EP.140/ SLATE FLOSSER
Finding initial product testers and educating ecommerce customers with Brynn Snyder, CEO & Co-Founder of Slate Flosser
In this episode of Retention Chronicles, Brynn Snyder, CEO and Co-Founder of Slate Flosser, joins Mariah Parsons, Host of Retention Chronicles and Head of Marketing at Malomo, to discuss her journey from a multi-business entrepreneur to developing a groundbreaking three-in-one flosser. Snyder shares insights into her life as a mother of five, her entrepreneurial roots, and how personal experiences in her husband's dental practice inspired the creation of Slate. The conversation covers the intricate processes behind product development, the challenges and costs associated with launching a high-quality product, and the crucial role of feedback from dental professionals. Snyder emphasizes the importance of education in marketing, the effectiveness of different acquisition channels like Meta and Google ads, and the nuanced strategies for retaining customers through email, SMS, and subscription models. She also highlights the significance of key support systems such as female founder networks and advisory boards in navigating business challenges. As the episode wraps up, Snyder discusses Slate's marketing strategies around habit-building and the limited sales events, providing listeners with a special discount code (MARIAH10) for aspiring buyers.
SLATE FLOSSER DISCOUNT CODE: MARIAH10
Episode Timestamps:
00:15 Meet Bryn Snyder: CEO and Co-Founder of Slate Flosser
00:47 Inspiring the Next Generation of Entrepreneurs
02:38 The Journey to Founding Slate
04:30 Innovating Oral Health: The Slate Product
14:51 Challenges and Triumphs in Product Development
20:28 Educating Dentists and Consumers
21:16 Finding Initial Testers
22:58 Kickstarter Insights
24:36 Marketing Strategies
28:41 Retention Marketing
33:56 Holiday Gifting Potential
36:44 Networking and Problem Solving
38:42 Promotions and New Year Resolutions
39:46 Conclusion and Discount Code
EP. 140
BRYNN SNYDER
TRANSCRIPT
This transcript was completed by an automated system, please forgive any grammatical errors.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
retention chronicles, e-commerce enlightenment, Malomo sponsor, post purchase wizards, oral health, five kids, entrepreneurial journey, flossing benefits, product development, Kickstarter success, customer acquisition, retention marketing, subscription platform, holiday gifting, female founders
SPEAKERS
Brynn Snyder, Mariah Parsons
Mariah Parsons 00:05
Greetings and welcome to retention. Chronicles, the podcast with learnings from expert e commerce brands and partners. I'm your host. Mariah Parsons, if you're here, you're either on a quest for E commerce enlightenment or you accidentally click the wrong link. Either way, I am thrilled you stumbled into our corner of the internet, and I hope you'll stick around. We've got pearls of wisdom for everyone, whether you're running a multi million dollar business or simply just starting out on your entrepreneurial journey. Before we unleash the brilliance of today's guests, let's give a shout out to our podcast sponsor, Malomo. Malomo is so much more than just another Shopify app, their post purchase wizards, making beautiful and branded order tracking smoother than a jazz solo. So our amazing founders, like our guests, can keep their customers happy and up to date while they track their orders. So hit that subscribe button like it'll increase your LTV overnight and go listen to our other episodes at Go malomo.com that's G O M, a, l, o m, o.com Get ready for insights, chuckles and perhaps a profound realization or two with this newest episode of retention Chronicles. You Hello everyone, and welcome back to retention Chronicles. Bryn, so so, so glad you could join me here today. I'm so excited for this one. Your energy is everything that we know and love on this podcast. So thank you for making the time say hi to our audience and give a brief introduction of yourself.
Brynn Snyder 01:38
Thank you for having me. My name is Bryn Snyder. I am the CEO and co founder of slate. We help people take charge of their oral health. And I have five kids. Oh
Mariah Parsons 01:50
my gosh. Wait. I did not know that you had five kids. Oh my gosh. Okay, tell us a little about them. Give us their ages. All that.
Brynn Snyder 01:56
My oldest is 15. She is amazing. All my I had four daughters, and then I got a boy. So Michele is 12. Jenna is 10. Juliet's eight, and Colton is five. I was an entrepreneur as a young person, and so I hope that I can help my kids want to be entrepreneurs
Mariah Parsons 02:17
too. Ooh. Okay. Are any of them showing like signals, like taking interest in the business at all, or like just like learning anything that maybe would spark something later down the road.
