The Brutal Money Lessons 90% of eCommerce Founders Learn Too Late

Matt Edmundson

00:00:05.120 - 00:02:43.860

Welcome to the E Commerce Podcast with me, your host, Matt Edmundson. This is a show all about helping you deliver Ecommerce Wow.

And to help us do just that, I'm chatting with Jodi Mercer about how e commerce seems simple, but as we all know, oh yes, there is way more beneath the service and we're going to get into some of those intricacies. Oh yes, we are.

So grab your notebooks, grab your pens because I feel like this is going to be one of those deep value drops if this is your first time with us. Very, very warm welcome to you. It's great to have you here with us on the show.

Make sure you like and subscribe and do all of that good stuff because we do these podcasts every week where I get to chat to some amazing people in E commerce, pick their brains, learn all that I can from them and then usually the next time we're all together as a team, I go through my notes and go, listen guys, what do you think about? And so it's great. We do. It's honestly added a ton of value to my own E Com businesses because like you, I'm an E commerce entrepreneur.

So I'm just here to learn as well. So look forward to it. And like I say, if it's your first time. Thank you.

Thank you for joining us and of course, if you're a regular, as they say down south, then welcome back. Thanks for sticking with us and thanks for staying part of the journey.

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And actually in the newsletter it's great because it used to be that we just send out the transcript from the show that there's a whole bunch more value in that newslet, etc as well.

Just some tips, some tricks, some other things that we've discovered along the way, stories, examples, all those kind of things, we throw them in the newsletter. So do subscribe to that ecommercepodcast.net now let's talk about Jodi.

Now, Jodi has an MBA, is a fractional CFO at Ascent CFO Solutions, bringing over 25 years of financial leadership to the table. She's worked with businesses across industries, helping them solve financial pain points and streamlining processes.

Jodi loves helping companies uncover their unique value and sharpen their competitive edge. Jodi, welcome to the show. Great to have you. How are we doing today?

Jodi Mercer

00:02:44.160 - 00:02:45.620

Great, thank you, Matt.

Matt Edmundson

00:02:45.920 - 00:02:53.460

Wow. It's absolutely my pleasure. Now I see in the background a grandfather clock. Is it actually working?

Jodi Mercer

00:02:53.760 - 00:02:59.820

Yes, it is. I just have the, the chime turned off because people find that annoying.

Matt Edmundson

00:03:01.720 - 00:03:07.984

Yeah, fair play. And is it an, is it, can I ask, is it an heirloom? Is it a family thing, or is it something you purchase?

Jodi Mercer

00:03:08.112 - 00:03:09.616

It actually came with the house.

Matt Edmundson

00:03:09.768 - 00:03:10.576

Oh, wow.

Jodi Mercer

00:03:10.688 - 00:03:14.368

Yeah. I said, sure you want to do that?

Matt Edmundson

00:03:14.504 - 00:03:17.104

Why not? They will become an heirloom.

Jodi Mercer

00:03:17.232 - 00:03:18.944

Yes, they will become an heirloom.

Matt Edmundson

00:03:18.992 - 00:03:46.084

Exactly. Because that's what we do with grandfather clocks. Yeah. Yeah, I would love.

I remember there was an old grandfather clock in my house growing up that is just in absolute disarray now, which is a real shame. So at some point, my intention is. It's on my very long list, Jodi. I'm a bit of a woodworker. I do like to, My hobby is to go in the wood shop.

I, I do have every intention of making one, but of course, you know what they say about intentions.

Jodi Mercer

00:03:46.132 - 00:03:48.480

Right, Right, right, right.

Matt Edmundson

00:03:49.500 - 00:03:58.960

Who knows? Now? We were talking before we hit the record button. You have lived in the uk. I mean, you're in Colorado now, but you have lived in the uk.

How did you find that?

Jodi Mercer

00:03:59.500 - 00:04:11.780

I loved it. I loved it. I wanted to stay, but unfortunately, that was the last year of my MBA and they kicked me out.

So I returned to the States and found my way to Denver. So.

