Notion! Notion is an infinitely customizable blank canvas of ultimate power. 

Notion's greatest advantage is also it's biggest weakness. That's where I come in.

As the GTM Lead @ Optemization, I specialize in helping companies in hyper growth mode scale effectively without letting their workspace become a "dumping ground" for scattered info, links, meetings notes, and outdated docs that no one can trust. 

Optemization is an Ops Design consultancy focused specifically on the adoption of Notion. 

That could mean large migrations onto Notion, improving current workflows, creating custom automations and integrations, or auditing what you're currently working with.

If you've made it this far and want to learn more, here's some resources that can help:

Notion's Eleven - A free online course exploring the fundamentals of building an effective Notion workspace for teams of all sizes:

https://optemizations.notion.site/Welcome-to-Notion-s-Eleven-317a0fd26bf24d0295504e4cab1eba83

AND, my last offer is if you ever want to about anything related to Notion, I'm your guy 😎 

Lastly the fun part. My Special Skills and Fun Facts include:

🏆 3x Cornhole Champion 🏆 
🏅 3x Dodgeball Champion 🏅 
👨‍🍳 Former Food Cart Owner 👨‍🍳 
🥩 Steak Off Champion 🥩 
🐔 Notoriously known as “The Chicken Man” 🐔

Skyler Birk-Stachon

Ashley Wright

Want to scale your brand to $100k+/mo with TikTok Shop?👋

Are you struggling to see the results you want on TikTok Shop?

Over the past two years, I've generated over $80,000,000 on TikTok for some of your favorite brands.

A few of our current and past clients include:
- Loop Earplugs
- Divi
- Petlab
- Mylee
- SNOW
- Stars + Honey
- Surreal
- Style Edit
- Thread Beauty
- Little words project

This success isn't just luck it's about understanding the platform, pushing boundaries, and being unafraid to test what works.

Brands used to doubt TikTok's ROI potential, but that's never been the case. With TikTok Shop, the ROI is clearer than ever.

If you're ready to create a whole new revenue channel with TikTok, here's how I can help:

1. Follow me on LinkedIn for daily TikTok Shop insights (scroll up and hit the bell to get notified).

2. Watch my FREE TikTok Shop Playbook (DM me "Playbook").

3. Want my agency to manage your TikTok Shop? (DM me "Support" and I'll share the details).

Glad you dropped by. 
To your success!

Mentor

1:1 video mentoring sessions with the world’s most in-demand startup mentors.

Tomorrow is my birthday.

I write one of these every year because it forces me to slow down and take an honest look at the last 12 months. 

Not the highlight reel, the real lessons.

This year felt less about chasing growth and more about refining it.

Earlier in my career, progress meant doing more. 

More clients, more calls, more output. 

Now it is about building something that runs with clarity and ownership. 

Systems over chaos. 
Operators over passengers. 
Direction over noise.

A few reflections from the past year:

1) Leadership changes when the business grows.

You stop measuring impact by how much you personally do, and start measuring it by what the team can execute without you in the middle. 
That shift is uncomfortable, but necessary.

2) Not all growth is worth it.

There were plenty of opportunities that looked exciting on paper. 

The biggest wins came from focus. Saying no protected momentum more than saying yes ever could.

3) Authority is earned through execution, not noise.

The industry has become louder. More operators, more agencies, more opinions. 
What cuts through is results. 
Case studies, outcomes, and staying focused on delivering real value rather than chasing attention.

4) Family changes perspective in ways you cannot fully predict.

As Bodie gets older, it hits differently. Ambition feels more grounded. 
Time feels more valuable. The way you define success shifts when you realise you are not just building for yourself anymore.

Personally, this year has been about tightening everything. 
Cleaner structure inside the business. Clearer thinking. 
Being far more intentional with where time and energy go.

Looking ahead, the focus is simple:

- Build something that scales cleanly.
- Create leverage through people and systems.
- Stay close to what actually drives outcomes.

Grateful for the team, the clients, the partners, and everyone who has been part of the journey.

