[Voiceover]: Welcome to the checkout. We catch up with previous guests of Add to Cart where we ask them five quick questions to understand more about them and leave you with a little extra inspiration to get through your Friday. Today's checkout features Mike angel from VOP, an app that allows brands to create shoppable TikTok videos from small beginnings. As a self taught programmer, Mike has worked with some of the biggest names in e commerce, including Black Milk, Shopify and Culture Kings. All right, I can't let you go without our quick fire checkout questions. I've got five for you.
Mike Angell: Yeah.
[Voiceover]: What is the weirdest thing you've ever bought online?
Mike Angell: Nothing too. The weirdest one was when I was at Culture Kings. We obviously sold hats and stuff. So it was a Kickstarter campaign where they made a hat where the brim was completely hand made out of wood. So I jumped on the Kickstarter campaign and bought one of those just for display purposes. I had to have a cap with a wooden brim. It's all like hand stitched and everything. It's pretty cool.
[Voiceover]: That's insane cool. Who is your favorite retailer?
Mike Angell: I don't have a particular favorite. I like anyone that's innovative. I think that changes every day. People who do like guerrilla marketing. So someone like Koala Mattresses Manscape is a company that's coming up that's doing some crazy stuff. So people just do innovative stuff and it can be anyone. I just like to see cool things in e commerce.
[Voiceover]: That's awesome. Which retail fad do you wish was history?
Mike Angell: Thinking you can force a customer to buy something by putting pop ups or something. Forced marketing is a trend I would just wish would disappear.
[Voiceover]: Yeah, that's cool. That's good. Can you recommend a book or a podcast that our listeners should immediately get into?
Mike Angell: So I don't read all of this in the podcast, which is bad.
[Voiceover]: You are the worst podcast guest ever.
Mike Angell: I know. But the one thing I can say is like the Shopify blog is the most informative thing, especially if you're an e commerce thing. Just follow it every day. Like anytime there's a post, there's probably something in it that you can do to grow your business. So yeah, definitely a resource to follow.
[Voiceover]: So it's so practical. Like whether you're a brand or an agency, there's always something you can get out of it that you can implement straight away.
Mike Angell: So not good. They put it into language that's not confusing for people. Like I come from the old days of E commerce. I swear everyone was trying to make everything more complicated than it needed to be. What I love about the new stage of E commerce is people are trying to explain it in a way where everyone will understand. So I think that's a big change.
[Voiceover]: Absolutely. Last one I've got for you is finish this sentence.
Mike Angell: The future of retail is, I'm going to say authenticity. We've talked about it in this authenticity is going to dominate and I think it's going to dominate really hard in the next three years or so.
[Voiceover]: So, Legend Mike, it has been so good to chat to you. I've loved following your journey so far, all the way from Black Milk through, and I think what you're doing with VOP is really exciting. So keen to see where that goes and appreciate you sharing all your inside knowledge on TikTok.
Mike Angell: All right, thanks for having a chat.
[Voiceover]: It's been good to hear more from Mike. Jump back into episode 19 where we talk with Mike about every everything social media, from communities and their preferred platforms to the key criteria for developing strategy. Plus we get his insider take on how brands should navigate TikTok and his predictions for the future. Thanks for listening and until next time, keep adding to cartoon.