Matt Edmundson

00:04:11.900 - 00:04:20.280

Very good. Very good. Well, you know, what was your favorite, if I can ask, what was your favorite thing about the uk Staying in the uk?

Obviously not the weather.

Jodi Mercer

00:04:21.580 - 00:05:09.570

No.

But I'm sitting here looking at 8 inches of snow out there, so, you know, I, I guess you could, you could say that maybe the UK weather would be more, would be easier to deal with than that. But I think the, the thing I liked about was the people. I, Everyone was just uniformly wonderful to me.

And being an American, you don't always get that response, so. That's true. I, I, I loved it. I love traveling to all the little towns. I would hop on the train every, every weekend and just go someplace different.

So it was, it was awesome because we don't have that, that ability really to just hop on a train and go. And I found that really fascinating about the UK that there's no place you couldn't get to by train.

Matt Edmundson

00:05:09.650 - 00:05:31.290

So, yeah, it's an intriguing one, isn't it? Because I. Vice versa. I lived in the States for a while, as people regular to the show may or may not remember. And I was always.

I remember when I went out there the first time and I'm like, well, I think I'll go visit. I kind of like the idea of going to this city over here and seeing what that's like and where's the nearest train station?

And they're all looking at me like.

Jodi Mercer

00:05:31.750 - 00:05:33.886

Get in your car, dude.

Matt Edmundson

00:05:33.918 - 00:06:00.204

That's just not going to work out. I'm like, but I've not got a car. Surely I can catch the train. No, no, no, no. And I'm like, I'm sure Mr. Carnegie laid some railroads across America.

Surely they know. So it's one of those things, isn't it, where, where you, I think you go.

Like, I, I remember going to the States with certain expectations that it would be like England, just with an American accent and better food. Um, and turns out I was not, I was not entirely correct.

Jodi Mercer

00:06:00.332 - 00:06:15.212

No, no, I, that's, that's why I found it fascinating. I, I could just pick a place on the map and say, how do I get there? And just head to the train station.

I could get there because I didn't have a car when I was in the uk, so that was my only way of getting around. So. And it was fabulous back in the.

Matt Edmundson

00:06:15.236 - 00:06:29.056

Days when trains were on time and reliable. But let's not go there now. Let's talk about E Commerce then. How did you get from I guess, your MBA in Manchester to, well, working now in E Commerce?

Jodi Mercer

00:06:29.168 - 00:08:06.190

Well, there's a story. So I, I came back from, from Manchester and promptly got a job in corporate America at some very large, you know, multinational global companies.

Worked my way up for 15, 20 years, ended up being the VP of Finance for a very large division of about 2 to 3 billion dollars of a, of a large global company here in Denver, and at some point decided that I've done corporate America, I, I would rather try something else. And got connected with, with Dan de Gollier from Ascent cfo.

And he suggested that perhaps you would look at fractional CFO work and didn't know what that was and sat down with him and explained it. And we, I said, well, can't hurt to try.

And I've been there now 89 years have worked with a variety of ecom, you know, service businesses, B2B, you know, CPG companies, B2C.

So had a variety of them, which you never get if you're really in, in corporate America, usually you're, you know, you're serial, serial company person.

And so this has been fabulous because at any given week, I, I have no idea what's going to happen and, and what the crisis or the, the question of the day is, or the, you know, you think you have your day planned out, you don't. And, but I, I, I, I thrive on that. So it's working good.

Matt Edmundson

00:08:06.730 - 00:08:11.234

It sounds a lot like my day, Jodi, if I'm honest with you. You never know what's going to happen.

Jodi Mercer

00:08:11.322 - 00:08:11.570

Right.

Matt Edmundson

00:08:11.610 - 00:08:17.412

For those, for those of us that might not know briefly what a fractional CFO is.

Jodi Mercer

00:08:17.516 - 00:09:20.720

Sure.

Well, in my case, right now I have about five clients and you spend anywhere from, you know, two to five to eight hours a week on any given, on any given client.

