How BYLT Grew Customer Loyalty and LTV Using a Custom Shopping App With Ryan Groh

Ryan Groh is the Associate Director of Ecommerce at BYLT Basics, a California-based premium apparel brand. With over seven years of experience in ecommerce and digital merchandising, Ryan has led initiatives that have significantly increased online revenue and improved customer experience through personalization and streamlined checkout processes. He played a pivotal role in BYLT's migration to Shopify's Hydrogen framework, enhancing site performance and enabling seamless omnichannel operations. Before his current role, Ryan was the Ecommerce Manager at Absolute Merch Inc.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

• [2:20] Ryan Groh introduces BYLT Basics and its evolution from DTC underwear to over 15,000 SKUs across channels
• [3:43] How a custom mobile app enhances brand loyalty and delivers a unique shopping experience
• [5:24] Identifying and targeting high-LTV customer segments for app adoption
• [6:58] Strategies for promoting app downloads and exclusive in-app offers
• [9:16] Impact of BYLT’s app on key metrics like AOV, LTV, and push notification engagement
• [10:32] Tools, tech stack, and vendors for launching an ecommerce app successfully

In this episode…

Brands often wonder whether building a mobile app is worth the investment when a responsive mobile site already exists. The decision is particularly tricky for ecommerce companies trying to boost loyalty, retention, and customer lifetime value without overwhelming their tech teams. How can businesses know if an app will genuinely enhance the customer journey and deliver measurable ROI?

Ryan Groh, an expert in ecommerce and digital merchandising, shares how his team approached the mobile app question by focusing on their most loyal customers. Ryan explains that an app can provide a more curated, frictionless experience for high-value buyers — especially those already engaged via SMS or email. He recommends identifying segments with high purchase frequency or cart value, using exclusive in-app promotions, and ensuring tech integrations support a seamless UX. For Ryan, app-driven ecommerce growth hinges on choosing the right platform vendor, personalizing content, and building app-based features that align with the brand’s LTV strategy.

In this episode of the Minds of Ecommerce podcast, Raphael Paulin-Daigle interviews Ryan Groh, Associate Director of Ecommerce at BYLT Basics, about scaling loyalty and retention through mobile apps. Ryan dives into how push notifications outperform traditional channels, how to evaluate whether your brand is a good fit for an app, and the value of a headless CMS in crafting seamless user experiences.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Raphael Paulin-Daigle: LinkedIn | X
• SplitBase
• Ryan Groh on LinkedIn
• BYLT Basics: Website | App on iOS | App on Google Play
• “The Secret to Subscription-Only Success in the DTC Wellness Space With Adam Gillman” on Minds of Ecommerce
• Tapcart
• Appbrew

Quotable Moments:

• “The app is a total LTV play… we want to cater towards those people.”
• “It just kind of creates, at first, just that unique user experience.”
• “We do see a significant amount of click-through on segmentation of push-through app.”
• “The app just kind of keeps that catered and logged-in experience a little bit easier.”
• “Some of it has been integrating different tools and vendors across, like subscription, loyalty, membership, and personalization.”

Action Steps:

1. Identify your most loyal customer segments: Focus on users with high purchase frequency or above-average cart values to drive app adoption and retention. This ensures you're targeting people most likely to benefit from and engage with a branded mobile experience.
2. Offer exclusive in-app promotions: Providing early or higher-tier discounts through the app incentivizes downloads and creates a sense of VIP treatment. This approach boosts app engagement while increasing purchase urgency among your top buyers.
3. Leverage push notifications over email or SMS: Push messages enable faster and more frictionless reengagement with loyal users, often resulting in higher click-through rates. They eliminate the extra steps of logging in or switching apps, reducing drop-off.
4. Choose the right app platform based on your tech stack: Vendors like Tapcart or Appbrew integrate well with headless CMS systems and ecommerce tools. Selecting the right partner simplifies app development and ensures a cohesive brand experience.
5. Personalize app content using dynamic data: Use store credit levels, purchase history, or membership tiers to show relevant offers and upsell opportunities. This personalization boosts conversion rates and makes the shopping experience feel more valuable to each customer.