Another year in. 
Still building.

Let’s go.

Helping 8+ Figure Brands Win on TikTok Shop | CEO of Social Tale | Speaker | Social Commerce Growth Expert | DM for growth, audits, or collabs

Your team ran a TikTok Shop test for 2 months, didn't see results, and shut it down.

Now you're saying TikTok Shop doesn't work.

The thing is, you didn't actually test TikTok Shop. You tested with outdated methods and called it a channel test.

TikTok Shop doesn't work in 2 months because the algorithm needs time to learn what actually converts for your product.

Creators need to post multiple times to figure out which hooks land. Your audience needs to see the product 3-4 times before they trust it enough to buy.

The brands doing $100k+ on TikTok Shop didn't get there in a couple of months.

They spent time building the infrastructure, testing content angles, and finding which creators actually move product.

Then they scaled what worked.

You can't judge a new channel the same way you judge a Meta ad campaign. Different platform, different timeline, different mechanics entirely.

Think about it this way:

Would you launch a new retail store, see zero customers in week 1, and immediately shut it down before you even finished setting up the shelves?

That's basically what your TikTok Shop test was.

Most brands kill TikTok Shop before momentum even has a chance to compound. Then six months later, they're watching competitors scale.

The reason why the TikTok shop isn't working for you is that you didn't give it enough time to actually work.

Khairul Aming just did RM2.3 million in sales in a single day on TikTok Shop.

That's ~$589K USD from one 12-hour livestream.

He sold 51,700 products and got. 5.42 million views.

TikTok Shop LIVE has already proven in Asia.

In Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, creators are doing 6-7 figures in single sessions.

Most brands in the US and UK are stuck posting 3x/week, hoping something hits.

They haven't even tested LIVE yet.

Meanwhile, the playbook already exists.

Here's what Khairul did that you can copy:

He ran a 12-hour livestream set up like a virtual Ramadan bazaar with different product stations.

He rotated through curated products from 14 local brands. He answered questions in real time. He created urgency with cash giveaways and limited-time offers.

And people bought.

This is what TikTok Shop rewards in 2026.

Not polished brand content.
Not hoping a video goes viral.
Not waiting for the algorithm to pick you.

Real-time engagement.

The infrastructure exists in the US and UK now. The audience is ready. The conversion mechanics work.

But most brands think LIVE is "too much work" or "not professional enough."

So they're leaving 6-7 figure revenue opportunities on the table.

Are you testing LIVE for your brand?

TikTok Shop Setup Checklist for 2026.

The exact steps we use to launch brands from $0 to first sales on TikTok Shop:

If you need help implementing this: https://lnkd.in/gV5_Ab9Z

Premium brands fear TikTok Shop.

"Won't this turn us into a discount brand?"

I get it. The platform feels risky.

But poor execution damages positioning.

Not the platform itself.

The brands losing their premium positioning are letting creators run wild with messaging, competing on price instead of value, and treating TikTok Shop like a liquidation channel.

The brands winning are doing something different.

1) They bundle intelligently to increase AOV

Instead of slashing prices, they create exclusive bundles that justify higher order values.

Limited edition sets. Product + accessory combos. Starter kits.

2) They use value adds instead of discounts

Early access to new launches.

Gift with purchase.
VIP creator events.
Not 30% off everything.

3) They anchor around hero SKUs and storytelling

Creators don't sell on price.

They sell the transformation, the outcome, the experience.

Premium positioning comes from how the product is framed, not what it costs.

4) They control the commission strategy

Commission happens behind the scenes.

Public-facing pricing stays premium.

No race to the bottom on discounts that train customers to wait for sales.

5) They use TikTok Shop as a discovery engine

Acquire new customers at full price through creators.

Then monetize repeat purchases through DTC retention flows.

TikTok brings the customer in. Your brand keeps them.

TikTok Shop doesn't cheapen premium brands.

Weak operators do.

Meta Ad spy tools show you WHO is running ads.

GoMarble shows you WHY they work.

One gives you a list of ads. 

