Facebook Ad Limits Are Crushing Growth (Here's the Fix)

0:00Brett Stapper:This show is brought to you by the Global Talent Co, a marketing leader's best friend in these times of budget cuts and efficient growth. We help marketing leaders find, hire, vet, and manage amazing marketing talent for 50 to 70 % less than their U.S. and European counterparts. To book a free consultation, visit globaltalent.co. Hey, everyone, and welcome back to the Future of Consumer Marketing. Today, we're speaking with Daricus Releford, CEO and co-founder of StorCash. Daricus, how are you? Great. Thanks so much for having me. No problem. Super excited to have you here. Looking at your LinkedIn, you've worked at pretty much all of the big tech companies.

0:36Brett Stapper:What was your experience like in big tech? Well, it was great. Sometimes I question why I leave such a cushy job to do 50 jobs that I paid half the amount. But, you know, it's one of those things like I've been an entrepreneur all my life. So, you know, I want to work at these tech companies. And the goal was to understand how a tech company operates so I could go on my own. And as I kind of went through, it was awesome. but I still felt the itch to be an entrepreneur. So here I am, I'm back at it. And what does Store Cash do? Yeah, so Store Cash allows you to save about 7 % to 15 % over 400 major retailers.

1:10We're subscription-based service, but most people normally save somewhere around$35 to$75 a month. And our subscription is about$24 for a whole year. So we want to make sure you get maximum cash back. And most times when companies do it, they actually take some of your cash back. We want to make sure we'll give you maximum cash back and provide you a great experience. So that's why we have a subscription, but you get double the cash back even though I'm going to get anywhere else.

1:38Brett Stapper:And what's the ICP? Like what types of consumers are you targeting here? Is it like the mega shoppers or who is it that's the ideal target? It's budget conscious consumers. The majority of the budget-conscious consumers, at least from our data and based on demographics, have been women around the ages of 30 to 36 and mostly moms. So it's worked out a lot for us in that demographic. But we do see people with definitely much higher income brackets looking to try to save money, too. So I guess I'm sure. And was that the ICP? Like, does that surprise you? I think you said, what, 30 to 36, you know, moms.

2:18Brett Stapper:Like, is that who you thought was going to be the ICP or you dug in, started bringing it to market and uncovered that that was the ICP? Yeah. So when we first started off, we started off with the younger, you know, 20. We thought that, you know, coming right out of college, you know, I knew I was broke, like I was looking for any way to send you money. And also they're very good in tech savvy. But what we realized as we kind of went into it is it's a little bit older. You know, there's people that are tech savvy, but also are, you know, mature enough to understand or at least have enough responsibility to understand how important it is to save as much money as you can as you go on throughout the day.

2:58So that was not the user group that we started off with, but it's been a solid base of users for us.

3:05Brett Stapper:And I think I saw in the onboarding notes that you're close to a million in ARR. Is that correct? Yes. And it's a heck of a milestone to get to. And it's very, very difficult. You know, I sold chocolate strawberries when I got out of college. I started a company and did really well. It took that from$25 ,000 to like$2.2 million in sales in just two years. Do this via an app? It's like 10x harder. It's so hard. It's like there's different phones. There are things that you can't see until the customer tells you about it. Nobody wants to pay for an app. Although it saves you more money than what you pay, like it is very, very difficult thing.

3:43So it's a huge milestone for us. It might be small for, you know, the bigger companies out there, like the acorns and things, but a super big milestone for us. And we can see how we can capitalize on that and expand a lot further from there.

3:56Brett Stapper:I mean, it's an incredible milestone. So first off, congrats to you and the team. And I can see that, right? It's like chocolate covered strawberries. There's probably no market risk, right? Like, you know that there's people who are going to be buying them with an app, like you said, for consumers to spend money. It's hard. My wife gives me shit about that a lot of times. like they'll like go to war with these like apps for i'm paying ten dollars a month and like i'll forget to cancel it and they'll be fighting with them online it's like i don't want to pay it but then in like business life you know i spend like 5k on like software you have 5k per month i'm like all this software and it's okay so it's interesting like i wonder what the psychology is there for consumers to be so against spending money on apps you know it is so bizarre to me it's the closest thing really to us yeah like we use our phones so often but when it comes to spending money on an app And, you know, I get my little gripe, you know, this grasp, I guess, tab it because Facebook has done an amazing job to try to find out how to make this easy and also free.

4:52And, you know, when you're in it, you understand what they're doing. It seems like they're selling your data, but really what they're doing is providing filters for small companies like us to like filter to the right group of people. And they flipped it to say selling data and they've just done it. And it's ingenious how they built this massive business. And because I'm doing it, you know, I can sympathize. But, you know, with that and then, you know, we're trying to make it free. But then also now it's harder to sell data because all the stuff with Facebook. So now you have to have more subscriptions.

5:24I'm sure you've noticed there's been more subscriptions in your life in the last two years because of all the restrictions they have put on data selling. People are like, well, you got all my data. Then why do you need to do a subscription? So it's hard. I think it was starting off. It was just like, I don't want to pay for a nap. And that's just been a thing. We'll go to Subway and spend$30, but spend$2 for a nap.

