Building Business Fortitude and Creativity in Digital Marketing

Adam Weeks:
Hey everybody, this is Adam Weeks from Open Channels fm and I have been thinking about this word. This word is fortitude. And it’s something that we all need in business, especially, you know, as we’re trying to grow our businesses and businesses all have to start some. Most of our businesses, they start small and we want to get attention to our businesses. We want people to pay attention and that’s not an easy thing to do. And I am excited to introduce to you my good friend, Gina. Gina is someone that exemplifies this word of fortitude and there’s a creativity here. There’s a lot of different strategies and things because getting attention in this digital world where we are talking to people all around the planet, how do we get people to pay attention to the things that we’re doing? So. Hey Gina, it’s nice to have you on. Thank you for joining. Quick introduction. Tell the people a little bit about what you do and who you are.

Gina Gindorf:
Cool. Thanks Adam for this amazing intro. So I’m Gina, as you mentioned, I’m the co founder of Loya, which is essentially a payment method acting as a loyalty program. So we really started because most online stores pay a lot to acquire customers who essentially never come back or very rarely. And Loya automatically Rewards shoppers with 5% instant cash back at checkout, turning the one time buyers into repeat customers with no extra work on the store’s end.

Adam Weeks:
Oh, very, very cool. So this is a lot of people in WordPress and WooCommerce. Is that who you’re talking to?

Gina Gindorf:
So we’re focusing mainly on WooCommerce stores for now with obviously the idea of expanding. But yes, WooCommerce WordPress is the focus for it right now.

Adam Weeks:
Got it. So it’s a plugin. Is Loya a plugin that people can use?

Gina Gindorf:
Exactly. It’s a plugin that’s already on the WordPress marketplace. So it takes like five minutes to set up. It’s very easy. We tried to simplify it as much as we could for both sides.

Adam Weeks:
Very cool. Give it a shot. I am really, like I said, this word fortitude has been stuck in my brain and as I was thinking about the success in business, there’s all different levels of where a company is at in their lifetime. They’re just starting out all the way to bajillion dollar Companies and you approach those things differently. Loya as a startup. And one of the things I’ve observed about Eugenia as I’ve gotten to know you is you have this tenacity, you have this fortitude creativity about you of like, hey, we got to get the word out about this thing because nobody wants to be the best kept secret. And so, yeah, how do you, in this digital world, in this, you know, day and age, when we’re all just looking at our screens and there’s a ton of stuff just being thrown at us all the time, how do you think about getting the word out about, about Loya? What are some of your, your thoughts about fortitude in, in marketing?

Gina Gindorf:
Well, first of all, thank you. Sometimes it does get overwhelming. There’s so much going on, there’s new things coming out every day. You kind of like fall behind. But things that have worked, I guess, or that I’ve been doing a lot, which is also how I met you, essentially is just looking for people, finding through networks, doing research, which sounds super simple, but today I feel like network and people is like probably the most important thing to do and is the only way to really get anywhere. And so making relationships. And like a lot of the times people are like, oh, well, this person doesn’t really fit into what I would need or blah, blah, blah. But that’s also not important because at the end of the day, a relationship is a relationship and they can help you today or they can help you in several months or you just met a new person, had an interesting conversation. So I think that is definitely part of how to like be seen, I guess, in this world because people really remember feelings and relationships more than they do products.

Adam Weeks:
I love that you just used the word feelings. I was listening to a podcast and they were talking about data and statistics and that’s really not how we make decisions. We make decisions based on, on, on feelings. If we used just data to make decisions, nobody would smoke or drink or do things that are bad for their bodies. They would make all the good choices all the time. But we know that’s not the truth. So yeah, it’s how do you help people feel differently or what are some of the creative things that you’re doing when it comes to maybe feelings.

Gina Gindorf:
So in terms of reaching out. Yeah. Or more in terms of like Loya

Adam Weeks:
itself, I think with reaching out, like how are you reaching out to people, getting people to respond back to you?

Gina Gindorf:
Oh, I’m just putting myself out there as much as I can and not taking no for an answer, I would say being strategically annoying at this point.