The other gives you strategic patterns + creative analysis.

Every ad spy tool shows you competitors.

None of them explains why an ad actually performs.

GoMarble doesn't just list competitor ads.

It watches them. Dissects hooks, copy, formats, angles. Finds patterns of what's actually converting right now.

Search 150M+ ads by funnel stage, hook type, and offer structure.

Not just brand names.

Then it connects to your ad account.

Compares competitor patterns against your top and bottom performers.

Shows you what's missing, overused, or mis-positioned.

Turns that into ready-to-shoot briefs.

We're using it for TikTok Shop creative research.

But it works across platforms.

Also, GoMarble built a Competitor Intel report. 

Enter your website, and GoMarble instantly shows competitors’ ads, their best hooks, winning angles, and a gap analysis against your own ads. 

Repost + comment “GoMarble” and I’ll DM you the link.

P.S. Repost for priority access.

You don't need a massive budget to scale on TikTok Shop.

I've watched brands burn $100K+ in 90 days with nothing to show for it.

Meanwhile, smaller brands with tighter budgets are doing $50K months.

The difference isn't money.

It's focus.

Here's what profitable brands are doing:

---

1) Pick 1-2 hero SKUs, not your entire catalogue

Most brands launch with 20+ products.

The algorithm doesn't know what to push.

Creators don't know what to promote.

Customers get confused.

Narrow it down.

One or two products that demonstrate well on video.

Give the algorithm a clear signal.

Give creators a clear story to tell.

---

2) Pay creators with retainers, not just samples

Sending samples and hoping the creators' post is expensive guessing.

We pay $30-150 per video retainer plus commission.

That guarantees posts.

Guarantees volume.

Guarantees the algorithm gets fed consistently.

Samples work for discovery.

Retainers work for scale.

---

3) Hit 250+ pieces of content per month minimum

The algorithm needs volume to learn what converts.

20 videos per month isn't enough signal.

250+ gives the platform enough data to optimise.

That's roughly 8-10 posts per day across your creator network.

Sounds like a lot, but it's just 25 creators posting once a week.

---

The algorithm rewards consistency over budget.

Most brands think that more money solves the problem.

It doesn't.

More focus and the right strategy do.

TikTok Shop Brand Safety Governance Checklist for 2026.

The exact framework we use to help brands scale to 7 figures per month without destroying their retail relationships or brand equity:

TikTok Shop just pulled a full U turn.

After weeks of noise, back and forth, and “potential updates” to Seller Shipping, this landed in inboxes:

“At this time, Seller Shipping remains unchanged, and previously shared deadlines are not going into effect.”

Translation, the dramatic shift is not happening, for now.

The last few weeks have been messy.

There was a strong push toward tightening control over shipping, clearly a move toward a more Amazon style model where the platform owns more of the infrastructure and margin.

From a platform economics perspective, I get it.

Own fulfillment, own experience, own more revenue.

But timing matters.

If your goal is onboarding serious $10m+ sellers, introducing a sudden operational roadblock with short turnaround deadlines creates friction at exactly the wrong moment.

We had multiple conversations with TikTok.

We supported brands through contingency planning.

We looked at operational impact, margin compression, warehouse shifts, customer experience risk.

And rightly so, several brands were hesitant to opt in under pressure.

High revenue operators do not like instability in core logistics.

This reversal is the right move.

Not because platform owned shipping will never happen.

But because forcing structural change before the ecosystem is fully ready slows momentum.

TikTok Shop is still early.

It needs enterprise brands.

Enterprise brands need predictability.

Platform growth is not just about monetisation.

It is about trust.

For now, Seller Shipping remains unchanged.

And that gives brands breathing room to scale without unnecessary friction.

The bigger takeaway is that TikTok is still iterating in real time. If you are building on the platform, expect volatility.

Build systems that can absorb it.

That is the game.

"Is TikTok Shop actually profitable?"

Every brand asks this around week 6.

And most kill it at day 45.

Right when it's about to work.

They see the GMV.

They see the commissions.

