Now I know you saw the title and got very excited, but it would be irresponsible not to give you a disclaimer of key things you need to know.
As a brand, followers shouldn't be your main focus. I'm not condoning you fixate on followers and go out to do anything you can to grow your brand. It's to show you ideas and advice on how to manage your brand as a small brand owner.
Yes, followers are important, but in the long term. It should come after more important things such as making sure you have a good product and presenting your brand well from your website to social media. Ensure your brand actually has demand and that your products are selling. You don't want to become a brand with a huge amount of followers with no demand.
I also want to note the quality of followers is more important than the quantity. This is one of the key lessons I learned growing the UNDISCOVERED Instagram page. At one point I wanted to reach certain milestones fast and over the months I realised the quality is much more important and overall better in the long term. It helps with engagement and building a loyal audience who are genuinely interested in what you do.
This means instead of going for any follow, first set the correct infrastructure for your page and brand. Do this by having a good product and actually posting good content. Present your social media pages well for new people coming across your page. This way you'll attract people to your page instead of chasing people to follow. The best followers you'll get are people who'll go out their own way to follow you without you even mentioning it.
Watch the video below to find out his strategy.
Key takeaways
1. Firstly, Set goals.
This will help you with direction and make it easier to come up with a strategy to help you get to that goal. You'll have a clear vision on the steps you need to take.
2. Think of your Strategy
Create an incentive, engage, build a community. These are all things that have been proven to help build a following and harvest long term results. These are just a few of the many things you can do.
One tip I liked from Jack was to look at ads you clicked on and almost replicate them but in your own way. We also mentioned the power of social proof, use that to your advantage. Social proof is people showing that they like you and what you're doing. In social media terms it can be people wearing your clothes, likes, comments, shares etc. People talking about you, looking up to you and supporting you is social proof.
If there's one thing to definitely not do is spam. Spam is annoying and sets a bad impression on your brand. I can also say this from first hand experience.
3. Put yourself in other people shoes when Marketing
Think about what made you buy something. What pushed you over the edge to make that purchase, was it the social proof or the design? Think from another perspective and find out what people may be thinking.
4. Use organic marketing to gauge your Product
This is probably the best way to see if people actually want your products. Too many brands pour money into marketing without realising the product is the problem, not the marketing method.
5. Set a good infrastructure before any Marketing
Make a good product, a text logo just on T is very unlikely to go far because your brand has no history, it's not known for anything yet, it hasn't fully developed. Once you've built a customer base and released a few products, then you can look at text logo pieces.
Also present your page well. This includes your logo, your bio and most importantly your content. Is your page random content or is carefully curated to attract the audience you're targeting? This accounts for the website too. Ensure your site isn't slow. While I know you'd want a crazy design for your site, it's also important for it to be simple, specifically in terms of navigation. Simplicity is key. Find a balance between a good design and a simple site.
You also want to think twice about pricing, like I mentioned, it is very possible to price your products at a high point. Some brands get away with it. But it's also smart to set entry level prices when you start and create the price points you desire once you're more long term with your brand.
Lastly, ensure shipping and stock is ready and set up correctly. Know your shipping costs and prices to charge your audience. Don't let shipping be the part where your potential customers are abandoning their carts. Also have the stock ready to ship as fast as possible. I'm not the biggest fan of pre-ordering, because of that reason, but for some it's what works to get them off the ground and that's ok. Just be aware people are impatient even if they know how long it ships. I see it countless times when people complain about not receiving their order knowing very well how long the brand said it'll take to ship.
That's it for the article, I really hope you've taken something away and that this has helped you. Please implement whatever you can to further your brand. And if you're thinking of starting a brand, I hope this was useful.
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Shipping sites he uses (Calculates all your rates based on package dimensions and weight, super easy to use with a label printer): https://www.easyship.com/ Shipping Sites for US Brands to use
(Basically the same thing): https://www.pirateship.com/
Label Printer he use: https://amzn.to/3UugMb4 Label Printer Paper (For this printer): https://amzn.to/3UyZDwI