Marketing Operators

Cody Plofker, Connor MacDonald, and Connor Rolain

Some call it the greatest ecommerce podcast in existence. Behind three behemoth brands stand three juggernauts of the marketing world: Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) & Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad). Finally, they’re pulling back the curtain to give you a never-before-seen look at what works and what doesn’t work to drive growth.

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#130
Yesterday · 1 hr 3 min
How a 15% Price Cut Sent a Ridge Product’s Revenue Up 60%
Why do experienced operators still overcorrect on average order value? Varun Kundra (Co-founder, Aftersell by Rokt) joins Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Cody Plofker (Advisor & fmr. CEO, Jones Road) to break down the pricing missteps that quietly cost real revenue and the metric worth watching instead. The hosts compare years of pricing tests at Ridge and Jones Road. They cover three ways to bundle for more revenue per order. Varun explains why image heavy upsells beat plain offers, plus a subscription upgrade converting at 20% to 30%. Connor and Varun wrap with a teardown of Winks, the brand behind Operators Build. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Proppel https://www.weareproppel.com/operators Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Operators Portal https://portal.9operators.com/dashboard Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#129
September 15 · 1 hr 4 min
Two 2027 DTC Shifts: AI Retention Marketing & TikTok Creator Burnout
“We just had a hundred thousand people buy in the last 60 days.” What does the future of retention marketing actually look like by 2027? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) unpack what Postscript’s AI memories mean for retention marketing’s future. They map out a 2027 playbook built on personalized experiences, even as TikTok Shop’s creator economy hits a breaking point. Postscript is building unified profiles instead of fragmented SMS data. That shift promises holdout testing and customer lifetime value tracking. RCS already shows early lift in live tests. Meanwhile TikTok Shop’s incentive structure is pushing affiliates toward burnout. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Proppel https://www.weareproppel.com/operators Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Operators Portal https://portal.9operators.com/dashboard Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#128
September 8 · 1 hr 5 min
Holiday Offers vs Black Friday, Cyber Monday: Which Comes First?
“Don’t let perfect measurement get in the way of good marketing” How do Ridge, HexClad and Jones Road each structure Black Friday, Cyber offers differently? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) share how holiday marketing campaigns pull their ecommerce brands in completely different directions. Shark Ninja becomes the opening case study, spending big on creator activations without measuring returns. The hosts counter with their own tactics, mixing steep weekend deal drops with full brand rebuilds between sales. The riskiest move this season turns out to be a discount that costs a brand its most loyal customers. Cody dives into Winks, a fresh sleep brand he and four other 9-figure executives are building from the ground up, and introduces Operators Build, the show capturing the entire journey from scratch. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Proppel https://www.weareproppel.com/operators Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Operators Portal https://portal.9operators.com/dashboard Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/ Operators Build https://9ops.co/ops-build-ytplaylist Winks https://getwinks.com/
#126
September 1 · 1 hr
Incrementality Testing for Black Friday, Cyber Monday: What to Spend?
