E158: Rowan Payne

Richard Hill [00:00:04]:

Hi there. I'm Richard Hill, the host of eCom@One, and welcome to episode 158. Today's guest, Rowan Payne. Now, Rowan is a account manager here at eComOne and works with a lot of our accounts, specifically on the social side of things, as well as Google Ads. And in this episode, we talk all things meta, TikTok, and a few other platforms in the mix around how to manage those ads, the creatives, and some of the little known things around managing ads on a day to day basis. It's a fantastic episode, so please hold on-site for a cracker. If you enjoyed this episode, hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you're listening to this podcast. You're always the first to know. With a new episode's release now. Let's head over to this fantastic episode. Rowan, welcome to the podcast.

Rowan Payne [00:00:52]:

Thank you, Richard. It's lovely to be here.

Richard Hill [00:00:55]:

So I think it'd be great for you to tell the listeners how you got into the world of e commerce, Ron.

Rowan Payne [00:00:59]:

That's a really interesting question, actually. It's not something that you might, expect looking at me. I, actually started my, professional career in in the arts in in theater. So I studied, at Manchester University to to be a fully fledged actor mainly focusing on both the theory of of of acting and also Shakespearean theater. And that told me a lot about storytelling and how we communicate with people in a way that is both engaging, but also compelling, and kind of leaving that industry and and spreading my wings and figuring out what I wanted to do with my life in in in a more of a professional sense. I got the feeling that there are a lot of things that I'd learned that could be utilized in marketing, as I'm sure you, you know, marketing is little more than communicating with a person and and getting them on board with the ideas that you're presenting. So, that was a a really interesting move for me, but I've I've learned a lot in the time that I've been working in the marketing sphere I started my journey on, lead generation, working with SME Businesses to, create lead funnels And that would mostly look, like using these social ad platforms like Facebook and Instagram as they were then called to generate high quality leads for businesses looking to sell services. And one of the big things that we championed in that particular sense was productizing those services as products. And that fed very nicely into my work, which then came on the e commerce front and really it's it's closer than you would think those 2, those 2 industries and those 2 halves of the of the marketing sphere.

Richard Hill [00:02:41]:

Yeah. So from acting or, you know, and learning the trade of acting, communicating, and delivering, sort of, pieces of round acting and the different elements of that to to go into marketing within the B2B side lead gen, phone calls, form fills, and then, to, to the e commerce side. They're obviously, I know pretty well, because Roan works with me here at at eCom, 1. We're looking after a lot of our key accounts, and you do a lot of work around the meta platform. Obviously Facebook has we I keep referring to it, and the key game told off by Rowan that it's obviously now called Meta, and it has been for quite some time, but old school, Facebook, meta, then why should companies invest in meta ads? So obviously specifically eCom stores.

Rowan Payne [00:03:28]:

There are a thousand reasons why a company might want to invest in a platform like Meta or even other social platforms like TikTok or even Snapchat, I'll try and condense that down a little bit. So, you know, just from a high point, high vantage point, the the key benefits that I try to get across to all of the clients that we work with. Firstly, it's gotta be volume. These social ad platforms have billions of users and I I think it's really undervalued how connected we have become as a society. Businesses are able to reach any type of user that they need to to supply their own growth. And one of the most effective ways to reach those users is through those social media platforms. Especially with Meta, their targeting is perhaps the most sophisticated that I've ever seen and, the specificity that we can can achieve in really dialing in those those ideal client parameters allows us to really ensure that our campaigns are best suited for the the business's unique offering. So that's only one of them, to be totally fair. Yeah. Yeah. I think that the other thing that's really great is the the rich media formats. So I'm sure that you've seen that, Richard, as you're scrolling through your phone late at night with a glass of wine perhaps needs to be

Richard Hill [00:04:48]:

-- What do you say? --

Rowan Payne [00:04:49]:

looking photo or maybe it's a it's a video or carousel, and these are really in in ways that we as advertisers can connect and engage with users that are outside the bounds of what we would turn traditional media. Yeah. You know, those static images, which although are really great at conveying value on as grabbing his video.

