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You began your career at Red Bull, who own arguably one of the most intense and viral-led brand marketing strategies in the industry. What did that system teach you about building awareness that e-commerce brands could learn from?
At Red Bull I really learned the power of building brand as well as a lot of brand discipline. You have to have a lot of discipline around the strategy and how much you really double down on that strategy time and time again. Essentially as a brand manager you're a steward of that brand. It was really valuable to have that brand bootcamp at a young age.
From a brand strategy perspective, I think about how the brand shows up. Literally down to every time you see a ramp; the famous bull and suns logo would always be going in the direction of the action.
Thinking about a piece of content and what's the exact right angle for the camera to be placed so that you get the athlete whilst getting the branding on the helmet right in the action moment. Thinking through in that level of detail, but also at that level. That’s what I mean when I talk about discipline.
At the end of the day, branding is just creating memory structures for consumers and so enduring brands and the brands that have the best market share are the ones that, over time sustainably are able to reinforce those memory structures over and over and over again.
When you think of Red Bull, you immediately think of Bull and Suns. You think of the rhombus can, maybe you think of their cartoon iconography, action sports. Those are the types of memory structures that are being built for consumers.
"Branding is just creating memory structures for consumers." - Liz Ahern
360 Marketing
Your expertise strongly sits within 360 Marketing. For a $5M-10M DTC brand, when should they be looking at 360? Or is paid social and direct response the path they should be taking at this stage in growth?
It’s really about making a surround sound for the consumer. Back in the day, you would have the primary channel of TV, or you have radio, and you could reach a mass amount of consumers with just one channel in a paid spot. Of course, nowadays it's so fragmented, so the goal of creating a 360 plan is really about how are you hitting the consumer across multiple touch points and across multiple stages of their journey.
Every point in the journey from, I'm just now becoming aware of this brand to, I'm actually in the consideration set and I'm evaluating several brands to solve this problem that I have. So 360 planning is really about thinking through all of those different parts of the funnel, but then also all the different marketing channels that you could potentially reach someone because it's not until someone sees it or hears it, multiple, multiple times that it really sticks in their head.
So in terms of that $5-10 Million revenue range where would you be looking at as the customer goes through the journey?
It's hard to say that there's one catchall. If you're going after a very Gen Z consumer, then you absolutely need to be on TikTok. You need to have a full funnel strategy there from organic content all the way through TikTok shop and paid, working with influencers that make sense to the brand.
Then again, if you're going after a Gen X or a Boomer, that might look quite different. I would say in general, for most modern DTC brands it's a mix of paid and organic digital strategy.
Hiring
Brands are facing more paralysis in the hiring process in 2026, especially at the C-Level. Companies are regularly altogether changing direction after starting a hiring process and even pulling signed roles. At what point does an E-Commerce brand need an experienced CMO versus a strong performance lead?
I think it can come in at any stage in the process. I always go back to—Do you have the right team members to both guide the strategy and the execution? That's where a CMO comes in.
I always think of the CMO as a very challenging position because often it spans both creative brand and performance, all under one roof. A good CMO needs to think about creative execution and big picture thinking whilst also needing to be in the weeds of the analytics.
At the end of the day, a marketer's role is to drive growth and to drive sales. They need to understand what are the levers? Where to place bets across from a budgeting perspective and what's going to maximize output. That type of thinking is valuable at sort of any stage of company and particularly for brands that don't have unlimited resources.
It really matters where they place those resources, with the caveat that’s why I like the fractional model a lot. You might not need a full-time CMO all the time working on the business. Depending on what the team structure looks like, you might just need someone that is a couple hours a week to help guide the strategy, to help think through budget and resource allocation, to do the analysis to see how things are trending, pressure test and be a resource for the team.
AI
From a brand perspective, as AI and automation increase, where is your focus in creative and campaigns to differentiate brand?
I think at the end of the day, the brands that win are the ones that are really able to drive that emotional connection and that really requires human touch and human understanding. So I think that's why you see a lot of these AI campaigns fall flat.
AI can be helpful as a starting point for copy. It's helpful as a starting point of mocking things up creatively. There's even cool visuals that you can do with AI but I don't think it can always understand true human desires, motivations, pain points, and create meaningful campaigns around those.
I think that's where human understanding, good marketers and strong creative really come into play.
Product
As CMO of Chamberlain Coffee you’ve been at the front row for celebrity-built brands. In your view, what is the biggest misconception brands have about celebrity-endorsed DTC success?
