good morning. coming up on m nbc "your business," we sit down with actress kate hudson her latest role is -- brick and mortar retailers get shoppers offline and into the store. and you know about millennials, but what are perennials? why you and your customers may be one. find out who they are coming up next on "your business." will your business be ready when growth presents itself? american express open cards can help you take on a new job. or fill a big order.

or expand your office and take on whatever comes next. for those who always find new ways to grow your business. american express open proudly presents "your business" on msnbc. ♪ ♪ hi, everyone i'm j.j. ramberg and welcome to "your business." the show dedicated to helping your growing business. actress kate hudson has always been a fashion trend setter both on the red carpet and off. and now with his athletic-wear line fabletics she is giving women fashionable choices for their workout. i sat down with kate in new york city to talk about why her line is so much more than just a business to her, but why she doesn't want to give up her day

job in this "small business stars." ♪ raised in a celebrity household and with several film credits, including her award-winning role in "almost famous" under her belt, kate hudson is no stranger to the spotlight. in 2013, she added a new title to her resume, business owner. >> my partners who came to me had an idea. they felt like there was this wide space in at leisure for afortable active wear that was more fashion forward. and they came to me thinking that it would be the right fit. and when i really sat and thought about it, it was like, well, this is just my life. it makes total sense. >> she partnered with the company just fab to launch her own line of workout clothes and active wear called fabletics. we did not expect the amount of success it had in this short

period of time. so that was really exciting. it allowed for me to have a much quicker learning curve in this world, which is a completely new thing for me in business. >> she doesn't have a traditional background in business, but kate says her acting career has helped her bring new ideas to the table. >> as a creative, you go in and think, i could never be a business person. my brain doesn't work that way. you realize it's as creative as being on a set for me because you really do have to come at things differently. and i don't think the formula in business is always working. so, you know, just coming up with different ideas to stay competitive is actually incredibly creative process. i remember the first time my partner sent me our weekly numbers, and i looked at this sheet and i was like -- and i called him. i was like, hey, i think you might just need to go through this with me so i really understand what i'm looking at.

and now, you know -- >> you learn the language. >> i got it. yeah, you do, you start learning the language. i think certain people have an instinct for what you want. when you're in this business where to me it's really about like what do the girls want? sometimes what fashion trends are trying to tell you you might sometimes have to say, i think we can take this risk because i really think girls are going to be looking towards this and hopefully we'll be on the cutting edge of that. >> if you took a range of i'm just the face of this company to i am running the company, where are you? >> okay. am i somewhere up there? am i the face? no. i mean, i am, but i'm a lot more than that. you know, i'm an owner in the company. and i have a lot of say in the things that go on inside of it. but i wouldn't be able to do this without my partners. the whole textile family and what they do, i don't know if that would have been my choice job for me personally as an

actress. i would like to keep my day job. and then have a new day job. so i sort of like to be more part of the things that i feel like i'm strongest suited towards. >> fabletics starts as an ecommerce kpaerngs membership company which is modern. going back to the way things were typically done. >> right. we wanted to allow the consumer to touch and feel product. so now we're at 18 stores. we'll be at almost 20 soon. and they seem to be working fine because we have such a devoted customer in our membership program. so they like to go to the store. they like to see what it is that we're offering that's not just the outfit that they want to buy that month, you know? >> kate says fablettics is much more than just a business for her. it's been a way to connect with women in a brand new way. >> so, where as i would have people come up to me and say, i love this movie or i love that

movie. i actually have women coming up to me wanting to talk about the things they're doing in their life. i had one woman come and she's like, so my husband left me. i gained 50 pounds and i've lost every ounce of it. and all of a sudden here we are ended up having this random conversation with this woman. we talked about relationships. that just felt really important to me. >> so fablettics to you isn't just a business. >> no, it's not. no, it's not. i think that's part of where the success comes from. when it's really authentic and you know that the message behind it is something that someone believes in, i think people get on board. and i think that our company is really -- it's all about, like, let's just relax. at the end of the day, if you're not making a huge lifestyle change and you're not enjoying it, it's going to be one daunting task to get a more healthy lifestyle. >> so how do you change the dialogue? how do you make it more fun for women? how do you make them feel like this is a great moment in their lives and make them feel like

they can get stronger without having to go from zero to 1,000? and that's really what we're trying to do. let's shift the lifestyle. ♪ it's been well documented that retail is reeling both for chain stores and mom and pops. it is simply a challenge to get people offline and into the store. as nbc reports, one chain is combatting that by disrupting the retail experience through the use of high-tech. ♪ >> brands across the country are fast forwarding to the future, launching new technology to disrupt the traditional shopping experience and lure you into their stores. >> it definitely feels like you're shopping in the future. >> the whole process itself is quite simple actually. >> it was a fun experience. >> in san francisco, sustainable clothing brand reformation just opened its first high-tech store. the clothes come to you. >> you pick like color, too?

