$100K/Month Tiktok Live Selling?! | Jared Mortensen

This week, I'm sitting down with Jared Mortensen, who's made a career leap that's as surprising as it is inspiring.

Jared’s gone from crunching numbers and optimizing supply chains for Fortune 500 giants like Boeing, Textron, and Koch Industries to disrupt a different kind of industry – men's underwear.

As the Founder of Real Men Apparel Company (RMAC), Jared is on a mission to bring inclusive sizing and actual comfort to the world of men’s underwear.

We're talking about a lot more than just fabric and stitching, guys. This is also about finding your edge, overcoming risks, and learning how to grow smart, not fast.

Plus, he’s sharing his huge success on TikTok and how he did it.

Here's a sneak peek of what's inside:

• Why size inclusivity in men’s underwear is a BIG deal (literally!)
• The "twig to berry ratio" and why it matters
• Jared’s top reasons: why TikTok & why now

So get comfortable and hit that play button. This episode with Jared will inspire you to shake things up and show you that your “crazy wild idea” might be your next big hit.

#business #ecommerce #startup #businessgrowth #smallbusiness #businesstips #tiktok #tiktokmarketing #tiktoklive #livestreaming #socialselling #tiktoktips #tiktokshop #menswear #apparel #marketing #digitalmarketing and #contentcreation #tiktokshop

Follow Jared Mortensen at:

https://rmac.store/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaredmortensen
https://www.instagram.com/real_men_apparel_company/
https://www.tiktok.com/@real_men_apparel_company
https://www.facebook.com/RealMenApparelCompany

Follow Ken Okazaki at:

https://www.instagram.com/kenokazaki/
https://www.youtube.com/c/KenOkazaki
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-content-capitalists-with-ken-okazaki/id1634328251
https://open.spotify.com/show/09IzKghscecbI7jPDVBJTw
Content Capitalists YouTube

Transcript

People don't realize how uncomfortable they are until they actually wear something that fits their body. Women's apparel you see a lot more size inclusivity, men's you don't. Men's underwear is traditionally designed like dudes are all a Ken doll, like they don't have genitals. And so, it'd be like if all women's bras were all like a training bra.

But women are different shapes and sizes, guys are different shapes and sizes. Really there hasn't been a lot of mod change in the way that men's apparel in general and then specifically men's underwears design. So that's where we developed our ABCD pouch size classification and then we go from extra small to 5XL as far as waist sizes.

The thing is like last holiday season I got really strapped for cash. I was struggling like how are we going to pay for everything? How am I going to finance? We're profitable. But how am I gonna cash flow everything? And so I was literally praying. I'm like praying, praying, praying to God. How am I gonna do this?

How am I gonna get through the next two months from a cash flow standpoint? And I distinctly had an answer from God that you need to live stream. I was like, on TikTok, I literally, that was the answer to my prayer. I'm like, crap, that sucked. Content capitalist podcast.

Ken Okazaki: Hey, welcome to another episode of the Content Capitalist Podcast. Today, my guest, his name is Jared Mortensen. Now, when I first met him, I realized that there was something he was doing differently that I'd never been involved with. I've kind of seen it. I didn't know how it worked. But just a tiny bit of background here before we kick this off.

He. comes from a background working at Boeing, Spirit Aerosystems, Textron, Koch Industries, Cosmic Pet, a lot of these brands that we recognize that are really global in terms of technology and engineering. And now he's turned all that experience and skill into something else that we're going to unpack together.

Unpack, that already sounds like a, double meaning there, but Jared, welcome to the show.

Jared Mortensen: Thanks, I appreciate it. So I'm super, super excited to be here to chat.

Ken Okazaki: Awesome. So Jared, when. We talk about your background and some of the things that you've done. I do want to get into that, but before we, lose the audience on like, Oh, this is going to be a boring kind of a podcast. Give us a quick rundown on what it is that you're doing right now. What is the business?

What's the product? And why is it interesting?

Jared Mortensen: Okay. Yeah. So, so completely different, uh, different product. And so sometimes, usually when I start talking about the product, people just like, I can see them laughing in my eyes. But, you know, so men's, apparel traditionally is not very size inclusive. And so women's apparel, you see a lot more size inclusivity, men's you don't.

so we have developed a ABCD pouch size classification for a guy's package for men's underwear. Right. And so men's underwear is traditionally designed like dudes are all a Ken doll, like they don't have genitals. so it'd be like if all women's bras were all like a training bra, like, but women are different shapes and sizes.

guys are different shapes and sizes, but really there hasn't been a lot of mod change in the way that men's apparel in general, and then specifically men's underwears design. And so that's where we developed our ABCD pouch size classification. And then, and then we go from extra small to five XL as far as waist sizes.

And so we have literally nine waist sizes and four pouch sizes. So we have 36 sizes. And so we're the most size inclusive men's underwear brand really out in the world. Absent doing something custom, so one, so it's exciting to be able to provide a lot of options for guys. does provide a lot of complexity as far as marketing and, and inventory management and product development and those types of things.

So that's kind of, that's, that's what we do, right? Sell it on Amazon for three years and then, uh, Shopify, uh, have our Shopify website and then TikTok. We've been in TikTok for about a year. Top TikTok, uh, underwear brand in the us. So,

Ken Okazaki: That's amazing, and I want to go so deep into that, and you know how it is then when people start talking about things like, you know, dandruff and itchy scalp, all of a sudden you feel itchy, right? When you talk about your product, every time I'm just like, is it too tight? Is it the right fit? And like, I'm like, checking in with myself and wondering, do I have the right size?

And like, but that question, Just like if I ask you right now, like, how's your left pinky toe right feeling right now? Now you're like, oh, my left pinky toe is, you know, it's a little cold or it's a little squished or a little sweaty. That thought didn't cross your mind until the right context was presented.

And what you've done when people watch your show or even talk about it, they might laugh, but they're also checking in with themselves like, is my package really, How is it actually feeling in the moment and, uh, it's happening right now and I don't know if the listeners are also, you know, checking in with themselves, but, I want to dig into that psychology a little bit later, but let's start off with that background with some of these, these brands that we all know and we see on, you know, we see the, the ticker tapes, we see them in the news, You were a part of that.

How'd you get started?

Jared Mortensen: yeah, so my, my career path has been like anything but, uh, linear, right? And so, decided I, I, I loved aerospace, so I put myself through college, working at aerospace company as a machinist and a, and a programmer. So I programmed big equipment that was making, big components for Boeing and Lockheed.

And so that's how I put myself through school. And then I was able to leverage that into an internship at Boeing out or out at, well, in between my junior, senior year. So then that's how I ended up going. I'm in Wichita, Kansas. So that's why I ended up moving here was to work for Boeing. and then Spirit Aerosystems spun off of that.

So I went there, but so a lot of jobs in operations, finance, supply chain, I really was able to move around. I tell people I went through my own like, uh, job or career training program, rotation program, where I rotated around to a bunch of, uh, a bunch of different roles. Then I actually left to go to an oil and gas company, Koch Industries, here in town.

So they're one of the largest private companies in the United States. So, did that for a couple of years, then got pulled back into Textron. You know, aerospace, uh, got recruited to come back and, uh, and work there. And so I had some, a number of different, uh, uh, senior management roles in supply chain, finance director for their operations, went through a major merger there, uh, buying Beechcraft.

So if you're familiar with their brands, they have Cessna, Beechcraft, uh, are the largest brands there. They've literally made half the airplanes ever in the world. Um, so super, super cool to work there. And then I got recruited to work at a pet toy company, like totally random, right? So I had a headhunter reach out to me.

We had this private equity backed pet toy company here in Wichita that needed help integrating five different acquisitions, and so I came as the VP administration to help really build the backend to that. So I had finance HR, customer service analytics and, um. And so I helped put that together. And one of the acquisitions was actually a, couple of guys that started selling on Amazon.

So they were doing cat scratchers and dog beds, and they went from nothing to 18 And, uh, and so I really got exposed to, marketing and e commerce from, from those guys. Cause most of my career has been. Industrial manufacturing, right? So marketing is totally different. Like when you, when you're at a Boeing or a Spirit or something or a Textron even, and I was never on that side.

