09] Brian: {laughter} This is super interesting. I do think there's a lot of room left here to send. I'm curious. That data you mentioned, post data, I'm very curious to see how things go. I would imagine, at least here in the US, that well, we usually see a lot of messaging this time of year around Black November and things have moved earlier. And it's just like you get a lot of email and a lot of messaging about holiday deals earlier and earlier every year, it feels like, but not this year. This year, we had an election. And I think that that may have had a large impact on how people are buying, how messaging went earlier in the season this year. And while maybe there was some messaging around it, it didn't feel as fierce as it does some years to me at least, anecdotally. So I can't help but think and wonder if we're gonna see some of that purchasing delayed into these upcoming weeks in the final days here going into that weekend. And perhaps we actually may have a larger weekend spend than normal as a result of this delayed purchasing. Greg, what do you think? What kind of impact the election's having on BF/CM this year?

[00:11:32] Greg: So it's interesting you say that, Brian, because I think we could spend the whole hour talking about this. The last couple of years, we see the data. Gray November, Black November, whatever it is when I do it. And two months ago, I'm seeing Christmas trees in my local hardware store. Alright. The big box store. And I'm like, oh, man. So last year, we saw a pretty big uptick right around Prime Day. The October Prime Day.

[00:11:57] Brian: Big deal days or whatever.

[00:11:59] Greg: Right? And it never really let off. You had a one week drop off the end of October leading into November, and then it picked right back up. We saw the same thing this year. So I feel and I knew I was coming out. We were chatting today, so I go on to my Gmail account that I only use to sign up for brands. So I get 400 or 500 emails a day, and I do the subject line because I was seeing them just anecdotally scrolling through over the last few weeks Black Friday. So I do a search for subject line. So I was traveling all weekend. I wasn't really paying attention to email. And look at three days ago, I got almost a little over 20. I think it was 22 things with Black Friday subject lines. Right? "Starts Now," "Early Access," stuff like that. And every single day, like, the day after that, right around the same figure. So I get the sense that people have been shopping earlier, but I think the election kind of pulled the conversation point. I think to your point, you don't feel like you're gonna hit over the head with it. I think the election kind of took the news headlines away from that.

[00:13:07] Brian: Right.

[00:13:07] Greg: That's how I feel at least. Right? So the data I'm looking at, you know, it's obviously from an email and SMS side. We saw the uptick. We saw the you know, it's continuing. I'm getting it in my inbox, but like you, I just kinda notice it. But I think the election just kinda pulled some of those talking points out. I do think to your point, though, I think we will see a pretty large Black Friday this year, though.

[00:13:30] Brian: Yeah.

[00:13:31] Phillip: And it is compressed, so I wonder if it's back loaded. We talked a lot about, like, holiday creep. Right? So, yeah, it's one of those interesting situations where, to your point, Greg, it has been anchored in physical retail now for months. I think we mentioned it on the show that Costco had things out into July beginning of of August in my local big box store. It's in our minds. I think people are just gonna have to get a hurry on. I also see an interesting move of using retention channels like SMS and email to drive folks to in-store for the larger retailers. And that seems to be also kind of back loading the shopping to the actual December window. It's like, come in over the cyber 5. It'll slip into December, but that's just what's happening this year. So I do think that this is a really interesting time.

[00:14:35] Brian: I think also so, yeah, to your point, Phillip, there's a little bit of a prediction. I've seen some buzz around. Maybe this year, we might see doorbusters and long lines again. If anything, because it's interesting content and that's fun. But also because it feels like maybe there needs to be a big push to in-store to get people to purchase. They odds of them making a purchase once they're actually at the store are a lot higher than just browsing the site. And so having messaging around in-store purchasing or key in-store deals that are messaged through text or through email, that could be a really interesting strategy this year. I feel like I think you're onto something.

[00:15:23] Greg: So I think the interesting part of that too is, and I don't wanna go too much down a political rabbit hole here, but we see people buying early. You keep seeing these studies put out by x y z company that people have done 25% of their shopping already. Right? And we're here, which if you're a big box store using email and SMS to get you come in the store, are you leaving money on table by not offering some of those things now, but you also have your doorbusters like you talked about? The election results depends on which side of the fence you fall on here. They always say happy people like to shop. So you get one half that might be super happy, and they're gonna go out shopping. And you get the other half, which might be ultra conservative about they're nervous about how much money they should spend this year because they don't know what's gonna happen next year, and you kinda get that pull back there. And I almost wonder if they might just go, "Oh, the hell with it. I'm going all out this year because I don't know what's gonna happen. I wanna be happy. I wanna enjoy it while I have it," and I wonder if that kind of accelerates you too. It's kind of an interesting time based on that.

