Ramon Vela

Host of Top Podcast Featuring the Founders of Consumer Brands

Why appear on our show? 

We believe that people want to buy from Brands they love, admire, and feel community with.

Our show attempts to illustrate “Why” people connect to a Brand and how the Brand connects the customer to the world around them.  

If you have had some success, have crazy happy customers, and are passionately obsessed with delivering an amazing customer experience and are interested in appearing on our show, please message me here on LinkedIn.

Host of Top Podcast featuring DTC, CPG, Omnichannel Brands

Interviewed the CEO’s of PAIGE, Sugarfina, Diff Eyewear, Pair of Thieves, HUM Nutrition, The Bouqs, Mighty Audio, Burst Oral Care, Ties.com, Tenzo Tea,  Lola Getts, and many more.

I help DTC brands turn $1 into $43.80 | Scaled Chronos from 0 → 85 team members

Hey! Thanks for stopping by my profile.

I'm Josh 👋, co-founder of Chronos - a retention and lifecycle marketing agency for 7 - 9 figure DTC brands (say that 3 times fast).

In short, we help fast growing brands nail repeat purchases, so they can scale their acquisition efforts with confidence.

Over the past 7+ years, we've worked with over 500+ brands and have generated over $300M in tracked, attributable revenue. Some of the results we're proud of:

👉 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐎𝐨𝐝𝐢𝐞: 2x-ed email rev in 90 days, $44M in first 12 months

👉 𝐓𝐫𝐮𝐥𝐲 𝐁𝐞𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐲: 26% increase in cart recovery AOV

👉 𝐏𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐌+: 288% increase in total email revenue

👉 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐈𝐂𝐄: 2.53x in customer return rates

👉 𝐋𝐢𝐟𝐞𝐥𝐲: 32% increase in customer AOV

In a sea of retention agencies, choosing the right one can be tough. Here's why brands choose Chronos:

🏷️ 𝐖𝐞 𝐝𝐨𝐧'𝐭 𝐝𝐨 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬: We've been in the game for 7+ years and focus on building long term relationships by consistently delivering results.

🏷️ 𝐖𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐜𝐮𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬: We've seen a lot. Having worked with over 500+ brands, we bring a proven playbook of what works - and what doesn't - to get you results faster.

🏷️ 𝐖𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐮𝐫𝐬 No 'yes men' here. Our team actively challenges ideas and collaborates with you to achieve the best possible outcomes.

Making that leap is never easy - but if you're ready to partner with a team that's as invested in your growth as you are, let's chat.

Feel free to DM me, or check us out at: chronos.agency

Joshua Chin

In the next 12 months, I’m rebuilding Chronos from scratch into a 75-person retention company with over 9 figures in GMV across 20+ brands. 

Here’s how I’m doing it: 

- Finding a rich person’s problem to solve.

- Charging upfront, but removing risk with guarantees.

- Sacrificing everything except sleep, health, and core relationships.

- Optimizing around 4-5 hours of deep work a day.

- Picking up the phone and dialing. I never wait for opportunities to come to me. 

- Going to relevant events and meeting 10 new contacts a week.

- Paying my way into networks (#1 investment), attending events, and joining communities where people ahead of me are hanging out.

- Treating every interaction as a reflection of who I am. Delivering on my promises, going the extra mile for clients and partners, and never cutting corners to make a quick win.

I’m not actually rebuilding Chronos right now.

But if I ever decided to, this is the playbook I’d return to without changing a thing.

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Helping DTC Brands Turn $1 into $43.80 | $300M+ Revenue Driven for 500+ Brands | Scaled Chronos from 0 → 85+

Ready to Make Retention Your Growth Engine? Let's Chat!

The Retention Playbook That Scaled 500+ Brands

CEO, Chronos Agency | Retention systems that turn $1 into $43+ | $400M+ attributed revenue via Email, SMS, Push | Free Audit Below

As a kid, all I wanted was to escape poverty. Entrepreneurship was never on my radar as a career option.

The moment I read that investment banking paid among the highest salaries, I knew it had to be my north star.

I thought it was the only path to take care of my family, make sure they had enough to eat, the bills were always covered, and money never weighed on them.

But I realized later on that breaking into high-paying industries like investment banking requires stacking opportunities in your favor. 

I had no network, environment, connections, or initial resources.

Still, I applied to universities with that one goal and got into the London School of Economics.

Then I saw the numbers. Tuition plus London living expenses came out to £400-500k. 

