How do you reach a billion dollars in retail sales? Mike Keech says it’s simple: focus.
Keech is the CEO of Liquid I.V., which sells hydration powders that people mix into water. When he joined the brand five years ago, it was a 30-person startup with around $100 million in revenue. Today, it is Unilever’s largest health-and-wellbeing brand. Keech attributes that to steady focus: Instead of launching a wide range of products, Liquid I.V. has remained laser-focused on its plan — to develop powders that work and get them into more people’s hands.
“I’ve worked on several big consumer businesses where they chased a lot of new shiny toys,” he says. “And a massive learning for me has been to ask: What are we great at? What’s our wheelhouse? The power of focus is really, really important. When you’ve got something good, keep working on it.”
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Here, Keech shares his playbook for building a fast-growing consumer brand while staying focused on what matters most.
How do you take a product like Liquid I.V. to market? It’s in a hypercompetitive space, and you need to convince people that the product really works.
Community, community, community. We started at a really grassroots level, with a playbook that the beauty industry had been using for maybe five or 10 years before — which was influencers. We started with a very large army of micro-influencers who were real, everyday consumers—people who were relatable and speaking on our behalf. That was one of the biggest and most cost-effective ways of seeding that message.
How did you identify which influencers to work with?
The art of segmentation. When we first started the brand, the biggest insight that drove us is that roughly 75% of Americans are chronically dehydrated. They just don’t know it. That’s a massive opportunity. So we did some early studies to segment the market, and identified four big occasions we thought were really important.
We had the nightlife occasion; that’s people having a good time, waking up the next morning, maybe not feeling so great. We have the exercise occasion; that’s people sweating and needing to be rehydrated. We had travel; you’re traveling at 35,000 feet in a tin can. It’s dry as the Sahara up there. And then we had heat-related dehydration.
That allowed us to be much more segmented and targeted in our approach.
What’s your approach to consumer research? How do you really understand what people want?
There are three main ways we do it. One is off-the-shelf research. We buy continuous tracking data, which allows us to understand movement over time and the big insights. We’re periodically doing deeper studies ahead of big launches where we’re entering new demand spaces.
The second is through social media. You will find very quickly that you have some “superusers” that are incredibly passionate. We have a small group where we basically have a one-to-one relationship. We’re sharing ideas with them, we’re asking them things that are on our minds, and we treat them no differently than a member of the team.
And last, but by no means least, go and spend real time with consumers one-to-one. Some of my most powerful insights and connections to marketing have come from spending time with consumers. You can only glean so much from a document with a chart and a graph, but when you meet the real consumer one to one, that’s when it really connects with you and the aha moments happen.
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What’s an example of how consumer research led to a specific product decision at Liquid I.V.?
We recently entered the sugar-free energy space, and it’s been a fascinating journey.
When we look at the total market of beverages and functional hydration, the biggest slice of the pie is energy drinks. So as we got into the consumer research, we talked to a whole bunch of people, and the number-one thing people said about energy drinks was, “Oh, my God, I get the jitters and feel terrible afterwards.”
We always want to zig where others zag. We don’t want to do a “me-too” product. So we asked ourselves, how could we deliver a better-quality energy? Then we designed a formula to deliver a gentler, more consistent, sustainable lift that does not crash.
In other words, you started with the problem before building the product. That way, when you come to market, you know it’s something people already want.
Absolutely, 100%.
Many consumer-packaged goods brands start in one format and then expand into others. You’ve been successful with powders, but there are many other formats you could explore, like gels or liquids. How do you think about expansion?
My vision for Liquid I.V. is that it will be a global mega brand. If I look at our growth road map, less than 20% of Americans have bought Liquid I.V., consumer awareness is less than 40%, and we are selling over $1 billion worth of retail sales. So my job is really simple: If I just keep communicating why to buy Liquid I.V., if I keep making sure that it’s available and people can try Liquid I.V., then there is no reason why we should not be able to grow many more billions of dollars with headroom that we have.
Of course, there are many more formats we could look at, but the opportunity in the short term is massive, because there’s massive headroom. When I think about new formats, they must be able to hydrate as good or better than what we have today. Otherwise, what problem are we solving?
The power of focus, especially when we’re still a youngish company, is critical. When you’ve got something good, keep working on it.
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How do you handle competition? There are a lot of new companies offering hydration solutions.
Over 50 new competitors have entered our space over the past five years. I am constructively paranoid about the competition, but I do not let them run my strategy. We have a strategy, we stick to our strategy, and of course as competition comes in, we watch, we learn, we adapt—but we are really clear on what got us to where we are today, and will continue to double down on those things.
You’ve got to have belief in what you’re doing. You have finite time, you have finite resources. You just can’t get distracted with that stuff. Know your strengths, focus on that, believe in yourself. And when you do see material threats, or industry changes, or industry dynamics, don’t be a deer in headlights.
If the facts change, then the business changes.
