Today’s guest is a visionary, public speaker, inclusive technologist, and Fashion and Industrial Designer that helped the first blind person to complete the NYC marathon without assistance. Keith Kirkland is the CoFounder of WearWorks, which invented a navigation system that removes the need for sight and sound. Kieth shared his incredible journey that led to the start of WearWorks, how his team in navigating the eCommerce world, and how you can use Amazon to test your ad spend. 

Takeaways:

• Even though you may have a specific audience in mind when designing your product, don’t design your product so that only that specific audience can use it. Think about the other applications and don’t add friction for them to buy your product.
• If you’re creating a product that performs a function and is also meant to be worn, you need to make sure that it looks fashionable and that the form is not completely sacrificed for the function.
• If you are already selling on your website, try A/B testing it against Amazon and using the results of that test to determine where you should spend your ad dollars.
• When you are dealing with a revolutionary idea, don’t just try and use it in the most obvious application, think about where it could go beyond that most obvious stepping stone and work to get there first.
• Amazon Launchpad is a special program from Amazon where you sell wholesale to Amazon and Amazon helps market the product for you. Through Launchpad, Amazon offers much better wholesale margins than those available from traditional distributors.
• The Launchpad program is very selective and your company must either be invited to join by Amazon or make it through the long application process.

Quote of the Show:

• “Touch is the future of digital communications” – Keith Kirkland

Links:

• • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/klkirkland/
  • Twitter: https://twitter.com/keithnin
  • Company Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wear.works/?hl=en
  • Company website: https://www.wear.works/
  • Wayband on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/wayband/id1405786049

Shout Outs:

• • • David Clark – Amazon Legends Episode # 119: https://argometrix.com/blog/episode-119-lifting-off-the-launchpad-david-clark-amazon-legends/

Amazon Legends is sponsored by Argometrix, the authority on, and leading supplier of, competitive intelligence for online retail. To learn more, head over to https://argometrix.com/ 

Amazon Legends is produced by Ringmaster, on a mission to create connections through B2B podcasts. Learn more at https://ringmaster.com/ 

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