Kinga Wilewska | MUJO: How to bring a product to market

When it comes to bringing a product to market, there are lots of aspects to consider before it reaches the shelves. 

To learn more, I wanted to hear from someone who has successfully launched products to market. Kinga Wilewska is the Founder & CEO of MUJO, the adaptogenic coffee alternative packed with vital nutrients. Having watched her dad lose his fight against cancer, Kinga developed a keen interest in adaptogens & set out to bring truly transformational products to market. 

Keep listening to hear Kinga’s advice on sourcing feedback on your products & how to begin making sales. 

Kinga's advice:

• Always pay attention to costs
• Spend time sourcing ingredients carefully
• Research your market thoroughly and understand where the gaps are
• Speak to strangers about what propels them to buy / what are their priorities / what packaging appeals to them
• Pay continual attention to feedback
• Communicate with your buyers; see your product as a service for them
• Refine your pitch and your website to suit your market
• Your brand needs to inspire trust and exude authority
• Always put quality over quantity
• Believe absolutely in your product yourself
• Be disciplined and honest with yourself (eg when you need help)
• Use Facebook to advertise - rather than use an agency (this can minimise spend and maximise reach)
• Minimise risks for first time buyers: guarantee them money back and absorb the shipping costs yourself
• Always be ready to learn some new way of reaching your market

FF&M enables you to own your own PR & produces podcasts.
Recorded, edited & published by Juliet Fallowfield, 2024 MD & Founder of PR & Communications consultancy for startups Fallow, Field & Mason.  Email us at hello@fallowfieldmason.com or DM us on instagram @fallowfieldmason. 

FF&M recommends: 

• LastPass the password-keeping site that syncs between devices.
• Google Workspace is brilliant for small businesses
• Buzzsprout podcast 'how to' & hosting directory
• Canva has proved invaluable for creating all the social media assets and audio bites.

MUSIC CREDIT Funk Game Loop by Kevin MacLeod.  Link &  Licence

Transcript

podcast

[00:00:00] When it comes to bringing a product to market, there are lots of aspects to consider before it reaches the shelves. To learn more about this, I wanted to hear from someone who has successfully, who has successfully, to learn more, I wanted to hear from someone who has successfully launched products to market.

Kinga Wilewska is the founder and CEO of Mujo, an adaptogenic coffee alternative packed with vital nutrients. Having watched, uh, having watched her dad loses fight against cancer, Kinga developed a keen interest in adaptogens and set out to bring a truly transformational, transformational products to market.

However, breaking into a new market is never easy. So keep listening to hear Kinga's advice on sourcing feedback on your products. So keep listening to hear Kinga's advice on why sourcing feedback on your products is one of the most useful things you can do. If you'd like to contact Kinga, you can find all of her details in the show notes, along with a recap of the advice she has so kindly shared.

Tune in next week to hear Guy Blaskey, founder of Pooch scale your business to a thr Tune in next week to hear Guy Tune in next week to hear Guy Blaskey, founder of Pooch and Mutt, on how to scale your business to 30 million in sales. 

I'd love it if you could subscribe, rate and review our podcast so other people can find it. Also tune in next week to Blaski, who founded Pooch and Mart on how to scale your business to 30 million in sales.

Juliet: thank you, Kinga, for joining How to Start Up. [00:01:00] Before we get into the details around sales, I would love it if you could give a brief introduction as to who you are and a bit about the business that you started.

Kinga Wilewska: Sure. So, uh, my name is Kinga. I, um, I am Polish American, but now I have moved my family over to Europe. I, uh, was pre in my previous life. I was an investment banker and I worked in strategy on operations, roles, and finance in a few startups.  Um, but, a few years ago when I became a first time, uh, When I became a first time mother, I had to go back to work.