Sponsor for this episode…

This episode is brought to you by SplitBase.

At SplitBase, we design, test, and manage high-converting landing pages and on-site experiences for fashion, luxury, and lifestyle ecommerce brands. Our optimization program pinpoints exactly where your store is losing money most, and then we help you fix that.

The result? Increased conversions and profits for our clients.

With our team of conversion optimization specialists, performance marketers, and conversion-focused designers, we've got your back when it comes to testing and optimization.

Request a proposal on SplitBase.com today, and learn how we can help you get the most out of your marketing spend.

You can find us on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. Don’t miss out on our exclusive podcasts at Minds of Ecommerce.

Episode Transcript

Intro: 00:06

Welcome to the Minds of Ecommerce podcast, where you'll learn one key strategy that made leading ecommerce companies grow exponentially. We cut the bullshit and keep the meat. In a 15-minute episode, founders and executives take us through a deep dive of a strategy so you get to learn and grow your online sales. In the last episode, you heard from Adam Gillman, co-founder and president of Hiya, who discussed their influencer marketing strategy for scaling the brand and ultimately selling it for $260 million. Today, on episode number 59, Get Ready.

Ryan Groh is the associate director of ecommerce at BYLT. And today, we'll be talking about how they've used an app as a base for their loyal customers and as a way to improve their user experience and, well, grow lifetime value. I'm your host, Raphael Paulin-Daigle. And I'm the founder of SplitBase. This is Minds of Ecommerce.

Now, this episode is brought to you by SplitBase. At SplitBase, we help leading eight and nine-figure brands such as Dr. Squatch, Transparent Labs, Collars and Co, and Amika grow through customer-focused conversion optimization programs. Our programs pinpoint exactly where your store is losing money most and then, well, we help you fix it. The result you get increased conversions, higher AOV, and of course, more money, which in return allows you to scale advertising profitably. We've been at it for over a decade and can help you manage CRO from A to Z, from customer research, conversion design, strategy, copywriting, and development.

We focus on growing your ecommerce sales while you get to focus on what you do best. So request a proposal today on SplitBase.com to learn how we can help you get the most out of your marketing spend. All right, Ryan, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for being here.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 01:56

Oh, Raphael, thanks for having me. Excited to be here.

Ryan Groh: 01:58

Yeah, well, as you know, this podcast is all about going deep and dissecting one key growth strategy so our listeners can get the most value right away. Now, BYLT has been a pretty successful brand. Maybe just to give some of our listeners some context. Can you walk us through what type of brand BYLT is in terms of scale and some of the milestones maybe that you've achieved?

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 02:20

Yeah, definitely. So Bill is a clothing apparel-based brand that has been around for about eight years, primarily DTC-based. Started off with our CEO's vision of creating the ideal, perfect pair of briefs as well as t-shirts. So that's how we started off. Our first couple of sales were in October of 2016, being t-shirts and underwear.

We've since scaled to over 15,000 SKUs, multiple channels. Right now, we're primarily focusing on a lot of buildings across our retail presence. We're almost about ten brick-and-mortar stores in the US. B2B app all over different social channels, though primarily B2C still. But yeah, we've since scaled quite a bit and I've been working with some pretty big clients lately, some partnerships events.

So yeah, it's been a pretty fun growth process the last handful of years.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 03:12

Amazing exciting stuff. Now, one of the things I think is really interesting is you guys have put a lot of focus into an app, right? And I've heard it from a lot of merchants. Sometimes, you know, it's like, why should we build an app when, you know, people can just go on our mobile website at the end of the day, maybe let's just start with this. What's the difference for people listening between, you know, having an app with, you know, a specific shopping experience there and then, you know, just sending people to your mobile site?

Ryan Groh: 03:43

Yeah, I think it just kind of creates at first just that unique user experience. You know, people are loyal to your brand. They want to continue seeing your brand. They, you know, embrace the content. They subscribe to your notifications or emails or SMS.