Richard Hill [00:05:09]:

Mhmm. It's incredible is that, you know, you know, thinking of the listeners that are listed now, you know, absolutely, you know, you're you're sitting there scrolling your phone, you know, whether that's an even or whenever it is. And the things that you see, you know, how relevant they are to your interests is one thing. So that's the targeting, but then the the sort of quality and the cleverness behind the creative that will then get your attention. So there's two sides to it. You know, my feet issues at the moment are trying to think without giving away too much. You know, I'm a quite a big boxing fan, so it's been full of all the the boxing that's been on over the last couple of weeks. You know, than targeting around. You know, I've got quite an interest in my lawn at home, which a few other listeners says, may now, it's been mentioned 1 or 2 times. So they're clever targeting, but then, obviously, how clever, you know, as a as a as a firm selling lawnmowers, for example, you know, just show me an image of a lawn mower is one thing, and it's very, very straightforward, very, very easy, you know, using the prat product catalog and the, you know, the equivalent of a dynamic product and and image ads and product ads, but obviously getting creative, with other media, you know, targeting me specifically in this example. You know, as a listener, and obviously there's a lot of different platforms out there that they're focused, they should be focused on potentially, you know, Meta, TikTok, Google as well. You know, when should a company know to sort of adjust budgets and look at sort of increasing budgets when it comes to their ads?

Rowan Payne [00:06:38]:

I don't think that there's any one definitive way to to know when you're ready to jump into a new platform or to move budget into a platform like metatiktok or or any other social platform. One of the things that I say, is a is a really easy metric to take take a look at, is really when your growth starts to stop losing its logarithmic growth. So, if you're starting to taper off and you're finding yourself on a plateau, that's a really good time as a as a marketer for me to come in then and and identify new opportunities. First thing that you should really understand before going into any kind of marketing strategy, whether that's a new one from scratch or even to adding in a new platform, is understanding where your target audience currently is. I think that's one of the big pitfalls that a lot of businesses make starting out at this they see a shiny new platform, they wanna jump on it immediately. But if your audience isn't already there, it's gonna be really hard for you to create campaigns that are effective at generating the results that you're looking for. So, you know, doing that research, taking a look at those platforms demographics and seeing where your ideal audience would lie is a really great way to ensure that you're pushing in the right direct for your company. An example of that would be, the 18 to 35 age gap age bracket TikTok is absolutely exploding at the moment. So if you're in cosmetic brands or apparel brands and you're targeting those age groups, that's a a really great opportunity for you to make use of those those native audience types, and really expand upon your strategy on those platforms.

Richard Hill [00:08:11]:

Yeah. I mean, and, obviously, I know speaking to you, Rowan actually sits about 10 yards away from me on a day to day basis. So obviously, we're we're very familiar with, sort of the the things that we come up with between us, in the agency, you know, with clients, but you talk about that plateau, you know, that's obviously quite a common conversation that you have you know, reoccurring most weeks with with new sort of potential clients and prospects and different companies that are in and out of the business with different events that we roll and whatnot, you know, if you're if, you know, where would you say that most companies are maybe going wrong? Is there some themes there where, yep, hit hit the plateau or, yeah, we were doing really well, and then X happened. You know, what are some of the things that our listeners, you know, can maybe preempt that you see quite commonly in terms of hitting plateaus and challenges that are reoccurring. So