My parents had been through bankruptcies, so that money didn't exist for me. 

Borrowing from friends or family wasn't an option either because I didn’t want to build my career on debt.

At that time, entrepreneurship was the only path left that didn’t require money or connections I didn’t have.

So I took it.

I dove into anything I could access: YouTube videos, online courses, books, and whatever else offered knowledge I could afford.

Looking back, scarcity and hunger shaped me more than anything else.

With time, that survival instinct morphed into a drive that never turned off.

I had to piss a few people off to get here, and I've come to realize that staying authentic doesn't leave much room for people-pleasing.

It's a day-to-day decision that costs you deals, relationships, and sometimes your peace of mind.

It means not bending over backwards just to make a buck and not caving in just to keep things comfortable.

I don't always get it right.

My mission is to be the most trusted marketing partner for growth-oriented brands globally.

And that means speaking the truth even when it stings.

Some people walk away. But the ones who stay are the ones who fully trust you.

And in the long run, that's what keeps you at the forefront in the game.

Instead of spending weeks in January cutting prices and scrambling for ideas, this 10-minute video shows you what to fix TODAY.

You don’t need to rush to build a successful business.

We’re bootstrapped. From the outside, the last two years probably look like a plateau, but so much has been compounding under the surface: our network, our judgment, our relationships, our operating skill. 

The quality of our work today is miles ahead of what it was 2-3 years ago, and so are we as operators.

Sometimes what feels like “going in circles” is really the roots growing before the branches show.

You can’t brute-force your way into durable growth, and you can’t buy your way out of the maturity curve. 

Some phases are the necessary training ground.

Look at the Amazon aggregators like Thrasio: they scaled fast on capital instead of fundamentals, shot up overnight, and then imploded just as quickly. 

Hyper-growth without depth is fragility dressed up as momentum.

Some seasons look quiet. In reality, that’s when the roots are forming so the growth can hold its own weight later.

This is a strong reference point if the goal of your welcome email is long-term sales instead of a quick first-order bump.

Selena Gomez’s retention team nailed it with:

- Headshot + welcome on first fold (immediately signals authenticity and connects with the audience)

- Short blurb on why she created the brand (aligns with audience values and challenges unrealistic beauty standards)

- Signature to end the email (adds personal touch, building trust and connection)

There’s no upfront discount. Margin protection comes first. The incentive is reserved for SMS opt-in, where it can be used more deliberately.

The result is a welcome email that feels intentional. It creates connection, signals credibility, and sets expectations for a longer relationship rather than a one-time transaction.

Without cohort analysis your LTV growth is pure luck. 

You're just blindly guessing when to sell and what to push.

This is what I mean: 

Say a good chunk of your customers naturally come back in 30 days. 

But your upsell only kicks in at Day 60. You lose the repeat order. Your LTV looks lower than it really is. And suddenly, you’re scaling ads on the wrong breakeven CAC thinking it is $50 when it should be $75.

That's 50% more room to scale left on the table.

Now, run a simple cohort analysis and you’ll find which product brings people back on repeat. That will become your hero product. 

Push it in paid, feature it in your welcome flow, cross-sells, abandonment emails. Now you’re building around what really drives lifetime value.

Now instead of chasing a flashy AOV that jumps around with promos and bundles, you look at SKU repeat rate. 

That number is steady. It tells you exactly when people repurchase and lets you confidently raise your CAC. Even de-risks your inventory bets.

Cohorts analysis is how you engineer retention to drive repeatable revenue.

This is your LAST CHANCE to join us live before we start.

We’re going live today at 11 am EST to audit Glossier and Caraway.

We’ll walk through their systems, flows, and onsite experience as it exists right now.

No recording will hit the same as watching live, as we think through each decision.

Join us to see what's working inside two of the most well-run DTC brands right now.
https://lnkd.in/gN3Fp7dd

A friend in the industry reached out after noticing something felt off.

• Lead capture hadn’t collapsed.
• Form submissions were steady.
• Pop-up conversion sat around 7%.

During our audit, we identified 5 small tweaks that could potentially double their conversions, drive +40% revenue, and increase AOV by 7%. 

Swipe through to see them in action.

5 Small Tweaks From One Lead Capture Audit 

If you’re running a growing brand, your attention is already maxed out with growth, hiring, inventory, paid media, cash flow, etc. 

Every lever wants to be pulled at the same time.

