Weekly newsletter from the guy that brings you the eCommerce Podcast

Make your business more valuable whether you plan to sell or scale

Did you know that more than 70% of founders can’t step away from their business for more than a week without something breaking down (including themselves 😊).

I was reminded of this recently when I spoke with a founder who hadn’t taken a proper holiday in three years.

Not because they didn’t want to. Not because they couldn’t afford to. But because they were the glue holding everything together. If they stepped away, even for a week, the business would grind to a halt.

On the outside, their brand appeared to be a success: revenue climbing, orders shipping, and, most importantly, customers were happy. But behind the scenes, the truth was very different. Every process lived in the founder’s head. Every decision came back to them. Every bottleneck stopped at their desk.

They had built a business, yes, but also a prison.

When Growth Creates Fragility

This isn’t an isolated story. In fact, it’s the reality for many eCommerce businesses. Growth should be exciting. Instead, it often feels like chaos:

• Teams are bigger but less efficient.

• Revenue is higher, but margins are thinner.

• Opportunities appear, but no one has the bandwidth to seize them.

The paradox then becomes clear in that success creates fragility when everything still depends on the founder.

👉 A founder-dependent business isn’t a valuable business.
👉 Growth without systems is just stress with more zeros.

Exit-Readiness Without the Exit

“Exit-ready” doesn’t mean you’re planning to sell tomorrow. It means you’re building a business that’s valuable whether you keep it or not.

When a company runs on systems rather than a founders personality, it gains freedom and options:

• The founder can step away without fear.

• The business attracts talent, partners, and investors.

• Valuation rises because stability replaces fragility.

I’ve seen this play out in our own journey at Aurion. We’ve built and sold brands and what we’ve learned is that the very foundations that prepare a business for exit are the ones that make growth sustainable.

What This Means

Back to the founder who couldn’t take a holiday.

We worked together to map out their processes, remove bottlenecks, and redistribute responsibilities. At first, it was uncomfortable (letting go is always a challenge). But over time, something shifted.

The team became more confident. Decisions got made faster. The founder found themselves working on the business instead of being consumed by it.

Four months later, they were planning their first proper holiday in years. And the best part is that their team was excited to prove they could run the business without them.

That’s what running a business should look like.

This Week’s eCommerce Podcast →

The Algorithm Knows What You’re Doing

Ever feel like Amazon is this mysterious black box that randomly decides which products succeed?

This week, Tim Wilson from Product Wind, challenges how we think about Amazon success.

Turns out, we all may have been fighting the wrong war.

The £38 Million Reality Check

Tim shared about a French consumer products company that came to him with incredible traffic data - everything looked perfect on paper. But their sales were practically non-existent.

Their conversion rate was 0.1% compared to a category average was 3.5%.

That's not a traffic problem. That's a fundamental conversion problem that no amount of advertising spend could fix.

You Can't Play the Same Game

Tim's approach is different. While everyone else throws money at Amazon ads and hopes for the best, his team asks a completely different question:

"What's your strategy for marketing to the algorithm?"

Think about it. Ten years ago, you'd wine and dine retail buyers to get better shelf placement. Take them to Dubai, whatever it took.

That person has been replaced by an algorithm.

But just because it's now technology instead of a person doesn't mean you can't influence it. An algorithm just needs data. So why not give it exactly the data it loves?

The Seven Signals That Matter

Through over 1,000 campaigns, Tim's identified seven specific signals Amazon's algorithm values most:

• External traffic (bringing shoppers into Amazon's ecosystem)

• Click-through rate improvements

• Sales velocity and consistency

• Conversion rate optimisation

• Reviews and ratings

• Engagement metrics

• Content freshness

The key is to show improvement across ALL these signals "week over week over week." When you do that consistently, you literally spin the flywheel in your favour.

The Orchestrated Army

One example that Tim talked about was 500 people driving 20 clicks each = 10,000 strategically timed visits that can move your product from page 87 to page 1.

Whilst 99% of brands burn money on ad spend, very few invest in this foundational work that makes everything else more effective.

Tim's ‘saving the best til last’ idea was simply to "Engage with your customers that love you the most." Those brand lovers don't just provide traffic and content - they tell you how customers really use your products and what positioning actually works. Sometimes the most valuable insights are hiding in plain sight.

Freebie of the Month →

A systematic framework for questioning business assumptions that feel like "just how things work." This 20-minute exercise helps you identify hidden constraints limiting your growth and discover alternatives you haven't considered.

Got an eCommerce business with stories worth sharing?

Come be my guest on the eCommerce Podcast, where I chat with founders about the wins, the disasters, and everything in between. Your story could be the one that helps another founder grow smarter (or avoid your mistakes). 

Until next time,

Make your business more valuable whether you plan to sell or scale.