“It is so incredibly easy to not drive incremental results the week of Black Friday.” Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (Advisor & fmr. CEO, Jones Road), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) share how they are approaching Q4 planning. Before scaling Black Friday, Cyber Monday spend, both HexClad and Ridge test incrementality with real control groups. That same discipline shapes their AMER vs CAC debate, since neither wants to scale spend that isn’t truly incremental. Also, AG1’s new gummy launch steps up, and so does its cannibalization risk. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Proppel https://9ops.co/weareproppel Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#126
August 25 · 1 hr 12 min
“Leadership Is Leverage”: Motion’s CEO on the Future of Marketing
What changes when a single marketer creates as much value as an entire department? Reza Khadjavi (Founder & CEO, Motion) joins Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Cody Plofker (Advisor & fmr. CEO, Jones Road) to explain why he built Runneth, an AI agent meant to eventually replace Motion’s own product. He walks through the context engineering behind that shift and what it means for marketers. Motion scrapped its own revenue targets right after a record quarter, betting the whole company on AI agents. Reza explains how markdown files and organized repositories turn those agents into something closer to a new hire. His advice: skip the Mac Mini, move to the cloud, and put close to 10% of payroll behind AI. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth Proppel https://9ops.co/weareproppel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Operators Portal https://portal.9operators.com/dashboard Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#125
August 18 · 1 hr 15 min
Funnel Coverage: The Upsell Fix Most Brands Never Check
How much can filtering a collection page actually lift average order value? What about cart, checkout, and post-purchase? Varun Kundra (Co-founder, Aftersell) joins Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) to unpack how ecommerce brands raise AOV. Four levers make that possible: collection page tests, product bundles, post purchase upsells, and cross brand advertising. HexClad’s new collection page lifted revenue per user by 7% and AOV by $10. Single silhouette bundles need no extra education, but new pairings like Japanese cookware still do. Varun ties it back to Aftersell and Rokt Thanks. Together they’ve generated over $1B in upsell revenue at a take rate under 1%. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Proppel https://www.weareproppel.com/operators More from Operators Operators Portal https://portal.9operators.com/dashboard Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#124
August 14 · 1 hr 12 min
Haus CMO Reveals the Incrementality Index Behind Smarter ROAS Calls
“I just don’t hear a lot of good reasons why this can’t be automated”. Can an algorithm allocate ad budget better than a human media buyer? Olivia Kory (CMO & Strategy Officer, Haus) joins Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) to unpack incrementality testing, marketing mix modeling, and early agentic media buying. Geo lift holdouts and attribution debiasing point toward a future of automated budget decisions. Olivia shows how A/B testing replaced ROAS benchmarks at Haus. Control groups and treatment cells now anchor every incrementality read. Connor Rolain also shares how one conversion campaign test reshaped HexClad’s Meta strategy. The team ties it all back to multi-touch attribution for faster decisions. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Proppel https://9ops.co/weareproppel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators More from Operators Operators Portal https://portal.9operators.com/dashboard Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#124
August 11 · 1 hr 12 min
Employee Number Four to a $1.2B Unilever Exit: Katie Cirulli’s Story
“It was the most fun role I think I’ll ever do”. How do visionary founders build teams to protect their time for big ideas? Katie Cirulli (Chief Emerging Brands Officer & fmr. President, Grüns) joins Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) and Cody Plofker (Advisor & fmr. CEO, Jones Road). She joined Grüns as employee four and rose from Chief of Staff to her current role. Before that, she spent years at McKinsey and Meta. She explains why founders need integrators, and how AI powers Grüns. She walks through the chief of staff role she built with Chad Janis. The CPM arbitrage test was an early swing that never scaled, unlike the LTO strategy that followed. Grüns now runs five emerging brands through dedicated marketing pods. Paid media, creative, and CRO, all guided by the same paper wall mindset. Powered By Motion https://9ops.co/motion-runneth Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Proppel https://9ops.co/weareproppel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#122
August 4 · 1 hr 2 min
Creators Over Reach: How to Rewrite Your Influencer Marketing
“Borrow cultural equity executed with real partnership compounds faster than anything built in-house.” What happens when a legacy brand like Lexus stops buying reach and starts buying culture? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) trace how Lexus is using Colin and Samir to reach an audience Lexus already has. One idea drives the partnership: reach your audience better. Cody argues AI generated UGC misses the point entirely. Connor Rolain reveals the four and a half percent lift from a recent cart upsell holdout test. Retention marketing gets the final word on why so few brands measure it properly. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://9ops.co/motionapp-creativebenchmarks2026 Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Proppel https://9ops.co/weareproppel Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#122
