Lessons Learned in Building a Marketplace Featuring Jaclyn Grauman of The Verticale

Marketplaces are notoriously hard to build. This episode features Jaclyn Grauman, CEO of The Verticale, a social shopping platform that enables customers to discover brands that align with their values. Jaclyn discusses her journey building a DTC marketplace that is focused on brand discovery, the challenges of connecting customers to brands, and the pivots along the way.

• Using community and word of mouth as a tool to build customer acquisition 
• Partnering with brands in a different way versus typical B2C marketplaces
• Utilizing customer and creator feedback as a tool to iterate the platform
• Why dropshipping didn’t fit with their model
• Gaining customer engagement and sharing brand stories through video
• Building a marketplace that is optimized for the consumer
• Fundraising for a marketplace (spoiler: it’s not easy!)
• Focusing on one consumer segment and why that’s critical

Music by Eino Toivanen, kongano.com
 
Edited by Deven Shah

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