I think that awareness is everything, and I think awareness without product relevance is where a lot of brands can miss the mark. Not only from a storytelling perspective—does that product have to be relatable and relevant for the celebrity who's backing it?—It has to feel like it's an authentic tie-in of why they decided to found this brand or why they're promoting it.
But the product is more important, whether it's solving a pain point functionally or emotionally there has to be connection and resonance there.
Where you see a lot of celebrity brands fall by the wayside is that they think that any celebrity partner is enough to create that awareness, but the strength of the product experience is what is going to drive that repeat, awareness will maybe get you some initial trial and buzz, but great businesses are built on having true community and having strong repeat of the product.
That's where the importance of the product comes into play, having something that's a very strong experience.
In your career you’ve created strong nationwide retail launches into Target and Walmart. There’s a big push for DTC brands to get into retail in 2026, what would your advice be for a DTC brand who wants to go in this direction?
There is so much to think about when you're launching in retail. It's one thing to get into retail outlets and another thing to sustain the velocities that you need to sustain in order to stay on shelf. You have to think about so many different things when you're going to launch.
One fundamental thing is your pricing architecture, and understanding. What are you charging customers on DTC? How are you promoting on DTC? What does your Amazon pricing structure and margin structure look like? Then when you go into retail there are certain retailers that always want be the lowest price in the market, for example.
Similarly there's certain retailers that require you to do a certain level of promotional activities, in which case you might need to price your product a bit higher so that you can sustain deeper discounts. If you're building a brand and you're thinking through your product margins you need to start thinking about the eventuality of going into retail and how you're going to structure pricing for all these different channels.
The second piece of it is what's your marketing strategy to sustain that velocity on shelf? You're not only going to need to have a strong trade promotional strategy which I always think of as more “below the line”, but you also need to think about how you're going to drive and sustain the awareness that you need in order to drive that velocity. That looks different for different brands. Going back to who the core customer is, how they discover brands in that product and category.
So it may be that it is a really strong digital play. You could look more at options like OTT and traditional TV channels. But always thinking about what is the best way and the most efficient way for you to drive awareness to be successful.
"It's one thing to get into retail outlets and another thing to sustain the velocities that you need to sustain in order to stay on shelf." - Liz Ahern
Is there a certain size of DTC brand where you would advise to scale before trying to launch into retail?
I think it depends on how and where people shop their specific category. If you're a canned beverage brand it's really expensive to ship product DTC. Most people are shopping for that as either an impulse buy or a take home product. They're shopping for that in retail, so a retail strategy is a necessity.
Whereas if you are a fashion brand or an accessories brand it makes DTC still a big part of how people are shopping for that category specifically. I think it's always hard at the end of the day, you want to be in as many channels as you possibly can.
At Red Bull we had this specific concept around mental availability and physical availability. Mental availability are those mental structures, the marketing and how you are driving awareness, specifically how you are driving top of mind awareness.
Then the physical availability is; are you at arm's reach of a customer? You know a customer is going to choose where they want to choose to go pick up a product. You know if the Target is the closest thing to them. They're gonna go there for their shopping or to pick things up. They're not gonna drive 30 minutes or an hour out of their way to go pick up a product unless it's something very special to them, whatever that is.
Being able to be in these multiple channels is very important for a brand as they're looking to grow and scale. The caveat to that is, do you have the margin profile in order to invest? What do you need to invest in both the retail side and in marketing to be successful and are you well funded?
Because once you get into retail, that cash conversion cycle starts to look real rough and the inventory needs are quite significant. You need to think about how does this all make a sustainable business? Very importantly, how many retailers can you sustain at one time?
So would you say to break into retail you really want to have a funding structure from a VC funding point of view.
Yes. Unless you're wildly profitable and you have your own cash reserves to make that leap.
Influencer Strategy
What would be your three biggest takeaways for brands looking to build out their influencer strategy in today’s social media climate?
It used to be that you could do a ‘one and done’ paid partnership and it would go off the charts and perform super well. If I’m honest, those days are kind of over.
The smartest thing for brands to do to start out with is have a really robust gifting and seeding program. Just get your brands in the hands of as many creators, potential collaborators, and partners as possible so they can try the product. Then, from there you see who actually really loves your product and is resonating with it. You can then use that as a jumping off point to build out either a paid partnership or something else.
Then I think the top tier of all of that is brands that are actually co-creating with some sort of influencer. So whether it's a specific flavor in collaboration with them, whether it's some sort of licensed product or a creator at the face of a massive campaign.
Deepening that relationship and having that sort of tie in, especially if there's that authentic story of where this specific creator has been a fan of the brand for a really long time. I've seen that be really successful at helping move the needle, especially if that creator is really able to galvanize their audience.
