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Launched Supp. Company, now how to market?

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

Ben Adams

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Mar 7, 2017
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I posted this on INSIDERS but didn't get any replies so here it is again. My company is ready to take orders and now I need to figure out how to actually get traffic to the site.

After around 8 months of work, i've finally gotten everything together and have begun to take orders. This is after a long process of:
-creating the product
-Making samples and giving to people I know for testimonials
-designing the label/logo (if anyone is in need of a good label designer I can refer you to the lady that did mine, she did a very good job with it)
-creating social media
-creating the website and reading copywriting books to help with it
-writing a few blog posts
-registering as an llc
-finding the right manufacturer

Heres my site: somavitasupplements.com
My first product is basically a mood booster that relaxes you, as well as increases sociability, and reduces anxiety/stress.

Right now my plan for marketing is to message ig accounts with around 10k followers and offer to send them a free bottle to try, and say that if they like it they could optionally post a review on their ig that I can repost. So far i'm targeting yoga girls, health/fitness crowd, and music festival accounts. I'm not exactly sure if this will drive enough traffic to the site but we'll see.

Additionally I approached a local smoke shop and gave them a few bottles to sell for free, and told them to call me if they sell well so we could work out a deal.

This is my first business venture, so I wanted to reach out to both help people by seeing my process as well as get any constructive criticism and advice on what to do from here in terms of marketing. Right now my site hardly gets any views at all so having a good marketing strategy is a must. I want to try and grow it organically before resorting to paid advertisements on ig/google.
 
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Argin Gerigorian

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Get on platforms! Take traffic from platforms to your site

Send 100 units to Amazon and start ranking for keywords there.

Include an insert card about how someone could get another free bottle with an Amazon order.

Be creative.
 

3things

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Figure out the specific niches where your supplement solves someones problem and adds value - ie, people suffering with stress, anxiety - and build yourself a landing page that explains how your product is going to help someone overcome their stress or anxiety quickly, easily and how their life will improve as a result etc etc. Do some googling in your chosen niche and pay attention to the ads - observe how the competition in your chosen niche is selling things.

Supplements are quite easy to sell when you focus on the problems they solve for people (the value they provide to the consumer).
 

theag

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After around 8 months of work
how to market?

Did you really not think of this before? :wideyed:

At some point during those 8 months you must have thought to yourself "damn, how am I gonna get rid of those mountains of placebo pills?!" and worked out some kind of plan, right? :happy:

Maybe you could post some IG links to those yoga girls you are targeting. For marketing research purposes.
 
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Destined

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I posted this on INSIDERS but didn't get any replies so here it is again. My company is ready to take orders and now I need to figure out how to actually get traffic to the site.

After around 8 months of work, i've finally gotten everything together and have begun to take orders. This is after a long process of:
-creating the product
-Making samples and giving to people I know for testimonials
-designing the label/logo (if anyone is in need of a good label designer I can refer you to the lady that did mine, she did a very good job with it)
-creating social media
-creating the website and reading copywriting books to help with it
-writing a few blog posts
-registering as an llc
-finding the right manufacturer

Heres my site: somavitasupplements.com
My first product is basically a mood booster that relaxes you, as well as increases sociability, and reduces anxiety/stress.

Right now my plan for marketing is to message ig accounts with around 10k followers and offer to send them a free bottle to try, and say that if they like it they could optionally post a review on their ig that I can repost. So far i'm targeting yoga girls, health/fitness crowd, and music festival accounts. I'm not exactly sure if this will drive enough traffic to the site but we'll see.

Additionally I approached a local smoke shop and gave them a few bottles to sell for free, and told them to call me if they sell well so we could work out a deal.

This is my first business venture, so I wanted to reach out to both help people by seeing my process as well as get any constructive criticism and advice on what to do from here in terms of marketing. Right now my site hardly gets any views at all so having a good marketing strategy is a must. I want to try and grow it organically before resorting to paid advertisements on ig/google.

You are in one of the biggest cut-throat industries. Your goal is to go where your target audience is. Even if you do go to them, why should they choose you/your supplement over what is already out there? What makes your brand better than other brands?

I'd suggest that you establish strong branding from the very beginning. If you don't, then it will be very hard to re-position your product/ brand later on. Once your branding is solid, then try to go after mass influencers that have connection in your niche/target audience.

Find top blogs in your niche and do guest posting. Do PR and make it creative. Generate buzz that grabs people's attention.... These are just some of the ways to skin the cat, many more solutions do exist.

You are in a niche/market that is beyond saturated. You need to stand out and be different, use some out of the box thinking to stand out and to attract attention.
 

Y.B.

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Feb 7, 2014
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FYI...if you want instagram influencers to post about your product, sending them the product won't do it. You'll also need to pay them.

I recently bought a company and we have some products that are similar to yours (although in liquid form). If you want an idea of what you'll have to pay, check out famebit.com
 

CycleGuy

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Jan 16, 2015
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You've pigeon-holed yourself into a tiny niche.

