#706 – Project X Is Back — Meet Scale Stories

Join us as we bring you an exciting new chapter with the return of Project X, now reimagined as Scale Stories. We welcome back Zoe Lu, the General Manager of Helium 10, who shares her inspiring journey from VP of Product to leading Pacvue’s SMB side. Zoe opens up about her journey and the power of leveraging social media, particularly through employee-generated content, to connect with ambitious women and inspire entrepreneurship. Emphasizing the importance of content creation in fostering business growth and personal connections in today’s digital world.

In another segment, we highlight the incredible success and growth of Helium 10 in the e-commerce space, driven by its strong customer and community connections and a forward-thinking approach to innovation. Helium 10’s new series, Scale Stories, captures the emotional and human aspects of the entrepreneurial journey, featuring real entrepreneurs at various stages. Unlike Project X, this series offers expert guidance to navigate challenges and achieve growth, ensuring a broader connection with our audience by bringing diverse narratives to the forefront.

Tune in to discover the unique stories and challenges faced by contestants in our upcoming series, introduced through a casting call. In the first episode, we follow Natalie, who has overcome significant personal hurdles and now advocates for mental health through her budding business. With guidance from mentors like Melissa, Leo Segovio, and Clarence, the series aims to demonstrate that success in e-commerce is accessible to everyone, regardless of background or experience. Don’t miss the live premiere of the first episode on YouTube, set for October 7th at 9 am Central time, prepare for more insights and inspiration with episode two on October 21st, and more episodes to come. Go to http://h10.me/ss to watch the premiere of this exciting series!

In episode 706 of the Serious Sellers Podcast, Bradley and Zoe discuss:

• 00:00 – Project X, Scale Stories, and Entrepreneurship Insights
• 05:02 – Boosting Engagement With @Leadwithzoe’s Content
• 14:04 – Helium 10’s Success Through Community and Adaptation
• 19:57 – E-Commerce Strategy Beyond Amazon
• 21:10 – Scale Stories Episode 1 Trailer
• 23:05 – Casting Calls and A New Helium 10 Series
• 28:55 – Business Scaling With Mentors and a Couple
• 31:58 – E-Commerce Success Strategies and Feedback
• 34:08 – Launching Products and Strategies With Mentors

Transcript

Bradley Sutton:

Guess what guys? Project X, Season 2, is back, but it’s going to be something bigger, something better, something completely different. It’s going to be called Scale Stories and today we bring on my boss, the GM of Helium 10, Zoe, to talk all about it. How cool is that? Pretty cool, I think.

Bradley Sutton:

Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Serious Sellers Podcast by Helium 10. I’m your host, Bradley Sutton, and this is the show that’s a completely BS-free, unscripted and unrehearsed organic conversation about serious strategies or serious sellers of any level in the e-commerce world. And we have got somebody here who has just made a record of longest time between being on the podcast. All right, we have the general manager of Helium 10, Zoe, back on the show, and I almost was like wait, I swear she was on the show. So I had our production manager, Mhel, look it up. February 2021 was the last time you were on the show, so four and a half years ago you were in another role. That was like right in the middle of COVID, I guess. I’m not even sure, but welcome back to the show, Zoe. It’s been a long time.

Zoe:

Thank you. Thank you for having me. Excited to be back.

Bradley Sutton:

So, first of all, what was your position in 2021?

Zoe:

Yeah, in 2021, I joined Helium 10 as Vice President of product and my charter was to build and grow the product team that builds everything on the Helium 10 platform.

Bradley Sutton:

Alright, so she went from VP of product and now what you know for those who don’t like general manager basically she’s like the boss of all of Helium 10 in our, you know, for the SMB side. You know, Helium 10 is a company, actually is part of a larger company called Pacvue, and we have enterprise software. We have SMB that means small and medium businesses and Zoe leads up the part where I work which is the Helium 10 side and there, as you guys can see who are watching on YouTube, she’s actually in my old office where I probably recorded that first episode. She was on, I think, and she’s there in the office today. I couldn’t make it.

Bradley Sutton:

And, guys, there’s a reason why I’m wearing my X things here. We’re going to definitely be talking about this, but X makes the old timers of Helium 10 remember something we did called Project X, which is why I even bought these. This actually is like this hat is from a Mexican soccer team in Tijuana they’re called the Cholos and then this is from an old baseball team called the Cuban X Giants. So those are like logos. I found out there that had the X and so I would get anything I could do X. But people have been asking for years for like a season two of Project X, and that’s what we’re going to be talking about a little bit today, because we have something, guys, we’re about to debut. That’s really, really exciting.

