Trouble finding good talent? Welcome to the club. The whole freelancer concept is incredibly powerful in it's flexibility and potential but finding the right person who can actually do what they say they can is no easy feat. The amount of markup on those freelancer's fees can also mean that brands end up being misled on the level of knowledge of said freelancer. Needless to say, there is room for improvement. Jai Dolwani, CEO of The Starters, a curated freelancer marketplace with vetted ecommerce talent, knows the pain of this process and is out to right the wrongs he experienced as the CMO at Winc, the well known internet based wine club. Pour some wine, swirl your glass, and open up your pallete to new ways to solve problems in the world of ecommerce.

By now it should be clear that running a brand is not an easy task. And brands sometimes make it harder on themselves. They think short term. What is my RoAS? Can I get away with basic creative? The problem is those short term fixes prevent them from seeing the long term growth they really desire. Agencies can help but when they can't deliver on the promises they make in the sales process, it makes it even harder for those brands to really win. Co-Founder and CMO of Webtopia, Jessie Healy, joins us on this episode of The Longer Game to share her insights from the brand side that led to her moving agency side, creating the "anti-agency." Does this strike your curiosity? Press play and let's begin.

Being an ecommerce business at $5M and $500M are very different. And the path there isn't always possible for every brand. In ecommerce, there are very specifics parts of your businesses DNA that are required to really grow exponentially and not every brand will have the right pieces to grow super large. You should also ask yourself, do you even want to grow that big? Andrew Faris, Founder of AJF Growth, joins me to share his wisdom and insight on all these topics. After working brand side, moving to an aggregator, back to brand, and now living in agency life, Andrew has seen a lot and this episode doesn't even capture it all. Let's get started, so grab a drink and hold on.

Amazon Aggregators have started to fail in a challenging economic climate with changing consumer behavior and people are piling on. Were some of us expecting failure? Sure. But majority of new businesses fail. So how is that different? Well Nathan Sieminski, formerly of Perch, one of the largest aggregators raising just over $900M, shares his experience working there and sheds line on the reality of that environment. Spoiler alert, it's different than you expected. We chat about how Walmart is bringing the heat and how the battle for ecommerce dominance is shaping up. Grab a seat, get a drink, and settle in for a conversation between two humans who want to see people win.

Do you know what Trade Spend is? Do you know why that $200,000 charge from Whole Foods just got deducted from your account? Well Nikki McNeil, Co-Founder and Head of Deduction Management Services at Vividly, is here to set the record straight. Trade Spend goes deeper than you think and it affects every single aspect of the business for CPG companies. You can't get around it. You can't get under it. But you certainly can misuse it so who better to learn about it from than someone who has worked in CPG companies like Justin's Nut Butter and Lilys? Born out of necessity, hear this Entrepreneur's journey into the unsexy but crucial parts of business and how to succeed through the hardship.

In a world where everything is on-demand and instantaneous, business still requires you to shell out cash up front and forego profitability in order to be successful and profitable in the long run. Izabella Ritz, CEO of Ritz Momentum, is no stranger to this world. She regularly advises people who want to validate product ideas and turn them into dollars on Amazon. But there are not shortcuts. If you want to succeed, the days of investing a few hundred dollars and making millions is gone. Izabella and I dig into the human psyche and discuss how you can actually succeed on Amazon because the opportunity is still ripe for the picking. Join us, won’t you?

Measurement of metrics are key to any successful business but the types of metrics that get the most attention are typically the sexy ones, i.e. revenue, growth, brand awareness... You get it. Tyler Jefcoat, CEO of Seller Accountant, an accounting firm designed to help business owners maximize profitability, joins us on The Longer Game to share his insights as a CEO. As someone who coaches other CEOs on better business practices, he shares that the energy of your leader is one of the most important metrics you can measure. In fact, businesses live or die based on that leader. No his name is not Jef, despite what our host may call him. But he is filled with plenty of knowledge on how to keep your business healthy in difficult times and shares why cash flow may be more important than just profitability. Let's make it rain.

Life is not a sprint, it's a marathon. The same could be said for the Amazon sphere as it develops. Since 2006, our guest Chad Rubin has been emersed in a world of the unexpected with seling on Amazon. Founder & CEO of Profasee, a dynamic pricing platform aimed at helping sellers on Amazon maximize profits, Chad has seen a lot of changes and stages in the lifecycle of the marketplace and he gives us his perspective on what's currently happening. Don't believe him? That's okay. Reality is negotiable after all, right? Feel free to expirement and test everythig we say on this episode of The Longer Game. That's how Chads been successful anyhow.

How much of your identity is wrapped up in what you do? Well scrap that. We're human beings, not human doings. My great friend Victor Dwyer, CEO of the Content Marketing agency Dwyer Enterprises, comes on to school us on happiness. With a myraid of experencies in agencies, Victor has seen the mountain tops and the valleys. Tracking metrics are important and he shows us how to do that while how having a strong company culture to create a strong unified team. And when it comes to content, Victor is King. He is going to break down for us how to make creating and posting content a whole lot easier. Want to learn more about yourself? Like spaghetti? Just press play.

Being an entrepreneur means you start solving a problem and just figuring it out. As times goes on, you often end up in a much different spot each year in order to keep the company growing. In order to excel in that role as the leader, you have to be able to reinvent yourself, time and time again. And the reality is, many people simply don't want to do that. Will Nitze, Founder & CEO of IQBAR, a brain and body nutrition company, joins us and shares why having a background in psychology, neuroscience, and government may just be all you need to build the next CPG company.