>> totally. >> shoppers select the style, color and size in a touch screen and 122 seconds, store clerks stock a magic wardrobe and your choices await you in your dressing room. >> they don't have to fight with other customers for a size. they don't have to have 100 things on your arm and really deal with is that piece. >> it's so easy. >> need another size? it's just a couple taps away. >> it feels very, very far away from a traditional retail store. >> your room is ready to go. >> perfect. thank you. >> ikea customers can a rang furniture in virtual reality to see if that couch really works in your home. oak lives is the company behind this product. they spend nearly 60% more if they engage with the mirror. and face cake deploys augmented reality. with foot traffic at retailers down a whooping 57% in the last

five years, designer rebecca minkof says upgrading the shopping experience is critical to surviving and growing. >> can you afford not to do all this in terms of technology? could you just decide i'm going to stick with the tried and true? >> with multiple brands closing stores and brands not making it, i think that if you are going to go into brick and mortar -- >> customers are greeted with an interact i have wall at the front of her store, to order up the clothes you want to try on, along with a glass of bubbly. >> you can order clothes to your fitting room without even going past the first few steps of the store. >> correct. >> her store is one of a growing number nationwide integrating the smart mirror in fitting rooms. the mirror shows the clothes on the screen and offers new outfit ideas at eye level. there's also adjustable lighting

to test your outfit in setting. >> that little ding is one of our associates actually getting the notification. >> how is all this technology impacted your sales and your bottom line? >> we know when the consumer goes in the dressing room, she's buying three more times the apparel than with a regular dressing room. >> a healthy bump for business is a new twist on shopping lands in stores. the power of brand is more relevant than ever before, especially when it comes to your social media identity. your marketing strategy should go far beyond just talking about the products you sell or the services you provide. how can we use branding to our advantage. chelsea krost has some best practices to share with us. it's good to see you, chelsea. >> great to see you. thank you. >> well, i think you have got to think about what your brand is, what you stand for because when it comes to social media you're not selling. all you are doing is furthering this brand in order to connect

with people. >> you just nailed it on the head. here is the thing, before we dive into branding tip and what to do, let's step back for a second. let's do a brand audit on ourself. we're new into the new year. this is the perfect time to do it. when i talk about doing a brand audit, look at your brand. look at your messaging. look at your copy. look at your color story. look at what social channels you currently have live. look at how often you've been engaging on those channels. look at your past month or three months worth of content to see what content got the most engagement. that's how you know what to generate more of. and step back for a second. make sure all your imagery is up to date. make sure all of your content is up to date. make sure those bios in every social channel is relevant information. that is like your business card right there. >> you know, chelsea -- >> step back, do a brand audit before you step forward. >> so what do you do in this situation, you have a brand.

it is very clear. you put up a social post that is a little bit off brand and it goes bonkers. everyone loves it. what do you do with that information? you can't change your brand, right? so how do you then fit it in? >> that is social listening at its finest. that is such an important key here. social listening. on and offline. social listening to what your audience is liking or demanding more of. you could be creating content that you think is fantastic, but then you do that random miscellaneous piece of content and you realize that's what your audience really ate up. maybe that's the direction you move forward with your content strategy with. so listening is key. that's why i say doing a brand audit further allows you to get to know your audience and then suit yourself up that much better to roll out your most effective strategy going forward. >> do you feel like you can then do some selling on social media?

you've established your brand. you've established this communication. can you then slip in some things about selling your product? >> so here is the thing when it comes to social media. you should look at social media as building brand awareness and building your community. because when you built brand awareness and have a loyal and engaged community, they kind of start to do the selling for you. they start to generate content around your product, around your services and that is called user generated content. that user generated content is even more effective to sell your consumer than you, the brand, the business pumping out, hey, buy our new product. buy our new product. so social media should be a place where you build your brand community. facebook is still trump's all when it comes to social media platforms. facebook in particular is a great platform to use to sell a product. facebook and instagram now have merged integration for their ads. so now you can do cross platform

