Build Customer Loyalty Programs Like A Netflix PMM
Subscription overload is real.
You open Netflix, scroll for ages, jump to Hulu, maybe Disney+, then somehow you end up rewatching The Office or Parks and Rec for the hundredth time.
Then a few weeks later you look at your credit card bill and think, wait. Why am I paying for all of these subscriptions?
And honestly, the entertainment industry isn’t the only one with a loyalty problem. Anyone in SaaS knows this. Brands aren’t competing on features alone anymore. They’re competing on habit, relevance, emotional connection, personalization, and the ability to keep reminding customers why they should stay.
This is one of the most interesting examples I’ve seen of a PMM stepping directly into that challenge. We’re talking about how Disney+ approached customer loyalty in a category where people cancel constantly, attention can shift overnight, and everyone is fighting for recurring value perception.
I could not think of a better person to walk us through it than the PMM who built the program, James Schultz. James is currently at Netflix thinking deeply about customer experience and the future of entertainment in an increasingly personalised world.
Before Netflix, he led program strategy and development for two major loyalty programs. First, DirecTV Perks, one of the first rewards programs in the entertainment industry. He launched it with the campaign “TV That Loves You Back” and gave away over $100,000 in prizes. Then most recently, he led Disney+ Perks, which is still in its early days, but has already shaped how streaming platforms think about loyalty.
The Disney+ Loyalty Journey
Even with the emotional pull of Disney, churn is still a thing. People cancel for all sorts of reasons, and “we’re Disney” doesn’t automatically solve it. James’s approach was to increase perceived value in a way that stayed aligned with the brand, and to build it off real customer insight instead of vibes.
Step 1: Understand Why Customers Leave
James started with the unglamorous work: getting clear on why people cancel. He pulled from CRM data, support tickets, and direct customer conversations. The goal was to name the real reasons in plain language, then shape the program around those reasons.
If you can’t explain why customers leave, you can’t build loyalty that actually changes behavior.
Step 2: Segment Your Audience
Once you know the “why”, you stop treating your customers like one big group.
Disney+ looked at loyal fans versus casual viewers and focused on the segment most likely to churn. That’s where a loyalty program can do real work, because you’re giving the right people a reason to stay at the moment they’re most likely to leave.
Step 3: Go Beyond the Product
James pushed the thinking beyond the product itself when it came to rewards. Discounts are easy. The more interesting lever is value that feels on-brand and expands the relationship.
For Disney+, that included rewards like a National Geographic cruise. It matched the world of the brand and encouraged people to explore more content, which strengthens the habit of staying.
Step 4: Evaluate Resources and Strategies
Then came the build vs buy decision. Do you build the program internally, buy a platform, partner, or stitch together a hybrid?
James weighed speed to market, resourcing, and long-term differentiation. If being early is part of the strategy, you need a plan that can actually ship, not a perfect system that takes forever.
Executing the Vision
A loyalty program doesn’t win because it launches. It wins because it’s managed.
James talked about ongoing measurement, internal alignment, and iteration. You keep checking what’s being used, what’s being ignored, and what’s driving retention, then you adjust. Otherwise it becomes another initiative that looked great at launch and quietly disappears.
Messaging Critique: BODYARMOR
Switching gears, James and I looked at BODYARMOR’s messaging.
“Choose Better” has the right energy, but it’s missing the specifics that make it sharp. Better how? Better because of what? If the coconut water base is the real edge, that needs to be clearer and easier to repeat.
Final Takeaways
James wrapped with a warning that applies to loyalty and messaging alike: don’t build and hope.
Validate with data and insight first. Use real customer language. Build around what customers actually value, then make it easy to understand and easy to use.
That’s how loyalty becomes a reason to stay.
LINKS
Messaging Critique (BODYARMOR): https://www.drinkbodyarmor.com/
Connect with James:
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jamesjacobschultz
Connect with Elle:
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[00:00:41] Elle: I want to start with a behavior that feels a little ridiculous when you say it out loud, but I bet all of us do this. So here it is. You open Netflix, scroll for 15 minutes, then maybe jump over to Hulu, then Disney Plus, then maybe HBO, but somehow you end up rewatching The Office or Parks and Rec for the hundredth time.
[00:01:02] And then a few weeks later, you look at your credit card bill and think, "Wait, why am I paying for all of these subscriptions?" The entertainment industry is not the only one with a loyalty problem. All of us in SAS know this. Brands are no longer competing only on product quality or features. They're competing on habit, relevance, emotional connection, personalization, and the ability to continuously remind customers why they should stay. Today's episode is one of the most interesting examples I've seen of a PMM stepping directly into this challenge. We're talking about how Disney Plus approached customer loyalty in a category where consumers cancel subscriptions constantly, attention sh- can shift overnight, and everyone is fighting for recurring value perception.
[00:01:51] And I could not think of a better person to walk us through this than the PMM who built the program, James Schultz. James is currently at Netflix, [00:02:00] where he's thinking deeply about customer experience and the future of entertainment in an increasingly personalized world. But before Netflix, he led program strategy and development for not one but two major loyalty programs.
[00:02:15] First, DirecTV Perks, one of the first rewards programs in the entertainment industry. and he launched with the campaign TV That Loves You Back and gave away over $100,000 in prizes. And then most recently, he led Disney Plus Perks, which is still in its early days, but it has already shaped how streaming platforms think about loyalty.
[00:02:37] Oh, and here's a really fun fact. Outside of work, James is an avid volleyball player who competes across indoor, grass, and beach formats. He even played on an adult traveling team across the US and Canada, including a match at the Richmond Olympic Oval in British Columbia, the same venue used during the 2010 Winter Olympics.
[00:02:57] James, it's amazing to have you on the show.
[00:03:00] James: Likewise. Hi, Elle. What an intro. I think I found my new LinkedIn bio. I'm gonna have to like copy and paste
[00:03:06] all of
[00:03:06] Elle: Do it.
[00:03:08] James: Uh, I've also definitely seen "Parks and Recs" over 100 times, one of my go-to shows, so I totally feel that. Uh, but it's so great to be here and thanks for having me.
[00:03:17] Elle: Definitely. Yeah, I'm currently rewatching Parks and Rec right now, actually. I'm in, uh, about halfway through Season 2.
[00:03:23] James: So good
[00:03:25] Elle: It's so good. Okay, let's jump right in. So you're currently at Netflix, and I do wanna come back to that, but today's case study is really about your time at Disney. So for the first segment of our show, we're gonna jump into the case study segment, where we're talking all about how you helped create the first true customer loyalty program really for the whole entertainment/like streaming industry.
[00:03:49] So, and what's really fascinating about your story is that Disney had already had, has one of the strongest brands in the world, right? Like [00:04:00] massive emotional affinity. I feel like being like a Disney person has been a phrase that I've heard nearly my entire life. So I mean, we're talking like generational fandom.
[00:04:12] So I guess like even with all of that, streaming still created churn behavior, which is just what's so interesting here. So take us back to the moment when-- like think back to your time at Disney. What was happening with Disney+ when you realized like loyalty had become a much bigger business conversation?
[00:04:34] James: Yeah, definitely. So one, we love a Disney adult. that's like key. But we'll talk a little bit more about some of those audiences. I think before jumping into why loyalty as a business objective was so important, uh, I think it's important to set the stage of just the explosion of SVOD or streaming serv- streaming video on demand services in general, and what that landscape looked like.
