656: How Chloe Built a $50K/Month Personalised Gifting Brand From Home

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0:51welcome to little empires brought to you by the team at founder at founder our mission is to support the next generation of e-com founders so while you may know us for interviewing some of the world's most successful entrepreneurs this series is a little different little empires shines a spotlight on the builders inside our own founder community the entrepreneurs who are in the trenches, taking action, learning and building their businesses in real time. These aren't overnight success stories. These are real journeys, real lessons and real founders creating their own little empires one step at a time.

1:24This podcast is proudly produced by the founder team to give our students a platform to share their experiences, wins, challenges and honest realities of building a business from the ground up. Now, let's dive into today's episode. Welcome back to another episode of the Founder Little Empires podcast. My name is Leah Finch, Community Manager at Founder, and I am here with Chloe Wadera. She's the founder of InWords Gifting, and we are going to hear her story about how she's scaled her brand. She just did a 50k US dollar month last month. So Chloe, it is so good to have you on the podcast. Welcome.

2:04Thank you so much, Leah. I'm so excited. Awesome. All right. So let's take our listeners on a journey of how the brand started, how it all began. Chloe, I want to learn a bit more about what your life was like before e-commerce. So what pushed you to enter e-commerce and launch a brand? All right, I'll take you on a bit of a journey from the beginning. So I actually had this big dream of becoming a makeup artist when I was growing up. And I dedicated about 10 to 15 years of my life pursuing that goal. And that was my first step into entrepreneurship. Because during that time, I also opened a hair and makeup agency.

2:41I started a brand of fake eyelashes. I tried many different things. Eventually, I did become quite a well-known makeup artist who I am. and during COVID time, we were in Dubai. I was married with my husband and he lost his job. And to be able to stay in the country, you have to have a visa. And so I was freelancing at the time. He lost his job. So we needed to find a better solution to be able to stay. And I happened to know one of the co-founder of Huda Beauty, Monica Tan. I used to do her makeup. I used to do makeup on Photoshop for the brand. and I kind of asked her for an opportunity within the makeup space to get something a bit more stable.

3:23I had a kid at the time as well and she offered me a position as a social media manager which was very surprising but I used to run my own social and this is also how I became well known as a makeup artist. So I took the opportunity and I stayed with her for three years and it was amazing to see how you know such a big global brand kind of function and see like you know how they run this incredible business with the power of social media mostly, but they were also very smart women and amazing. And I learned a lot about entrepreneurship there. And then I remember how it felt like to have my freedom because I spent 10 years as a freelance makeup artist and I missed my freedom.

4:03I missed my space to create. I missed my time. I also was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. So I needed a change. I couldn't just live my life the way he was at that stable job. And I had two kids. So I decided to go back to entrepreneurship and to start my own brand, not really knowing exactly what I was going to do, but just building it because I wanted a certain lifestyle. And I knew that entrepreneurship would give me that lifestyle. That makes sense. Wow. Thank you. Thank you for sharing. And that would have been such an eye-opener, seeing how Huda Beauty operates and the kind of level that they operate at.

4:42And the fact that you chose a path of e-commerce for your lifestyle, I think that's something that a lot of our community members can probably relate to, is that the ability to not necessarily work less, but just run your own schedule, run your own timetable, manage your time in a way that works best for you with family commitments. you experienced health issues and I can imagine it's given you a bit of freedom and flexibility from that perspective yeah definitely and I think once you test entrepreneurship is really hard to go back to kind of you know a nine to five and I really wanted the creative space as well I mean there's so many things I want for my life and entrepreneurship is ticking all those boxes it is very hard and stressful but it's my hard and it's my stress and I'm working on my dream it's not a bit selfish but it's just yeah just the way I wanted to live my life really.

5:34Wow okay and so let's let's learn a bit about how InWords Gifting came to life. So what problem did you set out to solve or what gap in the market did you set out to to tackle? Yeah so I didn't really exactly know that when I started. I think you get to really know your brand as you go along and it's really it was very interesting. But what I knew is that I wanted to have my creative space to put products out there that are special and make people feel special. So I started with, you know, tote bag with quotes on them and then special journals to help you stay motivated. And then many different cute things that really help people feel extra power in their life, extra love, extra steam, extra heard.

6:23And then I realized, you know, as that there were amazing gifts, ideas and then I look at the market and I realize that there's not many meaningful gifts ideas out there there's a lot of generic ideas and I struggle to actually find very creative gifts out in myself so I was like I need to fill that gap and really make things very special personalized that will really make people feel extra yeah extra special and so making people feel extra special and standing out in the gifting space right so the gifting space is huge like it is you could argue that it is a saturated market right so tell us a bit about what you saw in the market with competitors and and similar types of products and how you stood out I'm not gonna pretend I did a big market research because I didn't I don't have any you know business background I stopped school at 18 I have no idea most of the day what I'm doing, so I'm not going to pretend that I know.

7:23All I know is that I wanted to put in the market things, objects, pieces that are not there yet. And so everything that I create, projects in my mind that somehow I bring to life, it's never a reaction to something I'm seeing or I'm never trying to copy and make it better. It's always something new because I want it to be one of a kind brand. And I want to be a legacy brand and I want people to find things in my shop that they can't find anywhere else. So I don't actually look much at the competition. Yeah. Okay, cool. And for those of you who aren't familiar with your brand, InWords Gifting, tell us a bit more about your range at the moment and really a description of what your products are.

