How Expanding Our Portfolio Helped Us Grow Revenue 200%
This is a follow up story for Black Goat Media. If you're interested in reading how they got started, published over 6 years ago, check it out here.
Hello again! Remind us who you are and what business you started.
Hi, Starter Story community! Time flies and we have made quite some progress from our first interview.
My name is Tudor Cioltea and I am the founder of the e-commerce agency Black Goat Media and e-commerce brands Viata Verde Viu, Golden Flavours and Terralura natural deodorants.
We have developed a unique system for e-commerce brands to scale using Facebook Ads, Google Ads, and email marketing, while we also offer them an eCommerce platform that is optimized for conversions.
We average around $50,000/month and plan to get to $100,000/month in the next 12 months.
We do agency work for different partners and we also run our own e-commerce brands like Viata Verde Viu & Golden Flavours.
Tell us about what you’ve been up to! Has the business been growing?
Since our last interview, we went from $15,000/month to around $50,000/month in net revenue.
There were 3 main areas of focus for us:
- Grow our customer base for agency services
- Grow the portfolio of products listed on our e-commerce brand
- Develop new products under the Golden Flavours brand
We used the same channels, we optimized our advertising campaigns and funnels and kept in close contact with our customer base. We identified a type of campaign that works every month in the form of a free shipping weekend timed with the period of the month when the majority of our audience gets paid.
There are a lot of ways to optimize costs and serve the customers better by having a well-optimized warehouse.
One metric that we use to measure customers’ happiness is the return rate of existing customers. We are now at an average of 35% for the Viata Verde Viu brand.
What have been your biggest lessons learned in the last year?
In the agency business, our biggest lesson learned was to audit very well all the new clients. A few of them in the past 12 months were not a good fit for the way we work and our mindset.
In our e-commerce brand, our biggest win was keeping in close contact with our suppliers. Now we have a dedicated person for maintaining our relationships with suppliers and building new relationships.
What’s in the plans for the upcoming year, and the next 5 years?
For the next 12 months, we plan to optimize everything related to our warehouse. There are a lot of ways to optimize costs and serve the customers better by having a well-optimized warehouse.
For our own brands, there are a few directions we would like to pursue:
- Expansion in new markets, either directly or through partnerships
- Expansion in traditional retail channels in Romania and abroad
- Develop new products based on our customer's needs
Have you read any good books in the last year?
I have discovered the DTC trend and I have been listening to the DTC podcast from Pilot House. I have also been using Twitter a lot for learning from other e-commerce owners. Unfortunately, I did not find the peace of mind to take a book from start to finish.
Advice for other entrepreneurs who might be struggling to grow their business?
Sometimes stepping to the side and letting things progress naturally could give you more clarity instead of the daily grind.
Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now?
We would love to work with content creators that can create UGC types of content around our products in focus. They don’t necessarily have to be influencers and have an audience.