[00:04:56] Um, 'cause we have all heard the term streaming wars, and that really kinda changed the trajectory of like how we consume entertainment. So when we're thinking about these new business ventures around SVOD services, there was this major uncertainty from investors that required focus on growth, growth, growth, right?
[00:05:14] How many s- who can get the most subscribers, um, and who can be the first to profitability, right? We needed to prove out the worth that this is an actual sustainable business venture for a lot of these entertainment studios as well. so when you think about like monitoring customer churn or like when you hear churn, it's really those that are deciding to cancel the service, albeit many different reasons.
[00:05:34] There's involuntary churn, um, but primarily it's voluntary churn. You're making a decision to say, "I wanna cancel this service." and that was always there. That was always looked at as a KPI, but I would say it probably took a back seat. As I mentioned earlier, a lot of it was focused around growth and growing that, that share of pie, and getting, uh, to profitability as quickly as possible.
[00:05:56] So I wanna note that, again, these are general industry tr- [00:06:00] trends. Um, not like isolating or calling out Disney specifically, but it's something that we monitor and we look at across the landscape. And again, it's not i- isolated to Disney+ per se, but like as growth slowed and some of these higher penetration markets like the US or even after some of these companies decided to go global, growth started to slow and we wanted to start looking at, you know, how do we retain our subscribers?
[00:06:25] So you start thinking about all of these macroeconomic factors, that are impacting consumers' wallets. Uh, you're looking at the many, many choices of SVOD services now with the introduction of HBO Max and Hulu and I mean, you name it, right? A- and I feel like there's so many direct-to-consumer streaming services now.
[00:06:44] you think about the content troughs where you have a big release and then maybe it goes quiet for a few months, and then another big release. those are all factors that, that play into what we call churn. Um, especially in like regulations in countries, which I think we'll talk about a little bit later.
[00:07:01] I'll, I'll double-click into this, which is, um, making it easy for people to cancel subscriptions just as easy as it is to sign up. So there's essentially lower friction for people to cancel. so all of this, I would say, kinda created this perfect storm, in essence. And when you're... previously you think about cable or satellite, where it was traditionally how we consumed entertainment, there were high switching costs.
[00:07:26] So you would think about, "Oh my God, I have to call, I have to schedule an appointment with a technician to come out, I have to pay installation fees to get all my equipment installed." You're getting locked into a contract.
[00:07:39] Elle: like real rip and replace costs, right,
[00:07:42] James: yep, you get the
[00:07:43] point, right?
[00:07:44] Elle: Yeah
[00:07:44] James: have to ship your old equipment back.
[00:07:46] So when you're thinking about this from a consumer lens, there was this almost like ingrained loyalty because of the high sw- switching cost, right? You stayed with DirecTV or you stayed with Dish Network or whatever your service provider was at the time, [00:08:00] Charter, because of that high switching cost.
[00:08:02] But now with SVOD services, you know, we're making it really easy for consumers to sign up but also cancel, so, and likely without commitments. so when you think about that, like that low switching cost kind of emphasizes the ability for consumers to churn and burn, and then sign up when they want to.
[00:08:20] So when you're thinking about growth, while it's still important to hit the profitability, you know, people were starting to get hit with frequent price increases with the SVOD services as well, right? Um, as people were cutting the cord, they're starting to replace those with multiple SVOD subscription services, and those costs start adding up.
[00:08:41] And as those... you have six services, you start seeing price increases across all of them, it starts to hit the wallet a bit. consumers start doing the math and adding it up and saying, "Okay, well what can I cut?" Right? And sometimes entertainment's one of the first to go. So that really created the moment where, again, consumers are constantly evaluating their wallets to see if price, matches what the value they're seeing in their, in their service.
[00:09:08] and if not, a cancellation request is incoming.
[00:09:11] Elle: Yeah. And we see that in SaaS too, um, even in B2B, it's an easy, if there's not that, especially if there's not that high switching costs, if a certain vendor is not, if there's not perceived value, then there's absolutely that shift into a different vendor.
[00:09:30] yeah, so it was kind of the task at hand.
[00:09:32] Like, how did you, you mentioned you had this big, um, these big trends that you were seeing just on a macro scale that were then trickling down and influencing your particular industry. Like, what did you do once you realized you were in that, in that situation?
[00:09:46] James: Yeah. Before I dive into that, have you heard of the leaky bucket?
[00:09:50] Elle: Oh, yes. Yeah, but let's like, like talk through it. Talk through it for our listeners
[00:09:53] James: Yeah. So imagine trying to fill a bucket with water, but it has holes at the bottom, right? You'll never be able to fill that [00:10:00] bucket unless you plug the holes. So in this metaphor, the bucket's your business, the water are your subscribers or your customers, uh, and the holes are churn, right?
[00:10:09] So how do you, how do you plug the leaky bucket? and to your-- our earlier point, even with the powerful fandom of Disney, we still experience subscriber churn, and that was a problem that needed to be solved. So we knew we had the loyal Disney fans, right? The ones that pass it on to their, their kids, um, and it keeps going.
[00:10:30] You have the people that go to Disneyland ritually, right? Um, but, but we also had those casual fans that maybe only resonated with maybe a few titles that were on service or a few of the franchises. I'm a prime example. I'm really only interested in "Star Wars" content. I didn't tell anyone at Disney that.
[00:10:49] and maybe some, maybe some National Geographic content. But these audiences are more likely to churn in between those content troughs that I, uh, spoke to earlier.
[00:10:59] Elle: Right. Oh, I'm, I'll come back when Mandalorian comes back.
[00:11:02] James: Exactly. And, you know, when you think about these audiences, the loyal and the casual fan, there's opportunities in both to improve retention.
[00:11:12] So the question we asked ourselves was: How can we leverage loyalty and harness the synergies of the Walt Disney Company as a retention tactic to plug a few of the holes?
[00:11:22] Elle: Mm-hmm.
[00:11:22] James: We knew this wasn't gonna solve everything, but even just a small reduction in churn had huge financial benefits for the company.
[00:11:30] Elle: I love that you thought about like, okay, well what is the, the big perceived value that Disney offers as a brand, not necessarily just the product of Disney+, and then leveraging that differentiator and seeing how can we kind of bring all this together. So, okay, what did this look like? Like, you kind of, you had these like big macro trends.
[00:11:54] You then, you know, know how you're gonna move forward with, somehow [00:12:00] leveraging, the broader value that Disney offers. So walk me through, like, the action that you took and how you actually, put this into play
[00:12:10] James: So I would say the first thing we wanted to do is really identify the problem. We talked a little bit about it, right? Around like, yes, there's this churn problem, which was essentially it was like, how do we reduce subscriber churn? We then looked at the data to determine what is that leading indicator for voluntary churn.
[00:12:27] Why are people canceling? you can probably give a guess at what it was. Um, I think, again, as I alluded to earlier, there's a lot of price sensitivity, price value. Um, so price was technically something that really stood out for us as we were looking at, at the data. So we said, "Okay, well, we can't reduce the subscription price."
[00:12:46] Like that's-- Wall Street will never allow that. so how can we just infer that there's this imbalance of price to value perception, and how can we increase that value of our subscription to justify the price that they're paying? our hypothesis was that by introducing subscriber rewards as part of their subscription, we could reduce churn for the treated population, or essentially those that are actually redeeming their rewards.
[00:13:12] But also on the broader landscape of like just the subscriber base in general, just knowing that we offer this type of program, there was this halo effect, um, where not as, as impactful as somebody redeeming a war- redeeming a reward, but also the ability to like know that that's available to them. Um, there's this halo effect that we assumed we would see as well.
