Deeckla is the founder and CEO of SCRUFF & SMOOTH, a men's skincare and grooming hub. Prior to launching S&S in March 2022, Deeckla held leadership roles at Nordstrom, Microsoft (Xbox), and Eddie Bauer, specializing in marketing, loyalty, and business growth.

SCRUFF & SMOOTH is a men’s skincare and grooming hub featuring products created specifically for men’s skin and lifestyle. The site helps men quickly find face, hair, and body care products that complement their on-the-go activities.

In this episode you’ll learn about:

• 
  The importance of a niche market - understanding how important it is for your consumer to have products that are specifically made for them.
• A dropship business model - partnering with established brands to sell your products, never needing to keep inventory on hand.
• The strategy for selling to a minority market - ways to focus on research, and adjusting your branding accordingly.
• The importance of market research - getting past the superficial conversations to discover the true needs of your consumer.
• Finding research participants - a willingness to talk with anyone, and offering incentives.
• Rebranding - the importance of applying your research findings, and adjusting your brand and website to fit your consumer's needs.
• Improving website engagement - how a website rebrand dramatically increased website traffic.
• The importance of knowing your baseline KPIs - you can’t compare your success to another brand, know your baseline so you can track your success.
• Partnering with a developer - how an outside perspective can help your social media marketing efforts.
• Having a brand that focuses on the problem it solves, not the product - knowing what is most important to the consumers visiting your website.

Resources:

• Scruff and Smooth
• Fall Line Digital
• Shopify
• Jobs to Be Done Video
• Nordstrom
• Microsoft
• Xbox
• Eddie Bauer

Connecting with Guest:

• LinkedIn
• Instagram

Connecting with the host:

• Rebecca Babicz on LinkedIn

Quotables

• 1:46 “After experiencing some serious burnout in my last role, I decided to take some time for myself, and then ended up deciding to become an entrepreneur and found a new business.”
• 2:31 “Men are largely underserved when it comes to the beauty industry.”
• 4:29 “I will interview the founders myself and make sure that their heart and skin is in the game, that they really care about the things that they create.”
• 8:39 “Customer research is probably the most important thing that you can do, especially when you have a startup.”
• 10:17 “Being a first-time founder and trying to ask all the right questions and understanding the right thing.”
• 12:16 “The amount that I had learned from those conversations was insanely deeper than the superficial information I was getting in the beginning.”
• 17:19 “[Men] are just not exposed to the same level of information as [women] are. Women are bombarded left and right about skincare and makeup, and how to look flawless and look younger.”
• 19:41 “ I highly recommend [Shopify] for anybody who’s learning to create a website for the first time.”
• 20:15 “It’s very interesting to hear how men make decisions about what they want to buy.”
• 25:29 “Masculine does not necessarily mean darker colors, it can show up in lots of different ways.”