Retention usually sits quietly in the background. 

It keeps sending. It keeps converting. It keeps propping up acquisition without demanding a meeting on the calendar. 

So it gets left alone.

At first, nothing feels wrong. 

Revenue still comes in. Dashboards look fine. The system appears stable.

Then small things start to drift. 

Engagement cools. Repeat behavior gets less predictable. You add a few more campaigns to smooth it over. 

Segments get a little broader. Output stays steady, but only because you’re pushing harder.

We see this exact sequence across eCommerce accounts.

Strong acquisition keeps filling the funnel, which makes the retention cracks easy to miss. Pop-ups, flows, and segments that were set months or years ago keep running, even as traffic sources change and customer behavior shifts.

What worked at $3M is now expected to carry $15M without question.

None of this happens because founders don’t care. It happens because retention doesn’t fail loudly. It fails politely, one small inefficiency at a time.

Eventually, the cost shows up where you feel it most. Acquisition gets more expensive. Conversion rates soften. Growth starts requiring more effort for the same return.

This is exactly why we run audits. Not to tear things down, but to show you where systems have drifted, what’s still working, and what needs attention before that quiet decay starts dictating your growth.

When I was younger, feedback felt like someone had thrown a brick straight at my chest. 

One comment, and suddenly my thoughts were running in circles, tearing me apart from the inside.

I’d replay it over and over, dissect every word, and convince myself it meant I wasn’t good enough. 

At that time, every reaction came from feeling trapped in my own thoughts. 

But now I try to take it in fully, even when it stings, because I’ve realized that the feedback is exactly what I need to grow. 

It’s a skill I’ve honed over the years, and part of that process has been learning to separate myself from the situation and looking at the problem without letting my ego get in the way. 

Receiving feedback has become my practice ground. With every session, I get a little more skilled at it.

Back in 2018, we were deep in discussion with operators at a high-level mastermind about the supposedly “perfect” email send frequency for ecom brands. 

The conventional wisdom was 1-2 emails/week, as any more would be overwhelming or spammy.

Looking back, this was an obvious rule to challenge because it was rigid, leaving no room for nuance. 

So I went back to the first principle of what’s actually happening on the receiving end.

Are people really reading every email? Are they annoyed when they see more than two emails a week?

Our data said no. 

People read just 20-30% of their inbox, which means if you’re intentional, you can send more emails without burning your list.

But some rules, especially the legal ones, should never be broken. 

For example, something that seems small like sending SMSs to people who haven’t opted in, can be a huge risk. 

Companies can get fined hundreds of dollars per message, which adds up fast across multiple campaigns. 

When the stakes are this high, the cost of mistakes dwarfs any upside. 

So get creative, break patterns, and test everything relentlessly.

Just make sure you protect the lines that are non-negotiable.

We're going LIVE TOMORROW. 

At 11 am EST, we're breaking down the systems behind brands doing $50M-$100M+ and showing you what you can apply immediately as you head into 2026.

Inside this session, you’ll see: 
- How they capture emails and SMS. 
- What happens after someone signs up or adds to cart. 
- Where margin quietly leaks in Shopping feeds and Merchant Center setups. 
- How creative needs to shift from Meta to Google. 
- And how small UX decisions impact conversion more than you'd expect.

By the end, you'll know what's silently eating your margin and what deserves your attention first.

Join us tomorrow at 11 am EST: 
https://lnkd.in/gN3Fp7dd

I made a pretty big mistake last year, and my team was the one who paid the price for it. 

I still remember staring at the numbers mid-year, and realizing they told a completely different story than the one we planned for...

We hired and invested based on an overly optimistic plan without accounting for higher-than-expected churn or lower-than-expected revenue.

And by mid-year, everything crashed down on us. 

Layoffs, shaken trust, and my team ultimately faced the consequences of my blind spots. 

It taught me that optimism is fine, but SYSTEMS need to plan for the worst. 

The retention equivalent of this mistake is forecasting LTV like it's guaranteed. 

Brands assume repurchase happens on a neat timeline, repeat rates stay stable, and margins stay intact. 

But the repurchase window is theoretical and not validated. 

Heavy promos pull forward demand, train discount dependency, and compress margin right when you're scaling spend. 

Cash gets trapped in inventory gaps right when you need it most. 

LTV is a system outcome shaped by offer strategy, promo rules, and inventory timing.

Don't forecast LTV like a promise. 