Bradley Sutton:

But before we get into that, let’s just talk about things in general. Now I want to take it first of all, completely almost outside of e-commerce, which is something that you had noted, that NeuroGum talked about, like in the podcast, where, what was the word? It’s not influencer marketing, but where you have, like, employees, you know.

Zoe:

Yeah, it’s employee generated content.

Bradley Sutton:

Not UGC employee, EGC employee generated content and you’re like at the forefront of doing that. Let me just ask you like what inspired you to be like you know what previously, you know other leaders here at Helium 10, we’ve they’ve never really, you know, been trying to make a presence in social media, but why did you kind of like take that up the last year or so?

Zoe:

Yeah. So for two reasons. The first reason is the same reason that I lead Helium 10 is I’m personally a serial entrepreneur. I love starting new businesses, I love keeping up with the technology of the world and what we have noticed is that content creation and content is a distribution channel for sellers, for influencers. It’s a way to get the word out to people who otherwise never would have heard about you, and the flavor of it that I really appreciate is it’s much more of a connected content medium to everyone you’re speaking to. So that kind of leads me into the second reason I wanted to do this.

Zoe:

I am an ambitious woman and there are lots of ambitious women out there and I feel like my voice can connect with those ambitious women and show them what I’ve learned on my journey to lead Helium 10 or in my other business endeavors, whether that be commerce or outside of commerce and entrepreneurship realm. That could inspire them to do the same. So that is the second reason. That is the personal motivator is hopefully I inspire a few women do the same. So that is the second reason that is the personal motivator is hopefully I inspire a few women along the way.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, I mean I’m not a woman, but I get inspired by some of your posts. Like you had this one series, you were doing the 30 for 30 or something like that, and you had like a different tip every day. It goes to you could be anybody and be inspired by some of that. So what I want everybody to do right now is I know you all, hopefully, follow Serious Sellers Podcast on Instagram. Is follow Zoe’s Instagram. How can people find you on Instagram?

Zoe:

Yeah, my username is leadwithzoe L-E-A-D-W-I-T-H-Z-O-E. You can find me on Instagram or you can find me on TikTok.

Bradley Sutton:

Awesome, awesome. So everybody give her a follow, give a comment. Let’s boost that algorithm up. Give her a comment on one of her reels and mention what you liked about this episode. So there’s that part. Now, another thing that I’ve learned you know through your Instagram watch Living Vicariously through it is you’ve got like a crazy, I don’t know what the word I’m looking for is like not schedule but just like not SOP but the way you structure your day is kind of incredible. You’re the mother of two, I guess you can call it toddler age. You’re married. You work like 10, 12 hours a day on Helium 10, and you’re like this whole other real estate mogul on the side. You’ve got like side businesses like you’re an entrepreneur just like all of us in just a different way. So talk about that. How in the world, with 24 hours in a day, do you have time to do, to be all of those things and do it pretty efficiently?

Zoe:

So two things. I am very intentional about everything I do and I am very disciplined. So I really believe you can achieve all of your goals with the right prioritization. And there are trade-offs that I go through every single day. Can I go do a kid’s event or do I need to go to a meeting? But it all comes down to the routine and prioritization. So I’ll give you a few examples. So I wake up at 5 am, my kids wake up at 7. Me and Bradley were talking to each other at 5:30 in the morning this morning. So we are constantly connected at early hours.

Zoe:

Long story short is I use that window for my body and for my mind. So I’m very intentional about movement every day because it makes me a better person, it makes me a healthier person. And then I’m very intentional about setting up my day for success by planning out the three things I’m gonna do. So that goes into the next piece is ruthless prioritization. You cannot do everything every day and you have to pace yourself accordingly, otherwise you’re going to do an okay job at a lot of things and I’d much rather do an excellent job at less things. So every single day I have my three non-negotiables. I will do those things, whether they’re work related or personal related, no matter what. And then I have the laundry list of all the other tasks that can wait. But that ruthless prioritization is the reason I can get so much done, and it seems counterintuitive. You’re doing less to do more, but I promise you that is the way that you get more done.