ads make it that much easier on facebook and instagram. if you are looking to sell to a consumer, facebook is definitely incredibly effective and especially for the millennial generation your ideal target is between 18 and 30. instagram is not a platform to overlook, especially if you're in the visual space, food instagram is your friend and every business should be on facebook. >> well, chelsea, i think this is great advice. i love your idea of just taking a step back and doing a brand audit, even if you feel like your brand is very well defined. it does not hurt to just go through with your team and say, does this all fit and what's working and what's not. it was so good to see you. >> definitely. >> i really appreciate your advice. we all know what a millennial is and a gen xer and a boomer. that is how we're typically divided up when companies target us with our products or services. this didn't make sense to entrepreneur gina le pel, once

he passed a certain age, she started to only get ads for products geared for the older set and that is not what she was looking for. so she coined a new term for marketers and it's resonated around the world. ♪ there's a new term in town and it has people buzzing around the globe. gaga's one, so is fallon. ellen is one, too. move over millennials it's the dawning of the age of perennials. >> what are perennials? >> i describe perennials of people of all ages who defy generational stereotypes. who continue to push up against the growing edge. they're ever evolving, ever blooming relevant people. >> gina published a piece called "meet the perennials." within days it has gone around the world.

♪ from fast company to the london evening standard, gina knew she has tapped into something that was striking a chord. >> it was genius. i thought it affirmed what it was that we have always been doing. >> susan griffin black is the founder of eo, a power house in the body care industry based in ma rin county, california. when she heard the term perennial, she was thrilled that there was finally a word that described their philosophy. eo's wholistic view of their customer base has always been clearly reflected in their marketing. for susan, demographics mean little and age it's simply a number. >> by limiting things that way, it's sort of is like pseudo exclusion and we're so much more about inclusion. >> millennials can be perennials. i feel like this term perennial is just the kind of inclusiveness that we need in this divisive world right now. >> give me a list of companies

that you think of as perennial companies. >> i think amazon leads the pack in perennial marketing. they're actually targeting you based on your purchasing behavior, so amazon doesn't say, you hit 40, now you need some -- i think apple is a great example of a company that's perennial. i use their products religiously and so do my children. when my daughter was 18 months old, apple has such an intuitive product that she knew how to pinch and pull and swipe. >> when margaret johnson chief creative officer read meet the perennials, she knew gina was on to something. you've been a marketer for a very long time, why demographics, why doesn't that work anymore? >> i think it was kind of a tool that was created before social technology took over the world. now that we're all on facebook and twitter and all the social platforms, we know exactly what people like. those are the people that we should be targeting. people who are like minded, not people of a certain age.

>> the term perennial resonated with margaret so much that she used it in a national campaign for sonic drive-in. >> you're like a millennial. i'm more of a perennial. >> growing business owners everywhere are innately embracing this idea of the perennial consumer. and marketing based on shared values, beliefs and passions. in the heart of san francisco, there's nothing subtle about the splash hint water has made in the beverage industry. the perennial thread that runs through the fruit infused water is undeniable. >> when you think about how to market your products, do you think about age? >> not at all. i think it's really about solving problems and not only solving problems but also creating awareness for people. >> co-founder kara golden has turned hint water into a daily must-have for many. even stocking the fridges of silicon valley giants like google and facebook. >> they're really about healthy

living, removing sweeteners from their diet. it's really about the quality of life for them but also the quality of the product. we believe that as long as we have a great tasting product and a great quality product age is really agnostic. >> singer john legend, who is undoubtably part of the perennial pack is an investor in hint water. >> i'm a partner on team now and i joined with them because i believe in what they do. >> i think hint water has shelf appeal both to me and my children. they make a water that my kids love to drink, which is pretty hard to get kids to drink anything that's healthy for them. it's healthy for the entire family. ♪ >> when eo launched a line for the whole family called everyone in 2012, it was a game changer. the all-inclusive mind set from product development to marketing simply made sense. >> i just saw that people really needed something that was understandable, affordable, multipurpose. we started with six products in

2012. and the whole company has grown 30% year over year for the past five years. >> your packaging says perennial more than anything else, right? it says it right there. >> for everyone and every body. >> the design of the packaging i think a lot of people of different generations can relate to. >> yes. the type phase. the colors. and just the sim plisty and straight forwardness. it's not based on gender or age. i would love to come up with a term that makes people feel relevant of all ages. if i can do that, then -- >> you've done your job.