Brynn Snyder 02:28
Yeah. So they talk about businesses they can start all the time. I think, I think they'll start one soon. They do help me anytime I need help. So they know how to fulfill all the orders. They know how to do everything, but we're we now have, like, a fulfillment team so they don't have to do that as much. But a year ago, it'd be like, Oh, you're home from school. Help me package all these packages.
Mariah Parsons 02:51
Yep, yep. I'm sure that was quite a fun time just to be like, You know what? I'm gonna rope you in and we'll make it fun and package up all these fun orders that you get to see. I recently met the founder, or the co founder, of Monica and Andy Monica, and she was telling us how she brings along her daughter to any, any meeting, any, anything that's related to their business that she can and she's been doing it since she was a little baby. And I was like, That is incredible. Like bringing her into meetings with Walmart and all that, and she's like, she said she she'll take notes from the reviews and stuff, and she really takes an interest in it. So I thought that was really sweet. And you never know. You know when, when inspiration will strike, or when you know, a little, a little entrepreneur, entrepreneur will be born.
Brynn Snyder 03:44
So I love to hear that. I feel like that's one thing that helped me become an entrepreneur, is my mom was one, and she she just would do things. And I was like, oh, it's not that hard. You just have to do it,
Mariah Parsons 03:56
yeah, the hardest thing is getting it done. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So tell us your mom was an entrepreneur. What kind of led? What were like the steps before you knew? It sounded like you knew, knew you wanted to be an entrepreneur. You wanted to have your own business. But how did you actually get to having slate?
Brynn Snyder 04:15
Yeah, so Dr Snyder, who's my husband. He was getting he was feeling the anxiousness of his patients. And he was like, I am a good dentist. I give them good care, but they just are naturally anxious. He was like, How can I help people not be anxious at the dentist? And he was like, if, if I could just get them to floss, they wouldn't have cavities and they wouldn't have gum disease. But he's like, the problem with that is, is people don't floss, and it's too hard to do it correctly, because he's like, a lot of people use floss picks, but they're not stimulating the gums. So he started working on that. And I was like, I have five kids. You work on that. Like, I get that done. It's. I was like, I've, I've already done businesses. And then he I was like, I can't do this and be a dentist. And so I was like, Well, I know how to run businesses. So if you want, I mean, the business I ran when I was younger made, like, $250,000 a year. So I realized
Mariah Parsons 05:18
they're shrugged that off, right? Like, that's still impressive.
Brynn Snyder 05:22
But like, when I started this company, my goal was to be like, there. There really is no cap, like the water Fauci industry is 1.1 billion. And
Mariah Parsons 05:35
I was like, okay, to launch myself in this industry. I
Brynn Snyder 05:39
can do this. So, yeah,
Mariah Parsons 05:41
yeah, that's awesome. So a but a big part, like, you just said, like, there's, I get, there's a lot of education around just being something that is new to market. You're trying to educate consumers about just one the benefits of oral health care and why someone would want to or oral health, and why someone would want to make sure that they're taking care of themselves at the recommendation of their dentist, but you're also trying to weave that into the business marketing objectives, which can be tricky because a lot of the times, especially now, people want entertainment from marketing. And so it's tricky to also have that be like, enter. There's a word where it's like, edutainment or something, yes,
Brynn Snyder 06:27
is that the word I'm thinking of? Yes, I want to get there. I feel like we're good at the education part. We need to make it a little more entertaining, and we're gonna get there. I think the thing is, for me, I was like, everyone knows they need to floss, but if they knew the actual things, they would do it. Because, like, I eat healthy food because I know it affects me. I floss my teeth because I know I don't want dementia, but lots of people don't know those have correlations. So yeah,
Mariah Parsons 06:58
yeah. And, like, sticking up with the saying relevant with new things that are being produced, too. And so I don't know if we actually talked about this background, but I originally studied neuroscience in school, and so learning about all of the fun, weird, random correlations that you wouldn't expect, per se from, like you just said flossing and dementia, and you're like, wait, they're correlated. What? How? But then you learn things about, you know, just how the blood is going through your body, and infection and diseases and all that fun stuff that was at least fun for me to learn about, maybe
Brynn Snyder 07:31
for others. For me, I was like, wait, you
Mariah Parsons 07:34
think your brain would protect from bacteria, and it usually does, but the bacteria in your mouth is small enough that it can get through the brain barrier. Yeah, crazy. So see, like, I, yeah, studied that for four years, and I don't think I ever heard someone talk about the correlation between flossing and dementia. So this is new for me, right? So it's like, it's a tough because you're, you're, I imagine you're trying to stay up to date, obviously, with, like, industry knowledge, and then you're trying to share that with consumers and like, boil that down to be like, Okay, how is this an easy to consume piece of media that tells you, okay, this is why you should care about flossing, and this is why it needs to be part of your everyday routine. But then also you go into the market of water flossers, and I think it's like waxy floss or like textured floss. I don't know if the these are the correct industry terms. So correct me. You're doing great. Okay, good, good. I'll take that. And then also sleep. So how do you then there's like, such a world of education that you have to, like, I don't want to say water down, but you have to make it consumable and, like, in rapid, rapid pieces.