Bradley Sutton:

And now, what’s some of the things that you do as part of your physical part? I think that’s a part that I think entrepreneurs sometimes, I’m a perfect example. You know, let let go of it and, and you know, when we’re not going to work, we’re working, We’re, you know, Helium 10 is a remote company. I know you’re in the office right now, but most of the time you’re at home and and me I’m at home. Most of you know work out and stuff, but you do little. You have things that you’ve invested in, like in your own house, that are like game changers for you. What are some of those things?

Zoe:

Yeah, so I do at home Pilates or I go on walks, and the one thing I’ll say is a lot of people say what you say, Bradley. They’re like we don’t have enough time in the day, like it always slips. And that was me for many years. I had two babies and I wanted to be healthier for my children, to show them that they should be healthy too. So that was my original inspiration and the reality is you don’t need to work out for that long. It doesn’t need to be some arduous, intense thing. It’s all about consistency. So, for example, this morning I did a 30-minute walk. I sometimes do 15-to-25-minute Pilates workouts with like two-pound weights up to 10 pounds, like it’s very simple but accessible, and I think that’s the key. If you have to drag yourself to the gym or a class and it’s an hour long, no way could I fit that in. But because it’s short and I can kind of think about my day while I’m doing it, it helps set the intention for the day.

Bradley Sutton:

Something I’ve always wanted to do. I think you you’ve done it, though. Don’t you have like a sauna at home too, that you like, I think that’s your like 5am thing, that you said that sometimes?

Zoe:

I love my sauna. The reason I love my sauna is it is my box of thinking like nothing.

Bradley Sutton:

Fortress of solitude, like Superman, right?

Zoe:

Yes, my kids are not allowed in there. Like, if I want to get away, I go to my sauna and sometimes I bring my phone. I’m guilty of like responding to slacks in my sauna but nobody bugs me in there and it’s beautiful as a parent of young kids.

Bradley Sutton:

Awesome, awesome. And just one last quick thing here. You know, like I’ve I’ve had, I’ve talked to different sellers on here who also do investments and things like that, and some do real estate some get into like cryptocurrency for an Amazon seller out there. They’re starting to now make some money.

Bradley Sutton:

And of course you know. The priority should be put that money back into your company. You know, treat yourself for. You know, for a little, buy yourself a sauna, you know things like that. But I think diversification is important of income streams. And so your advice to somebody who is just now starting to make money they’ve got a little bit. They’re like, hey, what should I do with this? Should I just put this into savings? Should I put it into stocks? Is real estate still something, or is that now the bubble about to burn? What would you suggest to do?

Zoe:

It depends on your goals. So I’m very methodical in how I plan my life. So I think about my goals and I think about my 10-year plan, my five-year plan and my one-year plan and I work backwards. So where I want to be in 10 years financially, I need to make certain types of investments. Those investments could be, in my knowledge, it could be in apartment buildings, like I do today. It could be in other SMBs, it could be at Helium 10. So there’s an array of investments I’m making.

Zoe:

I can’t tell you what you should invest in until you know your goal and then you work backwards from your goal. Then every month, every year, you are looking back at your goals and saying did I take the right steps to reach my financial goal, to reach my spirit related goal, my health related goal? So all of that comes together because I could easily go buy three more businesses, but that would be too much time pressure for me, so then I wouldn’t have time on my side. So it just depends. If you don’t have time, go put your money in ETFs or go take a couple courses online and grow your mind.

Bradley Sutton:

What’s ETF mean?

Zoe:

It’s basically a fund, so it’s an index fund. It’s a small percentage of a lot of successful companies that you’re investing in in the stock market and it gives you the ability to diversify your investment in a very easy vehicle to invest in.

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Bradley Sutton:

All right. Now, going a little bit back to e-commerce and Helium 10, you’re one of the few employees who’s been here a while, so you’ve been in the industry. For those who don’t know, she actually comes from a software background. She was one of the ones who was on the team to develop the words with friends which everybody remembers they used to play. But what are some of the changes in the e-commerce and Amazon ecosystem in the last five, six years that you’ve been working here?

Zoe:

Bradley, I feel like so much has changed. It’s hard to answer that question. I think the biggest transformation has been how you reach customers and where you go to reach customers. So social commerce has been exploding and that means that influencers are a main way in which you tap into new customers and new audiences, and for that reason, we are in the midst of launching a bunch of products for TikTok shop and TikTok shop sellers, so that’s been incredibly transformative in the industry. I think another really interesting place that we’re in now that didn’t exist a few years back is this space where everyone has AI that’s accessible. So it’s made creating product designs really easy, building new businesses a little bit more simple. It’s taken some of the technical needs out of it, making creative a lot more accessible. So I think that there’s been this really big shift in who can become an entrepreneur, whether it’s in commerce or in the content creation space, because of AI. So, between social commerce and AI, these have been massive changes that Helium 10 has evolved to over the years.