I was a CFO at the time at a software startup, and umm I was basically on the verge of burnout because I, had gone straight into fundraising and I had a crying baby at home, wasn't getting enough. sleep and what ended up happening is I just started downing those cups of coffee, really relying heavily on the caffeine and it ended up making me pretty sick. I got really anxious. I would get these stomach aches and,  um, my hormones were completely out of balance and I knew that something needed to change. So, um, uh, I essentially started [00:02:00] mixing my own herbs. I have some background in. herbalism, over a decade ago, I lost my father to cancer. And during that time, my family, we became this army of kitchen alchemists and we were essentially finding any possible way to prolong his life, making it more comfortable. And I got to know the world of adaptogens and functional mushrooms really well. And, And, um, Muja was really born from that knowledge, uh, when I found myself, struggling during that time back in, it was 2021, 2022.  Um, I really leaned into that and, decided that it's time to really put my wellness first. Before anything else, and that's how Mujo was born, and Mujo is a coffee alternative, that supports your stress response at its foundation. It uses science backed ingredients that help elevate your focus, your energy levels, and the ingredients behind it, um, are really remarkable. I spent so many hours researching [00:03:00] them, um, and I'm very happy to share the story of how it came to be.

Juliet: It's. Really interesting because so many founders I speak to have created a product or a service that helps them through their time of need. A lot of them have found a problem and they needed a solution for themselves and they've created very successful business off the back of it, but it's finding that.

And quite sad to say acute point where you get to where you have to find that answer, but you've, you've made good on it. You now you're helping so many other people and what founder doesn't need to manage their stress. So just top line, how does the Muji, is it functional mushrooms? 

How do 

Kinga Wilewska: Yes, Mujo.

Juliet: How do they help manage stress?

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah, so, stress, um, there are two types of stress Uh, there's the acute stress, which is short term stress, and, uh, and long term, uh, stress, which is the one that's bad. And, um, a lot of people don't realize that stress can come in many different forms. Yeah, exactly. It's not just [00:04:00] psychological, but it can be environmental, toxins, diet, and when your body is exposed to stress, one of the main indicators, which is a hormone called cortisol, it becomes out of balance.

And a lot of people talk about, you know, coffee spiking your cortisol, and I think coffee is not the only culprit here. I think it just comes down to all of these stressors. coming into play, and the interesting thing about cortisol, um, which measures your stress response is that it manages other hormones, and it also manages your metabolism,  uh, your energy levels, your focus, so if you're able to, um, to, at its foundation, um, increase your stress resilience, everything else just raises up, which is really amazing.

Juliet: So everything gets easier if you've got your cortisol in check

Kinga Wilewska: Exactly. Exactly. Which is why anything that helps manage your stress, whether it's these cold plunges that people are doing or meditation or being very mindful about how you go about your day. And if it helps manage your stress, you automatically find yourself, um, and all the functions in your body. They just tend [00:05:00] to work 

better. 

Juliet: and you're more likely to get into that flow state, you actually might enjoy your day at work. I find it quite funny now, I'm sort of five years in, in a couple of months and friends are like, Oh, you have unlimited holiday and you get to be your own boss. And it's like, I have never been more stressed in my life.

Because I'm starting, and it sounds really negative, but it's, I'm starting something new that I've never done before. I'm my own boss now, which I've never done before. I'm managing a team that I have to pay, and if I don't earn the money to pay them, that responsibility is on my shoulders. That low lying, under level, relentless stress that's in your life running a business.

If you don't manage it, burnout will 

happen. Exactly, 

Kinga Wilewska: exactly. And the the ingredients in Mujo, the way they target the stress response is from a few different angles. And I was very, I became obsessed with these ingredients and I wanted to make sure that every single one of them plays a function. And so they they target you from, um, Your gut and also from the brain level because the gut and the brain they talk to each other and I think this is becoming [00:06:00] Yeah, exactly the brain the gut brain axis the vagus nerve so umm uhh part of the ingredients they go into your gut and vagus nerve and they kind of stimulate the immune system and Most of your immune system actually lives in your gut and when that's operating well, it's able to also communicate very well with your brain  Uh, and on the brain side, there are ingredients in there that reduce inflammation in the brain that can help with, um, growing new neurons,  um, and help with memory,  uh, strengthening those parts of the brain, so it's quite interesting, and the ones that support the stress response, which also helps kind of close the loop there, are the adaptogens, and the adaptogens, um, the most powerful one that I have in there, in my opinion, is the rhodiola rosea, um,  It kind of hacks the stress response by, uh, helping normalize the cortisol function. And cortisol is supposed to have one spike in the morning and then,  um, and then it decreases throughout the day. The spike is what wakes you up and what makes you alert in the morning. So, and you don't want to have multiple spikes during the day [00:07:00] because that's what kind of gives you these energy crashes. Um, And so once you're able to normalize the function of cortisol that impacts all the other hormones in a positive way and when your gut is strong and it's able to communicate effectively with the brain and the brain vice versa is talking back to the gut, your entire, um, system is working really well and that can impact your mood. It decreases your, uh, any weight gain because belly fat actually comes from irregular cortisol production.  Uh, so it's quite well and and what I like to say is that Mujo works with you,  uh, not for you because it helps your body operate at its best.