I was always finance operations and, um, and so being at, uh, the pet products company of my first really created. CloserTaste where I was on the leadership team and exposed to a lot of that stuff, but I still, like, I didn't have any direct experience at the time, but really got a taste, um, taste for what they're doing and got really excited and like, like, yeah, I think I can go and do this e commerce thing, and, uh, similar, uh, just repeat some of the, take some of the tools and the processes that I learned from the e commerce team that, uh, that we brought on and the products company.

And I always have product ideas, like lots of different things bouncing around in my head. I'm an engineering engineer by design. And, uh, so I'm always designing stuff, looking at problems and how do we fix different, problems that people have. Andyeah, as we look to exit, the company I worked for was sold to another private equity company.

And so we were looking to exit. So I. I told my wife, Hey, I think, I think it's time that we start a men's underwear company. And she's like, you're crazy. You don't know anything about that. I'm like, Oh, I've got Google. I can figure it out. So anyway, so that's how we, we kind of end up there. So,

Ken Okazaki: cool. I want to get into that, that startup phase, but before we do. A couple of things you said caught my attention. Number one, you switched quite a few times between different companies. What was your motivation for switching?

Jared Mortensen: well, I have a short attention span. And so like, uh, every 18 months, like my mind wants to go and, uh, I I'm ready for another challenge. I want to do something else. Right. So a lot of the jobs I was in, like I would start the job, I would really love it. And I do everything I can to automate the processes.

So I just didn't have to do the routine type of. things. And so I was, I was, it was really good. Right. So we were able to automate a lot of different things that we were doing. And, uh, yeah, but I really just want, what's the next challenge. Right. So I want to do something. Uh, what's, what's the next thing that I can do and, and learn about.

And so I'm always trying to learn and grow just personally. And then just, you know, intellectually, I want to, I want to have a new challenge. So,

Ken Okazaki: I'm just kind of stepping back here and thinking about it. Like if you were to look back at your career trajectory, do you think that switching around, that rapid switching helped you more or hindered you in terms of career growth?

Jared Mortensen: well, I mean, if, if you're looking at fear purely from a, like a corporate standpoint, probably hindering, right. But looking from an entrepreneurial standpoint, 

Ken Okazaki: you're an entrepreneur through and through like, no wonder you can't stay in one company for too long. 

Jared Mortensen: yeah, it's a, it's. So it does it. I don't always play well in big corporates, right. Because I'm trying to design and change things. And, uh, and so that scares a lot of people.

Right. And a lot of people within big corporates are risk averse. Right. And so like when you have somebody that comes in and it's like, Hey, let's try this and try that. They're like, ah, you know, then they start thinking about their. Their performance plan or their either budget and, and, uh, just the quarterly reviews or annual reviews.

And that's really what they're thinking about versus like, Hey, how do we go and change, uh, the way that we're operating? And, uh, and that just doesn't play very, very well. And so like people just don't want to move really fast in a lot of those businesses. And so it was, it's hard working in a big enterprise if you want to do a lot more, but yeah.

So part of it, you know, I was able, as I moved around to the different roles in the different companies, I was able to get backgrounds in supply chain manufacturing, finance, a lot of different areas. And so, Just train myself on somebody else's dime. I mean, they're making money. and so we're adding value.

And so it's not like it was just, you know, taking there, but you're adding value to those, to those businesses as you, as you do that, because, I mean, I was, in a lot of cases, I was recruited to go to those different, different roles, uh, or asked to move into those different roles because they had a particular problem they wanted to.

To deal with. Right? For example, like when I was at Boeing and there was the spirit, act, when Spirit spun off for Boeing, nobody in the business knew how to do financial statements or cashflow forecasts or things like that. So the finance VP came to me and says, Hey, can you theoretically, if we were an independent company, you know, can you go build some financial statements?

And so literally I was the youngest finance employee in the business. I think he can go and kind of figure this out. And so oftentimes I've been given the projects where nobody knew how to do it. And so old Jared will go figure it out. opportunities to learn. Yeah, I probably, you know, fix, fix things and, uh, just go learn in different areas.

And so that's kind of been my forte and that's why I was given a lot of different opportunities, You know, the different businesses. So treated very well, uh, everywhere I'd worked. And so it's been, great. And so left really well with, with everywhere that, uh, we've worked. And, but yeah, so, and I did have a business.

I, I left for a couple of years and had a furniture business. So I left Spirit, uh, for a couple of years and then tried doing some importation with some furniture. And then that housing market crashed in, in, uh, 2007. And so people stopped buying pool tables and then those types of things. So then it came back to Spirit.

So, uh, so I had to build up more capital. before I took another run at it again. So

Ken Okazaki: Tell me about that first run. Like what was your investment and, and did you in the end come out break even the low above? Like if you were to look at all the plus minus, you know,

Jared Mortensen: yeah, we just, we just broke even on that. So that was, I was going to get rich selling mattresses. So I moved to Boise, Idaho and we're importing mattresses, pool tables, bedroom, dining furniture, and we would just sell it out of a warehouse so I can get people like super low prices. And it was, it's kind of cool.

We do this private, we do like private party ads in like the newspapers. And so this is kind of probably my first foray really into marketing. And so, uh, so we would just do Craigslist ads or ads like in the newspaper for selling, it'd be like. You know, brand new pool table, you know, list is retail 7, 000 will sell for 1, 500.

And so then we, people will just call us off those, those ads. And then we would set up a time for them to come in and, uh, and buy the, you know, look at the table and we'd actually schedule a time, say, okay, I can meet with you at nine or I can meet with you at 11, what time works best for you. And so you'd actually schedule them.

And so then they would actually show up versus if you just say, Hey, I'm going to be open from, eight until five, like they're going to get

Ken Okazaki: yeah, then it doesn't feel as bespoke. Right. It's

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. So you lock them into a commitment. Plus it's like, Hey, it's a FOMO type thing. Like they're going to miss out, right.

If they don't show up and, and get this deal. Right. And so they feel like it's kind of sketchy. They're showing up to this warehouse park. And they're going to look at this, like half the people think it's like, Like stolen, like fenced goods. But uh, but we're able to give them a lot better deal than what they could get at the store, usually like half the price of a, of a retail retail price on higher end stuff.

Right. So it's really nice handcarved pool tables, like professional grade tables, that we could give them for half price. All the bedroom furniture was, and the dining is all solid cherry, like really high end construction, but we just didn't have, the markups going right from the factory, you know, direct to consumer.

So to really direct to consumer people and could do parts. 

Ken Okazaki: were these local. 

factories?

Jared Mortensen: Oh no, it's okay. Well 

Ken Okazaki: you didn't have 

Jared Mortensen: mattresses are coming from the U. S., but everything else is coming from China. So the pool tables, the dining, furniture, we do, we buy everything a container at a time. And we bring a 40 foot container, and then unload it.

Ken Okazaki: How did you get the idea to go to China and source this material? Was this because of your previous workings with the airline companies that you kind of understood about international supply chains? Or did you just get a harebrained idea? Say, I'm going to go fly out to Shenzhen or Guangdong or wherever and start looking or Alibaba because that's a big step to import large things like that.

And each one is a considerable investment in a logistical feat. Because I also do import export from China and I know that's, it's not too easy if, if you've had no experience there. So how did that develop?

Jared Mortensen: Well, I was actually, I was part of a group so we'd already lined up the suppliers, and so, uh, so I was just, I just became part of that kind of So it was in essence buying from a distributor, um, so we would, you'd place the, the orders directly with the factory and then the distributor would just get a markup, but it was like their brands, their designs and everything.

So it was, it was not like a private label. Like it was our, it was our label. It was this

Ken Okazaki: So there's already an organized system that you work 

within and, 

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, So it was more of a plug and play. So it was more like, Hey, just go set up the warehouse in the city. Here's the operating system. So it's kind of like entrepreneurial light. Right. And so it's like, Hey, you own this thing, you run the thing, but there's already this kind of, it was almost like a franchise in a way.

and you're just going to drop it. It's just a franchise without a buy in. and so you just go and set up the, the spot. So, so like most of the inventory was actually covered by a partner. And then I just owned a portion of the, cool table inventory.