Rowan Payne [00:09:01]:

the idea of a plateau is is is one of the most terrifying things that a marker can come across. I like to call it the triangle of death, where something is just good enough for you to not want to change it, but not good enough for you to be happy with the results. What tends to happen on platforms like Meta or TikTok is, you you'll create something and you'll publish it, and it will achieve a certain level of results that just happens to fly just under the radar of what you would like to see. Unfortunately, as business owners and marketers, we will always be humans and humans naturally have an element of, risk aversion. Now what tends to happen then is that plateau becomes an area of stagnation, where we're not willing to push beyond that. One of the big things that companies can do to avoid that pit, is to have a really clear line of improvement and optimization that will, kind of be laid out at the start of a project. So before even ads are launched, I wanna know what the next 3 months of optimizations would look like. Now that being said, those plans may change and we may have a different view as to what success looks like in in a month's time and If that is the case, then by all means we can tweak and improve, but even knowing that in month 1, we're focusing on imagery in month 2, we're focusing on creative and content gives us a really good basis for us to start pushing beyond that triangular despair and reaching true success for those businesses.

Richard Hill [00:10:27]:

Yeah. What would you say about, having a percentage of budget for sort of more sort of a written, probably risky is a bit of a bit of a bit of a stretch, but having a percent, a firm percentage of budget that is used to test more risky whether that's risky ideas, creatives, targeting. What would you say to that?

Rowan Payne [00:10:50]:

It's it's really hard to give you a number. I think each business has a different number that it directly corresponds to the decision makers. A version to rescue and some people who are willing to go out there and put everything on the table and see what works. And there are some people who maybe have been running adverts for a year or 2. They have a sense of what their audience responds to and really aren't looking to move beyond that. I think a good benchmark is you're kind of coming into this blind and you want to know what what what industry standards are, I like to dedicate 70% of my budget to the everyday working campaigns that are there generating results consistently for our clients. A further 20 percent of budgets go to the campaigns that are there to support those. So those might be awareness or remarketing campaigns that I'm ensuring that that that bulk 70 isn't falling out into any kind of limited learning pit. Yeah. Then we have 10% and really that's my that's my have fun temps, and I -- Yeah.

Richard Hill [00:11:47]:

--

Rowan Payne [00:11:47]:

I like to put things on the on the account that I'm not sure of. I I want to see creatives that go beyond the limits of what technically would be considered a best practice just to see if we can find things that could potentially be an opportunity for our clients and our clients are always really excited about the new possibilities that we come to them with.

Richard Hill [00:12:07]:

So seventy's 2010, I like that a lot. Obviously, it's something we've talked about a lot in the agency, but I think, well, I know that, you know, as you say, there's -- Clients and and stores just hit that plateau because they're not trying things. They're sort of set and forget mentality, but like the Google Google ads days sort of thing, you know, it was a big thing. You know, a lot more automation coming into play across all platforms, particularly, you well, every everything really, but if you're selling and forgetting, you know, ultimately, the competitors you you got a level playing field, which talk about quite a lot. Whereas if you're innovating with that 10 or 20 or 10+20 and 30, you know, you're creating. That's where and really where you're why you're paying an agency, you know, the setup. Yes. Absolutely. But then when things are semi dialed in, okay? Great. But then that ten plus the 20, that 30% is where you as an agency or your agency or your internal team yourself should be spending your time. Is that what is that what you're saying?

Rowan Payne [00:13:03]:

That's that's pretty much what I'm saying, and that's the ideal, you know, that's down the line when you're when you're optimized out of the wazoo and you're happy with the results, I would still have 10% acting as your experimentation. If you're coming into this blind and you've never run an advert before, I wouldn't jump straight into that. I would say, yeah, throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. Don't have any assumptions over what you assume your clients will respond to because more often than not, Facebook or meta, will prove you wrong. So the best way to to approach this this new project, I would say, is to try between 5 to 7 completely different ideas, leave them running for at least 2 weeks, to get a sense of how those campaigns are optimizing themselves and where you see the results run with those.

Richard Hill [00:13:50]:

Yeah. No. I like that a lot. So privacy and data protection. Let's go there for a bit. Obviously, a lot of chat on that. Things changing all the time, different platforms. You know, how can advertisers overcome the charges that are out there and they're sort of impending, changes that are always sort of upon us. When it when it comes to privacy and data protection.

