The Amazon Strategist Show

How To Build Stability And Scale an eCommerce Business with Andrew Morgans

• The Amazon Strategist Show • Season 3 • Episode 77

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Discover the transformative journey of Andrew Morgans, founder of Marknology, as he shares his insights on thriving in the Amazon business ecosystem. From an unfulfilling corporate role to establishing a successful e-commerce company, Andrew's story is one of resilience, passion, and making an impact. 

In this episode, John and Andrew discuss how platforms like TikTok are reshaping e-commerce, bringing both new opportunities and challenges. Andrew shares his tips for building authentic brand collaborations and bridging the trust gap with creators.

Packed with actionable insights and real-world advice, this conversation sheds light on what it takes to build a lasting e-commerce legacy in today’s digital world.
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Connect with Andrew and Marknology
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarknologyKC/
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/marknology/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marknologyllc/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuFlipj-HkO0whZJPVyCgSw

Connect with John Cavendish
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jgcuk
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thejohncavendish
LinkedIn: https://hk.linkedin.com/in/thejohncavendish

Know More About Seller Candy
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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sellercandy/
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Andrew Morgans:

Amazon is not easy. There isn't a course you can take. It's not a passive business that you can just buy. Even if you bought it already done and you don't continue to feed it, you don't continue to water it, you don't continue to grow it, it will die.

John Cavendish:

Hello, I'm your host, john Kamenish, and welcome to season three of the Amazon Strategy Show. The show that's all strategy, with no hacks, no silver bullets and no magic pills. Just show. The show that's all strategy with no hacks, no silver bullets and no magic pills just real, practical strategies to grow your Amazon business. Today, I'm joined by none other than Andrew Morgans from Marknology the man with the beard and he inspires me. Mark founded Marknology 10 years ago and been in the Amazon space 15 years and has so much experience working with all different sizes of clients. I really wanted to get him on the podcast to share some of that knowledge and insight. Just before this show, me and Mark were talking about Kansas City, where I've never been. I just know it's the windy city and maybe I'll go one day. So yeah, welcome to the show, andrew.

Andrew Morgans:

Okay. So, john, I have to correct you on a couple of things. I'm Andrew, not Mark, but the company is Mark Nolte, I know it happens all the time. Um, it's a mixture of Mark. I feel like e-commerce sits in the middle of marketing and technology, and so that's the position I had at a company and I was e-commerce manager and I had to work. I was in the technology department working with the marketing department, and I called it the Marknology lunch when I took our teams to lunch, and that's what I am. So I forgive you. And secondly, you're in Vietnam, so I'm not going to hold this against you. But the Windy City is Chicago.

Andrew Morgans:

Okay, kansas City is the City of Fountains. The City of what? City of Fountains? Surprisingly, city of Fountains Does it have many fountains? We have hundreds of fountains in the city. I think there's some kind of like racial reason why in the past, the founders of Kansas City have like kept it a secret from the rest of America Like I really do think it was. Like it has some history of like racial divide and things like that and they really just kept maybe some mob here, I'm not sure, but they keep Kansas City a secret because between the fountains and the rolling hills. It's actually a really beautiful city. Please come visit if you happen to be here, and I'm super excited to be on the show. I actually waited a long time to be on the show. You're a busy man and connecting has been on my calendar for a little bit, at least in my mind, if not on the calendar. So I'm really excited to be on the show and, uh, just get to know you a little bit better.

John Cavendish:

Yeah, thanks, andrew. I know your name is andrew. Every time I stare at your name on the screen it says mark knowledge and I read.

Andrew Morgans:

I read it because I like I prompt my brain hindsight, like 10 years in, I wouldn't have chosen the name. It's a strong name, get. Don't get me wrong, because if you google, google it, there's just us showing up.

John Cavendish:

Stronger than your name, apparently.

Andrew Morgans:

There's only us showing up, right, it doesn't confuse us with anyone, but just the number of times that I get Mark. I think even the emails in the phones shorten to just Mark instead of Andrew at Marknology. So forgive it.