Ken Okazaki: Okay, that makes a lot of sense now. you went through the various corporations, had this stint, uh, with the furniture, and then went back. And then why did you one day wake up and say, Honey, I want to do. Bespoke custom size underwear for men as a business. And we're going to bet the farm and, if you don't mind me mentioning the livelihood of yourself, your wife, and your seven children on men's underwear.

Jared Mortensen: well one my wife has a lot of faith a and such and she's really patient and so, and she's not very needy right. And so like financially and things like that which which helps right now she was concerned from a risk standpoint are we going to be able to make the mortgage we're going to be able to pay for, uh, for everything you know.

Luckily we did have some, uh, some money from the prior firm. You know when we exited there we did have some equity in the prior, in the pet products company so that we were able to you know, have that so we can go a year, uh, without having to, to draw a salary or anything like that, but. But yeah, I mean, I always have, I have a lot of ideas, a lot of different product ideas, right?

And so, but, uh, you know, we really have to look at, okay, what does the runway look like on, on these? Now I, I have no background in apparel and fashion, right? and how, how does that all work? And so, there was a significant amount of risk, but we did get it spun up. We started it when I was still at the pet products company, right?

So my wife are 50, we're 50, 50 on the, on the business. And so, so we actually got things. You know, it took me about six months of development, uh, with the initial products, because I, I think I did samples with probably 50 or 60 different factories. some already had like designs that they, on Alibaba, they look very close.

Cause I mean, this is all during COVID, right? And so like, it's not like I could go there and visit any of the factories in China. And so like, I'm doing all the design during COVID and then just reaching out to companies on Alibaba that look like they might have a product that's similar. and then doing, doing samples with them.

So I'll sending my designs and then getting the samples back and then, testing, you know, the quality, the

Ken Okazaki: testing, is this like you just trying them on? And after a day you say, how did it feel like, is 

that, or did you actually. 

Jared Mortensen: was 30

Ken Okazaki: Yeah, 

that's stage one, but then, but the whole point is that you're trying to make it specific for different sizes. So do you have a group of friends and you like, okay, and you had, you got their measurements and then, or like, how did the testing work so that you knew these different sizes within different packages?

So, well,

Jared Mortensen: Well, so I mean, there's, there's scientific research, right. So as far as like looking at different, the distribution of volume of, of guys uh genitals, right. and so there's, I mean there's, there's a lot of scientific research out there regarding like size. I mean, there's a lot of things people talk about race and, you know, there's actually size distribution's pretty, pretty.

Pretty normal globally. Right. And so, that's what you're looking at. Cause when, when, when we look at size, it's the total package. Right. So if we talk at the, it's a total ¥package deal, right? You look at the total twig to berry ratio. and so some

Ken Okazaki: you got to repeat that one, 

more time slowly in case someone missed it. That, that one, that one phrase that got my attention.

Jared Mortensen: And the Twig to Berry Ratio.

Ken Okazaki: Yes. Good. Ha ha.

Jared Mortensen: yeah. So some people, some people focus on the Twigs so much, and others the berries. So, so some people just, all the volumes on the Berry side, some people on the twig, right? and others it's a, it's a mix. Right? And so, so there's a, there's a scientific research out there regarding looking at the volume.

And so that's how, when we think about, um, the pouch, cause it's a single, our pouch design is a single pouch, right? So everything just goes into one pouch. There's some products out there that have multiple pouches. We don't really like those because there's a lot of scenes and you have to solve a jigsaw puzzle to put your pants on.

So we like 

Ken Okazaki: Multiple pouches? 

Jared Mortensen: yeah, yeah.

Ken Okazaki: does that work? 

Jared Mortensen: three pouches or, I mean, they have, yeah. Uh, yeah, there's all sorts of designs out there. So. Uh, yeah, there's a lot

Ken Okazaki: like a contortion act.

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. So, so some people really like, those types of things, but, uh, but, uh, yeah, we're not really into that.

We want function. Uh, and so, it really fits really well, but you don't have to, I mean, it's, it's complex enough to actually all right, you know, come up with different pouch sizes. And so if you had multiple pouches, it just makes it a lot more complex, right? So we just looked at, you know.

statistically, what didn't sizes were and tried to create a volume um, shape that would work, for that. So yeah, but we just started, so we had this A, B, C, and then D size pouch. We started with just a D size, right? So when we're talking about like, we're, we're attacking a billion, you know, billion dollar businesses, global businesses, right?

So how, what's the, the point of the spear? Where are you going to attack them? Right. and so the, the upper size of that range is where there was very, very few options, right? And so that's where we really, we really started first or attacked was on the D size. So it was the plus size. So B, our average size for the U.

S. male is a, is a B size pouch. Then you have A on the smaller side, then C and D on the larger side. So again, similar to a women's, Brockup sizing methodology. And so, so we were just for the first 18 months, we just did the D size. So that's where we started and then we incremented, incremented back as far as the availability.

So we actually built demand like, we had people searching on Amazon for a bee pouch, like a year before we even launched a bee pouch. So it was super cool. We created demand for a branded keyword, a search term before we'd even launched it, we just started with the D, but yeah, we just, I mean, some, like I'm a large, right?

So I can test a large, now I have family members and others that can test the different waste sizes. I'm not going to like, I didn't survey everybody on what their package size was, right? As that's a little TMI, right? So what we did is, I mean, we created the different sizes and we did, I did, you know, once I locked down some factories, I did the PO's and I started selling them.

Right. So I did, you know, small MLQ orders enough so I could get launched on Amazon and then we started getting feedback. Right. And so the thing is when you're a single, single person operation, you can iterate a lot faster. Right. So literally we started like you launch on Amazon and we got sales our first day.

I mean, we started selling, uh, and so we started getting feedback really quickly from

Ken Okazaki: run ads to get those sales or was it just,

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, we're 

Ken Okazaki: tell me about that. 

Jared Mortensen: You gotta, you gotta,

Ken Okazaki: No, but you 

said on day one you made sales. So how much did you bet on yourself on day one when you, when you put that out there in terms of the, you know, the exposure when you ran ads 

financially? 

Jared Mortensen: I mean, I started low, like low bid, and it's really long tail keywords, right? So, so that's, we live in the long tail, right? And so we're not going to compete on men's underwear, right? You're not even going to compete, right? It's, it's men's underwear, with pouch or men's bulge enhancing underwear.

So terms that would be used to search for very specific, uh, larger underwear for well endowed individuals, because we're, again, we're attacking on that D size, right? So that's where we're, we're, we're attacking the beast is where they're the weakest. There's the fewest options. It's the most underserved now.

It's the, it's a small portion of the, population, right? But that's, they're the ones that are most underserved, right? So that's where we attack, attack there, even though that's only. You know, 10%, of the market. They're the underserved ones. And so we, we went there first. And so the bids were really low when we first started running the ads on, Amazon, three years ago, I was paying 10 to 15 cents a bit.

Like my, my high bids were like, 30 cents or something like that. So, and you know, conversion rates were, were okay. I mean, converted, you know, five to 10%. But so, I mean, we started small just to learn. So we're talking, you know, 50 to a hundred dollars a day as far as the, uh, The budgets that we kind of started with and then, and then ramped up, but we got, we got sales and we started getting feedback really quickly.

So the thing is like some of it is luck, right? We just happened to pick a good, we have had some initial customers that are early adopters and they quickly started providing us feedback and then they became missionaries as well.

And so, some in marketing, you have the mercenaries, you have the missionaries. And so we had some customers that really became missionaries for us. So they would literally. Ago, and they, they proactively sent us like 2, 3, 4 page writeups. So this guy, it's like a four x or five XL waste. Um, giving us feedback like dated like minute by minute, like rundown of how his day went, going through different activities and how things felt.

And, and so then based upon that, like we were making, adjustments on the patterns, like on different sizes, right? So maybe we're good on the large, but we're gonna adjust this on a three x and that on a four x, right? Based off that customer feedback.

Ken Okazaki: That's interesting. Now, you're, At this point, you've got stuff going on on Amazon and it started, you know, turning over some sales at what point did you realize, Hey, this is the main thing. And, you know, like, this is my business and I'm switching career paths. maybe not just necessarily the time, but the, was there a trigger?