Bradley Sutton:

This is kind of almost a humble brag question as far as from Helium 10, not from a personal, not bragging about myself, but bragging about Helium 10. We both work for this company, but we all know of companies who were bigger than Helium 10 in the past or who have tried to come and be a competitor of Helium 10. But it’s like so many of those old companies people don’t even know. I mean, it’s been so long since they’ve been relevant. Some of them have been sold and are defunct now. How in the world has Helium 10 been able to not only survive but thrive? When you look at those whole industries, like the aggregator boom, which kind of like busted, and so many SaaS companies kind of like failed or never have really scaled up to our level, what’s the difference? Why have we succeeded?

Zoe:

There’s two big reasons here. One is our connectedness to the customer and the community we built. You’ve built the community, you lead the community. In a lot of ways, we are at the forefront of what’s happening in the commerce space. So I think that’s the first reason we are building and adapting based off our customers and what we’re hearing. The second is we are always looking around the corner, so there’s a lot of diligence internally on what’s the next big thing. How do we leverage AI? What is social commerce going to do to the industry? And because we’re always peering around the corner, we’re able to catch things before they’re mainstream and because of that, we stayed not only relevant but critical for all of these e-commerce sellers.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, 100% agree. And, speaking of community, one of the things that really brought the community together was our season one of Project X, where we show a real life thing that wasn’t staged or anything or planned. We did it live, where myself and Tim we found products, we launch it. This was like back in 2019, maybe 2018 or 2018, 2019. And those products were still selling today. But you do not I’ve told you about this, but guys out there in the audience, you can’t believe how many times I’m at 2019. And those products were still selling to the day. But you do not I’ve told you about this, but guys out there in the audience, you can’t believe how many times I’m at a conference or something and people will say, hey, I learned how to sell on Amazon from Project X or that inspired me. I had one guy tell me hey, because of that coffin shelf brand, I actually launched a very similar spooky brand and have made over a million dollars from it.

Bradley Sutton:

So I get comments now, five, six years later, still talking about a lot of people always asking, and so we were like, all right, let’s do a season two, but how can we make it bigger and better? And then that’s how we landed on what is now going to be called Scale Stories, where our premiere is coming out next week. What are some of the ways that that Scale Stories is different? Premiere is coming out next week. What are some of the ways that Scale Stories is different than Project X? And what was some of the ideas? Because a lot of the ideas about the differences were from you and your teams as well. What were some of the reasons why we kind of went in a different direction here?

Zoe:

So, stepping back, the reason Project X was so successful was because it showed people the step-by-step to become an Amazon seller. It made it easy. It was also entertaining. The dynamic on the show was something you wanted to watch, so we wanted to keep those elements. We wanted to be educational and we wanted a very interesting dynamic where you were engaged.

Zoe:

The piece that I felt very passionate about is the human connection and the rawness of going through this entrepreneurial experience, because the reality is, when you’re an entrepreneur, there are many components of your life that impact that. Your interests, your history, your life is a training ground for what you’re going to do next, and I wanted to harness that emotional connection, that human experience, in this next iteration. So the way Scale Stories is different is it’s taking real entrepreneurs at different stages of their journey in e-commerce and providing them the support and the education to get them to the next level. So we’ve really transformed this from something where it’s two people talking about how you build something to where it’s a collection of experts who are coaching and guiding this person going through this experience for the highs and the lows, there’s tears, there’s laughs, and it’s just something that every person on a human level can connect with, because you could be like. That was me. That’s how I felt. I was scared too, and that connection is what’s so powerful.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, I agree, you know, like I personally didn’t want to just do another one where it’s me being the one finding the product, because the first time that that you know it was, it was somewhat relatable, because I did it from a viewpoint of, hey, we’re going to start this Amazon, you know account from scratch, but all right, been there, done that. Actually, you can still use a lot of the principles from the original Project X. Still works even today, so there was no need necessarily to redo it verbatim, but by choosing real people out there and at different stages. I think that’s another huge difference where we have a couple of people who have never sold on the platforms that they’re about to Amazon and TikTok shop, and then we also took existing sellers, because there are so many out there in our audience, maybe listening now, and those in the community who have already started selling on Amazon but are having issues. You know like.