[00:13:31] So after that, we, we conducted broad research. So we looked at existing Disney+ subscribers and non-Disney+ subscribers, because we also felt like there may be, like, an acquisition lens here as well, to really understand the types of rewards and benefits that each of these specific audiences would like to see or, or they would see value in.
[00:13:52] and that step was really imperative for the development of the program strategy, because we want to ensure that we were building something that consumers actually wanted, [00:14:00] and not just building something that we think they wanted. so we wanted to make sure everything we did was, was backed by data and insights.
[00:14:08] It was really interesting to see the research, which it pointed out, I mean, it's not a game changer for folks that are in the loyalty space. They know people like free access, uh, early access, freebies, sweepstakes, gamification elements. So think about, like, badge journeys. So, "Hey, I complete 'The Mandalorian' and I get a badge.
[00:14:26] I unlock something." and of course, discounts to other Disney benefits, uh, and business units like our consumer products, all our, you know, the Disney store or our parks, uh, all of those definitely rose to the top. So, and then a few other third-party partner rewards also floated to the top. So people like, like food delivery services like Uber, the likes of DoorDash, um, they kind of go hand-in-hand with entertainment.
[00:14:50] You know, you're watching something on the couch, you know, maybe I want, like, a buy one, get one free offer on, or free delivery or something like that on one of the, uh, s- food delivery subscription services. so that was great news for us because again, one of the reasons loyalty programs fail is, one, there's, like, a lack of rewards.
[00:15:06] Uh, two, the freshness of rewards, things can go stale very quickly. And then three, cost, right? Cost of procuring all of these rewards tends to get really expensive. But we saw huge opportunity for us by leveraging the synergy of the other Disney business units. Uh, we could have a large array of offers, keep them fresh, and keep our costs low.
[00:15:31] So again, taking a data-driven approach, we tested a few of those offers to validate our hypothesis before deciding to commit to a full loyalty program, cause that would be hard to walk back if we decided to launch and didn't have any indicators that this was gonna be successful.
[00:15:46] Elle: Right. Absolutely. So you took the time to really study the data to figure out, okay, well, what, why are some of those subscribers falling through the holes of our, of our bucket, right? And then after you dug [00:16:00] into that a little bit, then you tried to figure out, okay, now how do, can we leverage the rest of what Disney has to offer in a way that matches the perceived value that is, uh, motivating enough to keep a subscriber to stay, but then also doesn't get stale after a while.
[00:16:19] And so it feels like, ooh, something new. Ooh, something new. Oh, it's different now. Oh. So it kind of keeps the intrigue and interest, um, even during times when, speaking for myself, The Mandalorian may not be available. Well, that was myself b- before kids. Now it's like, kidding me? Disney has tremendous value.
[00:16:37] Like,
[00:16:39] James: all of it, yeah
[00:16:40] Elle: oh, yeah, every single pr- the, the entire princess collection.
[00:16:43] James: Yeah. My, my niece, she's, um, about to turn two and, you know, my brother and sister-in-law finally allowed them to start watching, TV, and she has gravitated to, to "Moana," and it's just, it's powerful to see what, like, a brand can do even for a kid at such
[00:16:59] Elle: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And, specifically for creating some of that loyalty, product marketers do have to lean into brand because that, uh, you can't not create a customer loyalty program without the support of the broader brand. I just, in my opinion, those have to go hand in hand. so okay.
[00:17:21] So let's talk about like the execution side of this. so you identified a potential solution, and then you hit some crossroads. Now, it sounds like you did some of this data and, now you kind of know what you wanna do. Did you then, like you built that out yourself? Feel like, do we move faster? Do we partner externally?
[00:17:40] I guess like ta- walk me through kind of that moment and how you decided to move forward.
[00:17:45] James: Yeah. I think it's pr- important to call out that s- we were, like, in an intere- interesting space, given that this was product marketing led, but we knew that Endstate was gonna be a loyalty product.
[00:17:56] and as you mentioned earlier, like, I had the experience at DirecTV of [00:18:00] building a loyalty product from scratch or, like, they like to say zero to one.
[00:18:04] and we knew at Disney+ that others were starting to look at the landscape and beginning to find unique ways to drive value. And to your point, I think we had to pitch the idea to senior leaders and C-level execs at Disney. But one of the decision points was really to build it or buy it, and there's pros and cons of each, right?
[00:18:23] There's building it, it would take
[00:18:26] Elle: And when-- Sorry, so to ju- I don't, to interrupt you, when you say building it, you mean like the customer loyalty program itself,
[00:18:31] right? Yeah. Okay. Sorry. Okay.
[00:18:34] James: Yeah. And I guess the two options, building it internally versus, "Hey, we're gonna go and source, a partner to leverage like a loyalty SaaS product and integrate." So those were kind of our two options. So the building or buying it, of it.
[00:18:47] and to go back to the building part, right, we know that we're always fighting for internal resourcing, uh, so it likely would take longer to get put on the roadmap and to build, p- ses- essentially pulling engineering resourcing away from maybe another high priority project, not making it on the roadmap at all because it was such, it was so marketing led, it's hard to fit that into a larger product roadmap.
[00:19:10] or even if it did, it may take us years to build something because, We're building a streaming product. We're not building a loyalty SaaS product. Um, and there's also this risk of tech debt, right? Of like continuously having to allocate resourcing to improve that product that we're building internally.
[00:19:26] so
[00:19:27] Elle: that tech debt is so real too, especially in like the broader SaaS world. So I, I think that would resonate a lot with a lot of PMMs who are kind of facing the like build versus, versus buy
[00:19:37] James: Buy, exactly. Uh, there, there is an upside though, right? Of building something because you can build it the way you want it. You can make it uniquely Disney. You could limit the cost to essentially, like a big one-time capital expenditure cost. Um, you-- of course, you would have like the ongoing maintenance of that product, but you wouldn't have this like subscription model with a partner that you're [00:20:00] constantly, is hit- hitting your bottom line.
[00:20:03] And the buy approach, right? That, that's another option that we weighed. The pros of it being kind of the out-of-box solutions with some level of customization, so we could still make it feel somewhat Disney. It would help with speed to market, which was really important for us. Um, we knew everyone else in the landscape was likely feeling the same pressures we were, and likely exploring very similar alternatives
[00:20:25] to
[00:20:25] Elle: Yeah. You mentioned a lot of those, like, macro trends, industry trends, and that plays a role in your strategy, right? Like, there's a reason why you you did that initial work of seeing what was happening and how that was influencing your business. It's probably influencing your co- competitor's business too
[00:20:40] James: Exactly. Uh, and then when you're thinking about like resource, like we can't say what's gonna take zero resourcing away even if you go with a, a buy solution. But the scale compared to somebody like allocating a whole tiger team to build a product versus I need some engineers to help with some level of integration is pretty isolated.
[00:20:59] and we would have no tech debt since again, as I said, stated earlier, partnering with a loyalty SaaS product, they're the subject matter experts in the field. They're continuously updating, enhancing their products, and we reap the benefits of that. and the cons is kind of the complexity of integrating with a partner.
[00:21:17] Um, I think you're in the SaaS space, you know, it's, it's never an easy of a flip of a switch, sadly. so th- that was something that we, we kept front of mind for us as we were making this decision, and also again, not being fully customizable and just the ongoing cost. So again, pros and cons of each. for me the decision was pretty obvious.