John Cavendish:

Thank you, August. Can you tell us a little bit about your story and how you ended up where you are now in the agency space and kind of the journey together?

Andrew Morgans:

Yeah, so I'll go as quick as I can Hopefully bring some value to our listeners here, just sharing, you know, some of the real stuff. You said no magic pills, so we'll just get right into it and for me it's just been about probably 20, 30,000 hours on Amazon, you know, has got me here. Just you think about 15 years in a space. You think about 40 hour weeks and as an entrepreneur it's probably more like 50 or 60, you know before long you're thousands of hours in.

Andrew Morgans:

I started out I had a degree in computer science, networking and security. Back then there wasn't a lot of computer science options, niches, networking and security, and I hated it. I hated. I had a corporate job. I was making more money than I'd ever made Because I used to just be a traveling musician, and so coming and starting to use my degree and go to corporate job was just like wow, there's a lot of money for me at the time. But I hated it. And a year in I was working at MasterCard and the Knox Center. A year in, I was just like I have to try something else and so I was looking at places, seeing what, what might be out there, where, like you know, computer skills came into play. People weren't working remote, people weren't. Uh, even online selling was, if you think, 15 years ago it was just it wasn't as big as it is today. Like it was. It was. It was we were buying stuff on eBay, um, Amazon was out, but like um, I don't even think there was advertising at the time, so just smaller.

Andrew Morgans:

And I took a chance at a startup. There was a founder, the investor, the bank roller, a guy two years younger than me at the time but he had built the website and the systems, a really smart guy named Andrew Peek. And then myself and I came in and they were like, look, we have the website, we're looking for someone to help us with eBay and Amazon and some of these things and help on the website. And I was like sure, let's do it. And a couple of weeks in and I was just wearing so many hats in a company like that, we're doing a couple hundred thousand dollars a year in sales and before long I had my first sale on eBay, just making a combo listing of a trailer hitch and some wiring and put it together and boom, it was like a new listing I had made and we got a sale and I was learning how to use, like you know, huge hitches, how to get good shipping rates on those to negotiate to beat out other people that had pricing that was better than us. But if we got good shipping rates and we were able to make more profit and if I bundled items, then I could even save more on shipping rates. And I was doing bundling like 15 years ago.

Andrew Morgans:

Right as far as strategies on Amazon go and, long story short, I was just hooked with the creativity of it. Whereas networking was like reactionary and waiting on stuff to break and in a knock center, this was like creative and whatever you could come up with, from reaching out to manufacturers to list products on Amazon to sourcing products from China. We were doing it all at that first, that first company. I went from there to as an e-commerce manager at a more corporate company eight stores, $1 million growth, $2 million growth, $3 million growth. I'm like, if you think about it in a two, two and a half year time, I was like this is crazy, like whatever.

Andrew Morgans:

I'm talking we're doing millions of dollars in sales on Amazon and I'm not even I'm not even really that smart or that good at that time. It was, it was the timing Right and it was just like. This is really cool. Um, I started freelancing on a site on Upwork. I got top 10 in the world on Upwork, not because I was that great, but again because no one was on Upwork doing Amazon services. Um, there was gurus, there was coaches, there was courses for some people doing that. A lot of the best people in the Amazon space were writing software.

Andrew Morgans:

I would say that's really where they migrated to and I cleaned up on the services side on Upwork, I started working with Adidas and Suiza and some of these big brands. That, in my mind, was just like if they need someone like me, this is a wide open space. I'm outperforming the teams they have no one's paying attention to. This is really what I saw and it was the first time that I had like an entrepreneurial idea. I think that was really like.