[00:17:51] Brian: That's a very bullish take. I like this take. Either people are like, "Oh, screw it. I'll just spend the money," or they're celebrating, and they're like, "Oh, next year's gonna be incredible."

[00:18:03] Phillip: I don't know. I think I could even say it a third way. I could see it as maybe people have been very cautious this year. I heard a lot of anecdotal response from people in Future Commerce network and some of our community earlier this year saying despite everything they were trying to do, there's real lag in things like win back campaigns or performance marketing, a lot of creative testing, shifting of spend to things like performance max or what have you, but nothing seemed to really be working from spring to summer, and now things seem to be picking up. So I just wonder if maybe there's just some timidity across a lot of the you know, maybe it is the electorate. Maybe it is part of that. Or maybe it's the mood, the vibe shift is real. {laughter} Maybe that's a thing. It's what I keep hearing at least.

[00:19:01] Brian: Or maybe I mean, remember when Le Labo ran the "Capitalism stinks, but you still smell amazing" headline? I think to Greg's point, maybe there's some level of this is not great, but at least we can go spend money.

[00:19:20] Greg: For sure.

[00:19:21] Phillip: Retail therapy is a real thing.

[00:19:23] Brian: Yeah.

[00:19:23] Phillip: Can it be overdone? Are there mistakes that can be made in this window, Greg? Is there, I think about some folks feeling like they're fatiguing lists. Some folks feel like maybe they're doing more than they really need, that it has diminishing returns, and maybe you're fatiguing your team. I'm curious what you have to say about that from all of the data that you have on your end.

[00:19:53] Greg: I would say it's probably true from both sides of the the aisle. You're probably fatiguing some, and you're not fatiguing others. I think the biggest, I don't know if it's a mistake, but the biggest kind of maybe hiccups or concerns I would have if I look at brands is... So this is just one incident here. I was looking at the emails today that I was talking about, and I saw the Black Friday preview sale. And I always wondered about this. This goes back years, but I'm like, well, is it a preview or is it a sale? Like, which is it? And if it's a sale, do I need to wait until Black Friday? Like, is this the best deal? And I think that's the one thing where it's just not clear to the audience what you're actually offering there. So I would always say, you know, if it's the best deal, this is going to be you get it now for a week and then you get a Black Friday week. Just tell me it's the best deal. It's not gonna go on sale. I'd really hone in the sense of urgency there in the messaging. These products are not gonna last long. Get it before it's too late. So that's one I would say to be aware of the verbiage you use in your messaging and see how that actually communicates. I think we're to the point now talk about, you know, Black November and stuff like that. We really saw the tipping point last year with Black Friday week. Either the Sunday or the Monday of Black Friday week or Thanksgiving week is when people are running their sales. I think that's just a permanent part of it now. So if you're waiting until Thanksgiving Day or Black Friday to start those sales, I think you're leaving money on the table. You can do it, but you're missing out on people because they're gonna start shopping that week. And then I would say now it's kinda counterintuitive, but discounting too much. I think you have the ability now to really hone in on your sense of urgency. "These items will not last long. We are going to discount them. Get them now." You can offer a little bit less there, but really use the other messaging and see how they sell. And I think those are the things that again, I don't think they're mistakes, but I think they're opportunities and challenges just to be mindful of. Now are you gonna fatigue some of your list because you're mailing a lot? Yeah. I think so. I think it's kind of the nature of the beast, though. I think you probably do that every year even if you get loyal customers. They're like, "Okay. Another one from you today?" They can ignore those things. And I would always say ignore them. If you're really concerned about it, this is where segmentation comes in. Right? Just pick some of your people who only buy during Black Friday, Cyber Monday. Maybe give them a day or two off, but, really, those are the people you should be targeting a little bit more. Loyal customers... Those are the guys you should probably give a couple days off to. Right? They know where you are. They know how to find you. Give them a little break there. Obviously, lapsed purchases. You talked about it, Brian, or Phillip, I'm sorry. You said you were chatting and, you know, there's less retention market and win back stuff going on. I think it's probably for a reason. They're probably trying not to fatigue people, but, you know, if they haven't purchased in 18 months, one a week, two a week at tops and just kinda let them go. So you're not for taking someone who ignores you, but you're still sending those emails out. That's kinda how I look at it from that perspective.