Juliet: Well, this is it. I love the fact they're called functional mushrooms because he doesn't want to function better. We all have to function to get work done and that for me anyway, it really appeals in terms of how practical it is and it's, it's pragmatic and it just helps, it's your support team, but given you've come from an investment background.

Investment banking background to say that again, given you've come from an investment banking background and now you're a founder of a wellness brand. And how, how did you start and how did you then [00:08:00] sell your product? Because that is a very, very strong pivot in terms of 

career 

path. 

Kinga Wilewska: Yes, it was definitely, it was almost like starting from scratch. And I would say that being an investment banker, and I wasn't even covering consumer products, I was covering building products and metals and mining, so it was a huge pivot for me. Um, Being an investment banker definitely gives you a strong foundation in corporate finance and accounting.

And as I, um, I, as I took the next steps in my career, I joined a few startups in strategy and operations roles. I I was basically, um, just working with numbers all day long, using data to kind of guide strategy. So going into CPG. And also, uh, developing a product with my own hands. It was really, really rewarding on the one hand, but on the other hand, it was also a little bit challenging because I had never been in these sales and marketing roles.

And I feel like if, if you're going to make a CPG brand successful marketing is [00:09:00] the number one thing that you have to master.

Juliet: And I think a lot of people forget that without sales, you don't have a business.

Kinga Wilewska: exactly. And so, Basically being, you know, approaching this as starting a business one on one, I reached out to my network.  my network. I went uh, I went to Columbia for my MBA and a bunch of my classmates, they actually are now in CPG. And one of them has, um, an advisory kind of like a fractional C. O. O. Business for uhh C. P. G. Startup specifically. So I leaned on her and her colleagues pretty heavily in the early days to really understand  what what are the regulatory requirements that I need to be aware of when launching a brand like this.

And I really did approach it mainly from kind of this operational and financial angle in the early days. Because I wanted to understand if I can have a profitable business. I really didn't want to raise capital I wanted to bootstrap the whole thing and Maybe in the future I will raise capital But I've gone through that route with my previous companies and I just wanted to kind of avoid spending [00:10:00] unnecessary money I wanted to have a very tight running business

Juliet: Well, that's it. When you're managing it, in your bootstrapping, the value of what you're spending has a completely different feeling. And I witnessed so many businesses like, yeah, we just got a raise and da da da, it's like, you're not as stringent. As you could be, I think there's a lot of wastage and when you're bootstrapping it and you're running those numbers, you're acutely aware of where everything is going and what everything is costing and your finger is on the pulse of the business like 

never to, ever. 

Kinga Wilewska: Exactly. Yeah. It really guides your decisions. And when I was developing the product, because so many different ingredients go into it, I have to ship them from all over. it was a combination of kind of like the art and science of building the flavor, the effectiveness, but also on the cost side, I had to pay attention because some of these ingredients are quite expensive.

Juliet: Yeah, they're rare. 

Kinga Wilewska: You have exactly, you have to be mindful of, uh, where your margins are going to end up once you account for all of the costs.

Juliet: I see a lot of founders that we work with when we're teaching them how to do their own PR and they could be an amazing jewelry designer or [00:11:00] an amazing artist or amazing business coach, but they aren't actually looking at the business as a spreadsheet. They are just going, well, I'm really good at speaking or I'm really good at design.

It's like, but that. Might not mean you're meant to lead your own company. You have to be comfortable with your numbers and you have to face them. And what's really interesting is that the more creative people I meet, the more they tend to want to shy away from the numbers. 

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah. 

Juliet: few friends with real blocks around money and finance that they can't talk about it.

And I think they need like a money therapist if there is such a thing.