And so being able to create an app that creates that more unique experience dedicated to the brand keeps that dedicated cohort, you know, focused into that brand identity. So if you go on your mobile app, it's easy to click back or go to a different tab or go to a different, you know, store anything like that. But within that app you're there. So you have that different experience and you can create different experiences that feel different than the mobile experience, that allow for that kind of unique branded experience in general. So, you know, whether it's dedicated push notifications, wish lists, different content, personalized material across, you know, loyalty offerings, there's a multitude of things that kind of give it more of that specialized feel, and it's also just easier to access rather than, you know, within a click of a button within your own app folders versus having to go search, get to the site, log in, you know, kind of go through that whole experience.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 04:58

Yeah, it's it's much more of a focused experience for sure. Who does it target? Because, you know, correct me if I'm wrong, but I can't imagine, you know, a new customer who's, who's not familiar with the website, who's clicked on an ad for the first time. I can't really imagine them downloading an app, you know, and signing up, you know, if it's their first interaction for the brand. So let's talk about kind of who's the target here.

Ryan Groh: 05:24

Yeah, I'd say, you know, we kind of look at it as like the built loyal. So you know the app is a total LTV play. So we're looking at people who have purchased, you know, three or more times in the last year, two or more times in the last year, people whose cart value has, you know, reached higher than our average LTV value last 12 months. And so with that, you know, we want to, you know, cater towards those people. We want to cater towards people that are a part of our membership program and then people that, you know, are kind of within that last 60 day range of purchasing that, you know, we've seen are still like opening up emails or opening up, you know, text messages, anything like that, that is kind of keeping them in that funnel.

We want to kind of bring them to that next step. And so a nice thing that I kind of look at it personally is, you know, when you receive an SMS or an email, you know, sometimes you have to, you know, click into that and it takes you, you know, to your email and then, you know, there's a couple of added steps with like going through SMS or email. Whereas if you get a free push notification, it pops up on your phone and you see the logo, you click on it and it pulls you right into the app. So you're already right there in your own experience rather than having to do those added clicks. Yeah.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 06:43

So something I'm wondering here is at what point do you start promoting the app to those customers. And how do you promote it? Is it and I'm guessing it's probably a mixture of techniques. But what are those triggers?

Ryan Groh: 06:58

Yeah. Great question. I feel like at first we were really pushing it. You know, through just different retention channels, you know, just kind of hey, like, you know, we have the new Bilt app. Come check this out here for more.

We're doing a separate campaigns as well. So certain discounts or, you know, discount codes or product offerings were only available in app. So you had to download the app in order to go get that offering. So you see the people that are kind of like, you know, like, okay, I really want to get this offering. I want to go download the app and get that.

Another strategy we've done is in-app discounts only prior to sitewide sales, and they might be higher discounts prior to the sitewide sale. So get it early. Get it now. Especially kind of like new product focus as well. So that's really helpful for us.

A lot of like static presence though, and like the footer of our site. Footer of emails. I think some just different, like segmentation through email as well is, you know, hey like we've seen you purchase on mobile, you know, it's your last like 3 or 4 orders. Have you considered the app. So stuff like that where we can kind of segment through channel purchasing to then kind of also recognize that that customer doesn't have the app in their account.

So kind of push it that that way as well. But a lot of it is kind of focused during the start. We've had an app for about over two years now. Okay. So since then we've kind of toned down and it's kind of more of like an organic presence now.

But but yeah, that hasn't really like toned down with like the capabilities that, you know, app partners are like allowing their merchants to do now with segmented notifications, testing, personalization, different offers there now, especially with what like Shopify is now offering with like functions. So it's kind of an endless opportunities for sure.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 08:52

I know one of the things that we touch base on a little bit was that it helps with LTV, especially with those segments. Right? More focused. Experienced. Now, I can imagine a lot of people who are listening to this are thinking, wow, like an app.

It's like building a new website. There's a lot to maintain. There's a lot that needs to happen, so it needs to be worth it. So apart from LTV, have you seen other metrics get impacted as well?