Bradley Sutton:

There’s rising costs, there’s rising competition and and and always changing strategies about what’s working and what’s not working, and people have plateaued in their business, people have gone down in their business due to restricting obstacles, and so we wanted to kind of make this not just one story, but four completely different stories about people who are at different stages of their e-commerce journey. Different stages of their e-commerce journey and also, as you mentioned earlier when I talked about the state of e-commerce. Like you said, hey, this is not just about Amazon anymore. You know you’ve got to be multi-channel. In the old days you said, all right, start on Amazon a hundred percent, maybe eventually go ahead and expand to Walmart, maybe eventually go to DDC. But nowadays there’s TikTok. Shop is like the hottest one and it’s like from day one you’ve got to be on other platforms.

Bradley Sutton:

And hey, another question that you had raised is do you have to start on Amazon, you know like maybe there’s a path to starting on on TikT^oK and and that’s a very scary one for me, because I like doing stuff that I know about but now we’re doing a full episodes based on somebody who has never, who has not, is not starting on Amazon, but they’re starting on TikTok. Who knows how it’s going to go. Guys, Just like with project X, we actually had some failures with some products. There was something the burrito blanket. I don’t know if you remember those of you watch the original Project X member. We were all set to go on burrito blanket and they were like nope, this product is a complete bust and we canceled that one.

Bradley Sutton:

So we don’t know how these things are going to go. Like we’re literally releasing these episodes and a lot of the products haven’t even been released yet. So, but we’re still going to be up front with it and but we’re confident that these are the strategies that can help sellers. So, really quick, I just want to show you guys a clip of what you can expect on this new scale stories, especially if you’re watching this on YouTube. You’ll get out of this, get a lot out of this. But even if you’re listening to this on audio, take a look at this clip and get excited about what’s coming.

Scale Stories Teaser:

Can just anyone start an Amazon business that can generate 50 to $100,000 a year, or even more? If I wanna do well, I’m gonna have to put in the work that’s needed. E-commerce is not something that discriminates, whatever background you come from. Being diagnosed bipolar at 15. My number one passion is definitely advocating for mental health. Her passion together with something that actually works, is going to be a win-win situation. Yeah, I wouldn’t say it’s that easy. Most people think it’s too late to succeed on Amazon. By the end of this episode, our mentors will have chosen the perfect product for her to launch Ooh, or we’ll discover that not everyone can make it on Amazon. Your feelings aren’t hurt, right? The top guy is actually doing about $40,000 in sales. What is the thing that customers were thinking about right before they bought all my competitor products, put like hundreds of products through this entire future that we have. But once we launch we know that it will sell on Amazon. Show up, put in the work, pay your dues. When do we start? I’ve got a surprise for you. My gosh, let’s get into this episode of Scale Stories.

Bradley Sutton:

Whoa, all right, now that like man production level compared to Project X season one way different. Why did you want to like really invest a lot into the production value here?

Zoe:

Just like my priorities. If I do something, I do it with excellence, and I thought that there’s no better way to capture this journey, this authentic, real journey into commerce, than with an amazing production team. So we found an incredible team. It’s led by this guy named Richie. He has filmed some of the biggest stars all over the world. Listening to his stories is like watching a movie, and he brought in what was it? 40 people to film this, and it was an incredible cast, an incredible filming team, and you’re just going to get so much more watching it from that level of investment.

Bradley Sutton:

Let’s talk about some of the different people. How did we find some of these contestants? I guess we can call them. They’re not really competing with each other, more like competing with themselves and some of the goals we set for them. But let’s just call them contestants. But how did we find them?

Zoe:

We did a casting call and they sent us selfie videos. We got these videos where they’re in their house and they’re saying hi, I’m, you know, insert name and we were able to connect with their story. We were able to see their background and everyone is just so unique who we pulled through into this series and we fall in love with their stories and their challenges and we found the people who were relatable and we found the people who could create that connection with you all to show that anyone can do this. You don’t need a lot of money, you don’t need an MBA. You need none of that. You could be anyone and be successful on commerce.

Bradley Sutton:

So this first episode that’s dropping next Tuesday is going to be with Natalie, and that’s who you guys just saw in that trailer right there. So tell me like why, as soon as you saw her casting video, you’re like all right, I’m in love with this story here. We need to have her on the show.