And they panic and say it's not profitable.

What they are missing is that launch ROI and scale ROI are two different games.

In the first 60 to 90 days, you're not extracting profit.

You're building infrastructure:

- Higher commissions to attract creators.
- Heavy content investment to test what converts.
- Tighter margins to build momentum.

This phase isn't supposed to be efficient.

It's supposed to prove the model works.

Most brands expect immediate profitability and pull the plug before the system matures.

They're chasing vanity GMV instead of watching contribution margin.

Those who see success treat TikTok Shop like a flywheel.

They focus on contribution margin, not vanity GMV.

They track what actually matters, such as profit per order after commissions, returns, and fulfillment.

They double down on repeat creators who already know their product.

These creators drive better conversion rates, which means lower effective commission costs and better MER.

They identify hero SKUs that drive volume without killing margin.

One or two products that hit the algorithm sweet spot can carry your entire catalog's profitability.

They increase content velocity until the algorithm picks up momentum.

More content from proven creators means the platform rewards you with cheaper traffic and better MER.

By month 4, MER improves. By month 6, it scales.

TikTok Shop is profitable when you stop chasing paper metrics and start building for the long game.

The question isn't "Will this work?"

It's "Are you willing to build it right?"

Tarte did $45 million in GMV on TikTok Shop in 6 months and sold 1.6 million products.

Everyone thinks it's because they're a big brand.

So, I looked at where the revenue actually came from.

88% was affiliates and 11% was the Shop tab.

Less than 1% came from their brand account.

Many brands think TikTok Shop success comes from posting great content on their brand account.

Tarte's posting maybe once a week.

Meanwhile, they activated 6,600 creators in a single month who published 23,000 videos.

That's 800 videos per day hitting the platform.

They're not waiting for one video to go viral.

They built a system where content just keeps flowing.

And the algorithm rewards that.

I pulled up one of their top creators.

Kaley Solitro has over 50K followers.

She's generated over $1 million in sales for Tarte.

Not because she has a massive audience.

Because she posts consistently and knows how to make content that converts on TikTok.

Their best-selling product is the CC Corrector.

$11.7 million from one SKU.

It works on TikTok because it's simple to show.

Clear before and after.

You see the result in 15 seconds.

That's what a TikTok-native product looks like.

Most brands are still trying to figure out what to post on their brand account.

Tarte just recruits hundreds of creators, gives them samples, and lets them do what they do best.

Then they amplify the ones that are already working.

Brands check their TikTok Shop dashboard every day.

But they're looking at the wrong numbers

Most brands manage TikTok Shop on GMV.

Check the dashboard. See last month's revenue. Decide if it's working.

But revenue shows you what happened 30-60 days ago.

The creators posting today drive sales in 4-6 weeks.

So when you only track monthly revenue, you're reacting to old data.

We don't manage TikTok Shop on GMV.

We manage it on leading indicators.

1) Creator Activation Rate

How many creators actually posted after getting samples. If it's below 70%, your brief is broken, or you're targeting the wrong people.

2) Content Volume

How many pieces of content hit the platform each week. We need 100+ per month minimum, or the algorithm doesn't have enough signal.

3) Repeat Creator Density

Which creators keep posting multiple times. One creator posting 10 times beats 10 creators posting once.

I watched a client hit $120K months.

Then they cut samples by 60% to "save budget."

Two months later, GMV dropped to $45K.

It wasn't seasonality.

It wasn't algorithm changes.

It was a broken content pipeline caused by cutting samples.

The work you do today shows up in revenue 30-60 days later.

Most brands celebrate a big month, then forget to keep sending samples.

Revenue drops 8 weeks later, and they panic.

TikTok Shop rewards consistency, not monthly sprints.

If you're managing TikTok Shop on last month's GMV, you're operating on a 60-day delay.

TikTok just released its 2026 trend report:

"People will come to TikTok for unfiltered stories and BTS moments, with most resonant brands showing real process and people over curated perfection."

This is why polished product videos aren't working anymore.

