606: (Solo) The Week Before Black Friday: What Smart Ecommerce Founders Are Doing Differently

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0:39Just head to omnisend.com forward slash founder without the E to get started. All right, now let's jump back into the show. Hey, founder fam, Nathan Chan here. And in today's solo episode, I'm going to go deep with you in the trenches to get ready for Black Friday. You've probably seen a million checklists, guides, strategies floating around right now, but here's the truth. It's not too late. Even if you're not fully prepped, even if you're still scrambling, there's still time to utilize one of the biggest sales campaigns of the year. And if you do this right, you will do very, very, very well.

1:17So this episode is your final prep checklist. This is not theoretical fluff, just the exact things that successful brands are doing right now, one week out to build momentum, drive conversions, and maximize results. Hear the stories, learn the proven methods, and accelerate your growth and future through entrepreneurship. Welcome to the Founder Podcast with Nathan Chan.

1:45This will be my 10th Black Friday. It's kind of crazy. I remember in the early days, founder it was around black friday time i wanted to launch one of our programs and a mentor said to me oh you do anything for black friday and i was like oh nah don't have anything planned he's like oh do it and see what happens he's like here's the set of emails just tweak the emails you'll do really well watch this and we did something like 50 000 75 000 this is early days founder in a weekend and i was just like wow this is crazy and then every year since at Foundr and my other companies, we've always done Black Friday.

2:22So the first thing I want to talk about is what are the biggest mistakes that I see brands make this week? And that is waiting. And here's the thing, purchases and getting people to buy and sales, they're one before Black Friday, not on the day. So if people don't know what's coming, they're not going to take action. So smart founders, what are they doing? They're warming up their list. They're teasing out to their email list with early bird offers, teaser emails, they've got countdown timers, they've got a VIP list. They know what offers are the hottest offers. You have an offer or a product or a bundle or something that you know when you discount or you know that's your hottest product.

3:03That's what you have to lead with, but you have to build anticipation. Any great launch or campaign always has to have hype and anticipation is the first very, very, very key ingredient to any successful promotional campaign. So you want to build anticipation. You want your audience to feel like your offer is inevitable. They've been waiting for it. It's an absolute no-brainer. I don't want to miss this. So if you haven't yet, make sure you send a teaser email today and a text message. Even if it's very simple, remind people what's coming. The next thing is stop relying on ads. I can't stress this enough.

3:47Don't put all your eggs in the paid ads basket this week. CPMs are an all-time high. Attention is low. And honestly, guys, your best results won't come from a cold audience right now. Smart brands, they use email and SMS lists. They're reaching out to past customers and warm traffic. So your job this week is really use Black Friday, this time period as the tool to get people that are potentially on the fence. You wanna convert those people who already know you, they've been thinking about your product. For example, for us at FoundUp, we have been strategically the past couple of months warming up our list for the past couple of months and we have a very, very big focus always on our Black Friday, The biggest low-hanging fruit is our warm traffic, our email list, our SMS list, our social media list, anyone that knows us, anyone that is product aware, right?

4:42So you will be able to do some cool stuff on cold traffic, but it's don't rely on ads. It's all about warm traffic and really getting people who are on the fence, making them a customer or getting your existing customers and purchase other products. The next thing I want to talk about is offers. A lot of people panic here and they start slashing prices. But I want you to remember, guys, a smart offer really beats an aggressive discount every time. So just because a lot of other brands are doing 50%, 60%, 40%, 30 % off, it doesn't mean that you have to too. And as much as it's a great way to move product, you have to remember you want to protect brand value as well as your margins.

5:22So one thing to think about is how can you bundle products? how can you add free bonuses the cool thing with bundling is it allows you to increase your average order value so you can make more profit per purchase how can you offer vip only perks instead of discounting on subscriptions off a product use urgency not just a discount to drive action how can you use gift vouchers so as an example if you give a gift card or a gift voucher for$10 $20,$30, what that actually does is it locks in your second purchase or your second order. You know, I've always remembered a great exercise is to look at what Apple are doing over Black Friday, Cyber Monday.

6:10They do not slash prices. What they do is they will add a gift with purchase. They usually add a gift card. They don't slash prices. But I think really when it comes down to the best offers, they are the ones where it feels uncomfortable. It feels like a steal. You've never done it before. And it's for your hottest products or your best bundles or things that you've seen work in the past that you haven't done in a while. All right, now let's talk tech. If your mobile store experience isn't seamless, you will lose sales. Right now, top brands are running test orders end-to-end on mobile. They are stripping away unnecessary distractions.

6:55And I would definitely recommend testing out your checkout across multiple browsers, making sure as well you're updating your shipping info and return policies. I remember for us at Founder, we were running a Black Friday promo and we didn't test the cards. And look, we picked it up quickly, but it cost us dearly, right? Right? Test how does it look in mobile. Test how it's going to appear even when you click on an ad. Right? Like what will it look like as an ad if someone clicks on an ad. Like really make sure. Test on mobile. It is so important. All right. The next thing is too many moving parts.

7:35The brands that win this week, they keep it simple. They make one clear offer, one clear message, and they back it up across every channel. Don't overcomplicate it. clean store one cta great offer another thing to think about is once you've done your black friday this is a bonus for you guys you're not too late to do your christmas specials as well so what you want to do is after you go for the black friday craziness then you really want to make sure that you're cutting off shipping so if people don't order now they won't be able to get the product in time for Christmas. That's very, very powerful.

8:16That's the next urgency push. That's really, really, really important after you do and get through your Black Friday coming into December. So I just want to share, guys, it is not too late. There is still time to make this your best Black Friday yet. Focus, execute, show up. And if you want to make sure you're not scrambling next year, if you want a real plan to build something sustainable, I have to tell you about our incredible Black Friday Cyber Monday offer. So for this week only, we have opened up Founder Plus, our 43-step e-commerce membership for just$299 a year. It's normally$499 a year, and that price is locked in for life.

8:58So you get grandfathered into this incredible membership price. So Founder Plus is packed with over 600 lessons from real seven - and eight-figure founders, the kind of stuff that I wish I had when I was starting out. We are running workshops all the time on Black Friday. We have some incredible, incredible founders teaching the most cutting edge stuff. This is our best and biggest offer of the year and it ends soon. So if you've ever said, I want to start my brand one day or you know what? I need more help with this marketing side of things with my e-commerce brand. Just go to founder.com, F-O-U-N-D-R.com forward slash plus.

9:39that's p-l-u-s not the symbol so founder.com forward slash plus or click the link in the show notes i can't wait to see you as a member i hope you enjoyed this i hope you have the best black friday yet and i'll speak to you soon