But basically what you're doing, you're acting as kind of a third party outside sounding board in most cases for a lot of these entrepreneurs because they're smaller companies. That's why they have fractional. So they, they, they can't invest in having a cfo.

And quite frankly, they, it wouldn't be profitable for them to, to invest in having a cfo, but they need somebody to kind of keep them on track, to help them with planning, to help them with forecasting and the discipline that's required around any small business. And, and sometimes just to bounce an idea off of. So, so that's, that's where I come in.

And, and if I under, you know, I get to understand the business and the finances and how they flow and then I'm able to, to give them a third party, kind of no dog in the fight, no skin in the game look and just give them the benefit of what I've learned over all these years.

Matt Edmundson

00:09:21.500 - 00:10:41.490

And so I'm kind of curious. I mean, let's jump straight into it.

We've had a few finance guys on, on the podcast over the years and I, I've, I've enjoyed talking to them because finance. We have a lady called Michelle who works with us. She's one of the directors, one of the shareholders in the company, and she is our cfo.

She's actually finance officer.

She's wonderful and she is lovely and she tells me off all the time for spending money, which I always, I find very funny every time it happens most days, to be fair. Jodie, as it happens, having worked across all of these businesses, like I can, I could give you a list of what Michelle tells you that I do wrong.

You know, I'm the guy driving the business, the entrepreneur. What are some of the common things that we get, get wrong with our finances as entrepreneurs?

Because I, I know a lot of people listening to the show are either just starting out in E commerce or they are, it's their E commerce business, you know, maybe turning over half a million million somewhere around there some, I mean, I appreciate some people listening to the show. I actually work for really big companies, but a lot of folks are this entrepreneurial bracket. So how are we, how are we doing it wrong?

Where, what, what's probably one of the top two or three things that we could change quite quickly and make a big impact on our lives.

Jodi Mercer

00:10:41.870 - 00:11:43.608

I think the biggest thing that I find is not having a clear and rather disciplined plan for what you're trying to accomplish. And especially the smaller you are, the more disciplined you need to be on your spend to your point and what you're spending on.

So if you're going to spend on marketing, understand what you want to get out of that and have some metrics around that it's easy, say pay per click, you know, and, and you can churn through cash and, and just be trading dollars for dollars. You know, you turn on the paper, click, and all of a sudden your volume goes up. That's great.

You turn off the pay per click, your volume goes down and all you're doing is trading a dollar for a dollar. And that's, that's not profitable.

So having a very disciplined plan, I think even if it's, even if it's six months at a time, but put something in place to hold yourself accountable and that's probably what Michelle is doing, is holding you accountable.

Matt Edmundson

00:11:43.784 - 00:11:44.744

Oh yes.

Jodi Mercer

00:11:44.872 - 00:12:56.160

And you know, and along with that, you know, it's not just marketing, it's, it's inventory. It's, it's all the pieces of your business. What are you willing to spend on and what return do you need to see before you spend more in that area?

So it's, it's just so easy to be excited by, by something that promises volume. You know, Amazon's a prime example as well. Volume recognition, getting brand out there, it's great.

But there's a lot of fees that go along with that too.

So make sure you understand the margin that you, you are getting out of any given avenue that you're going down, whether it's, it's A pay per click kind of marketing type of thing, or if it's Amazon or, or any other avenue. Yeah. The beautiful thing about E. Comm is you aren't tied to a physical location and to people who can get to that physical location.

The tough part is it's a very, very crowded market, as you well know.

And so trying to get your, your brand or your recognition out there is tough and getting people's attention is tough, but having a disciplined approach to the cash and what you're trying to accomplish is I think, really key.

Matt Edmundson

00:12:56.620 - 00:13:46.168

And this is actually where for me, Michelle, makes a big difference. And I think I can see where you would help businesses, Jodi, in that sense because I think as entrepreneurs we tend to be overly optimistic.

We hate the word discipline and to be fair, we're not big fans of the word plan either. And so it's, it's one of those things where there's a sort of standing joke in our office.

You know, if I, if I think something needs to be done, for example, on the website, I would say to the guys, oh, this will only take 10 minutes, won't it? And they laugh at me, go, no, man, it's 10 week development. What are you talking about?

