Ops for the Win, with Brenda Mendez - a podcast by Pilothouse

Looking for growth support? Building a brand? Need an ops overhaul?

Talk to Brenda Mendez, former COO of Snow Teeth Whitening and Branding and Marketing Specialist.

This force to be reckoned with problem solver and ops mastermind is ready to roll up her sleeves and help. She specializes in building ops to alleviate pain points utilizing her lived experience and no-nonsense analytical approach to streamline your business.

She’s basically business Mary Poppins. She wants to set up your business for success - so much so that you don’t need her anymore. Maybe a business Ghostbuster? ??



(...we’ll work on our analogy.)

Here are the key strategy takeaways from our podcast you can try on your own ops stack.

Approachable Ops

Strong foundations start with operations and systems. Brenda’s rule of thumb? Anyone should walk in the door and immediately understand how your system works and why it’s in place. No guessing games. Only clarity.

3 Pillars for Growth

Whether you’re growing a product, persona or service, Brenda uses this three-pillar framework to develop and elevate brands.

• Brand Equity - think about what you need to create from a brand perspective - obtain IP’s, IG handles, domains - everything you need for a seamless brand appearance across platforms.
  
  


• Community - investigate your customer journey seeking out any lost opportunities to convert. How are you talking to your customers? What rewards/loyalty program do you have in place? What is your follow up process? How are you retaining their business? Be customer-centric in all things and develop an experience that will emotionally evoke the customer.
  
  


• Associations - who do customers associate with your business? Whether pursuing influencer campaigns or retail opportunities - consider how your brand pairs with the brand you’re partnering with and whether or not this partnership maintains your brand’s integrity.
  
  

Bypass Burnout

Creating and scaling a DTC business is a major undertaking that requires serious mental stamina. Prioritizing your mental health is a must. Here are some tools Brenda employs (based on personal experience with burnout after a significant push when taking Snow to retail)

• Self Audit - Understand where you’re going and why. If you don’t have discipline and control as to where you want to take your company, it will grow into an unwieldy beast. You need to hone in on why you’re doing it, where you’re going, and how to prioritize your needs and values.
  
  


• 5 Non-Negotiables - Articulate five non-negotiables for your mental health, and book time for them in your calendar. Is it yoga? Going for a run? Facetime-ing your Mum? Make things that fill your cup non-negotiable to preserve your mental and emotional health.
  
  


• Communication Waterfall - As a founder, you only have so much bandwidth - preserve it! Brenda recommends setting up a system of stops and boundaries that empower your team to seek answers themselves before bringing it to your desk (Have you checked the google drive? Have you brought this to your manager? Have you googled it?).
  
  

Listen to the full pod for more, including how not to be a bottleneck, how to best activate different influencer tiers, and why rebrands aren’t as scary as they sound.

Watch: https://https://youtu.be/H27KXe93SRU

Subscribe: https://directtoconsumer.co

Join: https://dtcplus.co

Further episodes of DTC Podcast

Further podcasts by Pilothouse

Website of Pilothouse