Ecommerce: The Hammersley Brothers Ecommerce Podcast

Most ecommerce businesses are not worth investing in.

 

Not because they are bad businesses.

 

But because they are structurally broken.

 

In this episode, Mark and Ian break down what actually makes an ecommerce business investable and why only a small percentage truly stands out.

 

They cover:

Why do only 1 in 10 ecommerce businesses have real scale potential?

The difference between a lifestyle business and a scalable asset

What “structurally broken” actually means in ecommerce

The three key levers every serious investor looks at

How to spot an unoptimised business with huge upside

Why high margins and repeat purchases change everything

The role of conversion rate, average order value, and lifetime value

Why boring problem-solving products often outperform trendy brands

How to think about market size and long-term growth potential

This is not a theory.

These are the exact lenses used to evaluate real ecommerce businesses doing millions.

If you are building a brand, this episode will show you what makes it valuable and what holds most businesses back.

 

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/scheduleuk-ant

 

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

3. Join the Ultimate Guide To Ecommerce Facebook group and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - https://www.facebook.com/groups/924567391291786

If your best products are out of stock, your ads are going to struggle.

It does not matter how much product you have sitting in the warehouse.

If the products that actually drive new customer sales are missing, performance gets hit hard.

In this episode, Mark and Ian continue their 80:20 conversation and dive into one of the most overlooked parts of ecommerce growth:

Stock.

They break down:

Why do some products matter far more than others

How a few key SKUs often drive the majority of revenue

Why stock depth beats endless product range

How being out of stock on the wrong products can wreck your conversion rate and ROAS

Why are first-time customer products especially important

How Google and Meta behave when the core products are missing

Why do many brands spread budgets across far too many SKUs

What happens when businesses try to use weaker products to make up for missing bestsellers

Why adding more categories often creates more problems, not more growth

How to think more clearly about stock rotation, product focus, and scaling profitably

The truth is simple:

Most ecommerce brands are not short of products.

They are short of the right stock in the right lines at the right time.

If you want to scale without wasting money, this episode is worth watching.

 

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/scheduleuk-ant

 

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

3. Join the Ultimate Guide To Ecommerce Facebook group and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - https://www.facebook.com/groups/924567391291786

Most ecommerce brands think that more products mean more sales.

 

Usually, it means more complexity, more stock problems, more cash tied up, and worse performance.

 

In this episode, Mark and Ian unpack one of the biggest truths in ecommerce growth:

 

A small number of products usually drive the vast majority of the revenue.

 

They break down:

 

Why 20 percent of your SKUs often drive 80 percent of your sales?

Why adding more products can actually slow down growth

How too much range creates stock headaches, ad inefficiency, and wasted cash

What Bedding Envy taught them about white sheets, bestsellers, and running out of the products that matter most

Why narrower ranges with deeper stock often scale better than huge catalogues

How Google and Meta behave when your revenue is spread too thinly across too many products

Why “more choice” online does not work the same way it does in retail stores

The difference between recruitment products, add-on products, and dead-weight SKUs

 

This is a big one.

 

Because a lot of ecommerce owners are not short of products.

 

They are short of focus.

 

If your range is getting bigger, but your growth is getting harder, this episode will explain why.

 

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/scheduleuk-ant

 

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

3. Join the Ultimate Guide To Ecommerce Facebook group and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - https://www.facebook.com/groups/924567391291786

This is Episode 5 in our series on why your ads are not scaling, and this one is about something most ecommerce owners do without even realising.

They panic.

One bad day. One bad week. ROAS dips. Sales wobble. And suddenly, they are changing budgets, fiddling with campaigns, second-guessing the platforms, and essentially resetting the machine before it has had a chance to work.

In this episode, Mark and Ian break down:

Why emotional decision-making wrecks ad performance

Why do most people change things far too quickly?

How Google and Meta actually need time to optimise

Why looking at single-day performance is a trap

The power of using moving averages instead of reacting to noise

Why the best ecommerce operators know when to hold their nerve

How stock, seasonality, and demand create lumpy growth

Why are some months naturally stronger than others, and that does not mean anything is broken?

How to keep Google and Meta in sync instead of pulling one lever too hard

The reason teams fail is that everyone is looking at different numbers.

This is really about maturity.

The brands that scale are not the ones constantly panicking and changing direction. 

They are the ones who understand the model, know their numbers, and only make changes when the data actually indicates it.

If you are forever tweaking ads, budgets, and campaigns because of a bad day or two, this episode is for you.

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/scheduleuk-ant

 

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

3. Join the Ultimate Guide To Ecommerce Facebook group and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - https://www.facebook.com/groups/924567391291786

Episode 4 of our 5-part series on why your ads aren’t scaling.

 

Most ecommerce brands obsess over ads, creatives, targeting, and campaign structure. But the leak usually happens after the click. If your follow-up is weak, your ad account will always feel capped because you are paying to create interest and then doing nothing to convert most of the buyers

 

In this episode, we cover:

 

 • What we actually mean by follow-up is the time between the first click and the sale.
 • Why the biggest lever is not fancy flows, it’s capturing more emails first
 • The fastest way to boost conversion rate without touching your ads
 • Why weekend email promos can generate massive revenue even from first-time buyers
 • The simple rule: stop building flows if your email capture is 1 percent
 • How follow-up turbocharges ad performance by lifting conversion rate and ROAS
 • When remarketing matters and when it doesn’t, short window problem-solving purchases
 • The overlooked power of SMS abandoned cart, and when to save SMS for big promos
 • Timing strategy for email and SMS so your message lands when people are actually on their phone
 • Why making checkout easier often beats trying to solve every objection

 

If you feel like your ads should work, but they don’t scale, fix your follow-up and watch what happens.

 

Next episode: you are freaking out and changing things too often.

 

 

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/scheduleuk-ant

 

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

3. Join the Ultimate Guide To Ecommerce Facebook group and connect with e-commerce owners who are scaling too - https://www.facebook.com/groups/924567391291786