[00:23:03] Phillip: Yeah, would you advise folks on having a specific strategy with the repeating certain offers, having sort of more calendarization of those offers, or who you expose, what offers to? Do you do you reserve? Again, we're coming back to a segmentation question, but I'm curious. Is there a best practice that's working in 2024 versus, you know, one offer, whole list, everybody gets the same 25, 30% off, and that's kind of the move.

[00:23:40] Greg: I think that the best way to do it would be the former. I think the 95 percentile of people who are doing it do the latter. They're just sending, "Hey. Here's our offer." And at this time of year, it's not necessarily a bad strategy. What I've been seeing a lot, and again, we talk about anecdotal stuff, but what I'm seeing a lot is the last two weeks, a lot of promotion around new arrivals. So, obviously, you're getting stock in or you get a new product lines or something like that where that's it, "We'll give you a 20% off, but check out our new arrival." So it's new, it's fresh, lower discount. You try to get people jumping there. I've seen a lot of that lately. I know last year, I've started seeing a little more, maybe late October this year. But last year, as the season ramped up, started seeing a lot more back in stock. So we know products sold out once. Can you so you kinda get that social proof. And, again, we talk about sense of urgency and fear of missing out. But "Product's back in stock. Get them before they're gone again." So we're just kinda pumping that. I've seen that start to increase a little bit more lately. So I would say the long answer to a very short question is I don't know if there's a best practice about types of discounts, but I think there's more of a best practice around spacing these things out and kind of utilizing the small advantages that you have around how you promote those things. The new arrivals, it's new, catchy, even if they're old. Right? And they just haven't seen it. It's new to me. That's an opportunity for you there. So what it does is if your best offer is gonna be 25% off and you wanna offer it in November, you put these things in between, the 25% gets spaced out. So the next time you see 25%, it's not the same thing every single week because then you lose all that urgency to buy. "I get 25% off next week. I don't need to shop now."

[00:26:33] Brian: Having varied discounts or varied messaging is essential. What do you think, you know, of some other, more creative messages that you could provide to your customers through these channels that would get them to engage and share and also sort of take part in the campaign, if you will? Is there messaging that you've seen, Greg, or seems to be successful across Omnisend clients that would sort of invigorate and inspire people to forward the email or to share something about the campaign on social or to take part by making something of their own that they could share?

[00:27:14] Phillip: It's multiplayer. Yeah.

[00:27:15] Brian: Yeah. Exactly.

[00:27:18] Greg: So short answer is no. {laughter} So I'll give you some...

[00:27:27] Phillip: Next question.

[00:27:28] Greg: Yeah. Moving on. I'm out of here. So I haven't seen anything really creative, and I'm not saying it's because I might have just missed it. I think when we get to this time of year, it becomes a little more transactional than before. So you get a lot of... I mean, we just talked about it. "Here's 25% off." "Here's 25% off." "Get the sale." They're so focused on hitting numbers, and I think there's less room or less maybe desire to be more creative with campaigns. I would say, you know, I'm always a big post purchase email guy, have been for years. I'm like, send a series that is more than just a product review message or, you know, try to engage and make that customer experience a little bit better. Right? Because those are the ones that you can cut them off. And I think the best ones, companies like it tells a story, but COVID lockdown or whatever. I know how to cook. I'm not a baker. Pizza is not a thing I bake, but I bought a pizza stone. So one of these is almost like a stone, but steel. And they weren't the best messages in the world, but their post purchase here is like, "Hey, though, what do you need if you're buying a baking steel? Well, you need recipes. So here's a couple of our top rated recipes, pizza dough and, you know, three day pizza dough, cooking in seven minutes..." And, you know, those things, I think, you can share on social. And I think they missed an opportunity of being like, "Hey. Have a better recipe?" Or "Share this with your friends," or something. So I think we're to the point now where you can be creative. We see fewer companies actually doing it, but just ask them for what they want. And I think this goes for product review messages too. A brand should be using a lot of social proof across everything, testimonials, top rated products in their messaging and things like this. But these product review messages that normally go up are just like, "Leave a review for us." And they're just, again, very transactional in nature. I think that's an opportunity where you could spice those things up. Give them a little, you know, give them a little jeuje and make important more pronounced. Why do you wanna do this? And maybe link to some of those other, whether it's a funny TikTok video on the same thing, like one of those trends or something that maybe incorporate that. I think those are where they should be using them more, and trying to get them on the social media, but I just don't think we see a lot of them anymore.

