Ecommerce: The Hammersley Brothers Ecommerce Podcast

You increase your ad spend.

Your ROAS drops.

So you reduce the budget again.

Then, a few months later, you try exactly the same thing and get exactly the same result.

In this episode, Mark and Ian Hammersley break down what they call the Ecommerce Scaling Test, a way of understanding what actually happens inside your business when you try to spend more on advertising.

The important question is not simple:

Why did ROAS drop?

It is:

Where did the model break?

Mark and Ian compare scaling an ecommerce business to opening a second physical store.

Your first store might work brilliantly. But when you open the next one, you are dealing with different customers, different competition, and a different environment.

Increasing your advertising budget works in much the same way.

You are moving into a new layer of traffic.

Those customers may cost more to reach, know less about your brand, convert differently and require more convincing before they buy.

Instead of looking at ROAS alone, Mark and Ian explain how to break the scaling attempt apart and look at what actually changed.

They discuss:

 •Why does ROAS often drop when you increase ad spend?
 •The Hammersley Brothers Scaling Test
 •Why scaling is like opening another retail store
 •What happens to the cost per click as you spend more?
 •How Meta frequency can reveal wasted spend
 •How Google brand traffic can distort scaling
 •Why add-to-basket rate matters
 •Why average order value can fall as you scale
 •How email should support new customer acquisition
 •Why stocks can become the hidden scaling bottleneck
 •How to find the part of your funnel that breaks first
 •Why some products scale even when the overall account does not
 •When to move budget between Google and Meta
 •How to prepare your ecommerce business before attempting to scale

The goal is not to increase spending and hope it works.

It is to increase spending, understand what breaks, fix it, and test again.

That is how businesses gradually move through new layers of customers and build something that can genuinely scale.

Subscribe for more practical ecommerce strategy, Google Ads, Meta Ads, Shopify, and business growth discussions from the Hammersley Brothers.

P.S. Whenever you’re ready... here are 3 ways Ian and I can help you grow your ecommerce business:

 

 

1. Talk to us. Book a call with us and let's talk about accelerating your growth - https://go.hammersleybrothers.com/apply-now/

2. Grab a copy of our book - https://gohigh.hammersleybrothers.com/get-the-book

3. Follow the Hammersley Brothers on Instagram and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - 
https://www.instagram.com/hammersleybrothers

Images have always mattered in ecommerce, but right now their importance is changing dramatically.

In this episode, Mark and Ian Hammersley discuss the revolution happening in ecommerce imagery, why product photography can have such a major impact on performance, and how AI is completely changing what brands are now able to create.

For visually driven ecommerce businesses such as fashion, homeware and jewelry, the image does much of the selling.

It affects whether someone clicks on an ad, whether they explore a product, whether they trust the brand and ultimately, whether they buy.

Mark and Ian discuss what they have seen in their own ecommerce businesses, including products dramatically improving after their photography was changed.

They also look back at how difficult ecommerce photography used to be.

Professional shoots meant photographers, models, studios, locations, styling, lighting, editing, and significant organisation. Getting everything exactly right could take weeks or months.

AI is changing that.

Brands can now create, adjust and test imagery at a speed that would previously have been impossible.

But simply having access to AI does not mean the images will be good.

Mark and Ian explain why creative direction still matters, why you need to understand what good looks like, and why poorly executed AI imagery can actually make a brand look less trustworthy.

They also discuss:
 

Why imagery is so important in ecommerce

How product photography affects conversion rate

Why fashion and homeware are particularly image-driven

How AI is revolutionising product photography

Why great photography was previously a competitive advantage

How AI is removing barriers for smaller ecommerce brands

Why creative direction is still essential

How images influence Meta Ads and Google Shopping

Why simple product imagery can outperform complicated creative

How to test product images and identify winning products

Why some lifestyle imagery can actually make products harder to understand

How ecommerce brands can use AI without making their site look artificial

 
If your products are bought because of how they look, imagery may now be one of the most important areas of your ecommerce strategy.

Subscribe for more practical ecommerce strategy, Meta Ads, Google Ads, AI, Shopify, and business growth discussions from the Hammersley Brothers.

#Ecommerce #ProductPhotography #AI

P.S. Whenever you’re ready... here are 3 ways Ian and I can help you grow your ecommerce business:

 

1. Talk to us. Book a call with us and let's talk about accelerating your growth - https://go.hammersleybrothers.com/apply-now/

2. Grab a copy of our book - https://gohigh.hammersleybrothers.com/get-the-book

3. Follow the Hammersley Brothers on Instagram and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - 
https://www.instagram.com/hammersleybrothers

Where did the Hammersley Brothers Model actually come from?

In this episode, Mark and Ian Hammersley go back to the beginning and explain how their ecommerce model was built, the problems they were trying to solve, and the lessons that shaped the way they approach ecommerce today.

The story starts in 2008, when Mark and Ian were working with a group of ecommerce businesses during the financial crisis.

Some were growing quickly. Some were stuck. Others were failing.