Brynn Snyder 08:50
Yeah, I think that's been the hard point. It's like, sometimes I have to remind myself, like, you're you said embrasure. No one knows what embrasure means. You need to say, it's where the teeth and gums meet. So I think that's why it's really great to have a marketing team, because they they reel me back in and are like, program you're too difficult. What you're saying, doesn't it needs to be more digestible. So yeah, this
Mariah Parsons 09:15
is, this is one of my favorite moments in working in marketing. What I realized I did a little bit of consulting for an auto care company, and so I know nothing about cars, right? Like, I could not tell you one thing about a car technically, but it was great because I was exactly the consumer right, where I was like, I have no idea, like, what this means. I didn't even know that you had, like, right, like, axels. I'm like, what is that? What does that mean? And so then you have to write like you. You get to walk back of, okay, instead of being so engrossed in all the different aspects of you know what you're trying to foresee, the consumer wanting to know you like actually are the consumer. And it's a fun, fun overlay. But when you get to be like, wait a minute, I know exactly what message I would want to hear. But when you're not sitting in that seat, and you get the blessing of being super knowledgeable about product, or I feel this on the software side, you really have to pull yourself out of those, out of your own knowledge, to be like, Okay, what would be educational, but also consumable by my my customers. Yeah, I feel like I'm a Okay, middle man like Dr Schneider and hygienists obviously know so much more than I do, but I've learned a lot by working at the dental office and working with them. So
Brynn Snyder 10:39
I just think you can't unlearn what you know, but you have to be able to explain, and it's hard,
Mariah Parsons 10:44
yeah, yeah. And I learned that lesson too with teachers slash professors, right? Like, the minute you can master, okay, this is how you take yourself out of not knowing what you know, and then be able to teach it to a new person, then that has no idea what you're talking about. It really you become like the master of all masters, because you can just talk through, okay, this is what I know you need to know. But how do you explain that for the first time to someone?
Brynn Snyder 11:13
But we, I'm gonna work to be a master teacher
Mariah Parsons 11:18
of slate and help. That's our goal. That's our goal. That's our one goal from this podcast. We'll see how we feel at the end of the episode. But okay, describe, describe the product to our listeners. I know it'll be hard, because a lot of listeners are just listen, listening in and not watching the video, but describe to us, like, what makes slate different from the other philosophers that are out in the industry. Because I know, like I mentioned, there's a bunch of different types that are all in the industry of flossing. There's a bunch of different products, but I know slate is obviously cornering part of the market that is totally, totally different from what people are used to seeing. So
Brynn Snyder 11:57
the cool thing is, is we knew people have string floss people have water flossers. And then this is where we come in. We were like anyone who uses a Water Flosser, a dentist is still recommending they use string floss. So most people don't use both. We need to have them use both, or they can use our product. So our product is a body like an electric toothbrush, but then it has a specialized arm that is designed to be ergonomic for people of all abilities. So if you're five, you can floss, and if you're 80, you can floss. And then we have a special patented floss head, and that helps you. So a dentist has, like, a bunch of tools in their tool kit, so many and we and he was like, Okay, we like it when people use floss and a tongue scraper and a proxy brush. And he's like, What if I made something that had all those things in it so people only needed to buy one? So that's what we did. So we're the world's only three in one flosser. It has little tiny bristles and ribs on it, on these silicone parts that are kind of like a triangle, and they attach to the floss. So the floss is important. As you can maybe see, our floss has a bunch of woven strands. So the woven strand, yeah, the woven strands are important because if you have floss, that's like a glide floss, it's actually not grabbing plaque. So rule number one, need to grab, grab plaque. So you need either, like a loofah, like floss, or a woven floss, one without any chemicals. Then we knew people needed to do the C shape with a hygienist, and so we're like, how do we do that? So we invented what we call the gum sweeps, so that they do the C shape and stimulate the gums. And then one second, wait,