Adam Weeks:
I like that term. Strategically annoying. Yes. Tell me more about that.

Gina Gindorf:
I mean, I feel like nowadays people are just, like, worried to overstep or don’t want to be annoying in the terms of, like, okay, like, respecting their privacy, which obviously is important, but that also can lead to, like, disqualifying yourself too soon. And so following up is something I probably had, like, a lot of, like, issues with. Not in the terms of, like, issues, but just, like, uncomfortable thing to do. But you kind of have to do what you got to do, Right. So putting yourself out there in that sense, asking for help and being okay with asking for help. Because also, as like, a. I mean, I’m a woman in my 20s, right? So, like, what do I know? But it’s okay to ask for help, which is what I realized. And that’s how I got so many opportunities and, like, doors to open. I’m not saying we figured it all out yet, but I’ve definitely spoken to some amazing people just by asking for help and, like, hey, guide me. And people love to, you know, help and share their knowledge. So that’s been a really good way of getting to know people.

Adam Weeks:
Yeah. Have you found people generally helpful or they, like, nah, I don’t want. I don’t have time for you. Other people. How’s that gone?

Gina Gindorf:
No, honestly, I’ve noticed that people just love to kind of show off, which is what they do when they help, I guess, in a way. And no people. I mean, at least in my experience, people have been very kind, very helpful. And even again, like, there’s conversations that in the moment, I was like, okay, this is a great conversation, great person, probably not going to help me so much in the sense of, like, what I can do next steps. But then a couple months later, I’m like, oh, wait, this person did say this. And then that helped me solve an issue that we didn’t even talk about back then. So, like, honestly, my experience has been great. Like, there is probably nothing bad that can come out of asking for help and having a conversation with someone. So that’s just my thoughts.

Adam Weeks:
I love that of asking for help. Because people generally think of themselves as helpful people. They don’t want to waste their time. They want to make sure that they’re helping someone who can use their help. And yeah, asking for help is a good way to start a conversation because, yeah, like I said, they kind of like showing off in, like, a good way.

Gina Gindorf:
But, yeah, you know, people like to

Adam Weeks:
talk about Themselves, they do, and they want to share their experiences and. And if you can.

Gina Gindorf:
So, yeah.

Adam Weeks:
And that can. And that can make you more memorable and hopefully to be top of mind when those different conversations come up, I think that’s. That’s really. It makes you memorable.

Gina Gindorf:
I hope.

Adam Weeks:
You guys are trying a lot of different things. This is a fairly unique product. One of the tough things that I would say about the loyalty and the checkout process is that for a lot of engineers, stores don’t move my cheese. Don’t change what I’m doing. If it’s working, it’s working. I’m worried that I’m going to mess this up. How do you think about something so integral to their business to have them being willing to try something new?

Gina Gindorf:
Yeah, that is honestly something we’ve had a lot. Those are probably the biggest things that stop most stores. But this is how we had to explain it because we’re not actually changing the system of a store that works. So, for example, whatever, any WooCommerce store, we’re not actually changing anything about their store. We’re just adding a payment method onto their store. So giving customers essentially just another choice. Nothing has to be changed or moved or removed. It’s just an additional choice. And the good thing about it is that if customers don’t use it, then it’s like it’s not even there. Nothing changes, nothing happens. But as soon as customers start using it, then that’ll help with, like, their retention and the repeat purchases and all that. So it’s like one of those things that takes time to explain. And to get someone’s time is probably the hardest thing.

Adam Weeks:
So I imagine with this, like you said, you’re getting someone’s time is very difficult. And that first reaction from them, because there is so much noise out there, can be like, ah, no, we’re good. Don’t bother me. What are some of the ways that you might overcome that initial, like, nah, I’m good.