Ryan Groh: 09:16

Yeah, I mean just kind of alongside LTV, we've seen a jump in AOV and upped, you know, we see a spike in sessions though too. So and you know when looking across different you know retention messaging across like SMS or email and then push from the app. We do see a significant amount of click-through on the segmentation of push-through app over SMS and email. So again, it kind of just goes into like that, you know, catered, built, loyal cohort of people that are just like, oh, what's this promotion? I might as well just click on it right here.

It's going to take me 10s to figure it out from going from one click into the app to seeing what what's there, rather than, you know, going to the site, having to log in. You know, perhaps you're on a different browser and vice versa there. So the app just kind of keeps that catered and logged-in experience a little bit easier.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 10:08

I'm curious here. Right. Like, let's say I put myself in the shoes of a brand who's hearing about this, and now they're thinking, oh, it'd be great to have an app. What are the steps to actually getting one launched? Like are there specific like from the tech stack side?

Like how much custom work does it require? What tools do you typically use to make that happen? And what's usually the timeline for building an app like that?

Ryan Groh: 10:32

Yeah. Great question. I think first off, you got to understand like is your brand the brand that will, you know, benefit from having an app, you know, what's your SKU count? What's your customer cohort like. You know, what's your UT and just anything in general like, is this a place where people can come and continue to shop at?

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 10:52

That's a great point. I wouldn't see any value to a single product brand having an app, for example.

Ryan Groh: 10:57

Yeah, like for example, like, you know, the average price point of, you know, one of our t-shirts can be like $35, $40. So it's easy to, you know, make bi-monthly purchases. It's easy for, you know, brands like a liquid Ivy or a Doctor squatch or something that has, you know, a handful of SKU and product to have an app where you can kind of have that loyal customer, that membership, that subscription model, something like that, where you can kind of cater all that into the same experience. So with apparel, that kind of falls in that same realm. If I were to work, you know, or a brand that was selling like couches or something, that's going to be something that's going to, you know, take a few additional clicks before making that purchase.

And it might be unless you have like a subscription model for something like that or, you know, fabric softener or cases or something like that where it'd be easier to sell via app. I wouldn't consider an app is the best option for a brand like that. But yeah, I guess kind of going back to it, you know, we you know, we've seen a lot of other competitors in the space, you know, in apparel or not in apparel as well. Kind of pushing towards the app and just seeing trends of people saying like, hey, 15 to 20% of our overall sales are coming from the app. We're seeing, you know, higher LTV, higher AOV.

You know, we're seeing longer sessions in the app as well. And you know, you can just kind of create these dynamic and personalized offerings as well through this channel that give you that added look and feel, you know, to your brand. So yeah.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 12:31

And how do you get there? How do you build the app? Are there any specific tools? What's the timeline?

Ryan Groh: 12:36

Yeah, I mean, there's a few vendors out there that you know, are helping create, you know, that app experience. So you partner with a brand such as like a tap cart or app brew or Fuego. I mean, there's a handful out there that are, you know, kind of leading the space. But, you know, a lot of people are kind of customizing or making apps themselves. So that's an option as well.

But yeah, through that or just like through those three channels I mentioned at first, you know, you partner with one of them and you kind of figure out the look and feel of your app. How similar you want it to look to your mobile experience. What do you want to look, look and feel different. A nice thing for us is we're focusing. Our site is headless, and so a lot of our pages are built through our CMS.

So being able to create a react based look and feel of these pages, as well as kind of like third party or vendor apps on that are connect to our app feel kind of more seamless and react based is very important rather than like click on FAQ and it links you to an external Safari page or Android or whatever that be. So trying to keep all of it honed in the app is crucial for creating that experience. So, you know, technically that was like a one thing for us. You know, integrations-wise with, you know, everything we have in our stack across like, you know, reviews, post-purchase tracking, return and exchange product recs, I mean, a multitude of things. But then also for us, you know, we're a bit tech savvy being headless for over three years.

So a lot of the different sections and just kind of look and feels that we've been able to kind of create through our CMS, we want to be able to create that cross-channel in-app, but perhaps even more elevated.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 14:23

So what's been the biggest challenge with the app? Is there anything that comes to mind?