[00:21:35] I had my recommendation to buy versus build. again, for me it came down to we're an SVOD service. We're not building loyalty solutions, or products for loyalty solutions, and that we should keep our engineers focused on the Disney+ experience and allow loyalty SaaS providers to do what they do best.
[00:21:53] We needed the speed of market. We wanted to be the first mover in the space, and ideally we wanted to tout [00:22:00] that we were the first in the streaming landscape, uh, to launch such an initiative as loyalty.
[00:22:05] So when we think about, sharing this with leadership, I feel like it was very contentious. a lot of leaders at Disney wanted the build route.
[00:22:12] there was a lot of ways we were going with even just different internal tools of building those internally. But, ultimately we aligned that buy was, was the best decision for the spot we were at currently. So we kicked off the RFP, uh, request for proposal, for those that don't know the acronym, to a lot of loyalty SaaS providers.
[00:22:33] I think the list was like 50 long. and I ensured to the-- to ensure it was very collaborative because it s- was still product marketing led, but I wanted to assemble a tiger team, marketing, data analytics, product engineering, you name it, to really sit in on those conversations and watch the demos so we could make a unified decision on who the best partner would be.
[00:22:55] I didn't wanna do it in a vacuum, and this is one of the f- only times an initiative this large was being led by the marketing organization. And, that created some tension again at the top between marketing and product leadership of should this be product led or marketing led. Uh, and we ultimately landed that it best fit letting marketing continue to lead, in close collaboration with the rest of the teams with, for integration.
[00:23:22] Elle: I am so glad that it ended up being product marketing owning the project. I mean, one, because then you can come on here and talk about it. But, um, also because I have always felt that a product marketer's job when we, like, really, like, oversimplify it maybe, is to take context outside w- from the market, from our customers, from our competitors, and then bring it back in to drive strategy, and that's really what this was.
[00:23:49] It's a big strategic initiative, and it... I'm just, I think it's, uh, spot on to have PMM own it. Um, but I do think a lot of product marketers probably struggle with that. Like, this kind of [00:24:00] initiative, at least in the SAS world, would very often fall within, like, there's a whole team who's responsible for customer marketing or customer loyalty.
[00:24:08] and I'm curious, do you-- Was there, like, a customer loyalty or customer marketing team within Disney Plus, or was it all just kind of within product marketing?
[00:24:17] James: It was all within product marketing. We had different parts of the business, like lifecycle marketing that would do,
[00:24:22] you know, the outreach and the emails and push notifications. But there was, but there wasn't this centralized force or organization or business unit, whatever you
[00:24:30] wanna call it. product marketers were
[00:24:33] that team.
[00:24:34] Um, so I had a team of six people, a mix of p- product managers and product marketers that were assembled to lead this initiative. So
[00:24:43] Elle: I love that. It's the, the, cross-functional team. It's, it's good that everyone kind of aligned on that. okay. Uh, so this was such a strategic moment, for you and for your career, and especially now where I think product marketers are, not only are they fighting with each other with this like, you know, in the immer- world of AI that we are all immersed in, but like also fighting with AI of, uh, you know, build versus buy my product.
[00:25:12] so let's not go down th- that rabbit hole, but I think this is such a timely conversation around how to retain your customers and to meet that perception of value. so let's turn this into a playbook. Let's say that, you know, you're coaching me on, I'm a totally different industry, not streaming entertainment business, but I have this problem where there are market dynamics at play where I'm starting to see churn within certain segments of my business.
[00:25:45] What do I do to try to build up a retention or a loyalty program? Like, what's step one?
[00:25:50] James: Yeah, I would say step one is understanding your customer cancellation behavior and the value perception there. Do your research, whether it's partnering with your data analytics [00:26:00] team, your customer service teams, customer success, success teams,
[00:26:04] or even doing out customer support. Yeah, exactly. Or outside research.
[00:26:08] Ideally, it would be a combination of all three, so you can get a comprehensive 360-degree view of customer pain points, qualitative, quantitative data to really inform your problem statement and form your hypothesis.
[00:26:21] Elle: Yeah. So like I could see myself doing something like pulling CRM data to try to figure out if there was like a reason for cancellation, um, sourcing support tickets. Like, okay, did s- did, did out of all of these particular customers who canceled, had they submitted support tickets? Had they, you know, kind of like what are all of these possible data sources in front of me that I can dig into to better understand what caused the cancellation?
[00:26:48] And then even going as far as like having just an interview conversation with them. Harder to do in the consumer world, but in B2B it's a bit easier to do, have those kinds of conversations.
[00:26:58] James: you'll be surprised how many customers are actually willing to give feedback.
[00:27:04] Elle: Oh, good. Oh, good. Yeah, I would imagine it would just be hard to have a one-on-one with a consumer
[00:27:10] James: And, uh, there's different touchpoints. I mean, there's, uh, speaking from experience again, we've, we've seen calls, people calling into customer support just to give a recommendation of the, a product feature enhancement that then, that's then tracked by customer support and
[00:27:23] fed back to product marketing and product.
[00:27:25] You know, we have, uh, surveys that go out, um, that are a little bit more quantitative, um, or focus groups. You know what I mean? People are so willing to, to give feedback, which I, I find is, um, very astounding and super helpful for product marketers.
[00:27:39] Elle: I love that. I love that. I'm gonna rattle off a couple other things that kind of, uh, come to my mind when I think about, like, studying, like, reasons why consumers cancel, especially, like, just, just to kind of touch for my, like, B2B SaaS marketers. I think, uh, sourcing sales call scri- scripts too, transcripts, to see, like, what's kind of like happening [00:28:00] there.
[00:28:00] Maybe even, like, before it gets to the cancellation point. So going back in history and figuring, "Okay, how did we get to this point?" You know, they clearly were a customer at one point, but somehow we lost them. So how did we get from, from A to B? So picking maybe, like, a few marquee customers that you lost and trying to follow their entire customer journey.
[00:28:18] Like, where, where was it starting to fall off? And any resources you have at your disposal to kind of guide you through that historic journey I think would be super valuable as well. Okay. So step one was to understand why your customers are canceling to begin with. So what's next? What's step two?
[00:28:36] James: I would say double-click into that data and start identifying some of those different customer loyalty profiles or audiences. I think you named it, like looking at some of those marquee folks can help create like lookalikes, right? and when you start thinking about those, those ins- insights from step one and identifying those audiences, you can do that depending on your resourcing.
[00:28:59] But at Disney, luckily, we had some advanced modeling, um, people that are way smarter than me as it relates to data, where you can start seeing their behaviors, and see how they engage or lack thereof, uh, with your product or service. Uh, for us, you know, we identified, again, the loyal Disney fans who had really high engagement on Disney+ and a lower propensity to churn, meaning less likelihood to churn, another fancy way to say that.
[00:29:25] and then the casual fans, so that low to medium engagement on Disney+ and a higher propensity to churn. And we found that, hey, the latter is really gonna be our target audience, but still understood that the loyal Disney fans would be secondary to that, just to continue fostering that strong connection between the cons- consumer and the brand because they are our big- biggest advocates.
[00:29:48] So again, double-clicking into, into the data and start creating some of these audiences or personas that you can then say, "Okay, these are the people, these are our target audiences that we're going after, and here's how we can [00:30:00] tackle that."
