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When the coronavirus hit the US I was scared. For many reasons, health and family of course, but also for the stability of my business. I didn’t know what to expect, and felt really out of control. Can you relate?
What happened next though, gave me great hope and confidence for the future. Not only did my business not fall apart….the opposite happened! It grew. And sales came in so fast, I had the wonderful problem of trying to figure out how to keep up with the demand!
Sales didn’t just come on their own though. It wasn’t like I all of a sudden had a massive influx of traffic from a magic wand. I had systems and strategies in place that I doubled down on to make sure that my business stayed healthy and strong during a very uncertain time. We are in charge of our own outcomes. Even if the world feels like it’s crumbling around us. It’s up to us to employ strategies and tactics to grow our businesses.
I wanted to put this together to help encourage you to keep pushing through even during unexpected, unprecedented events. Here are 5 ways that you can grow your subscription box business even during uncertain times.
Use your list.
If you don’t have an email list, this is the very first thing you need to do. You absolutely must be building an email list so that you can stay in touch with your customers and have a way to communicate value and offers that you don’t want them to miss. We can dive deeper into email marketing another time, but for now, if you don’t have an email list yet your action item is to start building one. Collect email leads through a pop up on your website (they work!) by offering something of value such as a discount code, free gift, or digital download in exchange for their email address.
If you do already have an email list, set a goal to email your list at least once a week with different offers. Offers could be in the form of a discount, but they can go beyond that as well. Maybe it’s a free gift with purchase, or an invitation to enter a giveaway or contest, or maybe it’s an invitation to check out a really helpful blog post that would bring value or humor to their lives. Get creative and map out 4 different emails you can send. That’s a whole month’s worth of email – done! I use (and LOVE!) Klaviyo as my email service provider and highly recommend their platform if you sell on Shopify. Email marketing accounts for between 20-30% of my monthly revenue. I promise it’s a worthy investment of your time and resources.
Build a referral program.
A referral program is a great way to reward your loyal customers for sharing their love for your products with their friends and family! You can offer to pay them a cash reward for every new customer they refer, or you can set up your program to have them earn rewards in the form of boxes or products. There are a variety of referral program tools you can use for this. I use ReferralCandy currently.
Put excess inventory to work.
Every subscription box owner finds themselves with extra products from time to time. The problem with having extra products sitting on your shelves is that over time it can really hurt your cash flow. Been there, done that! Get creative on how you can put that extra inventory to good use and liquidate it so you have extra cash to either grow your business or pad your bank account for later on. I recently teamed up with my good friend Julie Ball of Sparkle Hustle Grow to put together a special workshop called Inventory Goals that will teach you 20 tactics you can use to turn extra inventory into cash and create buzz and build brand awareness for your business too! If you could use a little extra cash injection in your business, then this is for you. You can learn more at SubBoxGoals.com/inventory.
Cash in on low cost paid ads.
If you’ve considered adding a paid ads strategy to the mix, this might be the time to investigate them a little further! Facebook and Instagram run their ad spots by auction, which means you are paying to compete with other advertisers to reach your target audience. Depending on how many advertisers are advertising at any given time to the same audience, is how the platform bases your pricing. This is also known as CPM – the cost that a platform charges per thousand visitors to see your ad. Right now, CPMs are much lower than they have been in the past. This means that if done right, you can reach more customers for a lower price than before this pandemic hit. The cherry on top is that even more people are on their devices right now, so it’s a really great way to reach them. I enrolled in a Facebook ads intensive program taught by the brilliant Beth Anne Schwarmberger of Brilliant Business Moms at the beginning of 2020 and I have to tell you, it was a total game changer for me and my business! She teaches EVERYTHING you’ll ever need to know about running your own (profitable!) paid ads. If you’re interested in learning more about her program, you can check it out here.
Collaborate with other brands.
This is not only a time for humanity to come together but also a time for collaboration between brands. We truly can lift each other up and support one another during this time. Find some brands who share a similar audience as you and see if they would be interested in collaborating. These can take a variety of shapes, such as shouting each other out on social media or in an email newsletter, joining forces to do a giveaway, or creating a product together and donating a percentage of profits to charity!
I hope that this list inspires you to keep pushing through. Remember, people are still buying. They still need what you have to offer! Now more than ever are people looking for ways to make their lives easier, more convenient, more comfortable, and filled with a little bit more happiness. Keep serving them!
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