Andrew Morgans:

I think I could do my own thing with this. I think I could start my own business. So I really leveraged that Upwork momentum of being top 10 and the business that came from that, started Marknology, built Marknology to do all the facets of Amazon that I think a brand needs to be successful and we could. I mean that we could unpack that for hours but from SEO to PPC, to content, to branding, to international expansion, to brand protection, to Amazon advocacy slowly learning to solve. You know these things myself and then built a team around that And've been speaking probably the last five or six years on Amazon things and really branched out in that way outside of the Kansas City bubble, building my own brands, have a 3PL and warehouse a smaller one here in Kansas City, so doing a lot all based around e-com and Amazon and marketplaces really, and I'm still just very passionate about building brands and and and fixing problems and helping people.

John Cavendish:

I love it. That's an amazing story and I like how you know with a lot of people. You said you came from pain in. You know, initially I didn't want to do what I wanted to do. You found something you wanted to do and then it just it just grew and grew slowly from there and I think too many people want to get rich quick and the reality is, if it comes quickly, it goes quickly. You haven't become the person that can understand it and manage it and learn the skillset to uh, to make it work.

Andrew Morgans:

I think, uh, something I don't think about now, that just you just triggered me that I really thought about. Then I just went through a divorce and, um, my, my heart was broken and my mind was sick and just trying to get healthy. I was just ingesting all types of Gary Vee and things about entrepreneurship, things about mindset, and my ceiling was just so low for myself at that time that I was really just trying to get out of debt of like this bad relationship, maybe school debt, like things like that. I was just like, how can I get my finances? That's where I was thinking how can I get my finances ahead? It wasn't about being rich, um, or wealthy or anything like that.

Andrew Morgans:

Really, when I started my journey, I wasn't a businessman. I was a problem solver that liked computers and e-com, um, and so that was my natural direction. I really just leaned into services because it wasn't investing money in a product, right, and I can look back and be like if I had invested in product and Alibaba and private label, then you know, my story would be different, probably at this time. But instead I also have a lot of years on people in the services side because I leaned into that early and partially being at a company like US Toy that had retail stores and was old school and had a hard time internally with all those conversations between the art department and the advertising and the customer service team and the bookkeepers, and being an internal person there and having all those combos like 11 years ago or so kind of set me up to build a company I have now, which is when I'm talking to a brand or a company that's trying to step into 2024, the future or e-comm for their companies.

Andrew Morgans:

I know what those internal combos are like that they're having in company um, without them needing to even tell me. And so I started solving, like I know what that bookkeeper is going to say, I'm going to think about finding a great partner for them that can help help answer those questions or be that partner with them to answer those questions. So a little bit of a long answer, john, but you're right. But honestly, I wasn't thinking about wealth. I just was trying to get out of debt and trying to push my life forward, and my ceiling was as much higher now than it was then, but I really was just thinking I can do this. I think there's some problems here I can solve for some people.

John Cavendish:

Yeah, that's really cool and I think we should talk about that a little bit. Which is like when people start a business, you know they have a certain motivation. Usually is to either run away from pain or go for security or something like that. But that lasts only a certain amount of time till you're either out of the pain or you've hit your goal, or you're just struggling forever by. Always the number goes up. You know, to be secure, I need 200 grand, 500 grand, 2 million, 5 million, 150 million, a billion dollars. You know some billionaires who are super unhappy when they get there. So like, how can you talk a little bit about how your motivations changed then as you, as you grew the business?

Andrew Morgans:

100. Um. First it was just, uh, I was at a new company, going through a divorce and wanted to prove that I could do this thing as an e-commerce manager, not just a guy at a startup. And then it became okay as Upwork was taking off. Okay, I think this could be something I could pay down my debt and really get financially secure, at the same time still loving what I was doing.

Andrew Morgans:

Some people make all the money in the world. Hate it. I spent hundreds of hours and didn't get paid, trying to fix templates back in the day and there wasn't the Vanessa Hungs of the world giving education on flat files. Back then it was like you figured it out. There wasn't YouTube. There wasn't YouTube on Amazon stuff. So I spent hours on it, making some dollars, but also because I enjoyed it and I'd made commitments to people to try to help them fix it. So then it.

