Plotting a 3 month Growth Strategy with Simon Driscoll from UXB Skincare (episode 255)

by Chloë Thomas

Whilst we’re really focused on growth this month, of course we all have to focus on growth and achieving our goals month in month out – you can’t forget about it once January’s over.

So in this episode I’m chatting to someone who’s relatively early in their business journey, and who contacted me to see if he could share his growth journey step by step on the podcast. I of course said yes as I thought it was a great idea, and he’s going to be back on the podcast later this year to let us know how his growth focus is going.

Think of this as our before episode – but don’t think that means you’re not going to get much from it…. Simon shares a host of great book and podcast recommendations, he shares how he’s learnt huge amounts about his customers and products over the last year and how that’s going to super charge his marketing over the next 3 months. Some great Google Shopping Campaigns advice, and his growth plan for the next 3 months.

Simon Driscoll is the founder and sole person at UXB Skincare a business he founded in 2018 with a mission to develop affordable skincare products that really make a difference to customers skin.

2020 eCommerce MasterPlan Growth Series sponsored by Omnisend

This episode is part of our annual growth series – you can find out all about how it can help you grow your business and links to the rest of the episodes here.

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About the Business

  • Located in the UK
  • Selling mostly to the UK (with some orders from Germany)
  • Shopify Platform
  • The team is currently Simon only with some help making the product for larger markets

Simon’s Favorite Shopify Widgets 

Starting out With Face to Face Product Validation 

Simon started developing skincare about three years ago and has been selling at markets for the past year. While he says he has had his website up and running during that time he hasn’t paid much attention to it and has been focused on selling face to face at markets.

Even though Simon had planned on his business being primarily eCommerce, he didn’t really know how he should market the product. Selling face to face at markets has allowed him to validate his marketing ideas. He says that understanding which products were most important to customers, which bundles were most appealing and even the key phrases that resonated with customers are all important elements to get in place to move forward.

Simon says that like Facebook and Instagram, different markets have different types of audiences and that has allowed him to tweak his future advertising strategy. Simon also had the opportunity to get to experience repeat customers both face to face and online as well. 

Getting into Skincare 

Simon had the idea for a skincare line after a particularly good Turkish bath experience. That positive experience he had in 2016 led him down the path of starting UXB skincare and he slowly built up steam starting with soap and quickly branching into developing other products.

After testing his products on customers for a year in 2019 at small markets across the UK, Simon is primed to make his eCommerce portion of the business a heavy hitter. 

Current Stats

  • 650 site visitors a month
  • 35% from referrals
  • 23% direct 
  • Some from social, some from organic search
  • Monthly Revenue of £81
  • Add to basket 3%
  • Basket to Checkout 49%
  • Email List includes 1500 emails—but many are from a giveaway Simon participated in.

Q1 2020 Goals

Simon’s goals for the near future is to increase orders to 200 orders monthly with an average order value of £20 or greater. He also wants to have the advertising paying for itself.

Simon is keen to test all the tips and tricks he’s been learning from books and podcasts about building up an eCommerce business but doesn’t have the data he needs to build up more rigorous goals. Along with Chloe’s book, eCommerce Marketing: How to Get Traffic That BUYS to your Website Simon has been studying Ian and Mark Hammersly’s Ultimate Guide To E-commerce Growth: 7 Unexpected KPIs To Scale An E-commerce Shop To £10 Million Plus. Simon spends a lot of time listening and getting tips from several different resources.

From all of this research and the market research he did over the course of 2019, learning from his customers face to face, he has developed an aggressive growth plan for the first quarter of 2020.

Simon’s Plan

  • Spend £100 a day—primarily on Facebook and Instagram Ads. 
  • The first-month ad creative will be broad to build traffic and interest so that Facebook pixel understands the audience. 
  • Second and third-month ads will be dynamic based on month one data
  • Creative will be based on the method known as “Hook Story Offer” or “Brand Story”  
  • Use Automated Klaviyo follow up, especially abandoned baskets and missed opportunities
  • Continue optimizing Facebook ads and Google Shopping Ads
  • Bundles and offers and free shipping over £20

eCommerce Book Top Tip

eCommerce Traffic Top Tip

  • Word of Mouth—Doing the markets has had the most value to Simon’s business so far

Tool Top Tip

  • Keep App to sync information across devices

Growth Top Tip

  • You have to spend the money on Google and Facebook

Interview Links

Related episodes

Without the sponsors the podcast wouldn’t be possible – please do check them out:

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Chloe’s New Book:

Probably my favourite Amazon review so far for my new book eCommerce Marketing: How to get Traffic that BUYS to your Website:

“I finally decided to take the Friday off and read a book. This book. I have now read it once and will use it many times in the following weeks. A great reference and I’m full of ideas – can’t wait to get back to work next week!.”

Thanks Mr K Helle!

It’s a Kindle bestseller in the UK, USA, and Australia – and as past podcast guest Chantal put it “If you run an eCommerce business, buy this book!”

Grab the Kindle, Paperback or Audiobook on your local Amazon store now, OR check out the Crash Course before you buy