Ryan Groh: 14:29

Some, some like technically has been difficult, just like I think it's it's kind of a new space over the last few years. So some of it has been, you know, kind of creating these React-based pages. Some of it has been integrating different, you know, tools and vendors across, like subscription, loyalty, membership, you know, maybe like personalization and testing. A lot of it is just stuff that's, you know, being built out and kind of catered for. But I feel like the app space has only been around for a good three or so years that I've been kind of in it.

So yeah, that's been kind of an interesting technical side of it for us. And hence you see bigger brands that are, you know, kind of recognizing this as well that have, you know, leaned towards creating their own custom app instead because they're just like, I want to get ahead of this and I want it like this. We're going to have this for a long time. We're just going to start from the ground up.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 15:22

So yeah, for sure. Now this is super interesting. You mentioned testing and personalization. Obviously that's key as part of an app. I'm sure you're doing some of that stuff on the website as well.

Have you how have you been able to unify the testing, both in the app and on the website? Are those treated as entirely separate things? Or are you pretty much able to kind of recycle, for lack of better words, the same efforts?

Ryan Groh: 15:52

Yeah, no, that's a great question. I feel a lot of it's more so recycled, just kind of given bandwidth and size and, you know, overall content. But a lot of the strategy can kind of change just looking at, you know, some parts of the strategy that are deciphers just looking at AOV across channels. So AOV will be higher for us in app versus on-site. So you know, some of the recommendations we might have in a carousel will be a tad bit higher there.

Or you know, the content will be showing, you know, maybe a higher-priced pair of pants versus, you know, like a core pair of pants that's at a mid-tier price on site or something like that. So that's primarily it. It'll, you know, primarily just be like content. That'll be the differentiation. Upon first landing on like the homepage of app or site.

But for the most part, that's that's kind of it. We kind of keep it or recycled, as you say. Yeah. So, you know, some of the strategy will primarily go across, you know, we have a membership program where we have a couple different tiers of a premium and a basic tier. Premium is paid annually.

Basic is free. But across both tiers, you're able to redeem or earn and redeem store credit that, you know, we want it to feel a little bit more personalized. You're going to see your name, you know, kind of logged in as soon as you enter, and perhaps different content or, you know, you're going to see your store credit offering in cart. You know, sometimes something we're trying to build out is a kind of a cart test that will, you know, if you're a basic member or a free member or not even a member at all, you'll see an upsell for membership. But if you're you know a member, you're not going to see that in CART.

But it'll still show you your credits and it'll say like, hey, purchase this and you'll be able to, you know, here's how many credits you're going to get from this. And something I want to build out on top of that is kind of dynamic recommendations. So if they have $30 of credits, you can then click here to see like oh, see what I can get with this. And it'll show you.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 18:01

Like.

Ryan Groh: 18:01

That quick pop of like products under that threshold that you can get with your credit.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 18:07

So super, super interesting. We've been talking to Ryan Groh, who's associate director of ecommerce at BYLT. Now Ryan, this was an incredible and super insightful conversation. Now if people want to learn more about you, about BYLT, where should they go?

Ryan Groh: 18:22

Yeah. byltbasics.com or check out BYLT Basics on iOS or the Google App Store.

Raphael Paulin-Daigle: 18:29

Awesome. Thank you so much Ryan.

Ryan Groh: 18:30

Awesome. Thank you, Raphael. Appreciate it.

Outro: 18:37

All right. Well, that's it for today's episode. And thank you so much for tuning in. Now, if you like what you've heard, and you don't want to miss any of the new episodes that are about to come out, make sure you subscribe to the podcast, and well, bonus points if you also leave a review in the iTunes store or wherever you're listening to this. Now, if you're working on an ecommerce store that does over $1 million in revenue and you need help with conversion optimization or landing pages, well, I've got some good news because there's a pretty good chance we can help with that.

Go to splitbase.com to learn more or even to request a proposal. If you have any guest requests, questions or comments, tweet me at @Rpaulindaigle, and I'll be super happy to hear from you. And again, thanks again for listening. This is Minds of Ecommerce.

‍