Andrew Morgans:

Then it evolved from I wanted to be able to travel and have freedom. I had traveled playing music before and realized that without financial freedom, there's a huge element of freedom that you're missing, even if you can move and be a nomad and travel and things. So I was like, ok, I've changed my direction a little bit. Finances are important. I'm going to try to figure out how to get financial freedom as I started getting that. My extended family in a way my immediate family, my parents, my sisters, my loved ones were also kind of struggling in life in different ways. We grew up in a war zone in Africa. I feel like coming out of that just took us, you know, 10 years or so to get our stuff together and start to figure out American society and how to fit in here and how to do life outside of a jungle. Uh, you know, I really really do in hindsight. Um, so we were all kind of figuring our stuff out and I got this light bulb idea that, besides paying down my own debt or, like you know from the moves and the divorce, it was like, oh, I think I can, I think I can help my sister with some side money while she's going to school, she can help me with these flat files, and uh, you know, then she finished school and she finished her master's degree and then came and started helping me build my business, which is crazy, because no one was believing in amazon at the time. So then I was helped. It wasn't, I'd helped myself and now it's like, oh, wow, I can help, like someone else that's always been there for me. And then it grew um to my second sister, which, uh, one's like super creative. If you know Veronica, she's super creative and she's our CMO and Brooklyn's my COO super organized, she's going to color code the closet, all that. So we make a great team. Okay, one's got her master's. One was in equestrian stuff in Florida for eight years before she moved up here with me and then all of a sudden there was three of us and I was like, wow, this is is kind of amazing, I'm working with my sisters again. Uh, I've got my.

Andrew Morgans:

After this divorce I kind of had love back around me in a way and like this business had created that kind of um framework to have that, like you know. And um, we were doing stuff that we didn't necessarily love. We were doing flat files and all types of stuff, but we were doing it together and there was like, um, this part of Africa that came back with us because in Africa we were so together in such a unit. Uh, by kind of not without choice, it just forced us to kind of be like that and um, cause of war and danger and things like that, right.

Andrew Morgans:

And then now, here we were doing it again and my motivation changed again to be like, okay, like I'm taking care of this. Like guys like, let's take care of mom and dad, uh, okay, then I'm taking care of this. Like guys like, let's take care of mom and dad, uh, okay, then we did that. And, yeah, the team has grown up to 35. At one point I think we're down, uh, in the twenties now, um, but it's grown to be much more, much bigger than us, uh, and our tribe has grown and our tribe has expanded and now it's, um, you know, creating a legacy, uh, for the future and creating stability, um, not just, not just in my immediate family, but in our chosen family and the people we choose and the brands that we work with, like, so that's not, that's not all the goals and motivations and everything that's changed, right, but it definitely went through phases and changed in my dreams or my goals of what I thought could be possible with, with what I was doing really grew.

John Cavendish:

I love it. I love the story and also, yeah, how you know you saved yourself and then helped other people.

Andrew Morgans:

I think so many people try to reach out and save that person drowning without like or, you know, try to not save I don't like that word but you really try to support people, uh, even love people. If you consider yourself a Christian, a lot of Christians, um lead with love and, um, you know, try even love people. If you consider yourself a Christian, a lot of Christians, um, lead with love and, um, you know, try to love people and a lot of them hate themselves. They're not, they're not, you know they still they haven't worked on something inside and it's not as easy to see, but you really, you really got to take care of yourself before you can, um, really be a support to anybody else.

Andrew Morgans:

And when I when that got clear to me, it was this change from not needing to really care about my situation or my life or my health or my security. I was a missionary kid that didn't need a lot of things and instead I started being like I want some security and if I'm stable, wow, I can impact a lot of people and um, you know, that's kind of been my, my motto for myself. Building this company is like look, the more stable I can make the company and our team and the people in our team. The stronger we all are together, the more help, more people we can help.

John Cavendish:

Oh, I love it. So, changing tack slightly, how has Amazon changed over the last couple of years?