Was there a certain milestone? Was it something internally, like with your family, your wife? Let's talk about that.

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, well, personally, was fully committed before I even sold on Amazon, before I had my first

Ken Okazaki: Before your first sale, you're just like, this is it. 

Jared Mortensen: yeah, I'm going to do this. Yeah, we're going to make this happen. Right. So, so we're going to go, I didn't burn the boat. So, I mean, I still had back, I still had a job. I mean, still working a job and everything, but my psychologically, my intent was, and I had a very, uh, you know, a timeline set out in my head that this is when I was going to end my other job.

And I was going to transition, you know, fully into this, this other opportunity. We were going to make it work, You know, so I was convinced it's just everybody else that wasn't convinced. And, uh, and so until you start getting sales, right. And so like my family, my wife's family, they're like, Oh, that's cute.

Or that's interesting. Or that's stupid. Like most people, when I, what I would tell them, I would just see in their eyes, them smiling. Like, and so they were either just laughing it and like, this guy's an idiot or like, that's the dumbest idea ever. Right. So I can see whether they said it, I could see it.

Right. And so, but you know, as an entrepreneur, you have to be willing and comfortable, like just, Whatever, right? And so, like, uh, don't let that affect you because, you know, so many people live in quiet lives of desperation, uh, stuck in their, their different jobs, but they just, aren't willing to take the leap to go and try and do something different because they don't want to give up the comfort of their careers or what they know, right?

But, uh, I've never had really an issue, issue with that. I'm lucky. I have a wife that is super, super supportive and willing to, just go with it and, uh, support me in, trying and trying that. But yeah, my intent was that, hey, we're going to make this work. Now it's like, what can we do?

What will, what's the potential opportunity, you know, from a sales standpoint where we'll get, You know, I had some ranges as far as what I thought I'd like to do, but the more that we've grown, then the, then the higher that number tends to get. So as far as what I think we can, what we can actually accomplish.

So,

Ken Okazaki: for sure now Let's talk about how you started breaking into a TikTok shop or TikTok and, uh, the live streaming content creation, because that's a, that's a new area. A lot of people see it, they see other people doing it, but just like, is TikTok a fad? Are they going to get banned? is it even good for my brand?

let's hear your story.

Jared Mortensen: yeah, well, I can see where a lot of people would be afraid of that, particularly larger brands, right. Where they're just like, protect the brand and, you know, I'm new, right. And so like,

we're 

Ken Okazaki: want to be associated with China. A lot of people too, you know, just

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. Yeah. So who, yeah. So, so there's, there's some apprehension there. And, um, now for us, it was probably August, of last year, we really started looking at it.

It's like, Hey, we think there may be an opportunity here. we saw a couple of brands that were driving a decent amount of traffic from TikTok to, to Amazon, to their Amazon listings. And they were seeing some pretty big, you know, in the Amazon world. There a lot, there was a lot of talk the last several years, just external traffic, external traffic, you know, Amazon's getting, you know, giving like all these.

extra boost to anybody that's going to drive external traffic to their listings. And so, so that's where we were exploring it originally and so we need to go and drive external traffic off TikTok. It's a really easy way to go just post and we're doing EGC stuff uh, content that we already, that we're using on Amazon, Hey let's just do a post, that sort of stuff, and we can drive traffic And then the thing is like on one of my trips to Guangzhou, I met, uh, an individual that has some, apparel factories that, he also has, uh, live streams on Douyin, right. And, uh, we talked a lot about it. And one of my trips, I went over there and watched his, one of his live streams. It's a, um, women's apparel live stream on Douyin and he's doing like 80 to 90, 000 an hour, like just super crazy numbers, right.

On, on his live stream.

And 

Ken Okazaki: for the sake of all the rest of us, could you give us a breakdown? What is Douyin?

Jared Mortensen: Doan, so like TikTok in China, right? So essentially, you know, live streaming, you know, so, uh, the TikTok in China. they're live streaming on a couple different platforms there in China, but Ian's really the, the big one. And, uh, and so they're doing like on their sales there and doans like 90% on, uh, live streaming, maybe.

7 percent is off product videos, and only 2, 3 percent is off product card. Similar to what people are familiar with from an Amazon shopping standpoint, which is like just a PDP or your, your Shopify, or your Amazon listing. So, so that's just a small fraction of their sales mostly, uh, live streaming. So they have these.

Pretty complex studios, like really nice setups, big teams running, multiple streams at the same time. So I actually went and, and watched, uh, went and visited their studios and watched the live streams. And, uh, and that's when my eyes really opened, like, holy cow, this is where social selling is going.

This is where e commerce is, is going. It's just China's four or five years ahead of where the U. S. is. And so we need to. start, uh, looking and, and seeing what we can do, uh, there from a live streaming standpoint. And this is really, TikTok shop was just kind of turning on at that point. It was just right, just becoming available.

I mean, TikTok was big, a lot of traffic there, but everybody's just trying to drive traffic from TikTok to their other platforms, Shopify or, so that's where I started, I think it was, yeah, it was like August, we, we contacted an agency to get set up, set up an account and we started posting videos, didn't really sell hard, I mean, hardly anything at all, I mean, really for a couple months, but we were just Kind of figuring it out.

maybe it was October, uh, September, just the end of September, 1st of October, we got going last year but uh, on just selling on, uh, with video on TikTok, but we really didn't have a ton of sales. Right. And so the thing is, like last holiday season, I got really. Straps for cash, right?

Because we bring in a bunch of inventory, right? For the holiday ramp up, we'd launched a bunch of new products and you know, the cash, cash is always a big deal with inventory, right? So, you know, it can be six months from the time I put a deposit down to the time I actually converted on Amazon side and get paid.

And so we were really, really crushed on cash. And so I was. I was literally, so, I mean, this is literally how it worked. Like I was struggling, like, how are we going to pay for everything? How am I going to finance? Like, how am I just going to cash it? We're profitable, but how am I going to cashflow everything?

And so I was literally praying. I'm like praying, praying, praying to God. Like, how am I going to do this? Like, how am I going to get through the next two months from a cashflow standpoint? And I distinctly had an answer like from God that said, you need to live stream. And I was like, On Tik Tok, that was that, that, I mean, literally that was the answer to my prayer, like, the prompting I had, I'm like, crap, that sucks.

I don't want to live stream. I'm not a live streamer. I don't know anything about live stream. I mean, I've been, I've seen some of the studios thinking about like trying to hire an agency or working with my buddy in Guangzhou to actually live stream from Guangzhou into Tik Tok US, but the answer was like, you need to do it.

And so I built a studio in my warehouse. I got things set up and we started live streaming the week before Thanksgiving. and it just like took off, right? So I think

Ken Okazaki: that's exactly one year ago, isn't it

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we've been live streaming on Tik Tok, uh, you know, for a year now. So yeah, and it was, it was crazy. So it was like, uh, yeah, an amazing start.

Ken Okazaki: So let's talk about this getting started. You said he built a studio. Now, some people might have an image of, you know, you got ring light and a phone. Some people might think, okay, all these soft boxes, multiple cameras and backgrounds. Let's talk about the studio. What was it?

Jared Mortensen: Oh, well, yeah. I mean, it was, I put up some, it was in my warehouse, right? So I put up some, uh, drywall and painted it and, uh, and got some clothes racks. Cause I mean, we're selling apparel and hung the product up there. Yeah. I had some softbox, just bought, bought lights, um, some studio lights off Amazon. And so, I mean, I, cause I already buy everything off Amazon, and so, yeah, and then I just started streaming with my iPhone, right? So my iPhone, uh, you 14. And so, so that was just running off the, uh, off the iPhone. And, uh, it was just, it was crazy when we first started and we didn't know what we were doing at all. Right. I had no idea what I was doing, but there was so much traffic, very little competition.

TikTok was just smashing us traffic. And so we had live, like my top live, I had, I've had 9, 000 concurrent viewers, to three million impressions per hour. So we've had eight, nine million impressions. There's times where, like when we first started that we were getting impressions on four to 5 percent of all viewers that were online on TikTok.