Zoe:

Natalie has persisted through some challenges none of us will encounter and you’ll see this. She is a huge advocate for mental health. She has gone through some of the biggest challenges earlier in her life and she’s using that as inspiration for a business, and the way everyone who watches Casting Call Video connected with that. It felt real. It felt like she was learning from her past challenges and now she wants to bring awareness and wants to sell something to help other people. It was inspiring, it was tear jerking and because of that, she was the best fit.

Bradley Sutton:

So she is the one who is starting from scratch. So that’s all you know. That’s kind of like a similar path as the project I season one, except we’re we’re taking somebody with zero e-commerce experience, as opposed to me and Tim, who are already, arguably, you know we. We knew what we were doing, so we want to show that hey, if you are just getting started, 2025, 2026, it’s not too late to get started. And now the other way we did something a little bit different and you guys probably saw this on the trailer is I kind of have this like Ryan Seacrest role here. I’m not the one who’s doing all of the strategy and stuff. Who did we bring in like for that? What’s that organization like?

Zoe:

Yeah, so for the experts, we brought in a collection of individuals who are the best at what they do whether they are from Amazon as a corporation or they have their own successful businesses or they made millions of dollars on TikTok shop. We handpicked the smartest people in e-commerce and brought them in to coach. I don’t want to say you are the Ryan Seacrest there because you actually are a mentor too, Bradley. Don’t undermine yourself. You bring so much value and so many frameworks to the seller during this journey. You are truly the e-commerce extraordinaire. You are such a powerful person in this series.

Bradley Sutton:

Don’t worry, I’m not going to make it four years until you come on the podcast. You don’t have to butter me up. I appreciate it. But yeah, like this first episode, you guys probably recognize some of the faces. All of them have been on the podcast before. We had Melissa, who sold eight figures on Amazon, has exited a couple of brands. Leo Segovio he’s run e-commerce software. He sold also eight figures on Amazon. We got Clarence, who actually was one of the ones who inspired by the original Project X and now he has sold seven figures worth of products and has a successful coaching program. We flew him all the way out from Singapore.

Bradley Sutton:

We really want to have a good mix of people and it’s not the same mentors in each episode. There’s a couple you might see twice like Leo, but each of these episodes that we’re going to have are going to have different mentors. So now, two weeks from now on, actually, before I go further, I need everybody to do something right now. Go, hopefully this link will work, but go to h10.me forward/SS. All right, by the time you guys are listening to this episode, this link, I guarantee, will work.

Bradley Sutton:

It’ll take you to our YouTube video premiere of this, all right, so if you’re listening to this on the weekend here, go there right now and then hit the notification. Notify me on there the little bell. Make sure you’re subscribed to Helium 10 software on the YouTube channel. Make sure the notifications is on and that’ll take you to our live premiere. It’s a special way to broadcast at YouTube where all of us, including myself, will all be watching it together, worldwide. What time? What time is that going to be on the 7^th?

Zoe:

We will be launching it at 9 am Central time.

Bradley Sutton:

9 am Central time? Isn’t that like 7 am?

Zoe:

7 am Pacific time.

Bradley Sutton:

So I have to be at the office at 7 am?

Zoe:

Uh no, no, no, no. We will do our launch party a handful of hours later.

Bradley Sutton:

Oh, so it’s not going to be part of, it’s not going to okay. Oh, my goodness. You about scared me, right? Guys live on the show she’s telling me yeah, you got to leave your house at five 30 to get to the office at seven. For that I’m like what? That’s the first time I’m hearing of this.

Zoe:

No, no, we’ll do a party in the early afternoon. We’ll have popcorn and we’ll have some champagne. We will celebrate you and everyone who is involved.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay, so for the for the rest of you guys, you guys, if you’re especially if those are, you’re in Europe or Asia that 7am central time or that 9am central time might work out for you, but watch it live on there or you can watch it with us later on in the day. Thank goodness I’m not having to watch it at 7am, but all right. So that’s the Episode one is October 7th. Now episode two is going to be October 14th or 21st, I’m sorry. October 21st, and I don’t want to say the name of the brand yet because then people will start looking at their, their products. But but tell me a little bit about how you chose them through the casting process, and what inspired you about their story casting process and what inspired you about their story?