Gina Gindorf:
We’ve had a lot of those, to be honest, and obviously cold outreach like email calling, all that is a lot harder to get through than to just go into a store and talk to someone. So we started doing that more to like, door to door. Even if we’re focusing on online businesses, a lot of online businesses have a physical location. So having that, like, human interaction has been very helpful. And then the way we say it. So, like the pitch, instead of saying a loyalty program, we realized coming off as a loyalty program was not, like, successful at all. People have such bad experiences with loyalty Programs that it just has such a bad wrap around it. And so as soon as we said loyalty program, they’re like, no, we’re good. Like, we don’t even want to hear what you it. Whereas if we were like, okay, we’re a new way of payment, like, helping with repeat cost, like, purchases. Just framing it differently, even though it’s essentially the exact same thing, we got better reactions to it. So playing around with that, obviously we didn’t know, but playing around with the way to explain something has been very helpful.

Adam Weeks:
And yeah, yeah, I love that. Is that it’s difficult to remember what it’s like to not know something. And so what this feels like is that, like, when we’re in our business, like, yeah, we understand it, like, we get it, but how we explain that to someone they may like, no, no, I’m. I have an association with that. That’s not what I need. I’m busy. Yeah, go away. But as you’re. As you’re starting to creatively problem solve these things, like, all right, well, I know that. I know our product is good. I know if they just tried it that they would love it. I know that we would bring them more sales, that it would be successful. But overcoming those objections, what are you thinking about? You know, some of those creative ways to overcome objections.

Gina Gindorf:
Creative ways. So not stopping is, I guess, not very creative. But it just. Most people would stop after a. No. I think we went into the same shop at least like, five, six times until they were like, okay, like, either just, like, stop coming in or, like, try this. You know, like, we’ll give it a shot. But we definitely made events. Oh, we did a lemonade stand in New York, which was really fun. And we got, like, the weather was on our side that day, but it was a really cold month. And then there was one day that was hot. All of a sudden, everyone was. So for my New Yorkers who understand this on the west side highway, and that gets very busy. And so we just like, stand there and had a QR code and whole poster to get stores. And the, like, the saying was like, smart people get free lemonade and smarter people scam. And so that brought a lot of attention. A lot of people stopped especially, like, thirsty. Like, you just want to lemonade. But then when you’re here, like, you might as well hear what we have to say. And so that was very fun. That was cool.

Adam Weeks:
I love that idea of, you know, we all understand lemonade stands. It’s the kind of quintessential, like, childhood, like, this is how, you know the business that we all want to start and everyone understands it and you’re using something that we all understand to communicate something that’s kind of complex, like you know, the whole. Yeah, it’s not easy to explain how it, how it works. So you know, I think that’s, that’s a great. Any other creative ways that you’re, you’re trying to approach this problem?

Gina Gindorf:
I mean, yeah, so we’re at the beginning phase. So getting those first few people to trust you is obviously difficult. And I like, I’m well aware that especially with a payment system, like I would also probably want to see someone else try it before I do. Like we’re very well aware. So we said why, you know, try to convince others if we can just prove it by making our own store. So here we are doing our own online shop so that we can be the first or I guess like the most powerful testimonial in the sense of showing exactly what we do. Starting from a brand that has no customers, how much Loya can help us get new customers and get repeat customers. And then that way it just like we don’t have to do any talking and it just like proves it for our, like proves it by itself. So that’s probably the most creative thing we’ve done. Like starting our own new shop.

Adam Weeks:
Yeah, I love that because it’s this way to viscerally show like. Yeah, we believe so much in this and we want to have essentially kind of like the best possible case study and that if you’re starting from scratch, look at this. It works. Repeat, you know, customers and, and the processing and, and being able to show people.

Gina Gindorf:
Exactly. Because then you can trust it more when you see it instead of just like listening to they don’t know me like you know.

Adam Weeks:
Yeah.

Adam Weeks:
let’s back up a little bit to kind of some of the general strategies for people paying attention for getting some of their very, very, very precious time. What are some of the like social channels that you’re using? Do you have opinions like Twitter versus LinkedIn versus you know, in person events and some of those things Kind of some of your general strategies to, to get, to get attention.