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah, I think there probably is these 

days. 

Juliet: A coach for, for budgeting, but for you, I guess having that background was really helpful because you knew business, you knew what look business, successful business looked like and what needed to make it work. So you would have obviously spent a lot of time developing the product and looking at the ingredients, um, maximizing the taste and then the look as well.

How did you then, well, how long did it take from the idea to selling your first product?

Kinga Wilewska: it took [00:12:00] me probably a couple of years, um, mainly because I was still, uh, with my previous employer for a while. I didn't want to just quit and not have any income. I wanted to make sure that  Uh, this is actually an idea, uh, that's going to go somewhere. There's a product market fit. So I initially just started with research and I ordered a bunch of ingredients on Amazon and started mixing them to see if this kind of a blend would make sense for my taste buds. Um, It also took, I think you can do it in a much shorter period of time, depending on the type of product that you are building.  Um, because I really wanted to find the highest quality ingredient partners. I spent months vetting them and it took a while to really identify the ingredients. And the partners that I wanted to work with.

And then of course came the research understanding, uh, kind of is is this form of Bacopa monary better than that one, even though they're both, um, you know, maximizing these types of compounds.

Juliet: Well, it's 

nice also not to have the panic [00:13:00] of if you've got an income, you're covering your costs and you've got the luxury of time to really do that research and feel confident and comfortable when you go to market that you're ready.

Kinga Wilewska: exactly. Exactly. But I think there's there's always an evolution, um, of of the products, right? When you're uhh you think that something is going to work, uh, and kind of imagine this perfect persona that's going to buy your product. Um, but I think one mistake that I would say I made early on, Before even launching it is I thought I knew exactly who's going to buy my product. And the advice I got is that no, you need to talk to people, you need to research, you need to do surveys. You really need to get out there and understand what it is people are missing right now in the market.  Uh, because it's not like this is the first coffee alternative that someone has launched. There is a market for this kind of a product in the U.S.

 And now in Europe as well, more so, um, so I wanted to understand what it is that people are missing. So I think a big chunk of those two years, [00:14:00] I actually spent reading Reddit forums,  um, Amazon reviews, reviews of my competitors to really see why are people giving it one star? Why are they giving it five stars?

Who are the people kind of in the middle? And what is their process ehh thought process? 

How

do they talk about these products and kind of using their language and building my pitch so that when they hear it, it sounds really familiar and it can resonate with them.

Juliet: well, knowing your audience is, it's so, so important. And this is again, something on the PR side, which I've always said, PR is sales just without the commission in the sense that you need to know who you're speaking to, to know that what they want to hear, how they want to hear it, whether they want to hear it.

So we work with clients of their audience avatars of like four characters and we will build out a profile for them, um, to know who they are, where they're shopping, where they're reading, where they're getting information, where are they learning about things, and then we target the media list around that from the PR side of things to know exactly.

where they are because you don't want to be pitching into the abyss. It's a waste of 

time. 

[00:15:00] You're being efficient with it.

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah. And if you're someone like me who doesn't come from this kind of a background, coming up with this persona can actually be a little intimidating because,  uh, I mentioned before, I thought I knew what I was talking about. And then I worked with a team who helped guide me, but they actually didn't have experience with this kind  uh, product. So, uh, I had to do this exercise a couple more times to really refine

the personas 

Juliet: Or just be careful your hair's come up again. It's just on the little mic bit. Thank you. It just rustles.

Kinga Wilewska:  Um, yeah. So I had to be, um, I had to repeat this process a couple more times because the market continues to change and you don't want to do this exercise just one time and think that you have everything figured out. I think it's an iterative process, um, as you grow your business and you have to be listening to the social media, uh, continue to do surveys, learn from your existing customers as well. I actually ended up doing a lot of customer interviews with my uhh early customers to really understand how they feel about the website and the entire customer journey.

What convinced them to buy, how do they feel about the product and the packaging? And I got some really valuable insights from that. I think speaking to strangers who bought your product [00:16:00] is, uh, definitely a better way to understand if what you're creating is going to work because in the early days, of course, you have your friends and family trying it and

they're going to be nice 

and support you. Yeah. 

so biased. 