So it was crazy. So we were doing, we did our best live, we had 7, 000 in sales in 15 minutes, but they capped us when we first started on TikTok. We can only do 200 orders a day. And so we were hitting our cap in less than an hour every day. And so then we just like stopped streaming because they hit with a new account.

because there's a risk you and they want to make sure you can fulfill the 

Ken Okazaki: You're not scamming too, or something like

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. Yeah. So you're just not going to take the money and run with it. And so you had this 200 order cap. So through all the holidays last year, we had this 200 order cap. Otherwise we would have just done like stupid, just stupid numbers.

And so we did like 60, 000 in like a week and a half in November. And then, think 90, 000 in January. A hundred

Ken Okazaki: a, what gross sales? 90,

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. This is a GMB, the top sales. Uh, so 90, I think January, or sorry, in, in, uh, in, in December. And then it was like, uh, 100 in, in January. And then I think 120 in, in February was kind of the peak for the, for the year.

Ken Okazaki: And this is all a hundred percent organic, right?

Jared Mortensen: Yeah there was no paid, I didn't do any paid. So they were just smashing you traffic. And this is like stupid, like we had no idea we were doing. We didn't understand how the algorithm worked. Like, we didn't understand anything. We were just hopping on there, selling And 

Ken Okazaki: Just show 

up 

Jared Mortensen: yeah there's a, lot of stuff we knew now That if I would have known what I know now, we would have done just, again, stupid, stupid numbers, and But yeah, now more people are on there, so there's more competition, more products, there's more, you know, there's more people streaming, and they're just pushing less traffic directly, and they're trying to shift to more paid, right, so they want you to buy more traffic versus just like tons of organic, 

Ken Okazaki: So, here's what I'm curious about. Uh, what was the structure of, like, you hit live, right? 

first of all, the purchase function. They're buying directly from TikTok Shop, or are you sending them to your Amazon listing?

Jared Mortensen: no tick tock shop. Yeah. we wanted them buy and tick tock shot it because you would actually get policy points if you're trying to sell them to Amazon,

Ken Okazaki: they're not going to give you as much traffic either if you're trying to funnel it out, right?

Jared Mortensen: they'll shut you down, right. They'll literally, they'll actually shut you down and give you, give you violations and shut you down cause they don't want anybody to leave the platform. At that time they didn't, there were a little more, there's some things changing now, but they didn't want anybody to leave the platform at the time.

So if you mention Amazon, you could get. Get your account suspended if you if you had too many mentions of Amazon. So, no, we set up the shop. and so we we were, we would do everything within the shop and then we had it connected to our Shopify. That's how we managed inventory. Anyways, but, everything was on TikTok shop and they were doing crazy incentives at the time too.

So they would literally like, say we'd sell something for 40 bucks. They would give a customer 50 percent off coupon. So the customer would pay like 20 bucks. but they would give us 40, but they would also give us a 10 shipping subsidy, so they would give us like 10. The customer would pay 20, they would give us 50 and they were paying us a day after it would deliver.

So it was just like the cashflow was just absolutely amazing. It was 

almost like, 

Ken Okazaki: heavily there.

Jared Mortensen: We had like, we're, we're having like 95 percent margins. It was like stupid. And the cashflow was like, so that's what saved us. That's, I mean, that's what, like from a business standpoint, I want to say save us, but it just really helped us get through that really tight cash period.

And, uh, and so that's, it was the answer to my prayers. I mean, so, I mean, God knew what he was talking about when he said, go and do it. It was just, uh, I was not wanting to go and do that, but

Ken Okazaki: You know what? You know, you're, you're kind of quoting scripture here and I'm gonna, I'm gonna, story that comes to mind is, uh, when, Jesus says to Peter, cast your net on the other side. He's just like, that, that's the other side right there. TikTok, 

right? 

Jared Mortensen: Go over there. Well, we haven't done anything all night. Yeah. And so that's, that's what we did. Cause The thing is, like, everybody that I was hearing about from a TikTok standpoint in the U. S., it was all video. Oh, I did this video and it was viral and, like, we, we did all, we made all this money on this video.

Like, I've never had a viral video, never had a viral post on, we post consistently, we get consistent sales on our posts, but I've never had a, You know, a viral video where I made a lot of, you know, just had a ton of sales off that. It's been mostly off, off lives. I mean, I'm doing more off, video right now, but it's because we're posting a lot.

We have affiliates posting a lot, but yeah, the lives has really been where we've had the biggest success. And so it's been amazing for us.

Ken Okazaki: So with your life, videos. Let's talk a little bit about structure. Like, is there like a five minute loop where you kind of say the same thing over and over because people are coming in and out? Or kind of have a programmatic over? Talk to me about that because I think a lot of people are curious.

Jared Mortensen: Well, so, yeah. So a lot of people, when they think about, uh, like a live streaming, they're thinking like a QVC or HSN, like a, TV marketing type thing. And it's, it's kind of like one way. And you're, an infomercial or something like that. Thing is with TikTok lives, it's a lot different.

One people on TikTok, people's attention spans are about like a millisecond. Right. And so like, you know, your average video is like 15, 20 seconds. And so, so the attention span is really short. And so it's really more like, we have a script that we're really talking to. and you're going to cycle through that script in 30 to.

60 seconds. And so it's like going Groundhog's Day, like 10,000 times, like every 30. So the average watch time on our lives are anywhere from 20 to 40 seconds. Now you have some people that are on the life for an hour, and they get, they get tired of your repetitiveness. And sometimes they'll say, oh, this is a loop.

This is a loop. But, uh, and then you have other people that are on there a second, right? And so they're just scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. so you really, you may like answer a question and literally. 10 seconds later, somebody else is going to ask that, that question. And so with the TikTok live, it's, it's entertainment, right?

So in the U S it's different than in China as well, because China is very sell, sell, sell, sell, sell, right? And that's, that's kind of the model there in the U S TikTok. They want to be entertained. I mean, there's a lot of people that have exited the platform in the last year, because they're like, Oh, there's too many TikTok shop, too much live streaming, just selling.

And so a lot of people have migrated to like reels or to YouTube shorts and things like that and left the platform. because they, they've seen, they've seen too much, but yeah, so, so you, you have to be like entertaining, right? So how do you, how do you be entertaining and engaging educational and sell, right?

So it's like a combination of all those things. So we have some people that come to our lives just to make fun of our mannequin and make fun of the product, right? So we have our mannequins cause we can't model the stuff on lives. We'll get like banned like that because of like adult nudity, because the way the pouch is designed.

And so we have our different mannequins that are modeling for us and they're all named. So Bill is our most famous. A mannequin. So Bill, like, he models the stuff. and so we'll just have Bill and, and talk about the, the structure of the product and so people will just come on and make fun of Bill.

Oh, Bill's packing, he's really big. Oh, is that Diddy? Is that, whatever, is that, you have a lot of people just come on and make fun of things, which is fine, right? Because TikTok on Lives comments. are huge likes, don't mean it on a live lives. Likes don't mean anything from an algorithm standpoint, it's about engagement and about comments, right?

So how do you get comments? How do you get shares? How do you get, sales? Right. And so, so things that you can do to drive comments, like we're going to do all sorts of stuff to do that, to drive comments, to drive engagement. Right? And so one, it it's It helps people stay in the live, but then also bumps your algorithm score up if you're getting that engagement.

So we'll do things just to get engagement, even if somebody's not going to buy something. So you might have some 15 year old or 12 year old that's making a lot of stupid comments, but they're making comments. And so as long as it's not spammy, we'll just let them run because that helps drive up our engagement score with the algorithm.

And so, you know, you got to sell to the algorithm, you got to sell to a person. And so, it's, you know, How do you, how do you do that? But yeah, it's, it's Groundhog's Day every 30 seconds. so from a host standpoint, it can be ultra repetitive and you can go kind of brain dead as you like repeat through the same thing every, every 30 to 45 seconds.

So,

Ken Okazaki: Wow. Well, at least you don't have to invent new content all the time. Like you just get better at delivering the same thing, answering the same question a little bit tighter, or you come up with these analogies, like, you know, twig to berry ratio, like all these different things. Because you see what the reaction is each time, then you, it just trains you very quickly.