5:48Brett Stapper:No, no, no. Insanity. Did you know early on that you were going to sell to consumers or did you explore it? Like, is there a world where you could have charged retailers or did you explore if you could charge retailers? And that's the differentiator from us, from like Rakuten or Di or like any of those companies. what they do is, let's say they get back 10%, they'll only show you 5 % and then they'll take 5%. And so if you're at H &M and you get, you know, they're getting 10%, they're getting$5. You're only seeing$5. But, you know, our goal is to make sure you get maximum cash back. So that$24 a year is really$2, you know, a month.

6:29So in that case scenario, you would actually make more from us than you would in just one transaction. and a lot of, you know, coupon conscious like users understand that. And we're just trying to educate the rest of the world. Like, hey, you know, it is up front, but there is a massive, you know, kickback and a lot of these other companies are actually robbing you and taking more money. You know, this is a better way of doing it.

6:54Brett Stapper:So a lot of market education then. Yes, that is a hard thing. Sounds like everything that you've done is hard, but that's the case with every founder that I've ever talked to. even if you may look easy on the outside, the second they come on and start talking, it's hard, hard, hard, a little bit of easy, but then hard, hard, hard. Like, I think that's just the reality of building a company. Exactly. You know, I was like, oh, you know, I could do this. Like, you know, all these people, they have millions of dollars to pull this stuff off. I don't understand why they can't. And I was the guy saying that.

7:22And now I'm like, salute them. Because, you know, when I was doing chocolate covered strawberries and I had three stores on the East Coast, like I could see the customer. All customers are numbers in the system. You only know something's wrong with the app when they tell you. It's really like coding blind. You can't, unless we like do our, you know, pressure testing, you know, we can maybe catch those things. And even through these automated AI systems that we send our stuff through, we can maybe catch some stuff. But then users could catch a whole completely different scenario. And then, you know, we have to find out that scenario and then fix it.

8:00So, you know, it's difficult.

8:03Brett Stapper:I could go for hours. How are you acquiring customers? What's the primary channel that you're using for customer acquisition? So meta is huge. Meta is huge for us. Google ads and also, you know, TikTok has not been good for us, but Apple search ads has been pretty good. So another problem, you know, seem like I'm talking about all the issues, but Facebook, if they would put any attention towards ads, I think they would be worth 3X more than what they are right now. We beg Facebook to spend more money on there because it was just like, you know, they really have optimized really, really well, but they have no support there, no help.

8:45And it's like, they'll limit you a certain amount and then it takes years for you to like get up. Then if you back off, then it can reset itself. So it's unpredictable. Google is very predictable and also search ads have been predictable. Apple search ads. So yeah, those are the three. Facebook's the best, but very hard to spend money on Facebook.

9:05Brett Stapper:Facebook has to, you know, they're pro-capitalism. They're pro-making money. Like, why are they not doing it? It's a blind spot. I truly think that it's a massive blind spot for them. And they just don't know. I wish that I would see Mark and be like, hey, take so much more money. Just like have somebody that can actually fix this. Like, I know so many people that are like, I'm going to spend$10 ,000 a month. I can only spend$1 ,000 a month. Like, it's so many people. So yeah, it's got to be a black spot. That's crazy. And who's running the ads? Do you have an agency? Do you have a performance marketing leader?

9:39Brett Stapper:What does that look like? We used to run the ads. We ran into a problem with Facebook. And for whatever reason, it was a weird thing. They never told us the reason, but they shut us down. And apparently, there was thousands of people that had the same issue. And so we started getting an agency to do it back on a couple months later. And yeah, once we got back on, it worked itself out and we were in good shape. But yeah, it can be an agency. How'd you find an agency? That's the question I'm sure everyone listening is going to want me to ask. How do you find a good agency partner? So we're with Eskimos.

10:11They're good. We went through a couple of different companies. There was like 10 or 15 different companies. Eskimos was the most cost effective and also did a really, really good job. I mean, there's the recommendation. Definitely check out Eskimos. There are a couple of other ones out there. They're more expensive and I don't know how much better of a job they can do. So, you know, and also with these companies too, they understand how Facebook and a lot of these other companies work. So they will do some of the things around ensuring that you don't get kicked off for whatever reason it could be.

10:50Also, when it comes to Facebook and these other ad agencies or places where you can market your product, they are more lenient on these companies that do this for other companies. So if you're doing it by yourself, there's more scrutiny with these other companies. Yes, it costs more, but, you know, they're not screwing us as much.

11:12Brett Stapper:I see. That makes a lot of sense. What about the brand? Talk to us about the focus you put on the brand, what the brand stands for, and what you've learned so far from building a brand. So I would say, you know, the StoreCash brand has, for one, as you do this, there's a lot of pivots. So, you know, now we finally have got something that works. So we are now adding to a good product. Whenever you're building a brand, you really want to make sure that you're putting customers first. And not only the product, but like it so much where they can recommend it to someone else. You really want to listen to your customers and understand what they need.