[00:30:00] Elle: Yeah, so it's a classic segmentation. Like, okay, of all of our subscribers, including the ones we churn, This is interesting because you're taking, you're, you're applying basically a, practice or exercise of segmentation that you would normally apply to basically the broader market, but instead you're hyper-focusing it on specifically your customers, your paying customers, and then doing the segmentation to figure out, like, degrees of loyalty and reasons and value perceived behind each of those so that as you're building out, I'm guessing where this is going, as you're building out the actual program itself, you can prioritize which of those segments are going to ha- see the biggest return on that
[00:30:47] James: Nail, nail on the head. Yes, exactly. So
[00:30:51] Elle: I'm learning, I'm
[00:30:52] learning, I'm gonna be ... I'm taking notes for my next loyalty program. I've never built one, so um, okay, so then what's step three after I do this, like, mini segmentation customer double-click on customer data internally?
[00:31:06] James: Yeah. And this might be a little easier on the direct-to-consumer side, but when you think about loyalty, I think it's important to think about it beyond just the core product experience. Um, you know, we like to think around product enhancements to improve loyalty and retention, saying like, "Oh, this feature is gonna create less friction, therefore it's gonna generate loyalty and retention."
[00:31:29] And while that's true, we knew that there was a price value issue and consumers wanted more value for the price that they were paying. And after the research, you know, we started to test specific offers to those specific audiences, right? Being able to segment the casual fans had very different wants and needs than the Disney loyal fans.
[00:31:48] So being able to, to test and validate our hypothesis with different rewards, was, was super helpful, insightful for us. Uh, at the end of the day, our hypothesis was validated, but I do wanna be clear that, you know, we [00:32:00] still needed to make sure that whatever we were building was still heavily attributed back to streaming.
[00:32:05] So although we were giving rewards that may be outside Disney Plus, like, "Hey, we-- get free tickets to go to the parks or win a sweepstakes for a National Geographic cruise," it was always tied back to Disney Plus. It was unlock this as a subscriber, right? We wanted the attribution because at the end of the day, we didn't want to end up in the consumer's mind of like, "Why is Disney Plus offering this?
[00:32:30] This is so odd." So there has t- there had to be this correlation back to the Disney Plus service.
[00:32:38] Um,
[00:32:38] Elle: course. Yeah.
[00:32:40] James: for us.
[00:32:40] Elle: Yeah, so I'm, again, like I'm kind of translating. I'm trying to strip out like the context and like translate it back to like if I'm like in SAS that if I'm digg- looking at this particular customer segment and I'm understanding like, what is the perceived value?
[00:32:59] Like let's take away the monetary value for a minute and like actual business outcomes, like what are they trying to get out of using my product? And take the spirit of that and then try to understand what else can I offer them that can validate what they're trying to get out of my product or offering, and now put that monetary dollar amount back in.
[00:33:24] Be like, "Okay, so it was just this that you were trying to get from being a subscriber, and you like this. Now I'm gonna give you all these other things," and it doesn't, you know, it offsets my cost for XYZ reasons, but you're still paying the same amount but now, but you have all of these other opportunities that just kind of validate the reasons why you became a s- subscriber in the first place.
[00:33:49] That's kind of how I'm imagining it. Is that kind of the right way to think
[00:33:52] James: Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And some interesting findings that we saw, I just wanna like loop back around to an example is, you know, we had [00:34:00] National Geographic content on service. We partnered with that team for, it was like, I think a seven-day cruise to the Galapagos Islands, which is like one really cool.
[00:34:08] I wish I could, could've won that sweepstakes,
[00:34:11] right? Um, and it was really interesting to see that, one, we had a really high level of entries, but second to that, we saw a huge increase in National Geographic content being watched on service.
[00:34:26] So there's this, like, even though we're doing-- we're thinking beyond the core product experience as far as rewards, it was tying back to business objectives of higher engagement on platform, which then ultimately is, uh, reduces churn as well.
[00:34:42]
[00:34:42] Elle: Right, right. I love that. So the, again, like I'm gonna repeat what you said that step three was, like to think beyond the core product experience. And again, if I'm thinking of like how this would apply in like a, you know, a SaaS world, maybe beyond that product experience doesn't necessarily come from your partn- from your, um, from your internal company, but maybe it's a, it's a business partner.
[00:35:05] Um, so I'm even imagining like if there are particular industries or use cases where you go to market with a particular partner, maybe there's ways that you can add partners into the mix to increase that perceived value.
[00:35:19] Um, so I, I really like that step of like, as you're thinking about crafting the actual loyalty program itself to think beyond that core product experience.
[00:35:31] Okay. So what's the next step here?
[00:35:33] James: I would say the next step is, this one is probably the, the most crucial, is just evaluating speed, resources, and your strategic differentiation. So I'll keep this one short because I know we just spoke at length about this already, but I do think it's important to weigh all your possible options since no business is the same.
[00:35:53] Does it make sense for you to launch a loyalty program? The answer's not always
[00:35:56] yes. But again, we're all fighting for [00:36:00] resourcing. We're always up against the clock to ship something, and what are the trade-offs for any decision you make? Do you have a set date that needs to be, it needs to be launched by?
[00:36:10] Um, is it driven by leadership, right? Have they set a date that you need to meet? That's all gonna impact your decisions. Um, is it aligning to a larger brand moment or is the desire, like what Disney+ was, kind of be the first mover in this space? All of these are, are different forces that are kind of gonna help you make, make the right decision.
[00:36:29] Um, do you have the resources internally to build something and maintain it? Um, do you have the funds and the commitment from leadership, right? Is this a top-down alignment or do you need to create that top-down alignment? Which is critical in order to be successful. Leadership needs to be bought in. Um, so again, all of these questions need to be answered, but I don't-- it, it doesn't need to, you don't need to do it in a silo.
[00:36:55] Again, collaboration across the organization is so important. One, you get buy-in, but most importantly, number two, you ensure that there aren't any blind spots in your decision. So you'll be surprised about how many partners we evaluated, and I was like, "Oh yeah, this is the one." Like, "Let's sign it tomorrow."
[00:37:13] And, you know, it came down to, like, and engineering spoke up and was like, "We're not gonna be able to integrate with them." Like, "Th- this would be impossible." Um, and, like, having those people in the room that are looking at it from a different lens was so critical. And again, for us, it came down to speed to market, limited resourcing, and competing with company priorities.
[00:37:34] So, um, yeah. Again, that was kind of all of that
[00:37:38] and and that kind of culminated into the decision. But again, evaluating speed, your resourcing, and then how are you gonna differentiate yourself, um, with the competition? How do you,
[00:37:51] Elle: Yeah.
[00:37:52] James: your program unique?
[00:37:53] Elle: So I'm-- Those are the way that I'm, um, imagining your entire playbook built out. [00:38:00] Here's how I'm thinking about it. Let me know if this, like, jives with you. I'm thinking, like, your step one was to just, like, get immersed in the research, then go, "Why are you seeing churn," et cetera. Step two was like, okay, then that was that, like, segmentation analysis of your existing customers.
[00:38:15] And then step three was to think beyond the core product experience as you're trying to dream out, okay, what does this loyalty program actually look like? I feel like your step four is actually in parallel to all of that. It's like wra- it's all of that wrapped up in, like, the true go-to-market strategy for this particular loyalty program.
[00:38:35] And it's, um... I would-- How I would do this would be like your step four is kind of happening, uh, simultaneously as you're doing all those other three steps, right? Like, and you're, you create that tiger team as you talked about doing at Disney, right? Like, you create that tiger team, and you're coming together with the analysis that you're doing and, you know, you're having checkpoints, you're doing feedback loops, like, kind of constantly as you're doing some of those, like, some of that analysis.