The interesting part was that the difference was not always obvious from the outside.

Successful businesses do not necessarily have better websites, better advertising or better teams.

So Mark and Ian started looking deeper.

They wanted to understand what the businesses that successfully scaled had in common and what was missing from the ones that could not grow.

That process eventually became the foundation of the Hammersley Brothers Model.

In this podcast, they discuss how that model developed over time, how years of working with ecommerce businesses changed and refined it, and why the same core principles continue to shape how they approach growth today.

They also explore:
 

How the Hammersley Brothers Model originally started

What they learned from ecommerce businesses during the 2008 financial crisis

Why did some businesses scaled while others stayed stuck?

How the model developed from real ecommerce experience

Why the fundamentals matter more than individual tactics

The role of math, psychology and management

Why different ecommerce businesses need different strategies

How ecommerce has changed since the model was first developed

Why cheap traffic and better technology are no longer enough

How the model is still used to identify opportunities for profitable growth

This episode is a behind-the-scenes look at where the Hammersley Brothers Model came from and how nearly two decades of ecommerce experience helped turn it into the framework they use today.

Subscribe for more ecommerce strategy, scaling advice, Google Ads, Meta Ads, and practical business discussions from the Hammersley Brothers.

P.S. Whenever you’re ready... here are 3 ways Ian and I can help you grow your ecommerce business:

 

1. Talk to us. Book a call with us and let's talk about accelerating your growth - https://go.hammersleybrothers.com/apply-now/

 

2. Grab a copy of our book - https://gohigh.hammersleybrothers.com/get-the-book

3. Follow the Hammersley Brothers on Instagram and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - 
https://www.instagram.com/hammersleybrothers

If your Black Friday emails start the week of Black Friday, you've already lost sales to the brands that started weeks earlier.

In this episode, Ian and I share the email sequences we actually use for Black Friday: when to start, how often to send, and why sending more emails makes you more money even if you hate getting them yourself.

If you sell online and want this to be your biggest November yet, listen before you plan a single email.

#BlackFriday #EmailMarketing #Ecommerce

 

 

P.S. Whenever you’re ready... here are 3 ways Ian and I can help you grow your ecommerce business:

 

 

1. Talk to us. Book a call with us and let's talk about accelerating your growth - https://go.hammersleybrothers.com/apply-now/

 

2. Grab a copy of our book - https://gohigh.hammersleybrothers.com/get-the-book

3. Follow the Hammersley Brothers on Instagram and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - 
https://www.instagram.com/hammersleybrothers

Not all ecommerce businesses are built the same, and some are dramatically easier to scale than others.

 

In this episode, Mark and Ian Hammersley break down the five different types of ecommerce businesses and rank them from easiest to hardest to scale.

 

The five types are:

Compounders 

Volume Retailers  

Need-Driven Suppliers 

 Seasonal Specialists  

High Ticket One-Timers

Each model behaves completely differently.

 

A strategy that works brilliantly for a supplement brand could be disastrous for a furniture company. A business selling spare parts needs a completely different advertising, stock, and customer-acquisition strategy than a fashion retailer.

 

Mark and Ian explain why understanding your ecommerce type changes the numbers you should look at, the ROAS you can afford, how aggressively you can acquire customers, how much stock you need, and, ultimately, how quickly the business can grow.

 

They also discuss why some of the least exciting ecommerce businesses can quietly create enormous wealth.

 

Need-driven businesses selling things like replacement parts, shelving and specialist products can sometimes dominate markets because competition is lower and the customer already knows exactly what problem they need solving.

 

Meanwhile, Compounders such as supplements, skincare, and consumable products can scale incredibly quickly because repeat purchasing creates a high lifetime customer value. But they can also be brutally competitive and disappear almost as quickly as they grow.

 

The episode covers:

The five ecommerce business models

Which ecommerce model is easiest to scale?  

Why repeat purchase businesses can grow so quickly  

Why boring ecommerce businesses can be incredibly profitable

Customer lifetime value and repeat purchasing

New customer acquisition  

ROAS and advertising strategy  

Margins and scalability  

Stock forecasting and cash flow  

Seasonal ecommerce businesses  

High-ticket ecommerce  

Why one ecommerce strategy does not work for every business

 

If you're trying to scale an ecommerce brand, understanding which type of business you actually own could completely change how you approach growth.

 

Subscribe for more practical ecommerce strategy, Google Ads, Meta Ads, Shopify, and business growth discussions from the Hammersley Brothers.

 

#Ecommerce #EcommerceBusiness #EcommerceGrowth

 

P.S. Whenever you’re ready... here are 3 ways Ian and I can help you grow your ecommerce business:

 

1. Talk to us. Book a call with us and let's talk about accelerating your growth - https://go.hammersleybrothers.com/apply-now/

 

2. Grab a copy of our book - https://gohigh.hammersleybrothers.com/get-the-book

3. Follow the Hammersley Brothers on Instagram and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - 
https://www.instagram.com/hammersleybrothers