Andrew Morgans:

You know, one thing that's fun about this is I think I've got a little ADHD. I'm definitely on the spectrum somewhere, even a little out of it as far as that goes. Like attention span can be hard for me if it's not something I'm passionate about. And e-commerce has just kept my attention for a long, long time I guess a decade, right, so a decade plus, and it, you know, it used to just be getting the products up.

Andrew Morgans:

I was the one adding thousands of car parts to Amazon, with concatenating Excel files and, uh, you know, creating descriptions when there weren't any because you used to have to call in and get a car part. I have this type of Jeep and it's this year and they'd say here's the wiper number you need, come into those out of zone and get it. Uh, and now you could buy it online yourself. Um and well, there weren't descriptions. There weren't all these files that existed, weren't descriptions. There weren't all these files that existed. And you multiply that across all different types of products. Right, I was the one. Now we're the ones cleaning up the catalog. Right, 10 years later, 15 years later, we're the ones cleaning up those, those listings that look like crap. So you know, there's just a lot more competition, a lot more intelligence around the space.

Andrew Morgans:

You know, I think one of my biggest strengths has always been being an early mover. Think one of my biggest strengths has always been being an early mover, you know, an early mover on on things on Amazon, on TikTok shop, on different strata of content on Amazon, and so that's kind of been the pace is like continue to evolve with Amazon as it changes, be a front mover on the changes. Competition will continue to increase. Competition is a good thing.

Andrew Morgans:

You just have to be better at what you do and you have to choose like is this when I get out and go do something else, Cause I don't like the discipline it takes to be really good at something? I think you have to be honest with yourself as an entrepreneur, as a brand builder, and be like do I just want to be involved in something to a certain extent, or do I want to be able to solve the big problems? Uh, big brands, um, you know problems, big brands, you know massive changes. I think if you just always stay in an innovative, open minded, always changing mentality as an entrepreneur in e commerce, you'll be fine. So it's really just being flexible and ready expecting change instead of instead of fighting it.

John Cavendish:

Yeah, I would agree with that. I mean, I've been through a few cycles now and I feel like you see, things come and go and neither of those things you described is good or bad. You know, like I know many people that have got in and out of many industries and made millions of dollars by being the person that sees the right opportunity, takes it out of the opportunity, then gets out at the right time. You know, gets out before everyone else gets in almost, or as everyone else gets it. So, um, yeah, there's a million ways to have fun, make money, and if you're not having fun then you're not doing it right. Switch it up.

Andrew Morgans:

Right, you know, um, let's find someone that likes that thing If you want to make money in that space and not do it yourself. Um, but for me, this has been, um, something I was just naturally good at. I think there's a lot of things you do they're not naturally good at. I think problem solving is one of my, my skill sets, and then after a few years in you're just now you've got experience on top of, on top of problem solving and, as the agency grew to a level where my role is not necessarily the dude fixing the flat files and instead it's relationships and community and, you know, forward thinking and stuff like that, partnerships. Um, that's where, like I think, I really found my strong suit.

John Cavendish:

Uh, in e-commerce cool yeah, I love it awesome. So, andrew, we're coming towards the end. We have a section of the podcast called the controversial take. I don't know why controversial take our producer put it in. I think hot take is probably what Americans would call it. Yeah, so what's your most debatable or controversial opinion related to Amazon or the e-commerce industry?

Andrew Morgans:

Yeah, I think it's. I hate to throw the aggregators under the bus Some level I wanted them to win. I really was just like watching. You know how's this going to change our space and really change our community and our industry a lot, whether they made it or not. I'm just and really changed our community and our industry a lot, whether they made it or not. Just the amount of money they brought into space, the amount of attention, private equity, all that. But what I saw watching was like the bravada behind some of them not all of them, right, but some of the big players, just the bravada coming into our events Amazon, prosper, different stuff walking around, running, all the stuff that we used to walk around and just like handshake and hug each other. Now it seemed like this big business and suits and doing it a lot harder.