Rowan Payne [00:14:11]:

I think privacy and data protection are really important concerns that businesses are having at the moment, Sometimes I do wonder if businesses are more concerned about losing data than losing the insights that come with that data. More often than not, I find that businesses are more it in collecting data than they are about actually using it. So just as important as it is to collect that data in a way that is, within the confines of our privacy. It's also important to action that those data points into insights that we can use. So firstly, there are tools out there that allow us to collect data in in legal and ethical ways. Meta's conversion API is a really great tool that businesses can use to ensure that they're tracking data on their website. And also to have really good data clean cleanliness. So whether that looks like ensuring that your events aren't duplicated, or that they're fresh enough that they're timely in the account. These are things that we can control as advertisers on a businesses site. But going beyond that, what I would like to see businesses doing more in terms of their own marketing is embracing 2 concepts that we use a lot in eCom 1 and that's contextual and behavioral advertising. So, in case you're not aware, those terms refer to how we advertise offers and services not only just giving them, based on users' data, but also on their preferences and their contextual history. So if your users are frequenting a particular category page, let's say for instance that you sell lawn mowers and you're trying to sell a lawn mower to Richard, We're not gonna show him an advert for a lawnmower that he's never visited or he's never looked at. Let's show him the content that he's actively interested in. Maybe that's, do you call it, Richard? When you when you're scraping the the grass over the over the lawn, is it a scraper? Or

Richard Hill [00:16:01]:

Well, there's a couple of options to be fair. You could scourify you could, or you could vary cut. Depends how severe you want to, attack.

Rowan Payne [00:16:09]:

And so let's say that your taking a look at the scarifiers on a particular website. Really, our ads should speak to that desire, showing you content that relates to those products, but also talks about the specific benefits of those products. Those are the things that you're interested in, and I wouldn't want to shove something down your throat that you haven't given me insight into that you're looking for.

Richard Hill [00:16:31]:

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Rowan Payne [00:18:43]:

So, yeah, you're entirely right. Augmented and virtual reality are 2 really interesting concepts that are starting to become more and more utilized in marketing campaigns, as concepts, they have been around for a while now, with seeing them being used on platforms like Snapchat and TikTok to, create virtual try ons. Nike, the shoe brand did a very interesting concept, campaign where you were able to actually try on those shoes and see how they would look in on your own foot. Now, I think that that in itself is quite a high commitment campaign for small to medium businesses. But if you're an enterprise an enterprise business looking to take action on that kind of campaign, There are some really great services that the platforms like Snapchat and TikTok can help you with because they're looking to try these technologies out and, really there here to make sure that your campaigns are success. It's fantastic way for us to to engage with users in a more dynamic and engaging way, purely from the sense that you're you're actually enabling a lot of micro transactions, their micro commitments, for instance, putting on the filter, getting your shoes off, putting it onto your feet. These are all things that you're doing to signify that you're ready for the next step and priming your brain for that final conversion, whether you're making that purchase or pre ordering issue, these are all things that we can we can influence.

Richard Hill [00:20:09]:

Because I think the, the furniture store, I don't know if I mentioned their name, the one that has really got meatballs, they, you know, have had that sort of function for some time where you can picture the settee or the chair, you know, in your in your room. They've had that for many, many years now, and and that they've obviously iterated on that. Then there's various different models they have now, but I think it is becoming more and more sort of reachable, implementable for the more, you know, the the the medium term merchants, would you say?

Rowan Payne [00:20:40]:

Yeah. I would say that this is becoming more reachable. As we start to see it filtered down, there will be more and more opportunities for us to to make use of that technology. I myself have not used it, but I'm very excited for for the chance to for some of our clients. Possibly, there's there's a couple in mind I think would be a

Richard Hill [00:20:57]:

very good fit. Yeah. I mean, that that ties in quite nicely to, something else that, you know, we spoke about on our on the last episode with David Meakin from from Shopline, and that's live streaming and and shopping via live streaming, something you know, I was I was asked on a podcast, probably about 3 weeks ago where I was a guest, what keeps me up at night? And then that's a really good question. And at the moment, the one of the things that keeps me up at night is thinking about you know, our clients and how we can help them with selling our live streams. You know, we've got a beautiful new sort of office, recorded studio here now. How we can work with our clients to potentially get them in here in our studio, you know, with their products, and help them, you know, a man who manage know, their live streams with our team. Obviously, we've got a, you know, a fairly substantial team here that eComOne that with yourself. You know, what's been, you know, In terms of live streaming and e commerce, what's your sort of take on it and where you think it'll go?