Because I'm overly optimistic and I expect to make more money quicker and easier than it's actually going to be and spend less money than I'm actually going to spend.

Jodi Mercer

00:13:46.314 - 00:13:46.716

Exactly.

Matt Edmundson

00:13:46.748 - 00:13:53.388

And I get very frustrated when that doesn't happen because in my head it was, it was entirely fine and should have totally worked.

Jodi Mercer

00:13:53.564 - 00:14:52.280

Exactly. And I think that's where the planning comes in. Right. Is asking those questions, how much development does that take?

Because once again, that's a sunk cost, then once you've spent that money, you know, there's no turning back.

And once you've said to someone, okay, develop that, understand what that timeline looks like, understand what the, what the cost is going to be and understand that if they say 10 weeks, could be 12, could be 14, and you're paying for every week of that. So make sure that whatever you're asking for, you know, what you expect to get in return for that. How much will that increase your sales?

What do you think? And, and then measure it because it's easy to, you know, get excited about, like I said, the bright, sparkly, shiny object out there.

And let's do that. And I'm sure that will work.

But not understanding how much you need to get back out of that investment in order to make, make sure that you're not on, you know, in the Red at the end of the day.

Matt Edmundson

00:14:52.900 - 00:15:54.500

Yeah, it's, it's super, super. I mean, I'm thinking of, you know, all kinds of things we've tried over the years.

And eventually Michelle comes to me and says, do you know that this has cost this much money? I'm like, holy cow.

And if somebody would have said to me at the start, Matt, this great idea, but you know, you're going to invest 50 grand into that or 100 grand and it's probably not going to go anywhere, then I would have gone at the start wise, probably. Let's not do it then, you know, but again, it's getting through that.

I think entrepreneurs are a brilliant breed of people, but there is this belief that everything they do and everything they touch is going to turn to gold.

At least, you know, I've, I can give you more, more failures than I can successes because I've had that belief, you know, and so I find the whole thing fascinating.

So what are some of the key, some of the key metrics then as an entrepreneur that I should be thinking about where the business is concerned in terms of when I'm thinking about a plan. What, what do I really need to start paying attention to?

Jodi Mercer

00:15:55.200 - 00:18:08.934

Well, I think first, and everyone's different because there's different products, there's different reasons, you know, there's different services, whatever it may be. But I think realistically determining, and I do this all the time with folks coming up with how does your revenue get built?

Is it on a per item basis? Is it on their services that people offer? There's whatever that is, build it based on. Build your revenue projection.

Okay, if I'm going to make $100,000, I'm making this up this month. How many things do I need to sell? How many per day do I need to sell? How many per week do I.

And then track it and understand that okay, I'm behind or I'm ahead. Great. And, and don't just say, oh well then take the foot off the gas. No. Okay, great.

If you're ahead, what have you been doing to make you yourself ahead of that plan? I worked with somebody that they had several different avenues or channels for, for revenue. Okay, let's build that.

Let's, let's make the assumptions and understand what those assumptions and test those assumptions. What if I don't make 10, 10 sales a day? What if I only make two? And where, where does that leave me then?

Because you probably have some infrastructure costs that you're paying for. So where, where am I at the end Of a month, two months, six months, a year.

And understand that you, you need to watch that so you can course correct if, if you're.

If you find yourself in the fortunate place of, of being over your, Your plan, which I have to say, especially starting out, most entrepreneurs don't find themselves in that, but have planned for the downside, have a plan for how long can I keep going if I, if I'm at half of what I'm. What I'm projecting. Because to your point, that's why they're entrepreneurs. They're eternally optimistic. Fabulous, that's great.

But understand what your backstop is if you don't hit that and how long you are willing to invest and not find out eight months later. Wow. I didn't realize that much money was being drained out of my account.

Matt Edmundson

00:18:09.102 - 00:18:09.830

Yeah.

Jodi Mercer

00:18:09.990 - 00:18:21.290

So watch. And there's other metrics, you know, inventory, turn, whatever it may be.