Andrew Morgans:

And I think my hot take is the misconception that Amazon is easy and it's just like other business models and it's. It's really really not and it depends on there's Amazon, and then there's just like a relationship. There's two sides to everything. So there's the living, living brand. A brand is a live thing. I think it has voice, it communicates. It has to continue to grow or it dies. It has emotion with it. I think of brands as a living thing. And then you have any time any two living things come together.

Andrew Morgans:

There's a difficulty there that's unique to that, to map that much and, um, I think you have brands and then you have the amazon platform. Um, and there's just a difficulty there that only from spending 10,000, 20,000 hours on a platform and knowing that something is hard and meeting so many other amazing brains in the space and knowing that was really hard, was a frustrating but like eye-opening thing for me and I was almost like almost like I almost thought could money just make a hard thing easy? I really kind of thought maybe there was like a naivety to my, my thinking on what we do and to anyone listening to that it's not about talking about the aggregators, because the aggregate could represent it in a single human being or something like that trying to get into the space. But it's like it doesn't really matter how much money you have unless you can buy the best agencies to work with or the best partners that might help you on that learning curve, or buy already existing brand. But if you're going to take your brand to Amazon, do it yourself. There's not an amount of money that can make a hard thing easy and there's a difficulty to it.

Andrew Morgans:

Some people have had, you know, launch it, the right timing, hit success and get it. But for the most part, I've just been through so many scenarios where this marketplace has churned up people and spit them out, you know, and brands that ran good teams just simply couldn't make it or couldn't get it done. And when I know that, I just hate. I hate content out there. Hate's a strong word, but I dislike content out there that says anything about this being easy, because I think it disrespects the trailblazers that have pioneered this space to even be at the point where we can learn from them. And you know they've made some difficult.

Andrew Morgans:

Things seem simple, but taking brands that were in a way of thought and doing business like the people that were at the front of this, and changing that entire model to now be e-commerce and how to be profitable in e-commerce and how to do logistics All this stuff has come up in the last 10 or 15 years. Entire models have changed. So my hot take is just that Amazon is not easy. There isn't a course you can take. It's not a passive business that you can just buy. Even if you bought it already done and you don't continue to feed it, you don't continue to water it, you don't continue to grow it, it will die. It won't stay passive very long.

Andrew Morgans:

So I think it's just don't underestimate. It's like getting in a ring with a fighter and you might feel bigger than them and you know you think you're faster. It's everyone telling you you're faster. And don't underestimate your opponent, because anyone can get knocked out, and that's why I love e-commerce is the same reason I'm giving this hot take is because I love it, because it's challenging, it's hard, it's never exactly the same, it's not the same game every single time. It's simply not. There isn't just a template that you can follow to be successful with the brand, and so I challenge anyone that feels that way to just dig a little bit deeper, find somebody that's successful in the space and try to follow them and really learn, because you don't know what you don't know, and I want to see everyone that tries to come onto Amazon and be successful on Amazon be successful. I really do want that for people. The only way to do that is to have good expectations and come into it prepared oh, I love it and yeah, I would agree.

John Cavendish:

I mean, I saw, I saw readers and other people buy at many, many brands thinking they could just operate. Just operate, hire a few mid-level or low-level people and think that they would run operations better than the founder, who had focused on it continuously for two to five years there was a part of me that thought I didn't know if they could or not.

Andrew Morgans:

Like I honestly wasn't at that, I'm just like well I think a lot of them could.

John Cavendish:

If they bought in you or a high level agency to run, it would have been great. Or bought an agency and I didn't see anyone buy an agency. Someone should have bought an agency to run all their brands for them, especially the big guys who spent so much money.

Andrew Morgans:

They just had non-professionals running running them, which had good business people, good harvard finance people, good sales people, you know and um, but they didn't have enough money.

John Cavendish:

Yeah, those profit margins weren't good enough.

Andrew Morgans:

Let me flip the script just for two seconds, like what's a hot take that you have about the amazon space right now?