Gina Gindorf:
So this is interesting because with Loya we have I guess two different targets. We have getting onto stores and e commerces that would have Loya as a payment method. So we have to convince them and then the users who would actually end up paying with Loya. So these social channels, the fact that there’s so many kind of work in our favor for this because my co founder is a big X person and he will use, he’ll tweet or like will be on X all the time. And then LinkedIn is also really good for the, the side of like getting the stores and the merchants and okay. Whereas Instagram and TikTok and YouTube is more for getting the user sides like getting people, I mean essentially brand awareness so that people know what Loya even is and to get them excited about new stores that they can spend like spend at and use Loya at. So it really depends on the channel. But using a bit of everything takes a lot of time and is much harder. These like people who get millions of followers overnight is almost like impossible. But, but yeah, with time and like knowing where your audience is, that’s been helpful.

Adam Weeks:
Very. Yeah, no, I, I think that it’s kind of a. Everywhere, everything, everything everywhere all at once. Sort of like you’ve got to do them all for the most part. But knowing where, which audience is at. And like you said, most companies have different people that we’re trying to attract and we need the end consumer to have a trust so that when they see that Loya logo or they see that you know, at the checkout process, like oh yeah, that that’s something I can trust. But then also the store owner who’s the one you’re going to actually have the contract with the agreement with, they need a level of trust. And those two are different yet both important.

Gina Gindorf:
Yeah, it’s the typical chicken egg. Right. Which one comes first?

Adam Weeks:
Yeah, yeah. Not a, not a, not an easy thing to do. Storytelling. How do you think about telling your story or telling stories of others? Is that something that is a part of your strategy.

Gina Gindorf:
Yes, I think storytelling is very important, especially comes back to the fact of people remember things through feelings and not through data. And since my co founder and I are, I mean we’re young, we’re in our 20s, we don’t have some like crazy back VC or Google that experience. So storytelling and just being authentic for me is what’s extremely important and how we’re approaching everything. So we’re not like, oh yeah, we’re this crazy like big company. Like no, we’re just honest. Like we are starting out. We have a few that trust us already and we just want to build that community and be honest. And I mean we wrote an article about how much we don’t know like and where people usually are like, oh, I’m a know it all. This is why you can trust me. Where I’m more like, I’m not but I’m learning and I know enough to like do this. I don’t know everything but like this is what I’m good at. And I mean when you build something, you’re on it 24 7, you become an expert automatically. So yeah, I think that’s, that’s important. Just like being real to what you are and I mean no 26 year old is going to know everything, so why lie about it?

Adam Weeks:
You’re not supposed to be. Yeah, I think that that’s so important that being authentic, being a human first is, is really what is going to be attractive and people are going to pay attention. Being overly corporate, you know, using all the buzzwords, like. Nah, everybody uses the buzzwords. Be a human first.

Gina Gindorf:
You gotta know what the buzzwords mean.

Adam Weeks:
Yeah, you gotta know. Exactly. You’ve talked about connecting people. What is, Tell me about the importance of. Because it’s a little bit counterintuitive. Like, all right, if I connect those two people, how is that going? What does it mean to be a people connector?

Gina Gindorf:
Yeah, so that does kind of sound counterintuitive. And it might be most times, but growing up my family has been very like connecting in the sense of like always connecting people. So I think I just grew up with that. So my brain just automatically associates people. Like if I meet someone, I’m like, oh, this person does this. Like they could be a great connection. And sometimes it like works out that we can do something all together and sometimes it just doesn’t and helps others. But since I ask for a lot of help and I do get help, I like to also when I can help as well. So I don’t know if it has Much to do with Loya or how connecting others will get me connected. But that can also sometimes happen. So you never know who you meet, who, who the person knows that you know. So the world is big, but it’s also very small and connected. So I think it’s important to.

Adam Weeks:
Yeah, it’s true. I, I, my, my visual for this that I think about it is like Velcro. And if you look at Velcro like under like a magnifying glass, it’s got like little loops and hooks and one little loop and one little hook, like it’s not going to do anything. But if you get enough of those hoops, enough of those, you know, to, to connect suddenly, like it sticks together. And that’s the, the kind of how you see connecting people is that you connect two people and like, all right, they go off and do their thing and it has nothing to do with you. And yeah, but if you do that, you know, 20, 30, 50, 500 times, that is bound to connect and, and actually be that thing that, oh, now this works. And yeah, I really resonate with being a connector of people.