Could you summarize for us if there were like the five top things You'd advise someone who's going into this to learn that you learned through live streaming on TikTok.

Jared Mortensen: one is watching, right? So the thing is, there's a lot of brands that they want to do the TikTok thing, but they're not native to TikTok. They've never, they don't even have an account. Right. And so first is like, one, you need to get an account. you need to actually spend some time on the platform.

and so either you have, you engage someone in your team, that's actually a TikTok native, or you, you invest the time to actually get on the platform and spend hours watching live streams, right? So you need to spend a lot of time watching live streams, especially cause they're different depending on the category, right?

You have, you have like four different like major setups, the way that you can do a live stream, right? So a lot of apparel, a lot of times you'll see a host full body, but they're usually modeling the product, right? or you know, because you got to be product front and center because somebody's going to scroll Somebody's got to be able to see what the product is without the host telling them, right?

So product's got to be front and center because a lot of people 

Ken Okazaki: So you got to keep flashing that in front of the camera over and

Jared Mortensen: Well, it's just right there It's front and center like so so you have some, uh, live streams where it's like where you got to host others is just purely POV Like where where it's just like a POV in the

natural 

Ken Okazaki: their hands. 

Jared Mortensen: It's hands in the product, right?

So maybe it's an ice maker. So like ice makers are really popular for about 35 seconds on, on, on TikTok where everybody's doing icing, but like, so it was a POV in a kitchen with an ice maker there, they're scooping ice, they're doing different things, it's kind of, kind of showing how it's, it's being used.

so it really just depends on the category, right? So if you, if it's something you need to like demonstrate versus like supplement or something like that, the way that you're going to present it, but it's going to vary. And so it's important to like, look at some of these different, live streams and just see how they're, see how they're running.

and I, I would encourage people to, the thing is there, there's some agencies that are really, really good and there's agencies that like just want to be really good and they've just jumped on the TikTok bandwagon and they don't know anything about selling. And so, so you have to be careful with them, but we, we were lucky enough to, to get paired with a couple of people that actually knew what they were doing, that actually are live streamers and, um, do that for other people.

and so that that's helped us as well. But a lot of it started with my friend, right. And so in Guangzhou, if you're in China, of course, you just, you know, watching Douyin and see, you hadn't seen how they're doing there, but I would encourage you to just look at these high GMV our high sales, uh, live streams and see who has viewers, who has engagement, right?

And try to under, and look and, and decompose, you know, why are they getting this engagement? Okay, this has 10 viewers, this one has 10, 000 viewers, but they got to spend time on the platform. But then the next thing, you just got to do it, right? Just start and then test, test, test, test, test. so you just, you just jump on and start because that's a lot of people.

They want it to be perfect. The thing is TikTok is raw, right? It's not like a lot of polished type. It's not IG. It's not these other platforms. It's, it's a lot of raw and a lot of the consumers in a lot of cases actually expect a little more of a raw type feel. I've seen some dudes like selling foam mattresses in their garage.

Like it's literally, they got the garage door looks really almost dirty, like, and they're selling, they got people on there watching. So it's really interesting. So some people like, I have to have this like super polished. I got to spend 50 grand on this thing. Studio setup and, and all, and, and hire this whole crew.

Like, no, drop your phone on and just start going. So,

Ken Okazaki: Got it. So number one is, get on the platform and actually observe what other people are doing, what's working like a native, right? Number two is just start. If there was like anything else you could add to that. But you'd advise like a younger version of yourself. 2,

Jared Mortensen: uh, you, I mean, you gotta have a deal, right? So, a lot of TikTok buyers are deal sensitive and so maybe it's not like. just cheap stuff, but they got, they got to get a little better, better deal. The nice thing about TikTok is that the fees are so much lower that we can give a lot better deal on TikTok than we can on Amazon.

And so, so we want, you got to have a deal. So you got to think about your deal and it doesn't mean it has to be cheap. It means it has to be a good value for what they would have purchased. Right. It's not like just you're selling Timu stuff. And there's a lot of like really cheap stuff that's like Timu quality type stuff on there, but there's people selling like, 000 handbags, right? They're luxury hammock. And so you just have to know,

Ken Okazaki: like items going on TikTok shop.

Jared Mortensen: yeah, designer bags, right? So they 

Ken Okazaki: what are the 

Jared Mortensen: they're selling the individual bags, right? People are selling shoes like, uh, you know, custom shoes and things like that. And so, they're high, high AOV, like high order values, uh, on there. So you're not selling to a broader audience. It's a lot narrower audience you're selling to.

And that's the cool thing

Ken Okazaki: But each sale is, 

it counts for a lot, you know,

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, yeah, you make a sale and it's really good. Right. And so the TikTok, the nice thing is TikTok's algorithm is very, very targeted and it understands people's interest and it's not reliant on your followers. So you can get, you can get really good exposure.

Like we didn't have any followers. I mean, I started with nothing. Right. And so like I didn't have, when I was getting 9, 000 concurrent viewers, I only had 6, 000 followers. Right. And so TikTok is not follower based like IG or YouTube. Like it's. It's virality based. And so if you have a good product with a good deal and you're getting good engagement on the live, you'll get traffic, right?

You can get sales, but they know the users really well. And so they can target the algorithm targets really, really well. And so, yeah, you're not getting a massive number of viewers on with some of those, lives, but, but they have a really high order value, so.

I mean, the biggest, I mean, the sweet spot for, like, the majority of the sales is like a 30, like, order value, right? So, to cover the shipping and everything, so that's where a lot of people are at, but we have people selling, you know, items that are north of 100.

Ken Okazaki: So we got, Three tips there. If there was a fourth one,

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. Well, uh, have a, I mean, you have the, the deal, but FOMO is a really big deal. So like, having flash sales. So that's, that's something we do. We do like a flash sale. So it's like, Hey, we're going to do 30 percent off right now, but it's just while we're on the lives. and sometimes it may be in limited quantity.

So, you can goose your sales and get going, Hey, we're going to do five, we're going to do five units at 50 percent off, right? First come, first serve, you jump in, you get them. Yeah. And so that can help spike your sales, help drive your engagement and then gets people to subscribe to you.

So like, Hey, when we go live, we're going to do, we do flash sales, any 20, 20 to 70 percent off, right? So you've got to follow us here on Tik TOK. And so you'll get notified when we go live. So you can take advantage of the best sales. Yeah. You can go buy from us on Amazon or off our website, but we're always going to have the best deals when we go live here on Tik TOK.

And so you've got to follow us. Uh, so you're going to get notified, when we go live so you can pick up, the best deal. So, so there's some FOMO that you want to go and build and build some urgency. So you've got scarcity, urgency, really good for product drops, product launches, right?

Because you can just totally goose, uh, goose sails and drop right from the beginning. We haven't had a problem even with new, since we have products that have sold already, It's easy for us to come up with a new product and drop it without any reviews and we can sell it, right? because we have customers that want a new product, uh, launch.

If somebody's brand new, you do have to get sales. You got to get sales, you got to get reviews, on there. Because you can literally see the, the sales on every single item, right? If I look at anything, just from a consumer standpoint, everybody can see

Ken Okazaki: that's something you can't go and edit, right. It's like, it's, it's like, 

it's on the 

record. 

Jared Mortensen: you can goose it. I mean, you can go order it yourself and that counts.

Ken Okazaki: Yeah, other than other from aside from that, there's no other way to really game it. Right. It's, it's all like real data.

Jared Mortensen: Right. So you can see exactly what, what has been sold. And so, if somebody is just starting on a live and they don't have a lot of sales, you gotta go do some like, 90 percent off sales, like do a 90 percent off sale for 10 units, 15 units, 20 units, whatever you can afford to do to try to get some sales on that and then get some reviews, 

Ken Okazaki: if you do a 90 percent off sale, is that also on the record for public viewing that it was, was bought for a ridiculously low price?

Jared Mortensen: they can't see that very well. If you're

Ken Okazaki: They can't see the price. 