Rowan Payne [00:21:59]:

Yeah. I think it's an incredibly, powerful tool that a lot of businesses will start to be viewing as as a mainstay in their marketing campaign strategy. I was reading some literature, recently on TikTok, and their client success. I believe it was, a a very well known shopping brand, pretty little thing. They did a shopping live campaign recently, and it think it generated something like upwards of 9,000,000 impressions, over the course of a of a 4 hour live whatever the the length was. And that just really articulates how massive these things can be. Not only are you presenting a human face in your campaigns, which is something that we would really suggest all strategies revolve around what is the human element there. But it also contextualizes those products in a much more, real way. So gone are the days where you see the photos on a website and it's a white background. There's no context there. You couldn't even gauge how big the product was. Now we see it in somebody's hands. We see it on that person. We're getting, engagement through comments and live reactions to those comments. These are all things that really amp up the intensity of that campaign and make it a lot more, a lot more human, especially when you see those bloopers, because, unfortunately, you can't hide people from, like, Joe, can you? But yeah, I think I think it's a really fantastic opportunity, and I would recommend that any businesses that are currently marketing on those platforms take a look at how TikTok shop and TikTok lives can help you too to scale your your sales.

Richard Hill [00:23:34]:

I think what I'm gonna do gonna say, I'm gonna put it out there on this episode that, obviously, this is a, this is a, something that we're exploring in the agency. You know, we've we've got somebody else just joined us in the business. That's gonna be helping us with this side of our business. And in a few months time, in a few months time, we're gonna be launching lives as a service to clients and, you know, people that are interested. So if you listen to this podcast right now and you're interested in doing live sell selling via lives with your products reach out to me, richardereconone.com, and we'll see if we can work out something phenomenal for you. Where you might be on one of our first, you know, client's customers, guinea pigs, even, where we we we manage your lives with our team, you know, man everything we just talked about, and we'll make sure it's, sort of very, should we say lucrative before you, you know, in terms of, fees, because it might not be any is what I'm saying. So very good on listening. I'll maybe just rewind 5 seconds, grab my email, and drop me a little mail, and we'll maybe see you in the studio in a few months time. How about that? So I think, obviously, time of year now, we're coming up to peak. You know, peak season for, you know, the majority or a lot, a lot of e commerce. That's quite a broad stroke. That's not technically true, but, you know, obviously, we're coming into Black Friday, I mean, in a couple of months. Depending on when you listen to this, but we're sort of at the back quarter of 2023. And obviously making sure that the commercials around managing your ads and say specifically meta ads. You know, we wanna make sure that our listeners are minimizing sort of potential risk of losing, you know, margin and losing, you know, and and having poor ROAS and poor return, you know, what would you say to companies about sort of minimizing risk and losing money? Over there, the busy period that is upon us.

Rowan Payne [00:25:25]:

So I I would say that the biggest risk that businesses face with regards to social advertising is poorly planned campaigns. Campaigns left on check can become money perhaps and time syncs, trying to get a pork forming campaign back up and running is is always going to be harder than it is to plan those campaigns and set them off with the right step. So the first thing that I would ensure that all businesses are doing at this point in the year in the lead up to Black Friday sales or Cyber Monday sales, is ensuring that your tracking is properly configured for your website. Site and make sure that everything's properly firing. I'd also really recommend that you complete a test purchase to ensure that the data pulled from that purchase is accurate to the information that you're seeing on the on the events dashboard. So I wanna make sure that that conversion value is correct. Whether that's in including or excluding VAT tax or or whatever. And that also ensure that your currency code is correct because that That's of stumbling block that a lot of businesses come up against in those in those big sales. Secondly, I would ensure that what you're doing, is firmly grounded in data So any sale, any offer should at least have 2 or 3 weeks of prior testing and trialing to ensure that you've got you've got the right creative and the right content to make the most of that sale. It only comes once a once a year, so ensuring that that it's optimized is is the best way to go about that. Yeah. There are a few other bits that I will just quickly mention, firstly making sure that your messaging is consistent, Big pitfall here, people have a 15% Black Friday offer. They click the ad that says 15%. It goes to the website and suddenly it's 10%. Well. As a user, that just makes me feel like there's no trust. I'm not appreciated. And frankly, I'm not completing a purchase on that transaction. I mean, would you, Richard,

Richard Hill [00:27:18]:

No. Absolutely. No. No. Definitely. No. So, yeah, I mean, the the tracking, it still amazes me. You know, we've been doing this well. The agents see is you obviously many, you know, 20 odd years I've been in this game and tracking, you know, it's literally we have somebody in this business that is full time fixing tracking. I mean, it begs belief really, you know, and people coming to us that are doing, you know, scraping 10,000,000 plus. No problem. With the tracking not working properly. So, you know, I would suggest, you know, tracking audit, maybe. You know, like you say, there's a few things there. You know, from basics to having the wrong currency to certain events, not firing, you know, you know, you've got you're running remarketing if you're if you're tracking is not working, you can't re you know, you can't run any ads in reality and get true data without that tracking piece. So there might be a case of, you know, half a day's work somewhere, you know, internally, do an audit. You know, reach out to the platforms. Some of them may help you. Obviously, we can help you reach out to Rowan. But it is very typical. You know, so when you're managing whatever budgets you manage are now there, you know, 5, 10, 50 grand a month. If the tracking's out, you know, clearly you're gonna have some major problems, especially around peak where that extra 5% might be when you're sitting there in January, looking at, you know, paying all those invoices from suppliers, the other 30, 60 days, you know, and that 5% all the different sort of thing, which is you normally it works. Yeah.

Rowan Payne [00:28:44]:

It reminds me of, a client story that I had, earlier this year where we weren't running their adverts for for matter, but they were experiencing a discrepancy sees on conversion value. And I was called late 1 night, in a bit of a frantic state, he was he was very concerned that the numbers that he was seeing on matter were in no way close to the numbers that he was seeing on his website's back end. So we took the time and we went through the tracking, and and we we quickly saw that what was happening is that conversions were being tracked, not at checkout completion, but instead at add to basket. Now that's a huge error that could be. Incredibly, difficult to overcome in a in a in a mess around account. The the lucky thing is that we were able to get in there. We were able to to find the issue quickly. Yeah. And since that point, they've managed to grow their revenue on meta by a 100%. So effectively doubling their revenue.

Richard Hill [00:29:38]:

Yeah. So tracking guys, you know, get it audited, get it checked. So future trends, So obviously, lots of chatter out there about different things, you know, well, what would you say to our listeners about preparing? For things that you feel are coming down the pipeline, say, with meta ads over this next sort of 6, 12 months.

Rowan Payne [00:30:01]:

Sure thing. I mean, I think we all have a rough idea of what's happening. AI is taking over the world and I, for 1, am excited to welcome our new, robotic overlords, That's me. Well, that means for Meta. Well, there are new innovations every day coming out that allows to create really intelligent and dynamic campaigns. So whether that's the advantage plus campaign or the dynamic product ads, They are concepts that have been around for a while, but they're getting stronger and stronger by a day. You know, when they first came out, I was hesitant and I personally waited a little while before rather than those campaigns, but I can fully say that those campaigns are some of the strongest ones that I have in my arsenal now, and it's very unlikely that I would be running a fully fledged strategy without some form of dynamic content. The benefit there is that, these platforms that have these huge reserves of information are allowed and able to better structure campaigns for individuals user preference, and that goes beyond just what do they like to click on, but also what kind of tone do they appreciate being spoken to and what kind of imagery resonates best with them. Those are really great tools that we can use to ensure that our campaigns are best suited to the vast majority of people on these platforms. There is one other thing that I'm really excited for, And that's threads. Richard, are you on threads?