Zoe:

What’s really neat about the second episode is it’s a couple, so it’s a husband wife duo who started this business and they work together every day. They even enlisted their children to help them and they made a product that helps people with different ailments. It actually started with folks who were taking their product when they were feeling nauseous going through different medical treatments, and evolved from there. So their product is another product where it’s truly helping change people’s lives, just like how Natalie was thinking about mental health. This is an existing product that’s already had some success but could have way more success, especially on Amazon, but also on their Shopify store, TikTok shop all their business lines and all their channels through the advice of the mentors. So so excited to scale that business and help that husband wife take it to the next level.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, our goal is to two, three, maybe even four X their  sales, online, help them, you know, get launched on TikTok shop which they they had one listing up on Tik TOK shop with zero sales. Um, you know, we’re doing a lot of stuff with them. You know, checking out their packaging, checking out what’s going on on Walmart? You know, little things, little things they didn’t have, like, they didn’t have subscribe and save set up. So our mentors really went in and audited what’s working for them, what’s not working, and so that’s going to be really exciting to see their journey.

Bradley Sutton:

Now, episode three is where we go completely different than anything we or anybody else has ever done. Normally, what we’ve been telling people, which is 100% correct, is if you’re already selling on Amazon, duh, you better sell on TikTok shop if you’ve got it in your country, because you’ve already got the product. It just makes so much sense. It’s actually going to help your Amazon sales. But what people are not really talking about even if you search on YouTube outside of, like you know, being a creator or something like that is not many people are. If any are talking about. Hey, why not try TikTok shop to start? And so this was one of your ideas that you started. So how did you come up with this idea? And then tell us a little bit about you know, we can probably even spoil who’s going to be on here for episode three.

Zoe:

Yeah. So the way I came up with this one was the fact that it’s very competitive on Amazon right now and of course, there are challenges on Amazon with the fees. But you have TikTok shop blowing up with the content, with the usage and, just like any entrepreneur’s journey, you’re trying to find the white space, you’re trying to find the opportunity and my gut told me there is definitely opportunity on TikTok shop to get started. And then we started finding people who had done it. And once you find people who have done it, you’re like, okay, that’s where we need to go. But I want to pose a question. Actually, back to you, Bradley. I put this on you. I said, Bradley, you need to figure out how do we launch on TikTok shop successfully? What is the blueprint? Let’s build it like we did for Amazon and I’ll be honest, guys, Bradley was kind of nervous about this. This is totally not new. This is not-

Bradley Sutton:

Understatement. I was like paranoid about this. I was sweating bullets at night thinking about this.

Zoe:

We had to have a lot of conversations about it, but obviously we pushed through and you’ve learned a lot during your journey. But, Bradley, how did you go through this process of developing a brand new playbook for a new channel like TikTok Shop?

Bradley Sutton:

Well, like you said it’s about, hey, there are people who have done it. Maybe people aren’t talking about it too much, but there’s, you know, there’s people who have done it, and so it’s talking to those people, like we have one we have on the show. His name is, he’s one of the mentors, Ryan, who is doing, I think, high seven figure, high seven figures on TikTok shop and not all the products is on Amazon, and so it’s like hitting him up and trying to find kind of like reverse engineer what he did. We have somebody who’s been on our podcast before. Her name is Hurricane Liz. She’s a favorite guest of some and how she’s like leveled up from scratch on TikTok for some. And then we have Michelle who, yes, has mainly focused about bringing Amazon sellers to TikTok shop, but she had some strategies, and so it’s basically, you know, that’s what you do when you’re trying to make new strategies, like when I create you know, I just recently did the Maldives Honeymoon launch strategies like trial and error. You know, listen, learn from people smarter than me who have done different things and take different aspects. Oh, like, I like that. Let me combine it with what this person is doing and let me do some tests on my own, and so this is just phase one, like we’re going with a certain trajectory, as you guys will see in this episode about TikTok, but I’m going to start my own case study soon of launching my own products on my own account on TikTok and this is not like, oh, this is the number one. This is going to be the only strategy for launching on TikTok. We’re going to talk about one strategy of launch and, stay tuned guys, Helium 10 is all in on TikTok shop. We’re going to be launching some other strategies and tools too.