Jared Mortensen: Yeah they can't see the price it was made. Now to be able to see the prices paid you can actually like see them on for that consumer as well. It was like, Oh, there's a chance I could get it for this price or whatever. But, but yeah, they, whenever, when you're

Ken Okazaki: But it could also cause a lot of people to just hold off and not take any action unless there's that price again, right?

Jared Mortensen: got to be able to find it though. Like, um, and so that's the things like you'd have to find the live that's actually doing that deal. And, and so it's, it's almost, it creates this like treasure hunt type, type thing where people like maybe scrolling to try to find the, trying to find the deal, but yeah, you go on any product card and it's going to say the price that show the image and show the.

the, the sales quantity there. And so people look at that, it's like, hey, you know, this is only sold five, you know, maybe I'm not sure. Um, but Hey, this is, we've 20, 000 of these are sold. they give you the exact number until you get up to a thousand, and then it's just rounded, but, but yeah, so you got to have that, uh, get to get those sales.

And so, so you can do that in a life, right? So you can, you can. You can go and just drive, do a really good sale and, drive, or with, yeah, you can do it that with video, but, but that's something that's really important is to get past like a hundred, units on, on things, you know, as 

Ken Okazaki: Yeah, three digits kind of makes it feel big, right? Like two digits, three digits. Psychologically, there's a shift. couple questions here. Uh, has anyone ever stopped you in public and said, Oh my God, it's you, the underwear guy, like a stranger, because you've had millions of views. Um, has that ever happened?

Jared Mortensen: I've had people on my lives tell me that they've seen me in airports, but they didn't want to, I'm not, I'm not popular enough now that they'd actually like stop me or they're like, is that the

Ken Okazaki: and take a selfie with you or something. 

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. Yeah. I haven't, I haven't had any selfies. I don't have anybody's

Ken Okazaki: Autograph my underwear. 

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I do. I have had several people on the live saying, Oh, I saw you in the airport in Salt Lake City, or I saw you in the airport here. I thought that was you. And I'm like, Oh yeah, because I, all my lives, like I'm, it's, The thing, TikTok is a lot more, genuine, right? And so when I'm on the lives, I talk about my family.

I talk about where I'm traveling, where I'm going. Like I talk about what I'm doing. Hey, I, I'm only going to do this live for 15 more minutes. Cause I got a soccer game. I went play indoor soccer with my wife. We're on a coed soccer team. And so I'm like, Hey, I've got to, we're going to, we've got to cut this splash sale off in 15 minutes because I've got to go play soccer, right?

Oh, I'm going to wear, I'm wearing this compression. I've got a running tight, right? And so like with a compression pant and um, and so I wear it when I'm playing soccer, particularly when I'm playing goalie. And so I'm like, Hey, and that's. So I'll do a flash sale on that product because, Hey, I'm going to go wear it and use it like right after that.

Right. And so I'll talk about those things. Hey, I'm going to be here. I'm going to be there. Uh, and just talking about where I'm traveling, what's going on. So they have a connection to the business. So that's, that's the thing that's really. been amazing with the live streaming. Like it gives you a direct connection to your customers, right?

So people are giving you a direct feedback when you're getting direct questions about like the fit, the feel why it looks so funky, right? But then you have customers that are recurring customers are coming on and asking questions about the product and providing feedback and then they're on their preaching too.

So there's times where we have 40, 50 customers on our line that are like, Because they're on there to try to get the deal because they want it. They want another set or two sets or three sets. I have people that have spent thousands of dollars with this, right? And so they're literally like addicted to underwear, which is fine, right?

but they're on the lives and they're like answering people's questions. And so like, there's this huge social proof that goes along with the, the live stream as well. When you have these, these customers that are missionaries that they're passionate about the product as well as like, Hey, we're changing the way that men's apparel is designed.

guys deserve that product. fit their unique shapes and sizes that deserve to be like size inclusive. And so they're on their preaching, right? They're an extra small, they're a 5XL. So they're answering the questions. and so that's like, that helps a ton as well. Right. Just from a credibility standpoint, when you're on a live and you have like 10 or 20 other people that are chiming in answering questions.

And so that's a difference. Like when people think about selling on live, they think of it just as one way. They don't understand this feedback loop that. the community that you're able to build with your customers as particularly for smaller businesses where like they're talking to the designer, they're talking to the owner of the business and the designer, they can say, Hey, can you, can you do this in blue?

Hey, can you do this in this? Can you do this in that? And like, Hey, we'll, yeah, we'll look at that. We'll look at. And so we've launched new products based off the feedback that we've had from customers on a live stream. Right. And so. Yeah. it's just given us a ton of opportunity to like engage with our customers and build a better community.

Uh, and then we've had customers go and connect or like they start chatting in there and then they DM each other and then they connect. And so it's, it's super, uh, super, super cool. And so it's not just a one way, it's, it's this interactive, uh, community, but, Yeah. And so it's, it's been amazing in a lot of different ways that, I mean, we just went in trying to sell, right.

And then we got all this value coming out of it because we're open to, you know, open to that. Right.

Ken Okazaki: You know, you could take this over to Twitter or Instagram by just doing a hashtag contest for who wore it better and people have got to take photos of them wearing their underwear, you know, uh, sorry, that's a side thing. My brain gets a little excited sometimes about random ideas to get attention.

Uh, last question about this, and I know we're running a little bit over, frequency and time of day for streaming. Any tips on that from your experience?

Jared Mortensen: TikTok provides analytics around like when a particular brand's followers are on. Right. And, uh, and so we've looked at that. Ours for some reason says at 7am is when our peak, I don't know if everybody's like on there looking for stuff before

Ken Okazaki: Commuting maybe? And,

Jared Mortensen: It's nuts.

It's yeah, it's a, it's weird. Yeah. Just before they're going to work, but, uh, from a sales standpoint, our, our prime hours is really, are really from like three, 3 PM to like 10 PM, uh, where we're selling the most. We do see, you see some spiking around noon when people are like taking lunch breaks and things like that.

so that's, that's for us, but it really just depends on your customer, right? So the, the majority on for us, 90 percent of our customers on Amazon are male. 10 percent female. on TikTok. It's more like 60 percent to 70 percent male, 30 to 40 percent female, because over 50 percent of men's underwear is actually purchased by women, right.

So they're buying it for kids for their sons, for their boyfriends, for their spouses. And so there's a significant, uh, portion of use. Is sold to to women. And so, but, so TikTok skews heavier to females, but still more, more, more males there, but, right. but yeah, so kind of a three to 10, but it can be, it can vary from day to day, right?

Mondays are not as good, in the evenings. Fridays are good until about six or a decent until six. And then it, you know, it drops off. So there's different times depending on the day. so our best day is usually Tuesday to Thursday, and then sometimes Saturday can pop off really well, and we don't stream on Sunday, but, but yeah, so we, we try to do, we're Monday through Saturday live streaming now, so,

Ken Okazaki: and how many hours a day?

Jared Mortensen: four to eight right now, and so I was doing all the live streaming, and I, so I was only able to do like two a day, like depending on what my schedule, because I'm, I'm running the business too, and then trying to live stream.

And so I was doing it solo. I didn't have any help. I had my data science director. He was doing it occasionally. So he would kind of, uh, did that a few times. And he, I mean, he was doing stupid numbers too, like 10 months ago. And he's programmer, right? But yeah, so we, we're doing like five to eight hours and hopefully Friday we'll get our Spanish stream going.

So we'll have English. So this is English five to eight hours. My goal is to be 10 hours a day, English 10 hours a day on Spanish. so we'll, we'll have our first Spanish stream. Hopefully tomorrow afternoon at five, I'm still working on the studio. So as soon as we're done here, I'm going out, uh, and working on the studio, uh, tonight

Ken Okazaki: Okay. Okay. Exciting. 

Jared Mortensen: and going.

But yeah, we're super excited about that because Spanish, you know, U. S. is the second largest Spanish speaking country in the, in the world, so tons of Spanish speakers. Uh, so a lot of viewers on TikTok, very little content, very few sellers. And so we're super excited. We think there's an awesome, a massive opportunity, to make some headways there on the, on the Spanish side.

Ken Okazaki: Following up on that question, is there, let's say you did have the personnel and the talent Is there a negative for streaming too much? Let's say you have three, eight hour shifts and three guys doing that with every reason not to, if no reason not to.