Mariah Parsons 13:50
pause, C shape, are you like? Because I can see the product right where it's like, actually forming, yeah. Like, a, like, A, C. For our listeners, this is so funny, because I feel like we're like, we're like, you know, on social media where it's like, the hand behind and we're like, showing the product. So yes, yeah, there you go. That's perfect. But then, like, when you actually go to the dentist, and like, they're really, really getting in there when they're flossing,
Brynn Snyder 14:15
yeah, so I'll show you on on this type of Don so in my hand, I hold fake teeth, and you normally are wanting to grab around the tooth. That's called the C shape. So you run and you go around, if you can do that, you just got an A plus from your hygienist. What we learned is, when you have certain abilities or dexterity issues, you no longer can do that. So if you are have Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, or have arthritis, or you're five, you can't do a C shape. So little hard. We designed it so that you are going to put what we call our gum sweeps into. The area where the teeth and gum touch. So now you're putting that part in to the side, and it's able the sonic vibrations and the little bristles and ribs are able to do the technical part. So we took the technique out of flossing by inventing this.
Mariah Parsons 15:16
Love it, okay? I don't, I don't know if I've ever had such an in depth and good product like that you can showcase and really be educational on this podcast before, with, like, a full set of fake teeth and everything. So it's perfect. So when you were thinking about, like you said, three in one, like philosopher right sweep.
Brynn Snyder 15:41
We wanted to give people the only tool they needed, other than their toothbrush. Your toothbrush does like 40 to 60% of the surfaces, and then we wanted to make sure we got the rest of the mouth so the floss goes between the teeth for cavities, the gum sweeps clean the gums, for gum stimulation, to help get rid of gum disease, and then the tongue scraper gets rid of bacteria on your tongue, getting rid of bad breath. Okay,
Mariah Parsons 16:09
that's what? Yeah, that last one, the tongue scraper, I was like, want to make sure we call that out as well. So when you're thinking about building this brand new product and bringing it to market. I think it's always really interesting to hear about the product dev side of things, and then we'll get more into like the marketing and the retention side of things. But I think it sets, sets the tone nicely to hear about all the in all the intricities, is that the right word I'm looking for? It doesn't sound right.
Brynn Snyder 16:37
I know what you mean, but I don't think it's that word the little, little thing put together.
Mariah Parsons 16:45
It'll come to me in like five minutes, and I'll be like, okay, there we go. This happens on the podcast so much, which is why we love it. But yeah, all the little things that went into developing the product and like bringing it to market when it was something that's brand new,
Brynn Snyder 17:00
yeah, it was hard. We didn't want to go to China originally, because we were worried we'd get knocked off really fast, because there's electric toothbrushes everywhere. And so we're like, okay, how do we develop this? So we teamed up with some engineers. My background is product design. The Dr Schneider started the process, and so he worked with the engineers, and we designed the body and then the head. What we didn't realize was how much money that would cost, yeah, so we started off with like, $300,000 to work on the development of the product. And it it went pretty much, really, it went within the year, because we, we spent all the money on the development. And then you have to buy the molds, and the molds are like $150,000 Wow. And then anytime you want to change the mold, it's like another 10 grand. And so
Mariah Parsons 18:01
a lot of fun up front, it sounds like.