Gina Gindorf:
Yeah. It’s also good karma. So why not.

Adam Weeks:
Yeah, be good people and good things will happen. It’s not, it’s, it’s, it feels naive to, to say that because it’s not one plus one equals two. Like if you do this, then this will happen. But it is that over time, that positivity and connecting people, doing good, it’s does work over time.

Gina Gindorf:
Yeah, exactly. And we never know. So you might as well try.

Adam Weeks:
You never know. You might as well try and see what’s going to work. And that’s kind of the thing with, in business is that like, yeah, we’re here to make money, we want to sell our product, but that feels soul sucking. We might as well do good while we’re doing that. We can enjoy the business because this whole business thing can be fun if we’re helping others as we go.

Gina Gindorf:
That’s kind of really the fundamental of Loya, which sounds like, okay, sure, she’s just saying that to sound good, but in the way that it’s a payment method, it really is to help one stores get more repeat purchases, help them like get their customers to come back because spending on ads and that’s all very expensive and a lot of the time doesn’t work and it’s just not sustainable. So really wanting to help these businesses grow and get those repeat purchases, but also essentially helping customers, like paying has just been paying and we’ve just all Agreed. Because it’s always been like that. But, like, why, if you’re picking one store out of the millions, you should get like a thank you for it. Not just a thank you for your order email, but a real thank you. And that’s the 5%. So the 5% instant cashback that Loya gives. So we really, like, have this, like, win, win that. Like, everyone wins. And we’re not changing the world, but we’re helping a little bit.

Adam Weeks:
I love that. And we know that loyalty works. It’s the difference of why sometimes people will choose one gas station over the other because they’re, you know, part of their points. And, oh, yeah, I get this percentage off on this or things come in the mail. And I know that with my wife, you know, she, if it’s like Old Navy and the points that she gets there and now she’s going to go back. And we build relationships with brands and it can be so difficult for a brand to truly show appreciation and to give back. And the thing that the economics of it works because if you’re going to get 5% off, like, well, they’re not going to get something totally for free. They’re probably going to buy more stuff and it. But then they’re also benefiting because it’s just kind of this virtuous cycle that, that we, that we can, that Loya can participate in. And yeah, you’re. You’re telling that story, which is really great. All right, well, as we’re wrapping up again, you know, I’ve been thinking of this word fortitude. Your. Your face popped into my mind as I was thinking about this and love the different aspects that you’ve brought to this, that you, you know, energetic and exciting and you’re ready to like. Yeah, we’re going to be creative. We’re going to do a lemonade stand in New York or we’re going to start our own store. We’re going to teach people, we’re going to share our story in different ways. You’re doing that as we’re wrapping up. Any kind of thoughts, maybe if someone’s discouraged, what kind of encouragement can you give them for getting the word out about their solution that they have?

Gina Gindorf:
Honestly, this probably just sounds cheesy, but people talk more. People like to say bad things more than they do good things. So if they’re discouraging you, it’s probably because they’re not good enough to do it themselves. So just go in and whatever. Like, what does it matter?

Adam Weeks:
Yeah, yeah. The worst I can say is no and, and sometimes getting a no is helpful, like. All right, good. Now I can go on to the next one.

Gina Gindorf:
It really. You don’t need everyone to know to be successful or to make a difference. Yeah.

Adam Weeks:
Very, very cool. All right, Gina, if someone wants to connect with you, learn more about what you guys are doing, how on the great big Internet would they find you?

Gina Gindorf:
So my. They can find me on LinkedIn on Gina Gindorf. That’ll connect them straight to me. And then our website, Use Loyalty is our main website. And then our Instagram and all that is attached so they can find everything on there.

Adam Weeks:
Very good. All right, use Loyal. Well, Gina, thank you so much for your time. My name is Adam Weeks and this has been Open Channels fm. And we’re looking forward to hearing from you guys next time. All right, Hope you guys all have a great day.

Gina Gindorf:
Thank you. Thank you, Adam, so much.

Adam Weeks:
You’re welcome.