Juliet: not maybe your client either. They're not someone that you want, they'll hear about it anyway. And I think that's something that we learned really, really was a huge part of our B Corp process was how much feedback we should be asking for and really candid, and I say to people, please be blunt because I want to learn.

And it's like saying to someone, Oh, your mascara is on, you're kind of come down, you want to be told. And then, you know, you know what the problem is and you can iterate, but. A lot of people shy away from that because they, again, want to work in an echo chamber and don't want to listen, but then you will be in an echo chamber and you won't be scaling.

For you, how often are you going back out to market to ask for feedback? Well,

Kinga Wilewska: You can do it more frequently and you can automate this process as well. I think email marketing is incredibly powerful and you can build in flows that help you do that. You can do surveys  Uh, especially [00:17:00] if you're a very lean team like we are Um, I think it's really important to figure out how you optimize some of these processes

Juliet: Well I think I have a friend who does a lot of email marketing, Hannah Spicer, who's incredible at it from a product based business, but I'm really envious of her role because she can prove exactly her sales. That she's generated, whereas in communications and podcasting, you can't really ever say we brought this much value back to your brand.

But that data analysis that she has access to from her clients of seeing who clicked what and when and how, and they engaged and they fell off the basket and then you send them this email and dah, dah, dah, dah. It's fascinating. But then with the feedback part, you can make it into a really lovely community.

Um. A community element that you engage your community further and they become part of your brand. But so you just going back to sales, like how did you, uh, firstly, how would you define sales and then how did you learn to sell?  

Kinga Wilewska: um, so for me sales is It's It's an art of understanding of what people are going through and kind of the problems that they are dealing with [00:18:00] and then finding a way to,  uh, communicate,  uh, what it is that you've built your product or service in a way that resonates with them. So it kind of goes back to this, um, concept of understanding the problem and also understanding the persona that you're targeting with your product. umm It's about creating a meaningful connection. For me, I don't want to be pushing a product on someone who doesn't actually need it. I want to first understand if they are dealing with a problem that I can help with. And really view the selling process as a process of service. I'm serving rather than pushing,  uh, something on them.

And, uh, there have been instances where  uh, I will tell them about my product and, um, you know, they are avid coffee drinkers and they say, you know, maybe this is not really for me. I think when you learn to listen and ask questions, you can, um, you can connect the dots for them a little bit. 

Juliet: Oh yeah, 

Kinga Wilewska: When I

ask people about their energy and their focus, how their stress management is, and maybe there's a correlation with [00:19:00] coffee, uh, then they sort of open their eyes and they see, okay, you know, this is interesting.

Now I want to hear more.

Juliet: it's, I loved what you said there because I, when I, the same thing, I meet clients and they've already got the light in their eyes. And it's like, you connect, it's almost, I don't know, bad analogy, but when you buy a house and you can connect over pinterest and doorknob choices and lampshades, but you're in the same zone. And when someone says, Oh God, I hate PR, I'm like, Oh, good.

This is great because I have a solution for you and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. And you both get really excited about it and it doesn't feel like sales. 

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah. 

it really does. The both sides are benefiting and I think that's the 

Juliet: Yeah, fantastic. And for you, how did you learn this? Like, Is there any advice that you give founders about how to embrace sales, given how important it is?

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah, I think it's it's more about listening than talking, uh, because everyone, when they think of sales, they sort of expect a pitch, right? Someone talking at them and saying, here's why we're different.

But I think it, it's really on, on the flip side, you you have to talk to people, you have to, it starts with these small conversations. Um, And eventually you pick up on some trends [00:20:00] and you start to understand this is the problems that people are dealing with. And then you take your pitch and you refine it so that it really can resonate. You use the, I mentioned earlier that doing a lot of research on,  uh, forums and just talking to,  uh, your existing customers, it can help you refine not just the pitch, but also the customer journey, because even if you get someone to your website, it's not enough, right?

The website has to do its job. In your entire digital presence as well, um, from from discovery to checkout,  um, it has to be easy. It has to make sense. the the points of differentiation,  um, have to be very, very clear. And your brand also has to, um, exude trust and authority so that,  uh, people are comfortable checking out. 

Juliet: Yeah. And And, I think that's the thing when you start a business, it can

feel overwhelming how much you have to do, how many hats you have to wear. Do you have any advice for people other than drinking your wonderful coffee alternative, 

any advice for them how to manage that overwhelm?