Richard Hill [00:31:24]:

No. I'm not on threads.

Rowan Payne [00:31:26]:

Ah, well, you're getting left behind. So Brent is the newly launched platform by matter, which is essentially a stand in for X's functionality. I see it you know, it is very much in its early stages, but I do see it having some really interesting possibilities for what that means for marketing. Combining Meta's incredible data resources with Twitter's very fast content cycle, allowing us to possibly break into new markets. Yeah. So I I

Richard Hill [00:31:55]:

guess what you're saying there, then a couple of things that I think, you know, going back to that 70, 2010, we're testing some of the new things that come along. You know, Clubhouse came. Was it Clubhouse, wasn't it? Came along. Was that 18 months ago? Everyone's all over it. We're not hearing anything about that. Doesn't mean you were maybe wrong. Definitely not. Adopting, trying, testing in the in the in the moment that sort of maybe was it a 6 week blip? Maybe I'm not sure. I'll I'll probably talk turn a little bit because I wasn't I didn't get involved with that one personally. I don't think we did as an agency, but obviously, testing, you know, and I know for a fact, obviously, we've had conversations maybe 3 months ago. Man, I got my timeline slightly off where you've built out a threads account for 1 of our sort of outdoor brands that we represent. And obviously testing various things. And I think that's the key takeaways. They're testing that. It's a 10% of time, 5% of budget, whatever it may be. You know, obviously it varies from client to client, but then the AI side, you know, we talk about embracing AI, and I know that's, something that, you know, we've got a lot of things going on across sort of, you know, fully the agency departmentally, you know, whether that's ads content, etcetera. So, yeah, interesting times, isn't it? Where we'll we'll sit here and probably do a podcasts with an augmented AI member of the team.

Rowan Payne [00:33:07]:

Maybe. I don't know. Is that a thing? I never know. Maybe we're already doing it.

Richard Hill [00:33:11]:

Who knows? Hey. Have I really here?

Rowan Payne [00:33:15]:

Are any of us really here? It's a good question.

Richard Hill [00:33:17]:

So tools, you know, you've touched on the platforms and how you know, the the sort of AI and the different, types of ads that you can create, you know, and using the tools within the platforms, Yeah. That's great. Are there any other tools you would recommend specifically for social ads, for example, to help create, manage?

Rowan Payne [00:33:38]:

Yeah. I think it's a I think it's a difficult question because everybody's process is slightly different. I personally use a combination of 5 or different design tools to create my adverts. Yeah. But one of the big things that I think people aren't currently utilizing very well is content creation and content creators on platforms like TikTok. So one of the really interesting things that I think is not very well known. You might correct me, but by working with content creators, you can actually link your products into their shops. So for instance, if I was selling a certain product and that might be a cosmetics or apparel, I'm able to reach out to brand ambassadors and directly link my shop to theirs, and then essentially what you're creating there is a much wider network of resellers of your products. Allowing us to create lives, TikTok shop accounts, and create a whole ecosystem of people who are championing your brand. And that just goes that one step further to creating a brand experience that is a lot more dynamic, but also encompassing for your

Richard Hill [00:34:43]:

users. Lovely,

Rowan Payne [00:34:49]:

I I wouldn't want to give any recommendations on any of my tools. Because I like to use them, and I'm very secretive. But what I will say is that Adobe's new fledgling, product which I do believe is Adobe Fire, allows people to create dynamic ads and templates almost immediately So if that's not something that you've currently tried, I would definitely recommend you give that a go.

