Designing your content strategy around lifecycle marketing and retention with Fat Earth Media’s John Gross (Founder/CEO) & Rose Eppensteiner (S. Lifecycle Marketing Manager)

John Gross, Founder & CEO of Fat Earth Media, and Rose Eppensteiner, Senior Manager of Lifecycle Marketing at Fat Earth Media, join Retention Chronicles to discuss founding an agency to work with mission driven brands to help with paid media, lifecycle marketing, and marketing creative. 

Making a pivot in his career from environmental sciences to marketing, John started by taking out ad space in Craigslist advertising his Google Ads consultancy. But, he didn’t just want to focus on media buying, he wanted to invest in lifecycle marketing. So, he built Fat Earth to serve mission driven brands and help with their marketing strategy. 

John and Rose don’t just detail why lifecycle marketing is important, but also how it’s related to retention, and how to make lifetime value (LTV) higher than customer acquisition cost (CAC). Not only do they tell Mariah and Noah about how Shopify & Shopify Plus brands can achieve their goals year-round, but especially during the holidays. 

Fat Earth Media makes sure that their clients are set up for success by creating strategic content planning to look at monthly and quarterly campaigns. Segmentation is a critical piece for Shopify/Shopify Plus brands’ success, and making sure their email and SMS sends make sense is a big step in strategy planning. To do this, all teams have to be aligned and connected. 

Another area of expertise they focus on is design. An easy trap to fall into is to confuse complexity and effectiveness. A creative director may love an email, but if no one is clicking on it, it might be the best route to take. The Fat Earth Media team redesigns assets to make them better from every possible angle. 

For our holiday tips portion of the podcast, the Fat Earth Media team shares that they advise their brands to assume the consumer is very smart and don’t try to trick or be inauthentic for the extra dollar. Consumers will shop with the brands they like and trust, and the brands who know and follow that will win. 

This podcast is sponsored by Malomo, a leading shipment and order tracking platform for Shopify and Shopify Plus ecommerce brands. 

To see what your custom mockup of branded order tracking and transactional email/SMS would look like, fill out this form & we’ll send your custom design right to your inbox!

Episode Timestamps:

• Lifecycle marketing and retention with industry experts. 0:04

• Personal lives, adventures, and remote work culture. 1:39

• Personal updates, background of Flat Earth founder, and current focus. 7:18

• Career change and marketing strategy. 9:22

• Marketing strategy and Google ads. 13:55

• Marketing agency's mission-driven approach and impact on clients. 18:26

• Marketing career paths and agency start-up. 22:15

• Marketing agency growth and lifecycle marketing. 27:47

• Retention marketing strategies for existing customers. 33:35

• Email marketing planning and design for retention. 38:44

• DTC brand marketing strategies for the holiday season. 45:30