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah. [00:21:00] I mean, I will say that Mojo has changed my life for the better because I have been able to take on a lot more on my plate. I now have uhh three kids under four since the first one, uh, which is wild.  Uh, but,  uh, because I am conscious of the fact that once I support my stress response, I can do a lot more and the advice that I would have for people who are just, Starting out in this role is don't get discouraged. And, um, it's important for you to, first off, be authentic about the way you present your product and what it is that you're selling. Um, I mentioned earlier that the way I view sales is kind of a process of serving and being helpful. ehh Think about how it is that you're being helpful to someone. What is the value that you're creating? For people,  uh, because when you're solving a problem, you can always find a gap in the market to fill. You'll find customers. And then the second part is about just talking to people, listening, [00:22:00] understanding,  uh, what it is that they are looking for, how have products they have tried before failed them. I think that is a quite interesting conversation as well.

And. really understanding what makes you different. Um, quality over quantity, I think is also an important one for me.  Uh, I definitely don't view Mojo as a company that's going to churn out. a new product every six months because we believe in just Delivering the best the next product that we have that we're working on is really something i'm so excited about  Uh, and I know it's going to be of really high quality  um, just like the first product because We view ourselves as a company that really prioritizes that for our community

Juliet: also when you are having to sell it, you need to really believe in it. Someone said to me, you need to be deluded in your belief of how your business has weight and will serve others that if you don't have your own back and belief in it, no one else will. So that quality piece. Yeah, and you're speaking to someone that was trained by Chanel for years.

So [00:23:00] that quality is like you operate 150%, not even like 105 percent is okay. And Liz, the Chanel alum that we all say, you know, 95 percent most people would be okay with, but it's, it's a lot, but that, um, overwhelm I think is something that can't be unstated and there's absolutely every reason to go into business and start your own business.

Be really honest with what's going to come at you and how to manage it and how to look after 

Kinga Wilewska: yeah, exactly. And I think discipline is very important and being honest with yourself when things are working and when you need to ask for help,

Juliet: Yeah,

Kinga Wilewska: because I will be the first one to say that I came into this and I was starting from scratch, but I know when to ask for help and I think that's, and I know when I'm not good at something and I need to delegate it or or talk to an expert. So I was very honest about that part.

Juliet: I think that's it is you have to be very comfortable and that's where this podcast started because people kept calling me saying, I saw you doing your thing on LinkedIn and can I have a chat? I'd love to see what you're up [00:24:00] to. And they just give me advice that I hadn't asked for and I was like, Oh my goodness, this is so helpful.

But I'd never, I. Chanel trained again, you don't partner, you do everything in house. You don't ask for help. You've got whopping budgets. You don't need necessarily to ask for help. Suddenly you're out on your own. You need support. You need mentorship. You need coaching. You need support. I'll say again, in terms of people saying, do you want a cup of tea and a quick chat?

A problem shared is a problem halved, but. It was, I didn't embrace it soon enough. I think that putting my hand up and asking, saying, I'm really stuck. And as soon as you realize that 20 times a day, you're going to feel out of your depth and that's fine because you're going to learn something. You're going to fix something.

You're going to get a huge amount of job satisfaction when it works. It's brilliant. 

Kinga Wilewska: yeah, yeah, I totally agree. And I think it's also down to managing yourself and taking care of yourself because The startup life can be really demanding, especially if you have a family as well. So knowing what your priorities are, knowing what you do in, you know, in [00:25:00] special situations, who takes care of the business if you're going into labor

Juliet: God. Yeah. 

Kinga Wilewska: that. Um, So there's definitely a lot of planning and, um, and I think just knowing where everything is, I think as a founder, and I think it's a lot harder when you're a solo founder like me.

Sometimes I do wish I had a co founder because you can kind of complement each other's skills, but I do have to do everything from finance and overseeing, you know, accounting and, and doing the product development and marketing and sales and the email, everything is all at once, but at the same time, it can be really really rewarding.

Juliet: Yeah. And when it's working and it's growing and you can see it, you're completely responsible for that too, which is also a good thing and that, that having a co founder, not having a co founder thing is an interesting debate because I never had one and I never thought about having one. I just. And now having met lots of people who have co founders, sometimes working with their partner, their sibling or a parent or a friend, it's always like flat mating with someone.