Brynn Snyder 18:06
So if you can find someone who has experience in that, I think it's really beneficial. Luckily, between our engineers and me and Dr Schneider, we were a great team. Yeah,
Mariah Parsons 18:16
okay, so that's I would assume, very daunting. When you're looking at that price tag and you're like, oh my god, we we believe in this product is new to market, so we have to really invest on the front end. When, now that you're looking at it, and you know, you've had proof of concept, you're in the market, all that fun stuff, I imagine some of the some of the nights, maybe you sleep just a little bit easier, not not perfectly, but just a little bit easier. What was one of the things that you when you were looking at bringing a new product to market, that you kind of were like, no, like, we should stay the course. We should we should continue. Were there any like, little moments where you saw the proof of concept, or, like, hitting the market, or talking to people like, oh, yeah, I would definitely use that. What was, what was some of the like, very early stages of like, are we crazy? And then what are we seeing to kind of combat or to reassure us that we should really be pursuing this? Because I feel like that's with something that's new to market. That is what a lot of founders, a lot of entrepreneurs, face of like, is this just something that is solving a problem for me, or is it going to be able to capture the market in a bigger at a in a bigger percentage? Yeah, so
Brynn Snyder 19:29
that was something I really cared about. I was like, I'm not going to invest the next 10 years of my life to a product that can't succeed. So we did two tests, we sent, we made our product, and then we sent 500 to hygienists. And I said, if hygienists don't give us the thumbs up, I'm not doing this. And so we sent our because there's a lot of crappy products out there that hygienists don't recommend. So we were like, We want to be backed by dentists. So we sent our product out to 500 hygienists, 200 dentists. Yes. And said, Is this good? 95% of them said they'd recommend it to their patients. So I was like, check. And then 74% of them said it was better than any tool that existed. So I was like, Okay, we have approval from them. We can now see if the consumers want it. So we did a Kickstarter, and I don't know if I would do a Kickstarter again, but it was a good proof of concept. We were able to raise $200,000 in 30 days. And, well, 194 to be exact. Love that you got that right off the cuff. But I was like, Okay, we had 3500 people that like our product. We have these hygienists who like our product. It's just a matter of, can we market this product? But it's, it's a brand new idea. And there is one other company out on the market that is similar, but we're we. I believe we're completely different. They are an electric flosser, but they don't have gum sweeps or the tongue scraper, so I feel like we're similar, but not the same. Yeah, that means we have to educate a lot of consumers, because it's like, if we came out with another Water Flosser, it would probably be easier.
Mariah Parsons 21:18
Yeah, people would already know, right? And then you're, you're doing a lot more of the comparison in like other people in the market, but you're not educating on the on the industry that you sit in. You're educating on the product differentials based off of, you know, what other, whatever, whatever other companies are in that vertical with with your product. So it's a lot more like granular education, where you're like, Oh, this is why you would go with us over other person who has this product. So
Brynn Snyder 21:51
it's like, we have to educate the dentists and the hygienists, and then we also, so we have, like, two kind of groups that we focus on. We focus on the dental people, and then we focus on the consumer. And so, yeah, we're just excited because we see that the consumer buys our product. They get good results. They go to their dentist, the dentist confirms the good results, and then they tell their friends, yep, yep. And then that good old thing, word of mouth marketing referrals,
Mariah Parsons 22:22
starts to kick in. And then, you know, whatever, whatever snowball effect happens. So I'm glad that you said like, there's kind of the two different groups of Dennis slash Dennis, who are using the product in office, and then there's also the consumer who's using it at home. So first quick question is, where did you find that first group of dentists and hygienists that you were like, we want to send you a product and get your feedback on to see if it's something that we should pursue, like, where you've putting things out over social media, or just, you know, it's just,
Brynn Snyder 22:57
there's a big hygienist Facebook group and and we literally just put a like Google Form and said, if you're a hygienist, which, in order to be in this it was a private group. In order to be in this group, you had to live in North America and you had to be a registered hygienist. And our hygienists like, we're like, this is how we think you should do it. So we first to ask them, like, Hey, do you what do you think about this? And then we asked them, would you try the product and give us feedback? So that was how we found them. And then with the dentists, we reached out to my husband's colleagues that went to dental school with him, and then they would so between the dental school with him and then the bigger group of people was who he had it tested. We've had peer reviews since then, because we wanted things that were more formal. Because the consumer, I don't know if consumers cares so much about data, but dentists and hygienists, they want data, yeah, so we, we can't just say we see that it works. They were like, We want other people to tell us that it works,
Mariah Parsons 24:08
yeah, yeah. Use that credibility then for us to feel comfortable with using your product. There's a really a Facebook group for everything I love. I love that you just were able to source people from Facebook, okay, and then so also random question, but I don't think I've ever asked to guess this. When you did your Kickstarter, do you get like, I know, it acts as pre orders, right? Of people saying, you know, raise my hand. This is something I use. But do you get that contact information of those consumers, you must, right? Yeah.