[00:39:03] And especially for the dreaming up, like your step three, I could imagine that being so valuable to have, like, someone from product, someone from customer life cycle marketing, someone from, you know, engineering. Like, everyone who would be part of bringing this loyalty program to the world could help, um, enhance all of those, like your step one through three.
[00:39:29] What do you think of that? Like, is that something that you'd recommend that I do?
[00:39:33] James: Yeah, definitely. And again, I think this is all kind of the buildup to that moment, but I think there's, like, another step we're also missing is, like, the execution,
[00:39:42] right? Um, so it's all great, right? I
[00:39:47] think-- Yeah, just minor things, right? I mean, you know, your s- your program's only gonna be as successful as your execution, and I think that's another important step to, to consider.
[00:39:57] Um, 'cause I know we talked a lot about, like, the [00:40:00] building program and
[00:40:02] Elle: I, uh, I did ask you how to build it, to be fair.
[00:40:06] James: But I think it would be amiss for us not to talk about this, like, step five essentially is, like, execution. Um, and I can't come up with, like, a fancier title for this step, which you could probably do. But I, I think that's something that we noticed too is you could have the best strategy in the world, but if you lack execution, that's where something can fail.
[00:40:29] So being really cognizant, um, and have a plan in place, you know, not only what's your program strategy, but how do you get p- how do you position this in the marketplace? How do you message it? Um, and how do you kinda keep the lights on after your launch, right? Um, so just some things to, to think about, and maybe that could be a whole nother episode of, you know, after you build it, how do you market it?
[00:40:52] Elle: Yeah. We're gonna ... We, we should do a part two. Okay, I want to ask you a few questions before we move on to the next segment. So I would be remiss not to not ask about this. Um, so this, uh, program that you built at Disney+ was a pre-AI, for the most part, initiative. How do you think about customer loyalty programs and cus- managing customers' expectations, like, in, in the new world that we're in today with AI just kind of, like, bombarding us on a daily basis?
[00:41:32] James: every which way. Uh, I love it though. Um, I will say AI is really enabling us to move faster and personalize experiences better than ever before. And, um, I like to think of like pre-AI loyalty programs or experiences in general like static images. They're fixed, they're one size fits all, probably a bit passive.
[00:41:57] Um, and then AI kind of [00:42:00] transforms it all. Like, you're now in this like live adaptive experience where things are like responding to your actions. You're-- It's more personalized, uh, and it's constantly evolving b- and like learning based off of your input and output. Um, it really just enables us to build something that's a little bit more dynamic and custom.
[00:42:20] So like my experience, like if I could do this all over again post-AI, I would love to have something that's very tailored to that individual person. So Elle, you could log in to Disney+ and get a whole different experience than if I logged in into Disney+, um, the program or even the experience in general.
[00:42:42] And I don't know, it's just truly remarkable the, the, the, the pace at which AI is helping evolve product experiences. And I know AI had a bad rap for like a minute.
[00:42:53] Elle: I think it still kind thing?" rap but, but it also has a, like a very hopeful,
[00:42:59] you
[00:43:00] James: Exactly.
[00:43:00] Elle: I would say
[00:43:01] James: Yeah, I think if it's done right, if it's done right, um, and there's guardrails in place, I
[00:43:06] I
[00:43:06] Elle: Guardrails for sure, yeah
[00:43:08] James: see this consumer mental model shift of starting to see the value in, in AI, and it's helping their everyday life or just making things more one-to-one, I would
[00:43:19] Elle: Yeah. Yeah. If I'm thinking about it, like just the way consumer behavior is changing with AI, right? And like now we are bringing a lot more context to our digital footprint when we use some of these, um, LLMs, for example. So leveraging just that behavior of consumers, and how does that, how does that influence the way that they behave then with your product in particular?
[00:43:49] And how can you take that context and create an experience or a loyalty program that is best fit with that one-to-one subscriber that you
[00:43:58] James: Exactly. [00:44:00] Yeah. You think about like logging in, 'cause I mean, right now it's we're gonna offer this offer to everyone that logs in. It now could be we're offering this pr- this, uh, what is the saying? Right offer to the right person at the right time is essentially where we wanna get to, and I think AI helps enable that.
[00:44:23] Elle: Yeah. We're con- that's been a phrase that I've heard as a product marketer for a while now, but I think it's something that we're constantly trying to improve on. Um, so it's, yeah, it's kind of exciting to see how it can go with guardrails in like in a non-creepy way, of
[00:44:38] course.
[00:44:39] James: Exactly.
[00:44:39] Elle: Okay. So you're at Netflix now.
[00:44:42] So what lessons from this playbook are you taking with you in your role at Netflix?
[00:44:47] James: Honestly, so many learnings. Um, you know, as product marketers, our primary stakeholders are product managers for the most part. Um, so I think for me, it's just really being able to understand the why behind something, like working upstream to help shape and drive product strategy, um, based on consumer research and audience analysis.
[00:45:11] I think it's so important to really have a seat at the table upstream to, again, drive that product strategy. We aren't just about go-to-market. It-- Like, I think it's so important to be part of that early product development, giving feedback on designs, um, in product copy, just ensuring that we're building something our consumers actually want.
[00:45:31] Um, and it ma- at the end of the day, like when we're part of that upstream and we understand the product in its entirety, it makes it so much easier for us as product marketers to position it later on and message that to, to drive the, the adoption and, and usage of that. Uh, one other thing I was thinking about is really the, the...
[00:45:53] what we talked around, around like beyond the core product experience. Again, sometimes PMs are just so focused on shipping new [00:46:00] features or enhancements for the product that they're working on, that sometimes they don't really have a pulse on the strategies outside of the product. For example, um, you know, how can we as PMMs drive value through other important moments during a customer lifecycle stage?
[00:46:16] Um, for example, highlighting features to drive adoption and usage that may have like lost priority. Like maybe it was a feature that was built two years ago. We had a huge launch and it's super valuable to the company, but kind of like lost priority. So how does PMM step in and say, "Hey, how can we continue advancing usage of this feature, build awareness, drive adoption that ul- ultimately drives business outcomes?"
[00:46:42] Um, again, we wanna highlight all the great work that our product teams do. Um, and I don't know. We just have to start thinking about things like at Netflix, right? What is, what's beyond content? That's something that I keep thinking about here at Netflix. We have such a strong content slate, and if you look at any advertisement around Netflix, it's very content focused, right?
[00:47:02] It's "Stranger Things," it's "Wednesday," but there is so much work that our product teams do to make our Netflix members have such a delightful experience when they're opening the application and using it. And I think it's, um, a big opportunity for us to see how do we start marrying product innovation with content narratives, um, whether it's through advertisements or even just some of our, our messaging and positioning within the product, um, and o- and off service marketing.
[00:47:31] So just some things I'm thinking about is like Again, to recap, one, sitting within like a product management space with loyalty programs, um, I think helps me a lot just understanding the ins and outs of what I'm gonna market eventually. And then two, just ensuring that I'm thinking holistically beyond just the product experience.
[00:47:51] Elle: Yeah. That's so powerful the way that you described that. Um, and it reminds me of something that I heard, I can't remember who I got it from, some [00:48:00] other product marketing influencer voice would talk about how product marketers are responsible for deeply understanding what it is about your product that is truly remarkable to your target audience.
[00:48:16] And it sounds like that's some of the work that you're doing, like beyond just content, as you said. Like what about maybe it's a feature, maybe it's an ex- a certain product experience that not, isn't necessarily consuming content, but maybe it's something else that's just a delightful feature that kind of like captures the, you know, the loyalty, the retention, et cetera.