Jared Mortensen: No, I mean, it's just a diminishing, diminishing return as far as, I mean, like there's just some hours that aren't maybe going to be as good. 

Ken Okazaki: Yeah, but for example, let's say that. I don't know if you pay them hourly or commission based or both, but let's just say for example, these guys are like a couple hundred dollars an hour or something, right? They do eight hours, you know, That's a good day.

It's over a thousand bucks. And if you're making more than that in profits, is there a reason to not do it?

Jared Mortensen: No. No, if you're making money with that, so it's, it's really a balance between like are you making money on lives or can they make more if they're doing, uh, content. so I have my hosts going and creating like video, just video posts. And so, on times where they're not, there's not as much, uh, like activity right now, now during, for the next, like 20 days, we're going be like hard on the, on the

Ken Okazaki: Yeah, we're going straight into Christmas, man. 

Let's stuff those 

Jared Mortensen: so like the last, the last 10 days we, we did, we have been spending several hours a day just doing videos, right? Cause we're trying to seed, get a lot of holiday content created so that the algorithm, uh, for, from ads, cause we are doing a lot of advertising now on Tik Tok, we use a GMV max, ad algorithm, um, so campaigns.

And so we are doing a lot from a video standpoint. So we needed to get a lot of content out there for that algorithm cause it's just content hungry. And so we like, I mean, we did 19 posts yester, well, two days ago, I think I only had 10 posts out yesterday. just branded posts right on, on TikTok. But you know, we're really trying to get 10 to 20 a day on there to feed that algorithm.

But, no, if, if you're, if you're making the margin on it, so they're, they're brands. There's more some women apparel brands that Yeah, they're live 20 hours a day. Right. So I mean, you're doing with multiple time zones. Right. So your, 

four time zones, so you're covering East to Pacific.

and so, so you'd get some pretty good, cover it. There's a lot of viewers anyway. So, but yeah, if the margins are you, we have the people for big thing for me is just getting people like hiring live streamers because nobody knows what a live streamer is, right? And so, like, it's been a really hard for me to hire live streamers, LinkedIn posts and I'm posting on TikTok and promoting the jobs, job boards.

I've gone to career fairs. I've presented at marketing classes at universities, like trying to, to hire people to come be live streamers. And they're like, what is that? so yeah, so

Ken Okazaki: And yeah, females doing it too.

Jared Mortensen: I had a female, uh, streamer. She was doing really, really well. And then it's like, she had her own business.

And so then, uh, she does face painting and stuff like that. And so like during the Halloween, uh, she got just solely focused on, on doing all that. She did quinceaneras and a bunch of other like,

Ken Okazaki: I just imagined that because of the subject matter, a woman would do very well because 

now it opens up a whole new, section of, ideas that you can joke with and also be playful and just a little bit suggestive in the, the way things are spoken, things that a woman can, that a man can't say.

Right. So that, that would be a fun thing to put in. I'd imagine as a, from an entertainment perspective,

Jared Mortensen: as well as being like approachable for a female buyer, right? And less intimidated. And so, and just asking question, Hey, how does that, how does it fit, uh, fit, uh, your husband? And, and so like, asking someone those questions, they may be, they're more apt to ask, that.

So like, our top affiliate is actually a

and she goes live. And so she has 150, 000 followers. she's done really pretty well with, with the lives and so it's, but she's, I mean, she's doing a lot of other brands.

So she does, she's in her sixties. And so she does a lot of, anti aging and cosmetics and, some other aparams some women's apparel, but I'm our largest, Like partner, so, so yeah. And so she does really well. So, so we want to have a lot more women. so I work with, like join brands.

So I've used join brands to source UGC creators and most probably like 80% of the creators have source off of join brands are females, right? cause it's, you know, 

Ken Okazaki: I want you one more time, that woman in her sixties and there are people in their thirties saying, you know what, I'm too old for TikTok, too old for streaming, and now we have a 60 year old woman who is, making bank by doing, uh, content creation for you.

Men's underwear. That's amazing. That needs to be the headline. 60 year old women live streams men's underwear.

Jared Mortensen: yeah, yeah. So, so yeah, there's a lot of people have these different, uh, like 

thoughts, like TikTok. 

Ken Okazaki: it's, it's all up here. You know, it's, it's not nothing to do with your age. Just, just try it, right?

Jared Mortensen: Yeah. Just, just go and just go and do it. And so like, yeah, most of my affiliates are 40 plus that are on TikTok. Right. it's not younger, younger individuals that are creating a lot of the content for the, on the shop side. I mean, they're creating their own entertainment content, but they're not like as engaged to the, you know, from a, from a sales standpoint, they're not trying to make money necessarily.

I mean, they're wanting to get monetized for their content, their creativity, and, but, uh, it's the, it's the older people on the platform that are, they're in there to go and make some money. A lot of stay at home moms. Hey, I'm going to go and like create, uh, content. And some of those videos, like, Totally popped off.

Like it's done. It's amazing how you have had some of these creators that are, you know, it's a 35 year old single mom with three kids and making 30, 000 a year. And she goes and posts the video and it pops off and she makes 200 grand, you know, like it's crazy. I've had some of the stories that, and it's kind of life changing for some of these individuals, but you gotta be willing to put yourself out there.

And so that's where a lot of people are just not like just willing to go and, and, And, uh, you'd be surprised at what they can actually do if they'd actually try, but they're just afraid to do it, but yeah, most of our affiliates are 40 plus. 

Ken Okazaki: All right. We got to wrap this up, what I'd like to do is wrap these up with a question for the listener, because a lot of times instructions are telling people what to do. We've had too much of that in our lives, but if you ask them a question and they ask themselves something, it might get them to think differently.

So, if there's a question you'd ask someone, in order to help them see this differently, in order to help them see what opportunity is available for them, or maybe to just help them get moving in the direction they That they already know they want to go, what would you ask them?

Jared Mortensen: you just say what's stopping you.

Like what is, what is holding you back? Right. You had to identify that, what's the barrier? Right? What's, what's stopping you from, from trying? you know, is it fear? Is it, you know, a lot of times it's fear, but I mean, what is that? What is the thing that's that's stopping you from, trying?

So maybe it's time, maybe, you know, it's different, different things. But that's, that's what I'd ask.

All right, Jared, thank you so much. And to all the listeners, ask yourself that question, what is stopping you? and if this story inspired you, then I just want to ask you to please go check out the links, we'll have the link to Jared's store. RMAC.

store. 

Ken Okazaki: or the 

Jared Mortensen: RMAC. store. So you have to, you have to do the dot store. So, so that's, uh, might be, uh, a hang up for summer, or search first on Amazon. We like branded search real men, real men, apparel company. So a real man underwear on Amazon will pop up right to the top. Just don't click the paid, go down and don't 

Ken Okazaki: Yes, let's get him some organic traffic here. 

Organic growth. 

Jared Mortensen: Yeah, or, or, you know, Google us, uh, and, uh, or Shopify or follow us on TikTok. So that's what we'd encourage you to do. just search for real men, underwear, real men apparel on, on TikTok and look for the rhino. So our, our logo is a rhino, a battle rhino. So it's a rhino head with the kind of this, uh, Helmet on like a Roman helmet.

So it's kind of funky, but funny. So it's supposed to be a strong, but funny. Right. So, uh, don't take ourselves too seriously because we sell funny looking underwear, that's just going to like change your life from a comfort standpoint. So once you try it, then you'll just not, you'll not go back. So you've got to be prepared that, uh, it's just going to change your life.

But people don't realize how uncomfortable they are until they actually wear something that, fits their body. So.

Ken Okazaki: Thank you for that, Jared. seriously guys, do check out the links below. Also check out Jared on, on LinkedIn. I believe that's where I've seen you the most active outside of TikTok. And, uh, have a look at what he's up to. And until then, I'll see you guys all next week. 

Ken Okazaki: No hassle, worship here, we're a different breed. Action is what we got if action is what you need. Us content capitalists, we're breaking the flow. Cuz the old ways stay, new stories to be told. So content capitalists, get to the press.