The brands winning on TikTok Shop in 2026 won't have the best brand guidelines.

They'll be the ones showing:

- Messy unboxings, not staged ones.
- Real customers in real situations, not actors.
- Behind-the-scenes of fulfillment and shipping.
- Actual product usage, not perfect lighting setups.

This is why creator-led commerce works.

Creators aren't polished and show the process.

Your 10-page brand guideline asking creators to match your aesthetic is the opposite of what audiences want.

TikTok Shop rewards what people watch.

And people want unfiltered, not curated.

Are you still optimizing for brand perfection or giving audiences the real stories they're craving?

Most brands think their TikTok Shop strategy isn't working.

Usually it is working, but it's leaking.

We audited a brand last month doing $50K/month in GMV. Looked healthy on the dashboard.

Under the surface, they were hemorrhaging budget in 3 places they hadn't even thought to check.

Creators who took samples weeks ago and never posted, as they had a logistics issue, but nobody was tracking it, so samples kept going out. 

Commission structures were set at launch and never adjusted, even though category benchmarks had shifted. 

Content is generating views, but converting at a fraction of what it should. None of these showed up in their weekly GMV report. Every one of them was compounding.

The fix wasn't one thing. 

It was different for each leak. 

Some needed operational changes, some needed creator relationship restructuring, and some needed a complete rethink of which SKUs they were pushing.

The uncomfortable truth is that most brands don't know where their budget is actually going on TikTok Shop. They see top-line GMV and assume the machine is running efficiently.

It rarely is.

We're watching 3 things break inside TikTok Shop accounts right now.

Not gradually. In the last 60 days.

1. Sample quality collapsed

One of our brands before working with us was sending 400+ samples a month. 

Creators were posting, but the content was lazy. Generic unboxings. No hook. No angle. Just "look what I got" videos that generated views and zero sales.

The obvious move is to cut samples and shift budget to retainers with clear briefs.

The strategic move is harder, figuring out which creators actually drive GMV versus which ones just post for the sake of posting, restructuring your entire pipeline without killing momentum during the transition, and doing it while your competitors are still flooding those same creators with free product.

We rebuilt this for 3 accounts last month. Each one needed a completely different approach.

2. Commission-only is getting ignored

Top creators are sitting on 30-40 brand offers at any given time. Commission-only doesn't get you to the front of the queue anymore.

But the answer isn't just "pay creators more." We've seen brands throw retainers at the wrong creators and burn through budget faster than they did with samples.

The question isn't whether to pay. It's which creators justify investment, what deal structure actually locks in consistency, and how you avoid overpaying for content that doesn't convert.

That's a judgment call that looks different for every category and price point.

3. The algorithm changed what it rewards

Brands that built their entire strategy around waiting for one creator to go viral are getting outpaced by brands building systematic content velocity.

But "just post more" isn't a strategy either. We've seen brands push volume with low-quality content and tank their shop score. The balancing act between volume, quality, and algorithmic signal is genuinely hard to get right.

The brands scaling right now aren't the ones who spotted these shifts first.

They're the ones who had the infrastructure to adapt without losing momentum.

That's the part most people underestimate.

A 9-figure CEO messaged us before we spotted it.

A creator had posted a video implying the brand was "shutting down."

The video was getting traction.

Not a good look when the CEO sees it before you do.

What happened is that the creator used an aggressive hook to drive hold rate. "Is [Brand] shutting down?" "Why are they discounting so heavily?"

It worked. People watched. The algorithm pushed it.

But when you're working with enterprise brands and board-level scrutiny, you can't let performance run unchecked.

We're now having the same conversation with every brand:

What's your risk appetite?

Will you sacrifice short-term GMV to protect positioning? Or are you comfortable leaning into aggressive hooks for faster scale?

You can't optimize for both.

So we've built a clear creator brief with boundaries on what hooks are off-limits.

Automatic scanning before we put paid spend behind content.

Escalation protocols when risky content gets traction.

Because once you amplify a video with ad spend, you're not just distributing content. You're amplifying risk.