Bros who already use phenibut generally just buy raw powder.
They also tend to be the ones who research harder into supplements for mental health.

They aren't going to be as easy of a sale as normal bodybuilding supplements bros who will try a new pwo that's packed with ingredients they love at a fair price.

If it's targeted at women you might want to replace the testimonials with women instead of men. If it's targeted at men you need to butch up your visuals.

Think about how Onnit markets to men and their marketing.
 
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Ben Adams

Contributor
User Power
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72%
Mar 7, 2017
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28
Florida
Get on platforms! Take traffic from platforms to your site

Send 100 units to Amazon and start ranking for keywords there.

Include an insert card about how someone could get another free bottle with an Amazon order.

Be creative.

Wouldn't amazon be just as tough to get traffic as my own site so it would be better to just stick to trying to drive traffic to my site? I also think I may need some sort of license to ship that big of an order through USPS, i'll look into it.

Figure out the specific niches where your supplement solves someones problem and adds value - ie, people suffering with stress, anxiety - and build yourself a landing page that explains how your product is going to help someone overcome their stress or anxiety quickly, easily and how their life will improve as a result etc etc. Do some googling in your chosen niche and pay attention to the ads - observe how the competition in your chosen niche is selling things.

Supplements are quite easy to sell when you focus on the problems they solve for people (the value they provide to the consumer).

So you think a landing page which links to my site would be better than people just going straight to the site? I think my problem is my niche is a bit weird since a mood booster and anxiety reducer really can benefit anyone, as opposed to a specific type of person. That being said I've tried to market it more towards health conscious people in the middle/middle-upper class, hence the logo, colors, etc..

Did you really not think of this before? :wideyed:

At some point during those 8 months you must have thought to yourself "damn, how am I gonna get rid of those mountains of placebo pills?!" and worked out some kind of plan, right? :happy:

Maybe you could post some IG links to those yoga girls you are targeting. For marketing research purposes.
You're right i've thought about it a lot haha. I've always had multiple ideas just not sure what the best course of action would be. Theres always paid ads thru ig, google etc.., but from seeing a few people's supplement threads and messaging a member, it seemed that they were able to sell products without paying for ads at the beginning through forum posts, instagram, and podcasts.

You are in one of the biggest cut-throat industries. Your goal is to go where your target audience is. Even if you do go to them, why should they choose you/your supplement over what is already out there? What makes your brand better than other brands?

I'd suggest that you establish strong branding from the very beginning. If you don't, then it will be very hard to re-position your product/ brand later on. Once your branding is solid, then try to go after mass influencers that have connection in your niche/target audience.

Find top blogs in your niche and do guest posting. Do PR and make it creative. Generate buzz that grabs people's attention.... These are just some of the ways to skin the cat, many more solutions do exist.

You are in a niche/market that is beyond saturated. You need to stand out and be different, use some out of the box thinking to stand out and to attract attention.

Thank you the guest posting is a very good idea. I've written up multiple blogposts on health related topics and have only posted two of them on my site so far. So I will begin to look for blogs that I could give my unpublished articles to.


FYI...if you want instagram influencers to post about your product, sending them the product won't do it. You'll also need to pay them.

I recently bought a company and we have some products that are similar to yours (although in liquid form). If you want an idea of what you'll have to pay, check out famebit.com
Gotchya, well I just sent a few bottles to some around 10k follower accounts who agreed to try it and post about it if they like it, chances are they won't post about it but it can't really hurt to give it a try. Have you had good results with your company by paying ig influencers?


You've pigeon-holed yourself into a tiny niche.

Bros who already use phenibut generally just buy raw powder.
They also tend to be the ones who research harder into supplements for mental health.

They aren't going to be as easy of a sale as normal bodybuilding supplements bros who will try a new pwo that's packed with ingredients they love at a fair price.

If it's targeted at women you might want to replace the testimonials with women instead of men. If it's targeted at men you need to butch up your visuals.

Think about how Onnit markets to men and their marketing.

Your post has a lot of truth to it, I think the idea I was trying to go with was to market phenibut to the type of people who wouldn't have tried it otherwise. I've been using the raw powder, but by adding other brain/health-related ingredients that work synergistically to improve mood, I hope to gain traction in the more health-related community, both women and men. Trying to market it for the regular joe; it doesn't matter if you work an office job, are a student, an athlete, or just want to enjoy a fun night out because my product will benefit all of the above. I've studied Onnit a lot and love listening to Aubrey on Joe Rogan's podcast, I think they do a great job marketing and through advertising on podcasts he was able to grow Onnit into a huge business.

Thank you everyone for the advice, I understand it will be a real uphill battle from here on out. I'll do my best to implement some ideas and see where it takes me. And thank you to the whole community and MJ, as from reading his book and joining the forum a year ago I was inspired to create something of value. From taking my supplement myself, I know that can be of great value to people from all walks of life. No matter what happens, i've learned so much already and will carry this knowledge and experience with me for the rest of my life.
 

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