July 28 · 1 hr 2 min
TikTok Shop Masterclass: Inside Ridge & HexClad Affiliate Programs
“The new infomercial is TikTok shop.” Why did Ridge see 88% of its GMV Max lift happen outside of TikTok? Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad), and Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) sit down to unpack how their brands are building profitable TikTok shop affiliate programs. The conversation opens with Cody’s decision to step down as CEO of Jones Road. Connor MacDonald breaks down how Ridge structures affiliate incentives, generating 7,000 videos in a single month. He also shares a geolift study showing 88% of GMV Max lift landed off TikTok on Amazon and Ridge.com. The trio close by reverse engineering a TikTok shop brand, from price point to visual appeal. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://9ops.co/motionapp-creativebenchmarks2026 Proppel https://9ops.co/weareproppel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#121
July 21 · 1 hr 8 min
Meta Ads Underperforming? Why + What To Do Right Now
“I don’t think our ads are any better.” Why are Meta click-through rates rising while conversion rates keep falling? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) unpack why Meta ad performance has quietly shifted across ecommerce accounts. They break down Ridge’s new chains launch and the merchandising lessons behind it, and debate whether TikTok Shop’s affiliate program matters more than its storefront. Meta CPMs and click-through rates keep climbing across DTC accounts, even as conversion rates fall. The hosts respond with the exclusion settings and bid multipliers they are testing to fight back. From there, the conversation turns to Ridge’s chains launch and the pricing lessons behind it. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://9ops.co/motionapp-creativebenchmarks2026 Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel-mops Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#120
July 14 · 1 hr 11 min
The Performance Creative Director Hire: Operator vs. Ideator
“She has built an amazing system and an amazing flywheel.” What separates a performance creative director worth hiring from one who just manages a content calendar? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) dig into what it takes to hire a director of performance creative today, why the creative strategist role has split into two distinct skill sets, and how AI agents are emerging as a serious ecommerce conversion rate optimization play. They debate whether a great creative strategist should be an operator or an ideator. The answer is neither alone. Both hosts unpack why less prescriptive creator briefs are now producing better-performing ads than heavily scripted ones. The hosts close with a quick over-under on the retention tools most brands either overinvest in or ignore entirely. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://9ops.co/motionapp-creativebenchmarks2026 NeonPixel https://9ops.co/neonpixel Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#117
July 7 · 1 hr 1 min
Big-Swing vs. Incremental: Our Ecommerce CRO Testing Framework
“All bad tests turn good and all good tests turn bad.” How do you run ecommerce A/B testing faster without sacrificing statistical confidence? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) debate when to burn the current site down and rebuild versus grinding out incremental wins one test at a time. The answer depends on what you can afford to get wrong. They cover Ridge’s live theme rebuild, HexClad’s 27% RPU lift from a single collection-page interstitial in Japan, and the case for running four variants instead of two. Cody also breaks down the qualitative research stack that helped Jones Road Beauty string together six consecutive winning tests. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#118
June 30 · 1 hr 4 min
The Right Way to A/B Test Landing Pages on Meta Ads for Ecommerce
“It’s not a test. It’s diversity for the Meta algorithm.” Can running more landing pages hurt your ability to make decisions? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty) dig into landing page optimization strategy, conversion rate optimization for Meta ads, and when structured testing is the wrong tool entirely. They cover what Jones Road learned from overdeveloping pages and what a disastrous A/B test on a new offer taught Ridge about how Meta allocates spend. They examine the operational cost of landing page sprawl, how to structure a site-wide theme A/B test without introducing too many variables, and whether DTC brands at scale should slow down product launches or double down on them. AG1’s move into creatine opens a broader conversation about the limits of single-SKU subscription businesses along with where product expansion makes sense. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#117
June 23 · 1 hr 14 min
How to 2x Your A/B Testing Output Without More Budget
“We used to try to win every day. Now we’re willing to sacrifice entire months.” What does it mean to optimize ad spend when there’s no universal answer? Michael Ting (GM of DTC, JAXXON) joins Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) and Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) to challenge one of the most common assumptions in ecommerce email marketing and paid media: that there is a single optimized ad spend. There isn’t. The better question is what you’re trying to achieve and over what time horizon. Michael walks through how JAXXON uses cost per email signup to make confident budget decisions, spending aggressively into slow seasons and monetizing that list when it matters most. The conversation also covers decision quality frameworks, doubling AB testing velocity, and how daily performance reporting builds operator instinct over time. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#116