[00:48:38] So I really appreciate that thought. Yeah. Okay, my last question for you on this topic, James. What's one last piece of advice you have for a PMM who is in the midst of building a con- a customer loyalty program?
[00:48:50] James: Yeah, this is a good question. Um, I think I touched on it lightly before, but I would say don't fall for the fallacy of build it and they will come. Do the upfront work of identifying the problem through research, data analysis, come up with a hypothesis, validate that, that hypothesis through testing, and then develop a loyalty program strategy.
[00:49:13] Just ensuring that it doesn't feel transactional but emotional. It's tied to the brand. That's, that's really the sweet spot. And again, as I stated earlier, you may find that loyalty is probably not gonna move the needle for you, and it may be it's okay to say, "Hey, this isn't gonna move the needle and maybe this isn't our best option."
[00:49:33] Uh, but you have to have that discipline to look at the data and say, "Okay, this is gonna work," or, "We wanna continue testing before we're agreeing to something." Again, this is just to really ensure that what you're building is what your customers say that they want. Um, again, and the work doesn't stop when you launch.
[00:49:51] The likelihood of you getting everything within your, your first launch, like the wish list essentially for MVP, is, is not likely. So [00:50:00] you're gonna have to constantly evaluate results, improve where you can based on insights, customer feedback, all of that fun stuff. But yeah, just, just be, be, be very, uh, aware of the build it and they will come fallacy and just make sure that there's data that's backing up the justification to move forward.
[00:50:18] Elle: Yeah. I, I love that. And something that as you were talking, what made me think of is that, like, sometimes reward programs don't have to be so, like, transactional feeling, especially with, you know, the, I'll say the hopefulness that we have around with AI. It can feel more like relational intelligence, and remembering that there's a person behind the screen who is interacting with your product.
[00:50:46] And to, the closer you can get to the one-on-one feeling is probably gonna feel a little bit more... The customer will feel more understood and, you know, eager, willing to stick around.
[00:50:58] James: Agreed. Yeah, and just to add to that, I think you hit on an important point of this emotional relationship, right? I think what we launched when I was there, um, was very MVP. Like, this was like bare bones, let's get something out. The ideas, um, for the future of this program are out of this world. Um, it'll take some time to get there, but I know that the team that is now leading it, um, I, I'm very close with them.
[00:51:29] They're doing a fantastic job of, of, uh, of getting it to, to that vision that we had early on. Um, so y- I can't wait for everyone to
[00:51:38] follow should bring him on. We should bring him on and have like a part two. We can do like a, we can do like a three-person interview. You can kind of like recap the like the early days, the vision, and then they can kind of chime in. Okay, I love it. We're gonna do it. All right, so now it's time for the next segment of our show. This is the messaging critique. This is where, [00:52:00] as product marketing experts, we get to analyze real-world messaging. And the fun part is, James, as the guest of my show, you get to pick the company that we are critiquing today.
[00:52:09] Elle: Really quickly, I'm gonna run through some ground rules. You're gonna pick a company, or you have picked a company that, um, you are the target audience or you know the target audience really well. It kind of makes it more fair to do a critique. And you're gonna tell me what stood out to you about the messaging, um, something you wish the product marketer would've considered differently, and then we'll iterate a little bit on how they can take it to the next level.
[00:52:32] So without... Yeah, without further ado, please share the company that we are critiquing today
[00:52:37] James: So I'm gonna do a full 180 on you because, um, I don't know if it was fair for me to critique another, like, entertainment provider or in the SVOD space. So I'm gonna do, uh, BODYARMOR, the sports drink.
[00:52:50] Elle: I know it.
[00:52:51] I've had it.
[00:52:52] Tell me more. Tell me more. Like, a little bit, like, yeah, just for our listeners. Get the listeners up to speed
[00:52:58] James: Yeah. So I don't-- I wanna do them justice. I'm, I'm pulling from their website, um, quickly on just like what they are because I think a lot of people will conflate... I think there's like Bodyarmor phone cases.
[00:53:09] There's also
[00:53:09] Elle: true. Yes, there's a ton of different products out there with similar names. Yeah
[00:53:12] James: So, uh, it was founded by Mike Repole in 2011, and he went out to challenge the status quo.
[00:53:19] He was tired of outdated sports drinks and artificial ingredients, so he created Bodyarmor with a clear mission to deliver a better-for-you sports drink made with no artificial dyes, flavors, or sweeteners, packed with potassium-rich electrolytes, antioxidants, and coconut water. Um, and the, his ethos is choose better.
[00:53:43] And in 2021, Coca-Cola fully acquired Bodyarmor under the ONE Powerhouse hydration portfolio alongside Powerade. So, they have quite a few products, uh, but I wanted to hone in on Bodyarmor Lyte, uh, which [00:54:00] is the coconut water-based, um, healthy sports drink with the no artificial dyes and only 25 calories. Um, I'm a big calorie counter.
[00:54:08] Elle: Yeah.
[00:54:09] James: so
[00:54:10] Elle: walk us through Yelp. Like, what's, what yeah really well?
[00:54:14] James: Um, this one was hard for me, honestly.
[00:54:18] Elle: Yeah.
[00:54:20] James: It's, um,
[00:54:20] Elle: is hard, yeah
[00:54:22] James: uh, if you were to visit their site, they tend to have individual pages for each of their product. Their hero page is talking about one of their newer releases, which is like, I would say probably combating, um, or, or competing with that of like Celsius.
[00:54:38] Um, but if you were to like look at just their larger positioning, um, or messaging, they're leaning heavily into the ethos that I mentioned previously
[00:54:49] of Choose
[00:54:49] better. Yeah, exactly, rewrite your routine. Um, and for me, I mean, I liked that. I assume they're trying to convey of like, "Hey, switch up your routine.
[00:55:01] Choose a better sports drink." I think healthier is implied here, but I don't know. It was kinda hard for me. Like I know their target audience is, you know, probably athletes, um, you know, people that want a healthier option, um, like
[00:55:16] myself,
[00:55:17] where
[00:55:17] Elle: probably people who are like somewhat health conscious, who exercise on a regular basis, who care about having, you know, a drink with electrolytes, um, but maybe who get frustrated by having things like artificial dyes. You know? I mean, I'm constantly looking at labels to see ingredients and things like artificial or added sweeteners and stuff.
[00:55:44] I'm like, "Nah," it's, it's usually a pass for me, but I still want a lot of that.
[00:55:48] You
[00:55:48] know? Or maybe like, yeah
[00:55:50] exactly, like an alternative to coconut water, right? Like could be, um, something, like maybe a similar, like an adjacent audience, right? [00:56:00] That's kind of what I'm thinking. Okay, so what they're doing really well maybe is like starting to capture some of that with that, you know, um, it seems a little bit like aspirational a bit, like choose better, like hopeful, encouraging.
[00:56:15] Um, so like what w- as you kind of think through that, on the flip side of that then, what do you think, what do you wish the PMM would've considered differently? I don't even know if they have PMMs, but let's assume that they do. They probably have just like a brand team or like an agency, but
[00:56:33] James: That, that sounds like a brand slogan. Um,
[00:56:36] Elle: does, yeah
[00:56:37] James: uh, I guess a little quick backstory. So I came across this at Costco last year, um,
[00:56:42] and like it's part of our shopping list. Yeah.
[00:56:46] It's part of our shopping list. I'm very sad when it's not there. Um, somebody probably forgot to place the order. Um, but it's-- Again, it's-- For the messaging for me, it falls a bit flat.