But I think the first thing is build your revenue plan and understand what the drivers are of that revenue.

Matt Edmundson

00:18:21.940 - 00:20:13.412

That's such an important thing, isn't it? Because I, I think there's two questions that are very hard to answer in, in all of this. Number one, I love this plan for the downside.

I don't know if you've ever read the. Not the Jack Reacher novels by Lee Childs. Love Jack Reacher. I just want to. If you've not read Jack Reacher, what, Just go and read Jack Reacher? Just.

Everybody needs a bit of Jack in their life, I feel. Um, but there's this saying, and I dare say he's ripped it off from somewhere. But there's this saying that Jack Reacher has. Isn't it planned for the.

Was it hope for the best, plan for the worst? And I, I think it's taken me a long time as an entrepreneur to go. Actually, that's quite a sensible thing to do. Is to go. Is to. Is to do this plan.

The plan for the downside. What happens if we're gonna get half the sales in? What happens if we don't get any sales in? What happens if. If. Because it.

There's a big question that I get asked a lot and I don't know if there's an easy answer, but the question is, at what point do I switch everything off? Exactly right. At what point do I say enough is enough? You know, people might call it, well, at what point do I say that I failed?

I think it's probably an unhelpful way of phrasing it, but, you know, there's this, When's enough enough, right. I Don't know if you've got any insight in this because this is one of those questions that I tend to come across businesses a lot at the moment.

I don't know if you know, Jodi, but we're in the acquisition space as well, so we're acquiring E Commerce businesses. And you look at the accounts and you go, you know, there was a point you should have stopped and it was about 18 months ago is the truth.

And so how do you know when that point is?

Jodi Mercer

00:20:13.596 - 00:21:22.838

Well, I think by having a disciplined plan.

I think if you put it out there and you say to yourself, if I get to that point, if you do that up front, if I get to that point and we still haven't succeeded or hit the marks that we are, that we need to make, I will shut down. Because I think that's why you have a plan. Because you can, at the start, you can pinpoint where that pain point is, that you're going to say no.

Because if you keep going along, you keep telling yourself, oh, it'll get better next month. I'm sure next month will be better. I'm sure next year will be better, whatever.

And you look back in five years and you say, why didn't I at 18 months say enough to your point?

And I think what you need to think about is not that I failed, but now I could use my resources to start something else, to start something that may be more successful. Because you, you see people all the time that, that, that are burnt out.

They, they feel like they've just taken this thing too far and they just want to sell it and they're going to sell it for pennies on what they probably should have.

Matt Edmundson

00:21:22.894 - 00:21:23.350

Yeah.

Jodi Mercer

00:21:23.430 - 00:21:50.672

Gotten for it.

And if you, if you tell yourself, look, I need to plan for it and if it doesn't reach that I'm going on to something else because I'll use my resources more wisely than trying to keep something going that clearly isn't, isn't viable anymore.

And so I think you need to be, be very honest with yourself about what that, what that point is when you start so that you don't just convince yourself that just a little bit more. Just a little bit more.

Matt Edmundson

00:21:50.856 - 00:22:45.196

It's like being in an auction. I'll just go a little bit high. But it's very true. I love that plan.

For when your exit or, or when you stop in your plan say, at what point do we hit the brakes? And this is where, I mean, listening to you talk, actually, this is where outside accountability I think is quite helpful.

Because I think, for example, if I said to my wife, babe, this is the plan at this point, I'm going to stop. It's my wife. And I might get to that point going, I just want to go a little bit further.

And because I'm jimin, she's not independent, she may not want the argument that even, or whatever it is, it's probably easier to convince Sharon to say, well, let's just keep going. Whereas someone on the outside who's not involved in the emotion of the business can just go, no, you need to stop, dude.

And this is where that outside accountability I think really helps.

Jodi Mercer

00:22:45.388 - 00:24:15.756

I agree, I agree.

Having someone to, to say, look, we've been doing this for two years, two months to whatever it is, and this is what we expected and this is how much you've invested, how much more are you willing to invest? You said this was, this was your drop dead.

