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Launching oKickstarter: A premium dress sock that can confidently be worn from the office to the gym

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

SYK

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Thanks, appreciate your feedback.
Any suggestions for what type of detail or stronger angle's to go after?

Without knowing everything about you/your backstory I couldn’t say specifically. But from a PR philosophical stand point, think beyond the product itself.

What’s your unique story? What led you to create the company? What’s different about it’s mission? Look for any kind of hook that’ll make for a good story. Media don’t just want to be a mouthpiece for a company, they want to tell an interesting story. (Disclaimer: some trade/product focused outlets will focus more on the product itself, esp. if it’s new/unique).

To better explain, here’s an example using a startup I work with.

Original pitch: A tech platform that is the safest way to adopt and rehome pets

Meh.

Here’s how it looks after more delving and angle crafting:
25-year-old serial entrepreneur is using technology to stamp out the scourge of puppy farms after his own traumatic experience adopting a puppy online.

See the difference? Think deeply about what story you can tell so you’re not just relying on someone to write about the socks themselves.

Go get ‘em.
 
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Greg R

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I've wore these socks three times now and I can personally say that they are my favorite socks in my sock drawer. I wear them with work boots and dress shoes, they hold up great. The quality is excellent and even though I have not wore them yet cycling or working out, I'm confident that they are exactly what I need.

@powderhound100, I just backed you on Kickstarter.

When the Kickstarter is over, we need to have a chop chop chat about how you are going to sell 100,000 of these. @ZCP
 

powderhound100

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I've wore these socks three times now and I can personally say that they are my favorite socks in my sock drawer. I wear them with work boots and dress shoes, they hold up great. The quality is excellent and even though I have not wore them yet cycling or working out, I'm confident that they are exactly what I need.

@powderhound100, I just backed you on Kickstarter.

When the Kickstarter is over, we need to have a chop chop chat about how you are going to sell 100,000 of these. @ZCP
Thanks Greg, I really appreciate it. Happy with the product development side and quite confident in the product as we get it on the right feet. Looking forward to the chop chop chat.
 
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ZCP

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So @powderhound100 , already over halfway. Do you have enough proof to actually believe enough to start selling these 100 and 1000 pairs at a time instead of 1 pair at a time?

Who are you going to call tomorrow to sell a full pallet?? Let's get this going!!
 

powderhound100

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Unfortunately didn't have a good system for tracking and not 100% sure where the direct sales are all from. I think most is from our emails / personal outreach, but need to track better,stats.png
@ZCP, I appreciate the push and honestly, can't think of a great way to respond. Not sure if somewhere like Nordstroms would be smart, you pay for shelf space so if it doesn't move we could get screwed. Definitely will be contacting subscription boxes once we have samples available to send.
 
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ZCP

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@powderhound100 quit waiting!!!! start contacting them NOW!!!!

you MUST sell 100 pairs tomorrow ......... how will you do it?!
brainstorm, make a plan, execute the plan, measure, modify the plan, work the plan

respond by selling some frickin' pallets of socks! not socks. PALLETS of socks! :)
 

Greg R

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"Dear Retail Store,

Do you want to be part of something awesome?

Well, we would love for the opportunity tell you about our new sock technology that you can wear with dress shoes and at the gym.

We recently launched a KickStarter and reached half our goal in two days.

Here is a link to a short video of our product and attached is our sell sheet.

You're not going to want to miss out on this.

Let me know when you are ready to order.

~ @powderhound100 "
 

Merging Left

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If you add up the pledges that the page shows (are any of these hidden??) it adds up to $4,824. As of right now, you have $7,329 pledged and 79 backers. Where did that extra $2,505 come from? I don't know a lot about Kickstarter, but do people pledge more than is actually required to get each reward tier?

It seems weird to me that the average pledge amount is just over $250, but $19 gets you a pair of socks.
 
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ZCP

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"Dear Retail Store,
Do you want to be part of something awesome?
Well, we would love for the opportunity tell you about our new sock technology that you can wear with dress shoes and at the gym.
We recently launched a KickStarter and reached half our goal in two days.
Here is a link to a short video of our product and attached is our sell sheet.
You're not going to want to miss out on this.
Let me know when you are ready to order.
~ @powderhound100 "
If only there was a way to use this, almost like a script, with email addresses and some way to send emails to sell metric F*cktons of socks in large quantities......... If only there was a way......
 

TheCj

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Looks good, noticed it seems that mainly targeting men. Wouldn't women also want this?
 

amp0193

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Congrats on an almost funded kickstarter here Jonas.

Hopefully you shoot way past the 8k, and knock it way out of the park.

This will be great social proof that you can share to retailers.

Speaking of retailers... you gotta figure out the long-term strategy here. Subscription boxes are nice, and again, great social proof... however, it's one-off sales that are not repeatable. Retail is what's going to bring you recurring revenue.
 
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powderhound100

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Really close now 96% funded. Really hoping to wake up to goal. I think hitting it in 48 hours would be nice....
Made a few small changes and added the order now buttons. Might try some different header images as well.

Introducing the Pro-Formance Sock by ALMI

I'll definitely consider retail more thanks to all the suggestions from you all, wasn't part of the original strategy. We were thinking of a subscription model and e-commerce. Also plan on developing more products and work on developing the brand.
Bombas does millions of dollars a year online with no retail so of course there are multiple ways to skin a cat, however, agreed that no channels that should be overlooked and that there's some great potential there.
 