[00:56:56] Uh, like as an avid consumer, I... If I saw this, like I just always think about a billboard. Like you have like three seconds to capture an audience, right? Um, if you're like driving down a freeway or something. So if I saw this in a picture of a billboard, I always think of it in that way. I would just think it was another sports drink.
[00:57:15] If it was that and it said, "Choose better, rewrite your routine," for me, I would be like, "Oh, well, why would I go with this? I'll just drink Powerade," Yeah. or, or some other sports drink.
[00:57:26] Elle: Maybe not quite motivating enough. Like, 'cause it
[00:57:29] seems like, yeah, yeah, 'cause it seems like the choose better, rewrite your routine, it's definitely punchy, but it's almost like if there's... It's kind of missing the, like, why,
[00:57:43] you know? Like, it's not, um... And maybe it's there in some context, and like, no, we had, just haven't seen it.
[00:57:50] But sorry, I'll let you kind of keep talking
[00:57:52] James: No, good. I, and I do know they like list a lot of the ingredients, um, on the bottle itself where it's like no artificial dyes, [00:58:00] but it's, it's hard for somebody to see, right? Like you have to-- There's some intent there that you're curious to see what this is, but you need to first create that awareness of like what this is to even pick up the bottle.
[00:58:11] And, um, like for me, I think choose better, like to your point, like what am I choosing better? I'm not sure. And, you know, how am I gonna rewrite r- m- my, rewrite my routine by doing this? For me, it's like it's more fulfilling a need at the moment 'cause I need to quench my thirst. So I think the routine is, is, uh, is a bit of a stretch.
[00:58:32] I don't know. For
[00:58:32] Elle: Yeah. Yeah. I bet they're-- I wonder if maybe they're kind of tr- getting at or hinting to people who have their, like, their go-to, right? 'Cause BODYARMOR, because they came a little bit later to the sports drink conversation, they, um, they're probably trying to wedge themselves into an audience that has their, like, go-to drink that they buy.
[00:58:56] Like, you now have BODYARMOR on your standard, you know, Costco purchase list. Other people probably have, like, whether it's Powerade or, you know, Gatorade or, you know, whatever it is. Um, I wonder if there's, like, that's kind of what they're hinting at, but theirs is the, like, healthier, quote-unquote, alternative.
[00:59:17] okay, so what do you think they could do to take it to the next level? What would you like to see them? How would you-- how could you imagine that they, like, really take off with their differentiation?
[00:59:25] James: Yeah. So I'm, like, not a copywriter by trade, but I think it could be something more compelling around, you know, pure hydration without the fake stuff you can't pronounce. Like, kind of like being a little cheeky about it, like poke fun at the competition. Um, or even like, I think the coconut water is a huge differentiator.
[00:59:48] Elle: I didn't even know that, and I've like,
[00:59:50]
[00:59:50] Elle: I've consumed a lot of body armor.
[00:59:52] James: Yeah. It's, it's, it's coconut water, so it's like, you know, coconut, coconut water sports drink, no fake stuff, 25 [01:00:00] calories. Like, for me, that would catch my eye. One, I'm like, I'm really not a fan of coconut water, but I know how helpful it is for hydration. It just, for me, I can't do the taste, but to know that something is like mango-based and like coconut water with 25 calories, like for me, that would really draw my attention and make me wanna learn more.
[01:00:21] Um, Yeah
[01:00:23] I feel like there needs to be more emphasis on that
[01:00:26] Elle: I really--
[01:00:27] Yeah, I could totally picture them, like, diving deep into the lake, um, just being a little bit more bold and they're-- and aggressive with, like, focusing on, like, what you said, the fake stuff that you can't pronounce.
[01:00:39] James: Yep.
[01:00:40] Elle: That's a b- for-- That is something that I do. It's huge. I can't tell you how many times I'm at the grocery store, and I look at the back of a label, and if it's got something weird that I can't pronounce, unless it's something that is a must-have in my household, I don't buy it.
[01:00:56] I put it back. So if that's, if that is a characteristic, a characterical behavior of their target audience, that could be something that they lean into. You know what I'm realizing? In your answer and your suggestion for how they can take it to the next level, it really mirrors w- some of the activity that you did as you were building out a customer loyalty program, is to dig in and to look deeper on the value that-- like, to look at your existing customer base and understand the perceived value, do some of that research, like, build out some of those, some of that segmentation of your existing customers, and then, y- you know, try to take it to the next level in that way.
[01:01:38] And maybe, maybe they have done some of that, but I was just kind of drawing out the parallels that I was seeing between, like, your style in particular that I think is, um, you know, very helpful. Clearly a successful one.
[01:01:50] James: Full circle moment.
[01:01:52] Elle: Yes, totally. Okay. Well, shout-out to Bodyarmor and any Bodyarmor marketers out there. You've definitely got some fans. I'm a [01:02:00] big-- I've definitely consumed a lot of Bodyarmor. So, all right. So James, there's one thing that I like to make space for on this podcast, and that is a moment of gratitude. We truly do not get anywhere in product marketer-- marketing in general, honestly, without learning from each other.
[01:02:16] So I'm so grateful that you have taken the generosity and time to come on and share our, your expertise on the show. So thank you so much. Um, and I would love to turn it around to you and hear some shout-outs for some PMMs who have brought you to this moment and contributed to the awesome PMM that you are today.
[01:02:35] James: Thank you, one, for having me. So, so thankful. Um, this is gonna be an Oscar moment for me 'cause you're gonna start playing the music, but, um, I'm gonna c- you know, as I'm reading off
[01:02:44] my note
[01:02:45] card. Um, but there's been so many amazing product marketers, um, I've worked with. You know, I started off my career at AT&T in 2012.
[01:02:55] Um, Kyle Riley Johnston, um, he was the leader at Disney+ for global product marketing. Bright servant leader. Um, he's one that really kind of truly kicked off my product marketing career at AT&T, so major kudos to him. Um, my fellow and past PMMs, especially the ones at Disney+, um, whether you're on my team or a colleague or a leader, uh, the job is never easy.
[01:03:20] We're always like-- We have seen such talent on the team, uh, and it's not easy whenever you're establishing a new function or you're having to constantly prove your value, um, and a battle for a seat at the table. Um, so just everyone that's a product marketer, I give you major kudos and hats off to you. Uh, and finally, um, I wanna make sure I, I mention my folks at Netflix.
[01:03:39] Um, I've been here for, uh, it'll be a year in July, but the talent here is out of this world. Um, and I'm just grateful every day to work alongside such stunning colleagues. So thanks again for having me.
[01:03:51] Elle: Yeah, I love it. There's nothing like the, um, relationships that you make when you're, like, just in the thick of it [01:04:00] with something just really hard to do in your professional l- life, and just having, you know, those homies that that get you through it, and then obviously teach you along the way, so. Okay, this is my last question for you.
[01:04:13] Where else is it best to access your expertise? Can we just find you on LinkedIn?
[01:04:16] James: Yes, LinkedIn is probably the best spot. I'm pretty active on there, at least when I try to
[01:04:21] be when my life, life isn't crazy. Yeah. Um, so send me a, a request and we can connect.
[01:04:26] Elle: Awesome. Again, thank you so much, James. And hey, PMM listeners, if you liked this episode, please share it with a PMM friend, and I would be so grateful if you would leave us a review. It helps tremendously with our reach. Thank you so much for coming on this adventure with us today. I hope this episode leaves you with inspiration to take in the next step of your own journey