Brynn Snyder 24:40
So if they purchase the product on Kickstarter, you get a list of every single person's name and their address and what they ordered, and then you update them as you go. Because we started our Kickstarter in November of 21 and we didn't send everything out until November of 2022 so. So, yeah, if you don't update them, they they get upset. So we learned a lot through Kickstarter. We learned we we wanted our product to be as affordable as possible, yeah, but we realized we weren't charging enough when we did Kickstarter, like it was pretty much a wash, because our product is high quality, and because of that, it costs more to produce, yeah? And I always like, look at things and like, wait this, there are guns $400 and this Amazon knockoff is 100 why? Yeah, their guns are Yeah,
Mariah Parsons 25:41
of what you pay for, yeah and two you're you also sit in like an electronics category, even though it's like not, you know, like a gaming system or anything like that, you do have an electronic component of your device, so it's like that all obviously will also, you know, just be more to produce. So now I want to shift into more the retention marketing side of things. Move away a little bit from ops and the prep. So tell us about someone shopping with you. How one? How do you first acquire them? Like, what's the most successful method you've found? And then we'll get into the retention side of things.
Brynn Snyder 26:20
So at Slate, we have this motto, try it. If it works, keep doing it. If it doesn't, try something else.
Mariah Parsons 26:25
It's a great model to have. We have a similar one at Malomo. So
Brynn Snyder 26:29
we we tried everything we do social so meta and Google ads are the easiest way I feel like to acquire customers. Are they the most cost effective way. Sometimes, sometimes our ads are like 7x and sometimes our ads are like one and a half x. So we've noticed that tends to happen during certain times of the year too. So like, but when you first start a company, you don't know. Like, last year we were like, What? What are good months for Slate? We don't know, but now we think we know, so we'll find out if it's right next year.
Mariah Parsons 27:06
What
Brynn Snyder 27:09
was now, I forgot the question all of a sudden. Yeah, yeah. You
Mariah Parsons 27:11
got it. So, which platform, channels, Yep, yeah, yeah. So
Brynn Snyder 27:15
we tried, like, Pinterest and Tiktok and Instagram right now we don't. We see that Tiktok is able to bring awareness of our company, but we don't see that it's a high return rate on Tiktok. So at first, we try to so we put more energy towards meta, and we see that we have put more emphasis towards affiliates. And a lot of our affiliates are actually dental professionals, and we've seen that people want to know about this product from their hygienists or dentists. So we tried ugcs. We do lots of UGC because that's important too. But what we've seen is people want UGC from a dentist?
Mariah Parsons 28:01
Yeah, that makes sense, yeah. I feel like with when you're sitting in like health, the health, broader health industry, people want that credible person that they know to then recommend products, because it is something that is a little bit more, I think, not out of touch, but, like, removed from someone's normal daily knowledge, right? Like, it's not the everyday consumer who understands, okay, all these difficult, different, difficult terms to understand. Of like, what actually is something that matters when you're when you're talking about oral health, versus something that maybe doesn't matter as much, like, what, where should you put your, you know, your money, or where should you put what eggs in what basket? So to say, and so it's I can, I can totally see the through line of like, people want to know about a product and want to be able to buy it for themselves, but they want to hear that they should be buying it from those trusted individuals that they already follow for yes, you know, whatever educational reasoning, I
Brynn Snyder 29:08
think sometimes it's hard, because I see market people can be amazing marketers and not lie, but they're like, right on the border, Yeah, yes. I'm like, wait, this company is called Dr Emma's. You'd think that. And I'm like, they just called it. They called it that. I was like, oh, yeah, but we didn't call it Dr slate. We should have thought of that. I'm just kidding. The reason we called it slate was because we wanted everyone's mouth to be a clean slate. Yeah. Oh, I love that. Okay, um, but we learned that dentists are awesome to work with if they love our product. And the cool thing is, we have, like, I think, over 5000 dentists and hygienists who love our product, so now we just need other dentists and hygienists to know about it, so we're working on that.
Mariah Parsons 29:58
Yeah, I love that. So, um, so let's flip to the retention side of things, because obviously, that's where my expertise comes in. On the software side is all about customer retention after someone buys. And so walk us through someone purchases with you. What do they expect to see? Like, what kind of communications are you sending them? What do you find is really important. I would imagine education is, like, a very, very big component of just being like, this is how you use it. This is when do you have to replace the head of the yeah plus or so? Like, right? That, I thought I saw that. Yeah. So like, when, what cadence you need to be replacing that by all that stuff that, like, Okay, now the customers anticipating their order to arrive, they need to know these things.