It's a real risk if it goes wrong. [00:26:00] But I think knowing more about who you are and how you work at work will really help set up the structure of your business and if you then realize you do need. A polar opposite to support you and that's a co founder, fantastic. But that psychological part of running a business is so important because ultimately you are the front man that's going out to sell your wares.

You need it to all the back end to be set up well for you to be successful with that. Um, in terms of taking your product to market, where did you sort of start in terms of putting it out into the world

Kinga Wilewska: Yes. Uh, so we did a soft launch initially and I just posted on LinkedIn and on my social media just to see kind of what is, what is the take as the fish biting?

And 

Juliet: your website?

Kinga Wilewska: exactly. So as soon as I finished the website, I actually set things on pre order. Just to see how things would go as we were kind of refining the how we're gonna ship everything the final boxes We're getting delivered and we just wanted to see how much traction we're gonna get.

So umm That was [00:27:00] interesting and we get lots of positive feedback. But of course, that's your community. They're gonna be supporting and  and the first revenue came in then but it wasn't until uhh Strangers started started to buy that you're really validating the concept And you're getting the first feedback and customers are emailing you back and they're saying things like, Oh, I don't have a brain fog anymore.   Uh, what is in this? How does this actually work? Another person said this cures hangovers.

Juliet: Amazing. 

Kinga Wilewska: So, um, yeah, it 

works. So it was really satisfying. 

Juliet: Were you doing paid search or 

Kinga Wilewska: So yeah, so no, so I started with Facebook ads and I initially worked with an agency. And I have mixed feelings about working with agencies because I feel like you don't really own the process.

And what I learned from that is In the early days, it actually can be valuable if you're up for it to learn Facebook ads on your own Because you can test things and you have a lot more ownership of how quickly you go how quickly you scale So that's essentially what I ended up doing uhh Because I [00:28:00] felt like their approach umm And at that point, not knowing Facebook ads at all, just from a high level perspective, it just didn't make sense for me. So I did something that I usually do when, uh, I went, I'm not sure what to do. And I, I've reached out to people who are experts in. the field I found a couple of mentors on Fiverr and I learned Facebook ads from scratch.

Juliet: Amazing

Kinga Wilewska: And actually I was able to, uh, reduce my cost of acquisition by, I think it was 12 times compared to the agency, which kind of blew my mind based on what I've seen from their performance.

I had this intuition that my CAC was too high. 

Um, and I wanted to understand all of these metrics.  Um, so cost of reach, for example, a cost to reach a thousand people CPM,  um, on Facebook is a metric that not a lot of agencies look at, but it does tell you a lot about the state of your market, how competitive it is, the quality of your ads as well.  Uh, and, uh, putting all that knowledge into the ads that I created, I found a lot more success with it.

Juliet: And you'll [00:29:00] move 

faster because you'll be, you're in it and you 

Kinga Wilewska: You're in it.

You're monitoring it every day and you can see, okay, this ad is working. I can, uh, I can scale this out. This one is not, I switched it off right away. So your budget is working a lot smarter.

Juliet: how rewarding! 

Kinga Wilewska: And there are different yeah, there are different strategies that you can use to minimize spend and maximize reach, so I was, uh, as someone who loves working with numbers and data, this was something that I was really excited about, and once I cracked the code a little 

Juliet: Yeah. 

Kinga Wilewska: it, it was very rewarding.

Juliet: we feel the same when we do affiliate marketing. It's the same thing. It's like actually getting into the nitty gritty and seeing in live what's working, what's not, commission structures, all of that 

stuff. 

It's really, when I feel like I'm slightly deprived of numbers in my day job. So when I get to them, I love them.

So, 

yeah. 

Kinga Wilewska: I don't blame you.

Juliet: So for you, you really went, right, it's worth my time learning Facebook ads, but I might outsource, say, website design to someone else. You 

kind of 

Kinga Wilewska: Exactly, exactly. But, I did that as well, and I think it really depends [00:30:00] who you outsource to. I would say that it's worth Spending a lot of time finding the right partner for a lot of these,  um, responsibilities. Um, I work a lot with contractors and they mostly come by referral.  Uh, and that's what I trust most of the time.