John Cavendish:

uh, hot take, same hot take I've had for like a year probably, which is if you want to start an online business. Amazon is no longer necessarily the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. You know, it's not like the easy money. There are other industries out there which are probably easier money, easier to get into maybe tiktok shop. To be honest, if you learn it as a strategy, um, I think you still make really good money in Amazon. You can launch a brand, you make money, but you're going to need $20,000 to $50,000 and experience and someone with you who knows what they're doing. It's not going to be like us back in the day launching products in 2015,. And you were like it'll do all right, already had 10,000 a day and played it Didn't do anything, just did a bit of ppc.

Andrew Morgans:

Um, my best ever product did 100k in the first two weeks oh wow, good market timing.

Andrew Morgans:

Like I am not special in any way, we just had amazing market timing yeah, you know, I think there's a lot of winners that don't share that part of it, like they have one, they have one or made their million dollars or 10 million dollars or whatever. But they're not saying it wasn't so much that I was, I was great, it was that or that it was the timing. It was timing and time and chance and good market fit at the time, which is also a skill set to jump on that. But I just wish that more people were sharing, like you know, the truth behind how difficult it can be.

John Cavendish:

Yeah, I mean my friend who yeah, he made his 10 mil out of Amazon sold one of the aggregators. He is an amazing executor and product guy and he had amazing timing. You know they are now trying to liquidate his brand for a million bucks. The aggregator is because they're selling. You know, all these aggregators now selling off their selling off their brands and the space is much more competitive than it was. You know, I think he wouldn't go back into the same business, even if he could buy it for 10% of what he sold it for.

Andrew Morgans:

I know a couple owners, some well-known people that are they're actually looking to buy back their brand from an aggregator and then case study it and film the whole thing and show them. You know, trying to bring it back to life, and I think that's going to be kind of cool too. So a couple of people maybe they're not having to buy it for a million, you know, they might be getting it for something less than that. I think that'd be a cool story to see it come back into the original owners and the owner show you say, like I did it once I can do it again. Let me show you, um, I, I think that'd be. It's gonna be some pretty cool content, right, like if he really does make it public, I think that'll be some really cool content yeah, I think so too.

John Cavendish:

It depends who's willing to share, though, because a lot of people I know in the industry you know, the reason they're in amazon is they want to be rich and anonymous, like they've got to have. You've got to have a reason.

Andrew Morgans:

Rich and anonymous TikTok shop. Tiktok is an opportunity. I don't think it's for the faint of heart, because it's a little bit different than the same entrepreneurs on the Amazon side that want to be rich and anonymous because you don't have to be the creator yourself to be successful there. Don't hear me out, but it is a creative first platform. That that it guy that likes to hide in the basement or, like you know, just code and research and product development, product source and be left alone, no-transcript set and um, that's added some challenge, but some fun for me too yeah, I mean I think with tiktok.

John Cavendish:

I mean, from what I understand, I've just been diving into this top of it because I think there's some opportunity there. There's a lot of opportunity somewhere. I think there's some opportunity there. There's a lot of opportunities somewhere. I think there's a big gap right now between how people reach out to creators and set expectations and how they push their product, and there's a big trust gap between the two. And closing that gap in some way is the way to make. You know, $100 million, like the Jungle Scout equivalent of here, is to close the trust gap.

Andrew Morgans:

Listen, someone that just gets a free product and makes a video at home is not a creator. And the good creators, uh, the person that's actually the bodybuilder, actually the tennis player, actually the influence, like the skills that the person you want demonstrating your product is not good at creating. They're good at tennis, they're good at running, they're good at like right, they're good at running.

John Cavendish:

They're good at like right. Yeah, someone needs the clothes they got, which could be, you know, an agent theory, it could be a software, it could be something.