ZCP

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@powderhound100 i think we all just keep coming back to it seems like you 'hope this will work' instead of you are 'going to make this work'.

You seem to continually want to sit around and wait for sales instead of taking action. Which is why I originally questioned your belief in the product.

What makes you want to keep the parking brake on? Fear of what? Making too much money? Being too successful?

Why not sell EVERY channel until the market tells you what to do?
 

Eskil

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Great to see you've already pretty much reached your goal! :)

I'd suggest doing a Reddit AMA too. Either in the entrepreneur subreddit, or one of the clothing/fashion ones (but choose wisely). As I'm sure you know, the Reddit crowd can be very fickle and anti-corporate, but if you come there not to promote but to offer help and advice (on how you started with nothing, how a sock product is made, hurdles you have gone through, etc) people will be more responsive and supportive.

Also - I know we discussed this when you were here in AZ last month but - how did the press release go so far? I assume you're tracking exposure and clicks from it?
 
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struka

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Out of curiosity, where are the socks made? The USA or another country?
 

ZCP

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@powderhound100 now that we hit goal ..... can we stop dicking around with kickstarter and start making some real money? :)
 
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million$$$smile

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Glad your KS hit your milestone and can't wait to receive my order!

I've been wearing them for over a month now and can attest that they are a good pair of socks.

Jonas, I think you have a viable product, but I agree that you need to up your marketing game.

Focus on creating your market prior to receiving all of your product.
If you develop your customer base needing your product, it will force you to up your reorders and quicker to accommodate re-ups. I agree on focusing a large part on the B&M boutique market. Create a plan for marketing to small independent stores so that it is more controllable on the outset. Perhaps look into garment buying groups: Buying Groups for the apparel clothing industry

The difference between an 'Entrepreneur' and an 'entrepreneur' is how aggressive they work to create their business.
It literally can be the difference between creating a job with a product and a business creating jobs selling multiple products.

Will be watching for more updates.

Good luck and stay aggressive.

R
 

powderhound100

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@powderhound100 now that we hit goal ..... can we stop dicking around with kickstarter and start making some real money? :)
Contacted a guy that went to my college that went to my college whose a shoe buyer at Nordstroms, he's going to find the right sock person for me.
 

powderhound100

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Out of curiosity, where are the socks made? The USA or another country?
We found a really great manufacturing partner that's local to US, but has people in the ground in Haining City China where a lot of the sock factories are.
 
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powderhound100

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Great to see you've already pretty much reached your goal! :)

I'd suggest doing a Reddit AMA too. Either in the entrepreneur subreddit, or one of the clothing/fashion ones (but choose wisely). As I'm sure you know, the Reddit crowd can be very fickle and anti-corporate, but if you come there not to promote but to offer help and advice (on how you started with nothing, how a sock product is made, hurdles you have gone through, etc) people will be more responsive and supportive.

Also - I know we discussed this when you were here in AZ last month but - how did the press release go so far? I assume you're tracking exposure and clicks from it?
Thanks Eskil, I appreciate that.

I've actually had an issue with Home - Online PR Media, payment went through but files didn't seem to upload or there was some issue. Hoping to get ahold of them tomorrow.
 

powderhound100

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@powderhound100, what is your goal now that you've hit the minimum target?
Trying to figure that out and what to put into it. TBH this isn't going as well as we were hoping, sales have stagnated and I am trying to figure out what else we can do to improve conversions etc.

Recently campaigns like this did decent: SilverSocks - World's Cleanest Silver Merino Wool Crew Socks
Their sales didn't plateau, no idea why theirs didn't and ours are.
 
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Last edited:

powderhound100

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Got a new banner up which will hopefully be more engaging.

Old:
Top Professional bottom performance.png

Still trying to figure out positioning. We go back and forth on calling it a dress sock. Looking forward to doing more testing.. Gonna run with this for now:
New:
kickstarter header funded.png

Making some more tweaks to the page as well:
Introducing the Pro-Formance Sock by ALMI
 

Scot

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Here a line I use for my business.

“A healthcare company cleverly disguised as a food brand”

Maybe try..

“A gym sock cleverly disguised as a dress sock” ?
 

powderhound100

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Here a line I use for my business.

“A healthcare company cleverly disguised as a food brand”

Maybe try..

“A gym sock cleverly disguised as a dress sock” ?
Yes, initially we were using: "A high-quality athletic sock disguised as a dress sock." I'll go back to that, bit simpler/easier to understand tthan "A premium dress sock engineered for the office and the gym.
 
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Eskil

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How about trying this to give the campaign a boost: Referral Marketing Tool for eCommerce & Crowdfunding

I haven't tried them, but I see campaigns using them now and the model sounds good at least in theory. Basically you can utilize the concept of affiliate marketing by rewarding every pledger and their friends to share, and you share a small % with them so they are more likely to do so.
 

Blake_Writes

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How about trying this to give the campaign a boost: Referral Marketing Tool for eCommerce & Crowdfunding

I haven't tried them, but I see campaigns using them now and the model sounds good at least in theory. Basically you can utilize the concept of affiliate marketing by rewarding every pledger and their friends to share, and you share a small % with them so they are more likely to do so.
Nice! This seems like a great upfront offer for influencers?
I guess it could drive the "cost" of your rewards up a bit as you'd want to build this % into what each reward costs and maybe even your overall target goal...
 

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