There are some creators that post about brands and immediately that brand can sell out. So you have to figure out who that creator is for your category in particular.
"I think consumers make decisions emotionally—but then—rationalize them logically." - Liz Ahern
You’ve said to me recently that we have “entered the era of the emotionally rational consumer”, why do you think this is prevalent in 2026, and why is this your conviction?
I think consumers make decisions emotionally—but then—rationalize them logically.
But I think people perceive that they do the opposite. People perceive that they make decisions very rationally at the outset. As I'm thinking about brand strategy and product positioning, I really go back to what is the problem that this product is trying to solve.
At a functional level, there's usually some sort of problem solution there, but then what does that actually mean at a deeper level from an emotional perspective? Let's say I'm there to buy a hammer. I'm not buying a hammer. I'm actually trying to buy a hole in the wall.
That's the functional piece. But why am I trying to buy the hole in the wall? Maybe it's because I'm trying to put up photos for my family and it triggers amazing memories. Or maybe I'm remodeling my house and it's fraught with lots of different pain points.
I need to have someone who can guide me through this process and make it fun and engaging. There are different emotional avenues that you can tap into beyond just that functional piece. I think that's what good marketers and good marketing campaigns do at the end of the day.
Beyond that, that's when you hit them over the head with the rational piece. That's where you talk about features and benefits, and the value for the price. So that you're giving the customer essentially ammunition to rationalize that purchase for themselves.
"Let's say I'm there to buy a hammer. I'm not buying a hammer. I'm actually trying to buy a hole in the wall." - Liz Ahern
Category Expansion
You’ve had strong experience with category expansion how do you think about “trust equity” when entering a new category?
It's always an interesting play and I think some brands do it well, and some brands really struggle when they move into other categories. I think the first question that I always ask is why the category expansion?
At Red Bull our whole goal was household penetration. The energy category in Red Bull in particular had pretty low household penetration compared to a Coca-Cola for example. There was just the core product, and that's a big reason why Red Bull didn't expand into other categories, is that there was just so much room to grow the business just within that.
That category and that discipline and the focus allows them to really double down on that hero SKU and grow from bringing more people into the category. Now, for some brands, if the category that you're in is really small or it's not a very frequent purchase, that's when it might make sense to go into an adjacent category because you're going to need your existing consumer base to either trade them up to another product or have them bundle a product or create something that makes sense.
I always kind of go back to—what's the why—for category expansion and, does your customer give you permission to expand into that category? Is your brand positioning flexible enough?
To expand into that category, have you built up the community that's willing to take that leap with you? I would look at all of that before advising someone to expand categories.
In a world where everyone has access to the same tools, what creates true competitive advantage?
Honestly, it's the human's ability not only to put in the right prompts and inputs, but also the discernment to judge and evaluate the outputs too. With AI tools, typically you might get fifteen to twenty results back. There are probably going to be around eighteen that are garbage and maybe two that kind of work. Even then it still needs to be tweaked.
It's that competitive advantage and brands who are able to move quickly to leverage these tools. I think there's a lot of legacy brands that are gonna be left pretty flatfooted because they're not leveraging it day in and day out, or thinking through the implications of it. They are a busy person, an entrepreneur that doesn't have time to even think about how to sit down and integrate all these tools into their workday. It's important for operators to carve out space for themselves to test out new tools and to think about how they can make their workflows more efficient.
When you get super busy, AI is usually the last thing you're thinking about.
What do you see as the biggest opportunities to grow revenue and customer retention for DTC in 2026?
We're seeing a lot of in-person events and community events coming back, and I think what's really interesting about this is for brands thinking through how do they scale micro communities and do it in a way that's very thoughtful.
I go back to the fact people are wanting to get off social media and be more in person with one another, make friends and have that human connection again.
Especially as there's so much AI out there, it makes people feel icky or uninspired. But being in community with other people is kind of how they feel. This sense of belonging, I think interestingly enough, brands are kind of stepping in to fill that role for consumers.
It used to be that there would be these big splashy brand events—unless you had half a million dollars to drop on a big experiential activation—you couldn't really breakthrough. Now we're seeing actually that these micro events, like run clubs for example, or book clubs, these hyper-local, smaller community events are the things that are really starting to resonate.
The smart brands are trying to figure out how they can integrate into those moments, not only to drive that product experience, but also that emotional connection with the product. At Red Bull, for example, we’d always say, if you had a great night out and it started with Red Bull. That's that emotional connection that you're always going to associate. It is a similar thing with whatever that product experience is like for that community and how can you create that emotional connection and product trial.