And, and if you're going to invest more, why wouldn't you consider where you might get a better return than something that's already proven to you that it really isn't as viable as you thought it was? It still may be a reasonable business, but it's not what you need it to be. So move on to something else. What else could you move on to?

And I think that conversation is a tough conversation, but it's necessary. And I've had that conversation with several entrepreneurs and just said, you need to decide really what you want this to be. Is this, is this a hobby?

And, and that's fine. Then scale it back and make it viable at that level.

If this is going to be your livelihood or this is something that, you know, you thought was going to skyrocket and it's not end it and, and move on to the next. Entrepreneurs are never without ideas. Never. They have an idea a day.

So pick one of your other ideas and let's, let's, let's model that out and see what that's going to look like.

Matt Edmundson

00:24:15.908 - 00:26:07.518

Very good.

And this is actually, I mean, I mean, you wouldn't have no idea of knowing this about us, Jodie, but at my company we have a board of directors, but we have a chief exec of the board, which sounds very, very ostentatious in many ways. Chief exec. But I, I recommended this to startups, actually.

You get a chief exec who's not connected to the business because the chief exec is the one that's going to have the wisdom and go, what are you doing? And they hold you to account. And I really value that relationship I have with my chief exec and I value the relationship I have with the board.

Yes, the majority of those shares belong to me. I could technically say this is my company, this is my decision.

But I found as I've gone through the years, actually setting up a board where every member has one vote regardless of shareholding is really important. And actually where the chair of the board has the casting vote, who's independent and not involved in the day to day.

And Graham, who's the chair of our board, he thinks so differently.

To me, that was a reason why I said, Graham, come be the chair of my board when we set this business up, because he just, I've worked with him on other things. We've worked as trustees before in charity together. And I thought this, he would be a great chair. And you know, and I.

Worth every penny, if I'm honest with you, Jodi. And I think that that board, that accountability, that structure, that safety is, is paramount. Because you're right, I have 100 good ideas.

And the problem is I'll start on this idea today and I'll get, I'll be bored with it tomorrow. So I want to do this idea over here.

And of course you don't get a chance to build if you do things like that, whereas just having that board alongside you can, you have to be accountable.

Jodi Mercer

00:26:07.694 - 00:27:04.550

I agree. I think it's excellent. It goes right back to what we were saying, accountability and having that third party.

Because a board will see trends over time that someone who's in the day to day and who's just grinding away at it, they won't see that.

And the board will say, wait, we talked about this last May and here we are and it's November and this and this and this hasn't happened or it hasn't happened the way we think it should, but this little idea over here has, has done very well. Why aren't we pursuing that to your point? Well, I was kind of bored with that, but it has, it has legs. Why don't we pursue that?

And so I think they can step back and see that, you know, 20,000, 30,000, whatever foot view you want to, you want to use, they can step back and say, oh, I see, I, I see a trend here that, that you're not seeing when you're in the business every day. And we should, we should talk about that.

Matt Edmundson

00:27:04.670 - 00:27:05.062

Yeah.

Jodi Mercer

00:27:05.126 - 00:27:31.388

And then hold you accountable for, for a plan that, to your point, and in May it seemed like a great plan, but by July it really wasn't exciting anymore. Hey, that was the plan. Let's, let's keep going on that. What are we doing? Why aren't we, why aren't we pursuing it?

So, yeah, I think those questions and knowing you're going to have to talk to the board, I think brings, brings entrepreneurs. It puts, as I always say, strings to the balloons.

Matt Edmundson

00:27:31.484 - 00:27:31.836

Right?

Jodi Mercer

00:27:31.908 - 00:27:49.640

Balloons, you know, right and left. But you need strings and the board is your strings and saying, wait, let's, let's come back to what we said we were going to do.

You know, if there's a good reason for abandoning it, great, fabulous. But let's, let's talk about that. Yeah, let's talk about this.

Matt Edmundson

00:27:50.350 - 00:28:39.798

That is true. I'm, I think accountability is one of those things that we don't talk about enough as it relates to business success.