Brynn Snyder 30:41
You think that, like we would have had this nailed at the very beginning, but it took, it's taken us time to learn like at first we so we do email and SMS, and they will get email flows from us that teach them about the product and teach them about dementia and heart disease and those different things. And then we also our our product can be on subscriptions, so then they can subscribe and they can get it what, what we've learned is, is everyone's mouths are different than mine or Dr Schneider's or, you know, so we thought everyone would need their floss heads refilled on a four or five month subscription. But if you have really tight contacts, it might be three months. So we had we give them the ability to choose, but they might not know. So we use a program where they can go after and log in and change the link if they want to do that. But having a subscription platform is really important. We started with recharge, and then we went to stay AI, and I think we're gonna switch to skio. I don't know, I like stay AI more than recharge, but I think ski is the one that we are gonna go to next.
Mariah Parsons 31:59
Yeah, okay, that's that's really interesting to know. I know it's always Yeah, for for whatever reason, like the different platforms that people use, and I know subscriptions, obviously, is a big one, because if you can, if you have that business model, right, you just said you have to be able to change, have, have your customers change the cadence. Because, like, I know, I there's a couple of products that I have on subscription, and it's like, I, if I'm traveling, even right, like, that messes up a whole depending on what it is that can mess up a whole schedule. And then it's like, okay, I I'm out for two weeks, and now it's like, this weird overlap, or I'm gonna miss when, like, I'm not gonna be like, I'm not gonna be home. I need it to ship it exactly right. So it's just like chaos of life, the fun benefit that we get to have the ease of subscriptions. You also have to remember to update them when you know life calls for it. And so it makes a lot of sense that you would have, you know, have the subscription option. And even with the brands I work with on the tech side, like, seeing how it's different, like the messages that you want to communicate to subscribers versus first time buyers or non subscribers. Of like, okay, they should not be getting the same email post purchase because they subscribers should know. Like, if they, you know, got previous emails, and if they read them, then, okay, this is how you change out the head of the floss, or this is how you make sure that you're doing it correctly. Like, all those first time user things, is not what a subscriber needs to hear. Maybe they need to see the loyalty programs. Or, if they're hygienists, right, like, join, join that that group, and then recommend it to your friends, right? Like all these other things that become advantageous when you have a subscription platform, and it's just like those little, little things that can be helpful for a brand to be like, I know that you are, you know, a different subset of customer, and maybe this information would be more beneficial to you than you know, like a welcome flow or something like that, exactly.
Brynn Snyder 34:09
So yeah, we do email, SMS, and then we have the subscriptions, and then also for retention, or we have a referral and loyalty program and an affiliate program for dental professionals and a creator program for people who love our foster so I think that all of our systems could be better, but we're like, you learn like you think it runs a certain way, and then, and then someone uses it, and They're like, No, because I'm like, I did this 10 times, but then someone came to me, and they're like, this box, you have to fill it out. But I have no clue what that is. So that was like, Oh my gosh, so I just removed the box. But yeah,
Mariah Parsons 34:53
there you go. Simple as that. Yeah, it's all those things that we you know, you can run a trial 10 times, and then the 11. In Time is something different, or someone sees something right? So I think that's very, very relatable that you can you know things, things will just change and you'll have to adapt, or things won't be important anymore to you know, people in your loyalty program or become really important. So definitely relatable. And then I also, I want to ask, because this, this episode will air once we're past the holiday season, but I imagine that there's a really big market or opportunity for people to gift gift, either like family or friends or whoever else sleep, because it is something that, like, is so functional and so unique that it's like, you can really surprise other people. And
Brynn Snyder 35:53
it's like a surprise and delight. They like, open it, and they're like, hmm, yeah, about this. And then they use it, and they're like, this is the best present I got
Mariah Parsons 36:01
exactly and like, I imagine this for like, hard to shop people in your life where it's like, what the hell am I going to get them? I might as well, instead of getting something that you know is like, perhaps more generic and you've gotten before being like, you know, what, I might as well surprise them. And like, you know, maybe they weren't expecting that gift from me, but I'm sure as hell they use it, they're gonna like it. So
Brynn Snyder 36:24
I think it's a great surprise and delight present. We see that we really it is something people gift for Christmas. It's like your dad, he has everything he could possibly want, but he doesn't know this exists yet and you're gonna get it. And he's like, Yes, this
Mariah Parsons 36:41
is the best. Yeah, yeah. It's like, every everything under the sun that, like, someone could already have or is just picky about. And like, my dad is an exact example where I was like, You know what? I bet a lot of people relate to that. And I see on social media, just once we start to get into the holiday season, which I think it'll be happening, is just like gift guides and, you know, influencers being like, unique gifts, like, I see it right now. We're filming this day before Halloween is everyone's talking about creative costumes and, like, making lists, right? Like, there's just so many people that recommend different things around the holidays, or different things around like, just any, any the recommendation scope is just so great on social media, whereas people are just like, drawing out this unique thing, or even crafts, right, like everything under the sun. So I really could see an application of like, where, like, an application where you could be like, You know what? This is a really neat, unique gift, and you're in a surprise and delight someone that you buy this for. So wanted to open that up.