Andrew Morgans:

Yeah, I think that the bots, outreach and just the sampling products that you know kind of started on Amazon. We gave out samples for reviews and that's kind of some of the same. I think those people are the same people engaging, trying to get products for free. Um, that's why I say I think you need to be able to create yourself at some level so that you can kind of control that before you're able to rely on others to create for you, and that, hey, look what I'm doing with my brand, and then you reach out to someone and that's a real relationship. If you just have this entity and you're like create for me, uh, I'll give you a free product and I'll give.

Andrew Morgans:

It's like going to the bar and just talking to every single girl in the bar versus, you know, starting a relationship with one having actually something to say, and maybe that conversation will develop into a relationship, right. But if you just like buy you a drink, come home with me, I don't think that works Right. You know, it's like you got to talk to a thousand probably for that to work or whatever. So, yeah, stupid analogy.

John Cavendish:

But the point is I mean, I would continue with that analogy Like you want to be the person that owns the brothel in that analogy not a great analogy but if you're in the bar, you want to be the person that can value and then approach at the right level with the right amount of money because you know the value. And I think there's a massive opportunity there in some system that identifies the value so that the person trusts the system.

Andrew Morgans:

the owner, the brand owner and the content creator both trust the system, whether it's an agency or whether it's a software yeah, it's like not just the percentage you're getting, uh, give me this free product, then percentage you're giving and let me charge you for my video and the brand's also like but what are you going to do for me? Are you going to drive me sales? Like? This is not a relationship. You know. It'd be better to have two, two creators that actually can create products and love your product and actually play tennis or pickleball or run or whatever the thing is you're doing, than to have, you know, a thousand people just trying to make videos at home because they're stay at home moms or they're in college or whatever the case is. And I think that's really the disconnect. And again we get down to relationship and mindset about the thing and people. And again I think the opportunity at the next thing is also rooted in that relationship part. I think you're exactly right.

John Cavendish:

I wish to talk about that another time. That's what I'm getting excited about in the space is someone needs to build the Helium 10 or Jungle Scout version. I know there's some software, you know there's some data aggregators, but no one's like the cemented cornerstone of the TikTok shop industry yet, but no one's like the cemented cornerstone of the TikTok shop industry.

Andrew Morgans:

I just built an app to connect my TikTok shop to my warehouse and we're holding the data Instead of going to Silk. There's only a couple. It's like at the beginning of the Amazon space when there's nothing out there, and so right now my TikTok shop is holding my data in this app that we built this data warehouse, and then I'm able to push that out to St, which is my 3pl, 3pl central, my warehouse management system, and get it much faster than when I was going silk shopify there. Um, so it's a wide open space for like tools and apps and add-ons and research tools and and all the stuff I missed, I think, on round one with amazon and now I'm in a position to kind of maybe see some of it and jump on it. So that's got me a little excited. Not that I have an exact thing in mind, but just getting in and solving problems and seeing what comes up.

John Cavendish:

All right, love it Awesome. So, Andrew, thank you for being here. If people want to contact you, get you to look at their account, start working together. What's the best way to reach out?

Andrew Morgans:

Yeah, I'm on LinkedIn, andrew Morgan's, with Andrew Morgans with an S, I think there's one of me, so that's easy. But also Marknologycom. I'm on Instagram, andrew Morgans. Just my name, email, andrew at Marknologycom. Very simple stuff, guys. I would love you to jump around see the website, see some of our work. We're on YouTube. I like engaging with anyone on the channel you like to be on, so you know, if LinkedIn is your thing, reach out there. Female website. If Instagram is like following along and kind of seeing what people are doing, I love engaging there too. So thanks, john, for having me on the show, and I'd love to meet anybody, and anyone that's passionate about e commerce is in business, is my kind of people, so love to meet you.

John Cavendish:

Thanks, andrew, and thank you to all of our listeners who listened to to this episode. We've been on many different tangents, so I think it's gonna be really interesting for anyone that's that's been listening and check us out and please rate us on the platform. So, whether that's Spotify in Apple or if it's YouTube, please rate us because it helps us show up higher on the rankings. So thanks so much for being here, andrew, and talk to you soon.

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