Test it like a variable and protect the conditions that actually create repeat purchases.

If Q1 planning is on your mind, this live teardown session is worth your time.

January 14 at 11 am EST, we're auditing Glossier and Caraway live. 

Their email, ads, and onsite experience, all in real time.

We'll slow things down and walk you through what actually stands out when you look closely at brands operating at this level.

Send this to someone on your team who should see it.

Grab your seat here:
https://lnkd.in/gN3Fp7dd

Launching email from scratch feels simple until you realize one wrong move permanently tanks your sender reputation and inbox providers mark you as spam forever. 

Brands will blast their full list on day one, land in spam, and spend months trying to recover deliverability they'll never fully get back.

Here's the framework we use when taking over lifecycle programs with zero sender history: 

Phase 1 - Risk Assessment Before Launch 

Before sending a single email, we evaluate whether this brand has sender reputation built, or if inbox providers are treating them as spam by default. 

Can we segment by engagement recency, or does the list require cold outreach that risks deliverability permanently? 

Phase 2 - Micro-Segment Warming (Days 1-14) 

If we’re starting small, we create hyper-engaged micro-segments. 

7-day engaged, 14-day engaged, and 30-day engaged segments based on actual email engagement like opens and clicks, excluding Apple privacy opens, before expanding outwards to site engagement like visitors, cart abandoners, and checkout abandoners. 

This builds inbox provider trust through consistently strong open and click rates before expanding to cooler segments. 

Phase 3 - Staged Campaign Sequencing 

We develop campaign sequences designed to drive urgency while maintaining brand warmth. 

Launch email with promotional hook, urgency email, social proof with testimonials, emotional close, and post-sale education. 

This balances conversion pressure with value delivery so the program doesn't train discount dependency early. 

Phase 4 - Controlled Expansion (Days 30-37) 

Once we've earned inbox trust, we gradually widen the net to cooler segments while monitoring engagement. 

We earn access to broader segments through performance, and not by forcing scale upfront. 

The result: 

- 48.59% open rate demonstrating strong deliverability. 
- 83,379 recipients reached without spam issues. 
- 0.26% placed order rate under market restrictions. 

This is the operating standard we apply before scaling lifecycle programs. 

The brands that get this right don't just launch email...

They build sender reputation that compounds for years, not campaigns that burn out in months.

Click here to find gold nuggets of data for actionable insights:

chronos.agency

Book an Appointment with Chronos Agency Experts

I've seen retention programs sitting at 20-30% of revenue look completely fine on the surface, then quietly fall apart within 90 days.

The issue is almost never strategy or campaigns.

It's that retention is owned by someone without authority to push back on lazy promos, challenge assumptions, or run a disciplined testing cadence.

You need an owner with judgment, not with just execution skill.

Your subscriber list is a goldmine for boosting your revenue, but most of these people slip through the cracks before they convert.

We built a system to re-engage these nearly-buyers, and add an extra 5-15% to your owned revenue.

Almost every brand wants the same thing in 2026: cleaner growth and more profit per visitor.

Founders chasing their next million are obsessed with repeatable systems. 

That's exactly what we're breaking down on January 14 at 11 am EST when we go live to audit Glossier and Caraway.

Inside this session, you’ll learn:
- Where stores quietly lose momentum after someone signs up or adds to the cart.
- Where margin leaks hide in Shopping feeds and Merchant Center setups.
- Why creatives underperform when it moves from Meta to Google.
- Where small UX decisions on PDPs and checkout impact conversion more than full redesigns.

You'll walk away understanding where scaled brands put their attention and why it compounds into margin.

Join us to see how scaled brands sequence their priorities.
https://lnkd.in/gN3Fp7dd

[rare full-time coaching opportunity] im searching for an email & SMS consultant who is passionate about teaching and coaching. 
This role is for a community led by a world-class founder, influential in the DTC space, and will undoubtably be a massive rocket booster for your career.

Key requirements include:
- Proven success in crafting DTC retention strategies for 7-8 figure brands.
- Strong interpersonal skills with patience and empathy.
- Experience in teaching and coaching others in your area of expertise.
- A genuine love for the craft.
- No location boundaries. You can live and work from anywhere.

Know anyone who meets the mark? or if this strikes a chord with you, email me joshua@chronos.agency with the subject line 'email coach' and include your single best case study, showcasing a project you have personally worked on. 

I am personally vetting every application, and we're only hiring one person! So make sure to bring your best!

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