The Top 3 Things I'm Doing in My First 30 Days of Starting a Consumer Brand
I have a hypothesis for why many businesses never get off the ground.
No. Momentum.
If I launch my product 6 months to a year from now and nobody buys it, then I can make some tweaks and try again. But, if I fail on account of never having started, I won’t have learned anything.
That’s why my first 30 days are all about building momentum.
And, at the end of the month, I want to have concrete things to show for myself. Here are the top 3 things I’m doing in my first month of starting a consumer brand.
#1. Start growing my email list.
Over twelve years ago, Kevin Kelly, founding editor of Wired, wrote an article entitled 1,000 True Fans. The idea is pretty simple.
“To be a successful creator you don’t need millions. You don’t need millions of dollars or millions of customers, millions of clients or millions of fans. To make a living as a craftsperson, photographer, musician, designer, author, animator, app maker, entrepreneur, or inventor you need only a thousand true fans.”
At my company, Privy, we coach entrepreneurs and small business owners all the time to start growing their email lists ASAP. Even before they have a product in some cases.
Why? Because email is a channel you own. When you buy ads on Facebook or Google, or list your product on Amazon, you’re playing on someone else’s turf, and you’re subject to THEIR rules.
With email, you own your audience. You own your community. And, without a community of true fans, you’re never going to get off the ground.
#2. Build a minimum viable product to test with customers.
While I subscribe to Web Smith’s concept of linear commerce — the idea that you should start building an audience as a media operation long before launching products online — I don’t want to lose sight of my long-term goal, which is to be a company selling real, physical products to consumers.
Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia, writes:
“The first part of our mission statement, ‘make the best product,’ is the raison d’être of Patagonia and the cornerstone of our business philosophy [...] Having quality, useful products anchors our business in the real world and allows us to expand our mission.”
Similarly, I want to build a mission-driven brand and foster a real community, but I also want to sell useful products that a customer can buy to solve their problem.
That starts by choosing a name, buying product samples and creating early packaging to test with customers. Even if I don’t officially launch the product for months.
So, at the end of 30 days, I will have a sample of my product to start testing with potential customers.
(🎁 If you’d like a free sample when I’m ready to launch, simply subscribe to my newsletter and reply to the email with your physical address for me to mail it to!)
#3. Do napkin math & estimate margins.
The typical advice when you start a business is to have a business plan ready to go. But, when you’re less than 30 days in, it’s hard to know what your costs will be until you nail down your packaging, shipping, and wholesale costs — not to mention your costs to acquire a customer.
One of my favorite parts about selling directly online to consumers is that you can test products MUCH faster than you can in the offline world, and MUCH faster than big incumbent brands.
For example, if I’m Coca-Cola, it’s hard to get direct feedback from customers until my product is sitting on a physical shelf at the grocery store after I’ve already invested million of dollars in getting it there.
On the flip side, when you’re selling directly to your consumer via your own website, the feedback loops are much quicker. If a product isn’t performing, you can pull it from the digital shelf within seconds, which is why I’m not spending a ton of time on a business plan until I have more data.
However, I also don’t believe in walking in blind. I’m making do with napkin math and some ballpark estimates on margins to start. My plan is to iterate and adjust as I go.
One week in. Three more weeks to go. Let’s keep the momentum going.
- Evelyn
(Cue “Eye of the Tiger”🐯.)