June 16 · 57 min
DTC Content Creation Process That Wins on Paid Social
“The digital deliverables have outpaced production company knowledge.” How do you build a repeatable content creation process without hiring a full agency? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) break down how they approach content production across every budget level; ranging from $50k brand shoot days to $100 iPhone clips that outperform everything else in the ad account. The episode covers the full content production stack: multi-team shoot briefing, on-set creative strategy, and the in-house studio advantage. The trio also gets into clipping, AI-generated UGC, and whether dead internet theory is already shaping how products go viral. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Aftersell https://9ops.co/aftersell-mops Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#115
June 9 · 1 hr 4 min
How AI Is Reshaping Ecommerce Growth Teams: HexClad & Jones Road
“We’re not hiring less because of AI. We just expect each hire to be more productive.” Is AI shrinking your marketing team, or just changing who belongs on it? Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) and Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty) get into how two of the most operator-driven brands in ecommerce are rethinking their AI marketing team structure heading into the second half of 2026. They cover which roles are compressing, which are expanding, and what it actually looks like to build a leaner growth team that outputs more. Cody breaks down the CRO program he runs with one person that used to require six. Connor explains why HexClad hired more people after building an AI-powered seeding system, not fewer. And both share how they think about headcount requests now, and what they make teams prove before saying yes. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Aftersell https://9ops.co/4i3bb5 Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#114
June 2 · 59 min
Meta Ads Catalog, TikTok Shops + GMV Max, and the Future of Creative
Can Meta and TikTok Shop be combined into a single playbook? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) and Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty) are fresh off the Meta Performance Marketing Summit and cover what the event signaled, where paid social is heading, and what most brands are still sleeping on. They explain Meta betting big on product feed enrichment as the foundation for better AI-generated creative, and how GMV Max is quietly powering TikTok Shop’s top brands. The duo also reveals creators driving 60% of shop revenue, the Meta ads catalog, and TikTok Shop affiliate flywheels. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Aftersell https://9ops.co/4i3bb5 Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#113
May 28 · 40 min
Live at Meta’s 2026 Performance Marketing Summit: Ads, AI & Audiences
“There’s going to be a world where you just tell them your product and your business goals and they do the rest.” What does Meta’s AI push mean for ecommerce brands trying to win on paid social right now? Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge), Cody Plofker (CEO, Jones Road Beauty), and Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) recorded this episode live at Meta’s Performance Marketing Summit 2026 where they break down everything Meta announced: AI infrastructure to catalog-powered creative and what brands need to do about it immediately. The conversation covers Meta’s shift toward catalog-first ad infrastructure and why clean product data is now table stakes, not a nice-to-have. They dig into how the media buyer role is converging with creative strategy, what a 24-hour full-funnel launch looks like in practice, and why the brands building creator ecosystems today are setting up a major moat for catalog creative tomorrow. Powered By Meta Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/
#113
May 26 · 1 hr 6 min
The Meta Playbook That Took True Sea Moss Beyond Nine Figures
“You don’t have to be first to be the best.” What does it take to scale a brand from $20M to $140M in just 12 months? Luka Kvatchrelishvili (CMO, True Sea Moss) joins hosts Connor Rolain (Head of Growth, HexClad) and Connor MacDonald (CMO, Ridge) to break down how he took a bootstrapped, product-led superfood brand … and scaled it into a nine-figure DTC powerhouse. Luka shares his path from practicing law in Georgia to drop shipping foosball tables to leading a 33-person marketing team. The conversation digs into how Luka diagnosed and fixed True Sea Moss’ data infrastructure before touching a single ad, and how a surge in creative volume gave way to a more methodical, outcome-driven testing system. He also gets into the halo effect between Meta spend, Amazon, and retail performance; the power of the LTV-to-CAC cohort report; and how True Sea Moss went from Telegram groups and Trello boards to a marketing-led operation scaling toward half a billion. Powered By Motion Creative Benchmarks 2026 https://motionapp.com/thumbstop-pulse/creative-benchmarks-2026?utm_campaign=marketing-operators&utm_medium=sponsor&utm_content=creative-benchmarks-2026&utm_source=marketing-operators-podcast Saras Analytics https://bit.ly/9OP-Ytdesc Haus https://www.haus.io/operators Richpanel https://9ops.co/richpanel Aftersell https://9ops.co/4i3bb5 Operators Newsletter https://9operators.com/

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