Richard Hill [00:35:14]:

Okay. So given us a few there guys, but keeping a few a few more closer to his chest, to like it. Let's have a chat about the rebrand, Twitter, x. What's all that about? What's your take on that? Yeah.

Rowan Payne [00:35:27]:

The question on everyone's lips at the moment, isn't it? It's, making waves in pretty much every pool of marketing.

Richard Hill [00:35:35]:

Yeah. Yeah. I'm not so sure, really. I noticed that quite a lot of the, widgets on sites were broken recently, so they didn't they don't think they thought that one through thoroughly enough, e commerce stores.

Rowan Payne [00:35:45]:

Yeah. I think, I think a lot of people are reacting rather than planning at this stage of that rebrand. It was obviously a decision made quite quickly. And personally, I think a rebrand is is a delicate process that you do need to go through, with a lot of buying from from the entire team. So I I do wonder how, that rebound will be adopted not just by, exterior marketing teams, but, also the internal Twitter team or X as it would now be called. You mentioned that you're not so sure. Is there anything particularly that you're not fond of about the rear band?

Richard Hill [00:36:22]:

I think it was just quite a process and whether that was thought out or not, you know, I think is it is it is it right for the brand? It might be right for him, but, is it right for the brand? I'm not so sure we'll see over the coming months and so, won't we?

Rowan Payne [00:36:35]:

Mhmm. I think it's a it's it's definitely a a lateral move. I'm not sure how x plays into the the key themes and and benefits of the platform. Twitter to me has always been about communication and, I think that's linked very strongly with the the iconography of that singing bird. But then again, things do change, and we're already seeing that people are starting to to kind of adopt that that x mentality, and I think that that will, herald a a new age for the platform. Already we're seeing a the changes being implemented by Elon. So I'm looking forward to seeing what's next.

Richard Hill [00:37:10]:

I just wonder whether there'll be some e commerce specific things coming down, you know, some integrations to the to the the major platforms. Well, that's we'll wait and see. Obviously, maybe we'll be doing a specific episode in the coming months, regarding that. So, Rowan, it's been an absolute pleasure having you on the show. I like to finish every episode with a book recommendation. Do you have a book to recommend to our listeners?

Rowan Payne [00:37:31]:

So I'm gonna go for something slightly outside of the scope of marketing. I'm gonna recommend a book called Invisible Cities by a man called Italiano Calvino.

Richard Hill [00:37:43]:

Oh, yeah. Yeah. That sounds interesting. What's that one about?

Rowan Payne [00:37:46]:

So it's a it was a book written by, an absurdist artist, in the seventies. He's Italian, as you might you might be able to tell. And it's a book about, Marco Polo's journey through, kind of Asia, and the stories that he tells as he goes through that place, I won't spoil the ending for anyone who who wants to give it a go, but it taught me a lot about how, as humans, we communicate with others, and how recurring themes can be really powerful to really hammering that message in. So personally, I, I do lean on it quite a lot when I, when I create and I, and I want to get across a certain message. So it's a great read and, would definitely recommend it. So anybody who's looking to expand their horizons and try language different, sorry, literature of different languages.

Richard Hill [00:38:36]:

Sounds fascinating. I'll get that, linked up in the show notes and get a copy ordered for I've got a couple of trips coming up, so I'll get that one in the old backpack. So thanks for coming on the show. For those that wanna reach out to you directly, Rowan, what's the best way to do that?

Rowan Payne [00:38:50]:

So, the best way is to reach me is either by email, rowan@ecomone.com or potentially even just a DM on something like Facebook.

Richard Hill [00:39:03]:

Lovely. Well, thanks for coming on the show. I look forward to having a bit more of a chat in probably 6 months, and we'll see how, Elon's going on with the old X.

Rowan Payne [00:39:11]:

I look forward to it.

Richard Hill [00:39:17]:

If you enjoy this episode, hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you are listening to this podcast, you're always the first to know when a new episode is released. Have a fantastic day, and I'll see you on the next one.