I hear people say, you know, you've got to hustle, you've got to grind, you've got to do this, you've got to do that, and do these paid media ads and, you know, do this copywriting course. And I'm like, nowhere in any of this does it say, I'll go and hold yourself accountable to people that probably know a little bit more than you.

Which seems ridiculous when you think about it. But again, this comes down, I suppose, to the ego of the entrepreneurs because I, you know, we do have egos.

We do think we know better and it's, But I think accountability is one of those keys to success which is not talked about enough. If I'm honest with you.

Jodi Mercer

00:28:39.934 - 00:30:03.872

I would agree. And I think I saw that in corporate America. Right. I, I was in a couple of companies that were extraordinarily disciplined. Extra to the extreme.

That, that probably wasn't helpful either. Too granular. But, but I mean, you got down into the nitty gritty every time you went through a, a quarterly review of your financials.

And while, you know, there's the extreme there, that's, that's probably not helpful and, and, and very expensive to, to have.

Somewhere in the middle is where the entrepreneurs need to land and understand having that, just that cadence of reporting and looking at trends and being very, taking the emotion out of it. I think that's the best way to put it to your point. If you weren't passionate about it, you're not an entrepreneur.

They are passionate about whatever they're doing at the moment.

But having that, that sounding board to say, okay, but I think is enormously helpful for any entrepreneur just to have that, that person that, that doesn't have a dog in the fight and, and Quite frankly, in many cases isn't even part of the company because then, then there is no, there's no agenda. There's no agenda. They're just, they're just giving you what they see and take it and leave it.

Matt Edmundson

00:30:03.976 - 00:31:12.830

Right, yeah, exactly. And yes, very much so.

I was on the board for a PLC here in the uk, so, so I've, I've done very, you know, posh boards, as we like to call them, where every T had to be crossed and every. I had to be dotted.

And I've done boards where, you know, we, we've done, we, we do a lot of advisory boards actually, for, for smaller E Com companies, which is in some respects chalk and cheese, but a lot of similarities, you know, sort of absolutely crossing the divide. And I would sit there in the PLC board meetings, go, man, this is so bureaucratic.

And it's just, you're stifling any form of innovation, you're stifling any form of entrepreneurialism and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then, you know, you, you go to the, like you say, you go to the opposite extremes.

And there's this guy who's starting up a new business in the back of his shed and is like, okay, this is fascinating, isn't it? And you're right.

There is this middle ground where I think as entrepreneurs, if we're going to try and build anything that lasts, we have to sort of hit. And I don't think it's cookie cutter. I don't think it seems to be one size fits all. But there are principles that seem to make sense for everybody.

Jodi Mercer

00:31:13.410 - 00:32:16.410

Agreed, Agreed. And, and no, one size doesn't. I mean, as I said, for the last eight years, I've seen everything from soup to nuts.

But the one thing that I think brings people back to success, and this is where I think success happens, is when people say, okay, I will accept the fact that I, I, I don't know everything and I need, I need somebody to, to bring, to put those strings on my balloons. And once they do that, generally I think they a.

I think there's a sense of, to your point, safety or a sense of relief that not everything's on them and that they have somebody to backstop them. And I think that's comforting to a lot of entrepreneurs because the reason they're entrepreneurs is they're out there, they're visionary.

It's exciting. But that sense of, do I have a wrapper around me to keep me focused? I think sometimes is very comforting to folks as well.

Matt Edmundson

00:32:17.910 - 00:33:54.640

Well, Jodie, I'VE thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. It's not where I expected it to go, if I'm honest with you.

I thought we'd be chatting about other things, but I just love how sometimes we get caught up in these rabbit trails.

And I think it's such valuable advice that you've bought around this and about why you work as you know, and why that sort of that external accountability is a really big deal. And having a plan, sticking to the plan and having someone hold you accountable to that, yes, there needs to be inbuilt flexibility. Don't panic.

Don't start having palpitations just yet. Dear Entrepreneur, There can be flexibility in these things as well there should. But it's simple. I say it's simple advice.