Brynn Snyder 37:43
I really hope that it's hard to be on gift guides and like hopefully people know we exist. I'm excited if we get on some we got on some awesome ones. Last year we were in the goop gift guide, so that was fun. Oh, that's a great one. So hopefully this year we can reach people, yeah, that's always the hope, right? That's all we're just trying to do out here.
Mariah Parsons 38:07
So one last question before we wrap up this episode. When you're looking to level up, or you're looking somewhere that it's like, okay, I have this problem. Don't know what I should do about it. Where are you going to, you know, to see, like, how who else in the industry has had this problem? How do I solve it? Blah, blah, blah, yeah. So
Brynn Snyder 38:26
I have kind of, like, three groups of, I guess, consultant ish people. So I'm a, I'm in female founders only. Mackenzie Bauer started it. If you're a female, you should get into it, because it's really great. When I have questions, I asked that group, and then I also have a board. We did raise money, so I have a board that I can ask questions to. Some of them are very business focused. So if it's a business question, ask them it's like a tech stack question. I probably will ask e commerce people. And then I have, like, our trusted team, where we're like, okay, how do we do this? Who do you know? I think, really, you just have to ask. A lot of people want to help you, but no one can help you if they don't know.
Mariah Parsons 39:16
Yep, I love that. It's a through line, right through all these episodes. We met through female founders only, and so, you know, I always will give a shout out, but there's a lot of people out there who are just like, You know what? I've either been there or will be there, or know somebody who has been there. So,
Brynn Snyder 39:36
yeah, I'm in a few very willing slack groups that I'm like, oh, like, find your group. Like, e commerce is a group. And then consumer product goods is a group within that group. So,
Mariah Parsons 39:48
yeah, is it the CPG startup one by chance? Okay, yep, that one's also a great one. So yeah, I feel like, too. And then you can ask people like, what groups do you join? And then people start to be like, oh, you should join these ones. You know, they're helpful. So and then finally, last question, are there any like promotionals? Are there anything that you're excited about for the new year? Because I always, I always think it's fun, totally okay if the answer is no. But
Brynn Snyder 40:13
so slate, we try not to do sales all the time, because we want people to know like we gave you the best price we could give you, and so we only do two sales a year, and Black Friday, we do a 20% off. So that's super exciting. Okay, amazing. And then in January, it's habit time. There's no sales, but you should focus on your on your new habit of flossing. Yeah,
Mariah Parsons 40:37
everyone is trying to reset routines. They're all, there's the new year resolution. Is that the right? Yeah, yeah, right, yes. Like, am I blanking on that word now? So yeah, you can really match the market mentality of like, everyone's really trying to keep up good habits.
Brynn Snyder 40:56
It's been cool. We've seen that people who use our product three months later, 85% of them are flossing regularly. Wow, that's great. Like, yes,
Mariah Parsons 41:06
yeah, love it. Okay. Well, Brynn, thank you so much for taking the time today. This has been an absolute joy to have you on, and I know this will be a very valuable episode to our listeners. So thank you.
Brynn Snyder 41:18
Thank you so much for having me, and I'm sure we can give you a 10% off code. So let's add what's your typical thing.
Mariah Parsons 41:26
Let's Yeah. So retention Chronicles podcast, so we can do that, or we can do Mariah, either we'll do Mariah 10. Okay, oh my god, yay. Love it. We snuck it in at the end of the episode, so people will really have to listen to the whole thing, okay, but it'll be in the show notes for Okay, perfect. Yeah, okay, thank you. You.
