On this week’s episode I share a case study from a brand we are just launching right now. I share the strategy, how we’re executing our plan, and the results we’re getting, both on and off Amazon.

We have already built a passionate fan base just weeks after people heard our name for the first time! Also exciting are the results we’ve gotten with our Amazon search rankings barely more than a week after going live.

The Background

• Our niche is a fairly small, but tight-knit and passionate group whose interest is in the direction of a particular set of health and lifestyle topics.
• Our first product was created based on some testing we did on Amazon early this year. It is a special kind of water bottle that is retailing for $49.99.
• After our testing and product development were complete, we placed our first order for 1,000 units from our supplier. We expected those units to arrive between December 12-16, just in time to ship for Christmas…if we could get any orders by then.

The Strategy

• Build an audience that we can communicate with and send messages to any time we want
  • Create our subscription list using the ManyChat Facebook Messenger chatbot (not an affiliate link)
  • Also get our ManyChat subscribers on email over time – added about 50 email subscribers since our first announcement last night
• Get people to opt in to our list by using a piece of content that gets shared far and wide on Facebook
• Engage with the audience, have conversations they’re interested in – 2-way dialog
• Present offers that the audience will appreciate at opportune times
• Use the outside traffic and sales to boost Amazon organic search rankings
  • The problem we always talk about with Amazon is that on Amazon you don’t own the customers
  • But doing it this way, we own the customers – we were in communication with them before they went and purchased on Amazon, and we’ll be in communication with them afterwards as well

The Execution

• Started building our subscriber list October 14^th, but we really started in earnest on November 20^th, the Monday before Thanksgiving
• Started running very simple video and image ads, showing the product and its main features, and inviting people to join our list to be entered in a giveaway drawing
• Once they were on the list, we also offered them a discount code for making a purchase
• We were set to get our first shipment of 1,000 units just barely in time to ship for Christmas
• Didn’t even have a Shopify store up yet, so just set up a 1-page Facebook Shop and took pre-orders, telling people we’d ship by December 16^th
• Our shipment arrived December 6^th, so we made our Amazon product page live December 7^th
• We did a Facebook Live on December 8^th and announced a 20% off sale on Amazon running through December 10^th
• Sold 22 units on Amazon in the 2.5 hours after the FB live, with 12 units in the first half hour after the live ended

The Results

The Numbers (with the majority of the sales coming from December 8th to December 15th)

• $5,059 in sales through Shopify (Facebook shop, wholesale, and first day of our website being live)
  
• $4,313 in sales on Amazon in the first 9 days of the listing being live
  
• Spent $1,830 on Facebook ads
• Spent $126 on Amazon Sponsored Products Ads

The Audience

• We’ve grown a passionate audience of around 900 people in the past 2 months…mostly in the past 4 weeks
• We have great interactions with them
• We get 85%-100% open rates when we send messages, and click-through rates as high as 70%
• Imagine our results once we have 9k people on our list!

The Amazon Search Rankings

• Ranked 5^th or better organically for every single one of our major keywords 9 days after the listing went live
• Ranked 1^st and 2^nd for two of our most important keyword phrases, respectively

International Orders

• I purposely have been targeting our Facebook ads only to people in the U.S., but because our posts are getting shared so much on Facebook, we have made sales in Canada, England, and Australia as well

Facebook Page Likes

• This number doesn’t do much for us other than demonstrate our growing audience…but we have 1,768 likes after starting from almost zero 2 months ago…and still a low number just 4 weeks ago

Audience Interaction – The Best Part!

• We learn the biggest questions they have
• We learn the language they use in talking about the product
• They like us and feel like they know us – they are spreading the word (one person who’s in a private Facebook group specific to our niche said our page/product have been shared in the group 6-7 times in the past week)
• We have received 20+ wholesale inquiries without even advertising it, and we shipped our first 4 wholesale orders this past week
• The audience is telling us what products they want next

Your Challenge

• Put these strategies to work! Try it!
• Set up a ManyChat account…only $10 a month, or even free!
• Run a simple Facebook ad…spend $10 or $20 a day and see if you can get people on a list
• INTERACT…DO NOT SELL!!!
• Let us know what you try, how it goes, and what you learn!

Need Help?

If you would like help growing and strengthening your brand and driving sales online, you may be a candidate to become a client of ours. It only takes 5 minutes to apply to become a client!