Bradley Sutton:

So on episode two, we actually brought back Leo to help with them, and then we have Melissa, the founder of Pacvue, tons and tons of experience with advertising, and we actually flew from Amazon Singapore one of the top people from Amazon advertising to also help because for them, advertising was one of their biggest struggles, and so that was who made up our mentors on episode two. Now, episode four, we actually handpicked a brand that you guys might be familiar with, because this is somebody who has been in our community for a while and were gracious before to kind of like lend their account for, like some of our videos that we do and they’re, you know, like, like, as a as a kind of like a mini case study. It was this hemp cream that that you guys have seen maybe in some of my content. But the owner is a very unique situation, because I don’t know his age, but I think he’s already retired, like, maybe he’s in sixties, seventies, I’m not sure. But I love the fact that he kind of breaks the stereotype of oh no, if you’re in e-commerce, you know you gotta be somebody in your twenties or maybe thirties. You know, like, no, like, like it doesn’t matter what age or you can be a teenager, you can be in your 70s and retired and get into e-commerce, and so the story was inspiring there. But then he also has had a lot of problems with scaling due to the nature of his product, and so it’s really interesting how our mentors fortunately that one is Jason from Prime Team Agency and Kamal, the founder of AMZ One Step, and Vincenzo from eCompsy how they were able to identify things where he’s kind of a multiple, six-figure seller with just a couple of products, but they were confident hey, we think we still can double your online sales. So, all in all, guys, these four episodes are going to be really cool.

Bradley Sutton:

But it’s not just these four episodes. We also did breakout episodes for everyone where we kind of go back into the nitty gritty. That was kind of like what we did in Project X, that people mentioned that they, hey, they use Project X as a blueprint. So one fancy episode is great to inspire you, but we want you guys to also have these side episodes where you can get into the nitty gritty and into the weeds of step-by-step. How are we finding that product for Natalie to launch? How did we find the product for the TikTok launch? How are we optimizing the advertising of the candy brand so that they could maybe 3X their advertising? So we have made a lot of side episodes too.

Bradley Sutton:

And then so these episodes aren’t gonna be on the same YouTube channel, but there’ll be a link there where any Helium 10 member will be able to get access to actually it’s not even going to be like, even if you’re not a Helium 10 member, every everybody’s going to get access to those, but those will live in Helium 10, those side episodes. So all in all, guys, hundreds of hours has been put into this by,not just me. I’m only a small part of this. There’s so many moving pieces, like entirety of helium 10, from the product team to our go to market team. Everybody has worked hard on this to bring these episodes to you. So super, super excited again H10. Me forward/SS to get in on the premiere of the others.

Bradley Sutton:

So we’re also doing a live recap with live studio audience with you guys on the 14th of October. So to register for that, just make sure you are subscribed to our YouTube channel or our Helium 10 LinkedIn or our Helium 10 Facebook channel and you’ll be able to like, ask the mentors live questions and hear from them about Natalie’s episode. And then each week after that we’re also going to have ask me any things where you’ll be able to meet the mentors, and then we’ll also have other episodes with each of the contestants. So, guys, the next couple of months here at Helium 10, we’re all in on Scale Stories and we want you guys to be inspired as well. Any last words of wisdom or comments on Scale Stories what you’re hoping for our community for this?

Zoe:

I hope Scale Stories gets you to just do it. The hardest thing as an entrepreneur is taking that first step and hopefully scale stories gets you to take that first step in your e-commerce journey.

Bradley Sutton:

Absolutely, absolutely. We can only hope that it’s as successful as Project X. But we want to go higher. We want this to be even more successful than the original Project X. And so, guys, give us feedback.

Bradley Sutton:

If you love this content once you see it, and you want us to do more, we’re not going to wait, like we did with four years for Zoe to come back on the show, or four years for Project X, season two. Maybe we’ll do this like once a year, or twice a year, even, like we want to do what inspires you. And so you guys, give us feedback, please. What do you like? Be honest, it’s always not going to get offended. You know she takes critical advice, you know, I know that for a fact. So, guys, be open with your feedback on this program.

Bradley Sutton:

What would you like to see in the next season? What didn’t you like about this? What maybe like other scenario of a type of contestant that we can feature? Let us know, let customer service know. But thank you, guys, so much for tuning in. Thank you, Zoe, for being on here and being the really cool boss. I have been blessed to have cool bosses here at Helium 10, started with Manny, and then Boujan and Adam and now Zoe. So thank you for being a cool boss and buying me those custom shoes and Letterman’s jacket. That’s pretty cool. But anyways, guys, we’ll have Zoe back on here, maybe after Scale Stories. We’ll see you guys on our live premiere on Tuesday.

Zoe:

Thank you everyone.

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