And I think that's the case with a lot of people as well. when it comes to website design, I was very naive going into it and thinking that a beautiful website will make sales, but actually there's a lot more psychology behind it.

Juliet: Yeah. 

Kinga Wilewska: doing things in the right way that really maximizes conversions. So that was also a lesson I learned early on Um, um, when those ads were up and I was driving traffic to the website and I was like, you know, the conversions, okay. You know, I, why are people not checking out? And then I started to understand that you can minimize risk. for first time buyers. You can offer money back guarantee. You can do discounts for subscriptions. Um, you can cover shipping costs. A lot of people were adding things to cart, but not [00:31:00] checking out. So right away I was able to see, okay, well, the, the, you know, the shipping, what seems a low amount to me,  uh, actually I should cover it and build it, build it into the price and, and it will impact my margins, but it actually makes sense longterm once people subscribe. So doing this financial exercise, I think is incredibly important because it can help guide the entire customer journey 

Juliet: Yeah. And all the pieces of the puzzle come together, which 

must be 

so 

Kinga Wilewska: exactly. And then you see it work and you're just like, okay, I did my job, but then

you don't stop there because then the work of retaining customers begin.

Juliet: Well, is it like a child that you get them through one sleep stage and then suddenly they grow up six months older and they go through another different one that you have to learn and unravel all over?

Kinga Wilewska: It's exactly like that, but but it's great because all the different parts of the process are, they can be very satisfying and. Even though I say I'm very analytical, there's this big creative part of me that I'm able to channel into this business. And I'm a firm believer that everyone is creative.  Uh, for the ones who say they are not, I think they just haven't tapped into [00:32:00] the right part of themselves.

Juliet: Yeah, no, I love that and as you said before, because you're wearing so many hats, you're soon going to learn Canva. You're soon going to learn, you know, all the different things that you need to skill up, I suppose. Um, really exciting. So something that we do is, uh, the previous guest has a question for our next guest and our previous guest.

Wanted to ask you what makes you powerful.

Kinga Wilewska: Oh, that is a great question.

Um, I would say that the thing that makes me powerful is my confidence and ability to learn.

Juliet: Yes.

Kinga Wilewska: I think that even when I come into something and I have no idea what to do, I will find a way to get access to someone who can teach me or who can help me get through it. And I think if you have this mentality when you're running a business, anything that comes on your plate, whether it's Or a [00:33:00] regulatory hurdle or, um, you know, launching a new product with a new ingredient, something you haven't, you know, that hasn't been in the market and you need special approvals.  Um, you just find a way to learn how you deal with it.

And, um, I think the Facebook ads are a great example of 

Juliet: Totally. Well, that hunger also, like, well, there's a problem, someone else likened it to you climb the mountain and you summit and then you see the three more summits ahead. And as long as you're okay with, there's always going to be another summit. Once you conquer one, there'll be another and the to do list will never be done, but it's that.

If you like learning and like taking on the challenges, you're in the right job, which is amazing.

Kinga Wilewska: Yeah, exactly.

Juliet: your question be for our next guest? Could be 

anything 

Kinga Wilewska: wish I had a lot of time to think about this, but, uh, let's just, um.

Juliet: Anything you might be facing in your business today. It could be anything about scaling or people or sales or anything.

Kinga Wilewska: if you were to start your business all over again, what is the one resource that you would not be shy to invest in?  

Juliet: Let me write this down. I like that. Yeah. Cause [00:34:00] I, my favorite expression, I did think about renaming the podcast experience is what you get after you've needed it because once you've gone through it all and you're like, Oh, well, had I known that I wouldn't have done any of this, but looking back, yeah, that's a really interesting question.

I'm just thinking for me, for me, it's my team, hands down. I feel. And there's lots of things like zero dexed receipt capture, paying for professional Zoom. The team make or break my days? Oh, mostly make. So yeah, but that's a really good question. Thank you so much. And thank you Kinga for coming on the podcast.

It's lovely to meet you 

and 

best 

of 

luck. 

Kinga Wilewska: so much. It was great talking to you. I really enjoyed it.

Juliet: Thank you. Let me just quickly click stop.