It's advice that I think we just don't heed or hear a lot of in the current market. So I appreciate that and I think it's such valuable advice. So thank you for sharing. But Jodi, we've got to the stage.

Oh, this was wonderful conversation. But we've got to the stage of the conversation where I'm going to ask you for a question for Matt.

Now if you're new to the show, let me tell you what happens here. I'm going to ask my guest for a question. Jodi is going to give me a question. She's going to start off, jodi, I didn't tell you this before.

Here'd be cool button. You start off by going, matt, my question for you is.

And then you give me a question and simply I just go and answer this on my social media platform. So if you want to know my answer to Jodie's question, come follow me on social media. But Jodie, that's the introduction.

I should probably get some kind of music jingle or something sorted out ahead of time for this in the future. But what's your question for me?

Jodi Mercer

00:33:55.180 - 00:33:58.880

What is your favorite e commerce site and why?

Matt Edmundson

00:33:59.340 - 00:34:50.347

Oh, no one's ever asked me that. What is my favorite e commerce site and why? That's a very good question. And I dare say I'm not allowed to mention my own. That would be cheating.

This is not free marketing. Matthew. That's a great question.

So if you want to know what my favorite e commerce site is, make sure you follow me on social mediadmondson, both on Instagram and LinkedIn and I will be posting a video with the answer to that question. But Jodi, listen, great question. Thank you. But really genuinely enjoy the conversation.

If people want to connect with you, if they want to find out more about what it is that you do. Maybe you can help them in some way. I don't know, maybe they've just got some general questions.

What would you like to ask a fractional CFO Chief Finance Officer if you had the chance? Jodi, what's the best way to get a hold of you?

Jodi Mercer

00:34:50.483 - 00:35:10.779

I think the best way would be to go on to ascent cfo.com and you can reach me or one of our other CFOs or our founder Dan de Golia on there and happy to field questions, offer support and see what we can do for anybody.

Matt Edmundson

00:35:10.939 - 00:37:21.440

Fantastic. Sensecfo.com we will of course link to Jodi in the show notes, which you can get with the transcript and all that sort of good stuff for free to E.

CommerCommerce. If you subscribe to the newsletter, it'll be in the newsletter. And of course, let's, let's be real.

As I've been saying for the last few weeks, it's also in the podcast app which you're listening to this podcast on. So just scroll down. In the show notes will be a links Jodi, when you can, when it's safe to do so, just click the link, go over there.

Even if it's just to say hi and thanks and you enjoyed the show. I'm sure Jodi would love to hear from you. But Jodi, thank you so much for coming on the show. Honestly, really enjoyed the conversation.

Like I say, I wasn't expecting the direction that it went, but I'm, I'm so glad that it did. It was, it was such a fun conversation and it's caused me to go and ask a few questions about our plan, so. Which Michelle will be very happy about.

But thank you for coming on. Wow, what a great conversation. Huge thanks again to Jodi for joining me today. In fact, I, I can do this, can't I? Hang on.

Oh no, I have got this button. Jodi. Yes, there we go. Huge thanks again to Jodie for joining me today.

Now be sure to follow the E Commerce podcast wherever you get your podcast from because I've got some more great conversations up my proverbial sleeve and I don't want you to miss any of them. Any case, no one has told you yet today, let me be the first. You are awesome. Yes, you are crated awesome. It's just a burden. You've got to bear it.

Jodi has to bear it. I've got to bear it. You've got to bear it as well. Now the E Commerce podcast is produced by the Fantastic Podjunction.

You can find our entire archive of episodes on your favorite podcast app. The theme music was written by Josh Edmundson and as I mentioned, this transcript, the show notes, and all the good stuff.

Where to sign up to the newsletter Everything you ever wanted to know is on the website ecommercepodcast.net hashtag disclaimer maybe not everything you want us to know is on that website, but a lot of it is. But that's it from me. That's it from Jodi. Thank you so much for joining us. Have a fantastic week wherever you are in the world.

I'll see you next time. Goodbye for now.