如何才能实现十亿美元的零售额？迈克·基奇说，答案很简单：专注。
基奇是Liquid IV的首席执行官，该公司销售可溶于水中的补水粉。五年前他加入该公司时，它还是一家拥有30名员工、年收入约1亿美元的初创公司。如今，它已成为联合利华旗下最大的健康保健品牌。基奇将此归功于公司始终如一的专注：Liquid IV并没有推出种类繁多的产品，而是始终专注于其既定目标——研发有效的补水粉，并让更多人能够享用。
“我曾在几家大型消费品公司工作过，他们都热衷于追逐各种新奇玩意儿，”他说。“我从中学到的最重要的一点就是要问自己：我们的优势是什么？我们的专长是什么？专注的力量真的非常非常重要。当你拥有好的方面时，就要坚持下去。”
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在这里，基奇分享了他打造快速增长的消费品牌，同时又能专注于最重要的事情的秘诀。
如何将Liquid IV这样的产品推向市场？这是一个竞争异常激烈的领域，你需要让人们相信这款产品真的有效。
社群，社群，社群。我们从非常草根的层面起步，采用的是美妆行业五到十年前就已开始使用的策略——网红营销。我们最初拥有一支庞大的微型网红队伍，他们都是真实的普通消费者——他们平易近人，并且愿意为我们代言。这是传播信息最有效、成本最低的方式之一。
你们是如何确定要合作的网红的？
关键在于市场细分—–-连30多个人的公司都是专注一个小的细分市场，如果我们人数更少还什么都去做，就毫无竞争力可言了。品牌创立之初，我们最大的洞察是：大约75%的美国人长期处于脱水状态，只是他们自己没有意识到。这是一个巨大的市场机遇。因此，我们开展了一些早期市场调研，确定了四个我们认为非常重要的 场景。
我们经历了夜生活场合；人们玩得很开心，但第二天早上醒来可能感觉不太舒服。我们经历了运动场合；人们汗流浃背，需要补充水分。我们经历了旅行；你乘坐着一个铁罐头在35000英尺的高空飞行。那里干燥得像撒哈拉沙漠。然后，我们又经历了与高温相关的脱水。
这使我们能够采取更加细分和有针对性的方法。
你们的消费者研究方法是什么？你们如何真正了解人们的需求？
我们主要通过三种方式进行研究。第一种是现成的研究数据。我们会购买持续的追踪数据，这使我们能够了解市场随时间的变化趋势以及重要的洞察。在新产品发布、进入新的需求领域之前，我们会定期进行更深入的研究。
第二种方法是通过社交媒体。你会很快发现，有一些“超级用户”非常热情。我们有一个小圈子，基本上和他们保持一对一的关系。我们会和他们分享想法，询问我们心中的疑问，并且像对待团队成员一样对待他们。
最后，但同样重要的是，要花时间与消费者进行一对一的真正交流。我许多最深刻的洞察和营销理念都来自于与消费者的互动。你只能从一份包含图表的文件中获得有限的信息，但当你真正与消费者面对面交流时，你才能真正理解他们的想法，并产生顿悟的时刻。
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Liquid IV是如何通过消费者调研来制定具体产品决策的？举例来说，
我们最近进入了无糖能量饮料领域，这是一段非常有趣的旅程。
当我们纵观整个饮料和功能性补水市场时，能量饮料占据了最大的份额。因此，在进行消费者调研时，我们与很多人进行了交谈，人们对能量饮料最常见的评价是：“天哪，喝完之后我会感到紧张不安，而且感觉很糟糕。”
我们总是想另辟蹊径，不走寻常路。我们不想做千篇一律的产品。所以我们问自己，如何才能提供更高品质的能量？然后，我们设计了一种配方，能够提供更温和、更稳定、更持久的能量提升，而且不会出现能量骤降的情况——–只有产品更好，消费者才会愿意切换产品，否则即使广告做的好，别人用了也会抛弃的。
换句话说，你在开发产品之前就先解决了问题。这样，当你的产品进入市场时，你就知道它是人们真正需要的。
绝对正确，百分之百正确。
许多消费品品牌都是从一种产品形式起步，然后拓展到其他形式。你们的粉剂产品取得了成功，但你们还可以探索其他多种形式，比如凝胶或液体。你们是如何看待产品扩张的？
我对Liquid IV的愿景是将其打造成为一个全球超级品牌。从我们的增长路线图来看，只有不到20%的美国人购买过Liquid IV，消费者认知度不到40%，而我们的零售额却超过10亿美元。所以我的工作其实很简单：只要我不断宣传购买Liquid IV的理由，只要我确保产品供应充足，让每个人都能有机会尝试，那么我们完全有能力在现有增长空间的基础上再创造数十亿美元的销售额。———对于产品的生命周期我认为应该需要具体研究，不同的产品有不同情况
当然，我们还可以考虑更多其他形式，但短期内的机会巨大，因为发展空间非常广阔。当我考虑新形式时，它们必须能够达到甚至超过我们现有形式的补水效果。否则，我们究竟在解决什么问题呢？
专注的力量至关重要，尤其对于我们这样一家还比较年轻的公司而言。当你有了好东西，就要坚持下去，不断完善它。
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您如何应对竞争？现在有很多新公司提供补水解决方案。
过去五年里，超过50家新竞争对手涌入我们的领域。我对竞争保持着一定的警惕，但我不会让他们左右我的战略。我们有自己的战略，并且坚持执行。当然，随着竞争对手的出现，我们会观察、学习、调整——但我们非常清楚是什么让我们取得了今天的成就，并且会继续加倍努力。
你必须对自己所做的事情充满信心。你的时间有限，资源也有限，所以不能被这些事情分心。了解自己的优势，专注于此，相信自己。当你遇到实质性的威胁、行业变革或行业动态时，不要像受惊的鹿一样不知所措。
如果事实发生变化，那么商业模式也会随之改变。