The difference between agencies that scale brands and agencies that get burned is simple.

You either build governance around growth, or growth exposes your weaknesses.

Scale without control isn't a strategy. It's a gamble.

And serious brands don't gamble with reputation.

People think TikTok Shop is for cheap impulse buys.

In January, products over £100 generated 41% of revenue on TikTok Shop UK.

That's 15 times higher than the global average.

TikTok Shop isn't a discount channel anymore. It's a legitimate commerce platform where people buy home appliances, premium clothing, and high-utility items.

People are hitting "buy" on £100-200 products while scrolling their feed because creator trust and brand legitimacy have matured.

Most brands are still treating TikTok Shop like a clearance channel.

Running aggressive discounts. Racing to the bottom on price. Positioning themselves as cheap alternatives.

Meanwhile, premium brands in the UK are proving that you don't need to discount heavily to win.

You need trust. You need the right creators. You need to position value, not price.

This happened in January. A month when shoppers are traditionally bargain hunting.

And high-ticket items still dominated.

If you're afraid TikTok Shop will damage your premium positioning, the data disagrees.

The platform has matured. The audience is ready to spend. The infrastructure supports it.

Are you still treating TikTok Shop like a discount channel or building it as a premium commerce platform?

You're paying creators $500+ per video.

Meanwhile, your best testimonials are sitting unused.

You probably have hundreds of customer reviews sitting in your Shopify backend.

Real testimonials from real people who bought your product like:

"This serum cleared my skin in 2 weeks."
"Best purchase I made all year."
"My toddler destroyed this dress and it still looks new."

But they're just text buried on your product page.

Nobody sees them.

Here's what you can start doing:

AI takes those exact words and turns them into video content for your brand account to post on TikTok Shop.

You're not making anything up or creating fake reviews.

You're taking what Sarah actually said about your product and putting it in a format that performs on TikTok Shop.

Because text reviews don't sell on TikTok.

Video testimonials do.

Your affiliates drive traffic and create authentic content from their accounts.

Your brand account posts AI testimonial videos that add social proof and conversion power.

Most brands waste all their content budget on creator videos and forget their brand account needs to post consistently too.

AI testimonial videos solve that without hiring a content team.

Are you using AI testimonials on your brand account or leaving it empty while affiliates do all the work?

Creator marketing is powerful.

Scaling it manually is impossible.

You can't manage 1,000 creators through Google Sheets and inbox chaos.

You can't manually track shipments, negotiate contracts, and process global payments one by one.

Most platforms try to help, but they only solve pieces of this.

One does discovery.
Another handles outreach.
Another does reporting.

You still need massive manual effort to connect everything.

That's the problem AMT solves.

AI-powered creator marketing that handles the entire workflow so your team stops doing operations and starts doing strategy.

It runs sourcing, vetting, outreach, negotiations, contracts, payments, and performance tracking.

All-in-one platform across Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.

Every program type, such as gifting, affiliate, sponsored, and UGC.

Brands like Noshinku, Stars + Honey, and Wild Nutrition are already scaling with it.

Do you want to see AMT in action?

Comment "CREATORS" and I'll send you the link to get 10 fully vetted creators, completely for free.

"Do we need full catalog pushes or focused launches?"

I get asked this a lot.

Hero SKU focus wins on TikTok Shop, while the full catalog pushes dilute traction and wastes budget.

High-velocity content consistently outperforms polished brand campaigns because the algorithm rewards speed and volume over production value.

Brands that scale quickly drive over 70% of their revenue from a tight group of creators and a small set of SKUs instead of spreading effort across their entire product line.

LIVE shopping, affiliate content, and paid amplification need to work together as one integrated system rather than separate channels competing for budget

Most brands launch with too many products and wonder why nothing gains momentum.

Focus creates traction faster than variety ever will.

taplio

The Battle

Skyler Birk-Stachon

Ashley Wright

Followers

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The Battle

Skyler Birk-Stachon

Ashley Wright

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Ashley Wright's LinkedIn Performance

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