with so many productivity apps and websites to choose from, time spending the right ones can cut into your ability to actually get things done. so this week we have five of the best ones courtesy of entrepreneur. one trelo. if you have hard deadlines and need to get your team in synch, check out this project management and collaboration platform. users can create task lists and discuss projects in realtime. trello synchs across devices. two, fantastical two. this calendar app for mac is simple and plexable to work with and lets user create detailed reminders about upcoming events. three, one password. if you're smart enough to have a different password for each site but have a hard time remembering them all, the one password app safely keeps track of them for you. four, pocket. this read it later app lets you

save articles and videos for later so that you can stay focussed on the task at hand. thermostats. when we come back, if you want to get in the game, you may need a business code. will your business be ready when growth presents itself? american express open cards can help you take on a new job, or fill a big order

or expand your office and take on whatever comes next. find out how american express cards and services can help prepare you for growth at open.com.

maintaining your current relationships with your current clients. there's nothing with asking your clients. feel free to say more than trees. if you keep the name, if you stay with trees and people are doi googling you, they'll find you don't fit and come back to you. your goal is to work with what they come back to you. in this cause it's no longer trees. we now have the top two tips you need to help grow your business. let's introduce our panel. alfred edmond is senior vice president sxectiontive at large for black enter surprise and stephanie ckaplin, for her bran. good to see you. >> alfred, let's start with you. >> identify got a new appreciation for business coaches. hopefully this feels like, you need a coach to help you run your business. someone put it to me this way.

even serena williams, tom brady, at the top of their games have coaches. they can look at you from the outside and tell why the ball is going where it's going or in this case why your sales are going the way they're going. they really do pay off. the key is to get you with someone who can provide referrals of someone who can say they got measurable results. a lot of coaches can talk about how they can inspire you and motivate you but its all about points on the board. >> what does measurable results mean for a business coach? >> if your sales have plateaued, you want a coach that has other clients that can say because i implemented what they told me to do, my sales ratcheted up. if the goal is to be more effective with social media, you want someone who says based on these recommendations by coach, we have this -- >> business coach i think they often think someone who is going to help me with leadership, help me with some personal issues around managing whereas the way

you're describing it sounds more like a consultant. >> my thing is there are cheerleaders, which may make you feel good about what you're doing but they're not going to help you perform better on the field and then there are coaches, real coaches are saying, let me analyze your processes, your communication skills and then there should be measurable results. a lot of coaches are just very, very good cheerleaders. >> stephanie, i've been watching your stephanie grow from the sidelines and it's so impressive. you started right after the college. it's been how many years now? >> seven years. we started it while undergrad the at harvard. >> it's amazing, reaching college students. >> sure. one tip i have is to establish and articulate core values for your company. i mean internal facing core values for you, your business partners and employees. one thing we found is in the early stages of your krngs the culture kind of just happens naturally up. don't necessarily need to spell

it now the any way but as time goes on, as new employees join, you have to be more intention about setting that culture. we found setting core values is a helpful way. >> do you write them down? how do you communicate them? a lot of companies do it and then put it in a drawer and never see it again. how do you make it a part of your everyday running of your business? >> exactly. we had the same thought, once we came up with these core values we didn't want to present them to the team once and no one knows what they are so we thread them into the performance review. they have a performance review about nir specific jobs and their role and we're grading them based on how fully we see them embodying each of those core values. we know they'll come up of three months, six months, performance review schedule thereon they're held accountable.

>> there are some words you just think everyone wants. everyone wants to seat innovative. i mean we should have innovatetive companies and maybe yours isn't and that's okay. we should be truly thinking about what is it about my company that makes us special rather than what is kind of -- what's in the ethos right now. great ideas from boat of you. thank you. this week's your biz selfie comes from georgianne who owns monday morning flower and balloon company in new jersey. they do balloon and fruit and cookie bouquets with shipments around the country. it's so much fun for us to see the photos we get from around the country. take a selfie of you and your business and send it to us at

yourbusiness.msnbc.com or send it to us with h#yourbiz. if you have any questions e-mail us at yourbusiness@msnbc.com. we posted all the segments from today's show plus a whole lot more for you. don't forget to connect with us on or digital and social media platforms as well. i'm j.j. ramberg. remember, we make your business our business. will your business be ready when growth presents itself? american express open cards can help you take on a new job, or fill a big order

or expand your office and take on whatever comes next. find out how american express cards and services can help prepare you for growth at open.com. >> good evening. >> thank you at home for joining us for the next hour. nice to have you here on a friday night. being a staffer for a member of congress these days means sometimes accepting things that you might just not want to accept. it means accepting physical things that you might not have room to accept. >> we have a letter here for the congressman signed by 1,000 of his constituents from the third congressional action group. >> this was an office visit paid this week to new jersey offense of tom mcarthur, who wrote part of the new version of the republicans' bill to kill affordable care act. his home district constituents calculated that mcarthur's revised veio