[00:29:51] Phillip: We saw this a few years ago. There was a data chart that was created by a survey done by Common Thread Collective, which is sort of like a email retention performance marketing agency. And they showed over time that basically the industry is kinda coalesced in ecommerce in particular into a handful of offers that work. It's a lot of creative offers, a lot of creative messaging, a lot of, you know, interesting things that are sort of gimmicky or what have you. But, generally, it was like, there's really three things. It's like gift with purchase. It's 25% off. It's 30% off. Buy one get one free. There's a handful of things that work really well, and most companies realize that over time, and the creativity sort of has winnowed over time.

[00:30:46] Brian: Seventy percent off works great for me. I like 70% off. Any brands listening, you can target me with 75% off...

[00:30:55] Phillip: Brian loves a a killer deal. And when you really think about it, I would say over time, generally, new things in the world start as highly creative and highly differentiated. I don't know, the 1950s automobiles. It's like some wild designs. Really interesting, creative, varied color palettes. And then today, we've sort of come into some harmony over now there's a handful of silhouettes, a handful of colors that consumers buy, and that's what we sort of coalesced into. Would you say that sort of encapsulates it? Is that over time, we've just sort of realized, like, there's a relationship between a brand and a consumer, and this is the thing that kinda works. Innovation is not really at least in Black Friday, Cyber Monday isn't worth... The juice isn't worth the squeeze.

[00:31:54] Greg: I would say if you're looking at Black Friday week, when it's hot and heavy, everyone's sending three, four times a day.

[00:32:01] Phillip: Sure.

[00:32:01] Greg: I would say then, yeah, that's probably right. You get them the offer. By the way, Brian, you give me 70% off. I'm shopping all day long. I love it.

[00:32:10] Brian: Oh yeah. All day. This is the problem with Black Friday. I end up shopping all day long because there's a lot of brands that offer 70% off.

[00:32:17] Greg: I think during that week, Phillip, you're right. It's this is what works. Give them the offer. Send it to them. Let them shop. I think the opportunity though, just because it's kinda coalesced in this, and you guys hit on this with your company. Just because that's what it's coalesced to and that's what people think that the majority consumers want does not mean or how it converts people does not mean that's what they want necessarily. And I you look at, you know, car culture and it never went away, but it's kind of revitalized now. We see a lot of it. Sneakerheads, like sneakers are at a boom. My 12 year old is... I'm not a sneakerhead. Yeah. I got the same sneakers from four years ago. My 12 year old's all about him. That's what he asked for for Christmas and his birthday and stuff like this. And, you know, I think they are an opportunity, not they, but just, like, people in general that like stuff. They like colors. They like newness.

[00:33:11] Phillip: Mhmm.

[00:33:12] Greg: I think those are areas where brands should be doing more of that. And if you talk about it during Black Friday, Cyber Monday period, how about October as everyone starts their shopping? But there's kind of still a lot of it's October. Right? It is what it is. I'll wait till November and even early November. I think there's a lot of opportunities for brands to do that, but I think they don't because your point, it's coalesced. That doesn't mean that's the only thing that works.

[00:33:35] Phillip: It's such a good point. And you could certainly read that as sort of defeatist, but I think we go through these homogenization cycles where right now, everything from toothbrushes to smartphones all kind of have the same form factor. They all kind of operate the same way. Every so often, you know, look at automobile is a really good cherry picked example, Greg, because you'll have a Cybertruck that comes along and is this wild exaggerated breakout moment that kind of changes the conversation. And not everybody's cup of tea, and there's a certain archetype of a person that that appeals to. But it does expand our horizons of what's possible. And I really like that in this season, if frequency and recency and frequency are sort of the name of the game for messaging, the tools and the skills that you learn to be able to produce creative at that scale is also the same kind of tools in the team that you need to produce more highly high concept creative later in the year. So I think that those are, it's just different muscles that you're working.

[00:34:40] Brian: You said Cybertruck. I thought you were gonna say Batman Tumbler.

[00:34:45] Phillip: Well, there's that too. Yeah. That's a different, if you have some oil money, if you're in the market for a Batman Tumbler probably.

[00:34:55] Brian: That's what I want my next car to look like.

[00:34:58] Greg: So on this point, though, I was so my answer is obviously coming from the email perspective.

[00:35:02] Phillip: Of course.

[00:35:03] Greg: So the one thing I look at it is your social feeds. I think we have an opportunity to do that now. All the ads, it's to your point, it's rinse and repeat. Or I get an ad from x y z brand as I'm scrolling Instagram. They all look the same. It's the same format they're doing. There's nothing new. I come to see it. I would love some newness on my feeds because you're gonna see the ads. You're gonna look at the ads. You're gonna see who it's from, and you're gonna spend a second or so kind of assessing that. I think that's an opportunity where, to your point, if you wanna do something a little more creative, you wanna be a little more outlandish there or just spend more time doing a better design, I think that's an opportunity that you can do even during the peak season because it does jump through and catches people's attention. So email one side, I think social, you know, on the ads, I think you have an opportunity there.