11:52And sometimes your customers don't know what they need, right? You know, Apple, for example, when they pulled the head jack, you know, headphones, I think we were all like, what? What are you doing? Oh, my God. But, you know, we didn't know we needed that at the time, right? Because when we look back at it, the AirPods are amazing and I think everyone loves them. So it's super important to not only listen to your customers, but also understand what they're going to want as you kind of move forward and be able to kind of predict it and provide them that service. They'll be happy. They might be a little disgruntled initially.

12:28But as we like, we moved into cashback and then we provided a cashback at a discount, you know, but we took part of that and it was free. And when we moved into the subscription model, they were disgruntled. But then we got a lot of responses that, oh my God, it takes so much more now. Like what's going on? You know, so sometimes you need to know what they need before they know, but you also, you know, mix it and listen to your customers and that you got to find that balance.

12:58Brett Stapper:What about the marketing team? Is there anyone on the marketing team right now or is that you and the agency partners that you have? So it's the partners that we have. We have a head of marketing, but we didn't see too much of a change with the marketing. And then, you know, we kind of got in there and we saw some increases. So I've been trying to delegate and kind of push tasks off of me, but I've noticed that I'm just a guy to do it. So that's the hard part. Like when it comes to fundraising, like we are right now, Like, this is the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. And I've done very, very difficult things.

13:33Like, it kills me because I'm like, whenever I look around, I'm like, darn it, I'm the best person to do it. When it comes to marketing, I'm like, at this moment right now, I'm the best person. Me and David, David, he's my new operations head of operation. Me and David are the best people to do it. So, you know, we now sit for two hours a day and work on marketing. So, you know, a lot of things have been delegated now out, but there are certain things that you just got to do. You know, if we're in a startup, you know, I know there's a lot of people that don't like Elon Musk, but he made a really good statement.

14:10He was like building a startup is like chilling glass. Staring into the abyss. Not knowing what's going to happen. And also you get all the worst problems, you know, like something horrible happens. They're calling you and you have to fix it. you know so i know you know he might not be the best person to do certain things but i do feel a lot of sympathy on him because man he is yeah it's amazing what he's been able to do in the

14:35Brett Stapper:share period of time one of those quotes that just instantly like hits you with shares it's like the perfect way to like capture what it's like to be a founder and to be an entrepreneur and to be a builder i remember the first time i heard that like this summarizes it like if anyone's going out and wants to be an entrepreneur like just know this going into it's chewing on glass staring into you this. Yeah, like, you know, and working at, you know, Apple and Facebook and like Google, and I feel like we were in the glory days too of Google because it doesn't seem like it's the same. Down on the first floor was a bowling alley.

15:06There was bicycles to go to any parts of the campus. There were over 300 buildings in Mountain View that were Google buildings. And it was a massive like campus and there was at least four or five food trucks outside. And then downstairs, There was either a cafeteria or a five-star restaurant. And then there was an Uber service that was a Google Uber service that would take you. And then you also could go up to San Francisco and like, it was a dream, you know? And then Apple like was more strict, but they pay you more. But it was amazing to be able to see some really cool people that have changed the world, right?

15:39And with Facebook, you know, being able to see people that have changed it there too. And then Facebook's interior is also built by the person that built Disney.

15:49Brett Stapper:I didn't know that. Yeah. So it really looks like you're in Disney World and there is like ice cream shops and the people are standing outside like, hey, do you want ice cream? And you walk in there and then they like take ice cream and like there's dentist offices and like it is truly a different world. But anyway, you know, to go from that to do this, you're definitely an Oscar door. I can definitely see that. Now, final question. So we get you out of here on time. What's next? You know, what's the big picture vision? What's the next few years going to look like for the brand? Yeah, so we're adding in tracking and budgeting and very more like focused on budgeting aspect.

16:26And it's going to be an AI automated tool. So you add your play app account and we take all that information, understand what's your rant, really summarize all that. And you tell us how much you want to save and we'll give you a plan. Are you every day or every other day or once a week and tell you if you're in the green or if you're in the red, hey, you need to like, you're going over here, like and try to keep you on track. There was a thing I did when I was 15. I was 15. I was getting paid$15 an hour. And everybody that was there, we all thought we were rich. It was really cool. But I realized I was only getting$60 a day.

17:01So me and my twin brother at the time, we was like, we're only going to spend$20 a day. And then that way we can save 60 or 70 % of our funds. Being able to do that really helped us all throughout the years. And then this helped us all the way up and down. on, you know, being able to buy my first home, really nice home in Encino, California, and also a second home. So like, I want to really be able to bring that to the masses and really help users save and budget while getting cash back at some of their favorite stores. That's more of the direction. And then we're also going to add AI to really be able to connect it to.

17:37Brett Stapper:Amazing, man. I love it. This has been such a fun conversation. I know the audience is going to love it and just appreciate you taking the time. Yeah, no worries. And thanks so much for the time. Keep in touch. You take nghĩa about it!