[00:35:50] Phillip: On that note too, I spent a few years ago, Greg, I don't know if you remember, I was sort of beating this drum of ecommerce is boring and it has too many rules and we have to do all the same things. And there's a rule book that, you know, Baymard has instituted that for usability sake and for not for nothing, a bunch of case law and ADA stuff. It's like, we can only build websites one way, and that's the way that works, and you can't do anything else. And I was sort of lamenting that. That's a bummer to me. And I had somebody at a brand who was like, "But have you seen our emails? They're really creative." And "Have you seen our our performance marketing? There's no rules there. You just do what works, and you can keep testing." You don't have boxes that have to be specifically positioned a certain way. I think that's really, it reframes to me that it's like the site is a transaction of a funnel of one sort, but there's a lot of other things that people consider to be a doorway for your brand that can be much more highly creative. And messaging, I think SMS and email are very much in that vein of these are places where we can creatively test. Yeah. Maybe not so much in the actual weekend of Black Friday. But we always end this... Greg, it's always a pleasure to to catch up with you. We always sort of end asking you to do a little prediction from your vantage point, and with all your experience. What do you think the future of commerce is looking like as we go to close out 2024 and head into 2025?

[00:37:22] Greg: So funny. I was having this conversation last week with someone, and we were talking about trends for next year.

[00:37:30] Phillip: Mhmm.

[00:37:30] Greg: And I said, "I don't know. Can I say the same?" {laugher} I don't see... I mean, email and SMS are one thing. We've seen it for the last year and a half, probably, that brands are shifting more focus to email and SMS. I think one cost control, a little more predictive than paid search and stuff like that that tends to fluctuate a little bit. I think that's gonna continue. I think we'll see that. I think if you look at the whole ecommerce space, I think the big changes, they're not a year away. So I'm a big proponent of VR stuff, but we're like, even two years from now, that's not gonna be the thing. But down the road, I don't think we're going to see a lot of changes. I think we'll see a lot more focus on email from brands that are looking to, you know, I don't want to say save money, but looking for something a little more consistent that gives them the flexibility to maybe venture and try new things elsewhere, while not recapturing those things. And so it's a really bad answer to say, I think we'll see a lot of the same, but I think we will see a lot of the same next year. There's nothing that I see that tells me this is gonna change us, revolutionary, you know, and expect the second half of next year to kinda be flipped upside down because as I say, I think we'll just have the continuation of what we're seeing today, which isn't sexy, but...

[00:39:01] Phillip: It's not. But it also makes me think of the fault in our stars. The future happens slowly and then all at once. It's like we probably any one year to the next, you don't really see tectonic shifts. And then one day, you wake up and you're like, "Wow."

[00:39:22] Brian: "It's very different."

[00:39:25] Greg: I mean but it's like that with everything. So if you look at social media...

[00:39:29] Phillip: Sure.

[00:39:29] Greg: Stuff takes time to grow and stuff that comes out. Remember the first iteration of Facebook shops or whatever? It crashed and burned. I forgot what they called it back then, but they were like, "Good try. This is gonna change the world." And then it's like, "Okay. Let's get rid of that. We'll kinda recenter ourselves, and we'll try that later." You know? So I think we're in that kind of in between period right now.

[00:39:50] Phillip: I like that too. And I think that is one solid answer and a really excellent point of view from Greg Zakowitz, who is the Senior Ecommerce Expert in residence over there at Omnisend, many years as friend of the pod, and many years in this ecosystem together. Thank you so much for sharing this journey with us. Thanks for coming on the show, Greg.

[00:40:14] Greg: Oh, thanks for having me, guys. You guys are... I'll just say this. This is a small ecosystem. Everyone tends to know each other. You guys are seriously two of the nicest people in the ecosystem. So I just thank you for that.

[00:40:25] Brian: Oh sheesh. Thank you.

[00:40:26] Phillip: Thank you. And we feel the same way about you all. Thank you for partnering with us in this season of Future Commerce and really proud to be building together. And thank you all for listening to this episode of Future Commerce. Find more episodes of this podcast and all future commerce properties at FutureCommerce.com. And why don't you drop us a 5 star rating where it matters? Go to go on Spotify right now, Apple Podcasts, and leave us a rating and maybe a review if you would be so kind. And thank you so much for listening to this episode.

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