8:06Yeah, so I always said InWords Gifting, you know, meaningful gift idea for sensitive people. I think there's a lot of sensitive people on this planet and we don't cater to them enough. There's actually a term called HSP. It means highly sensitive person. And it's just a way that your nervous system is built. And there's actually about 20 to 30 percent of the population, global population, that is HSP. So I always think of those people when I create my, because I'm one of them, I'm super sensitive. So it's a range of ideas of gifts from journals to memory keepsakes, where you keep your precious items to, yeah, tote bags and there's more things coming.

8:45Okay. And so that's your ideal customer persona. Yes. Perhaps someone that you see yourself in, like you identify with your ideal customer. Yeah. Was that helpful for you to get started, to market a product to people that you feel like-minded with? So you're understanding what the customer would be looking for? Yeah, 100%. You have to because I spend a lot of time on social media. You know, I post every single day, multiple times a day. You need to have a personal in mind when you talk on social media. You want to attract your tribe, as they say, and you want, you know, whatever I launch, I know that those products will resonate to a certain audience and that is super helpful.

9:25It's just, you know, it will attract naturally the right audience. Yeah, absolutely. The messaging that you're putting out there, you can truly understand what it's like. So you know what your customers are looking for and what the type of solution that they're looking for. Highly sensitive people. I haven't heard that expression before. And so you mentioned that you didn't do a lot in terms of market research. What did you do in terms of validating the idea before you put some serious money behind it? I would also love to tell you that I did something, but I did not. Again, I was very naive. Leah, I actually didn't even know that you could use meta ads.

10:04I didn't know you could put ads out there to promote your products. I started with zero clue what I was doing. I was very delisional. So I did not validate my product. I just thought, well, surely if I like it, other people will like it too, which I know is the worst thing you should be doing. But there's also something about really trusting your intuition and your guts. And every time I see my products, I know, like, I just feel it. It's just, it's amazing. but again I'm a delusional person so but memory like memory boxes was my first big product that's where I invested most of my money and I really saw that there was not many options out there and I know that everybody has in their house a shoe box or a plastic box filled with their memories or a drawer in your house I mean surely you have something in your house where you keep your little things that you don't want to lose and oftentimes it's not a pretty box and I wanted to give people really a special place for that.

10:56So I was truly, I'm not the only one with this problem and that's pretty much how validated my idea. Of course, a memory box that is a keepsake, that's potentially something that you buy for your child as they're growing up. Or I saw that you've got a wedding one on your website, right? All those little keepsakes and special memorable things that you can package up, as you say, rather than putting in a shoebox. And let's talk a bit about the product development process. right? So talk to us a bit about what the first version of the memory box looks like compared to how it is now. Yeah. So the creative process or the way I start my product is always, you know, an idea.

11:40And then I kind of try to do a little sketch. And now we are in an amazing time when we have, you know, AI. So I'm actually able to creatively think with, you know, ChatGPT or mid-journey and kind of see my mock-up in real life and alter with AI until I really pinpoint exactly what I like. So I'm able to kind of unload what's in my brain and see it instead of having to go through, you know, I don't even know it. I'm sure there's a job for it, but how do you call those people? The creative designer? I don't know. I don't know. People that do mock-up. And that would cost me a fortune. So I'm able to really do it myself with AI.

12:16And that's been super helpful and then I start the sampling process and I go back and forth until I already get something that I like. Okay all right so using the power of AI to come up with a mock-up image and tweak it and refine it over time for your memory box. For every product. For every product you're doing that. Okay yeah that's a really helpful hack so you're using ChatGPT you're using MidJourney as well? Yeah. That's what you used yeah? I use both yeah it's it's it's beyond helpful it's you know you're thinking with your brain with yourself whether as before you had to think and trust somebody else and it's things might get lost in translation but right now you know you it's just I don't know it's much more clear and out of it out of the process yeah and you can you can tweak and iterate in real time right at your desk and you don't have to wait yeah you move much faster for sure yeah tell us a bit about how you found your manufacturer or your supplier like what that first experience was like yeah sure so I pretty much google you know and then I find platform like Alibaba when you have thousands and thousands of different suppliers and then you kind of you know message as many as you can to to find to find the best fit and that that takes a long time because it's not just but obviously you can filter by you know their reputation you know their reviews all of this stuff how long they've been on the market but also it's down to the communication for me every single time it's like do i have an easy communication is it is it clear do they are the answering nicely to me you know is it is there must be a connection there when there is they could be the most amazing manufacturer in the world if there's a poor connection i know down the line that it's not going to be a right fit so it's it's it takes it takes weeks really and then you go through the sampling process and And that also tells you exactly, you know, because they promise something and then something else arrives.

14:15So it's a long journey and every single, you know, box has to be ticked until you agree to kind of invest your money. Of course. And so you've mentioned there that a poor connection is a sign that a brand owner and a manufacturer are not going to be a good fit. What are some of those things to look out for when you're connecting and finding the right supplier in your experience? What are some positive signs to look out for that it's going to be the right fit? What are some positive signs? Yeah. So again, like just the flow of the communication. Are they really, because everything I do is like tailored.

14:55It's not I just find something I buy. It's always very tailored. and they need to be patient, you know, with me and go for the journey with me and be willing to experiment as well, which is not always... Some manufacturers don't want to take that time because it takes a lot of time. So it's really when I see people that are caring and patient, because there are a lot of still, you know, factory that are, that's for me the good signs, you know. Yeah, of course. That communication is so important when you're establishing that relationship early on. And also giving them those signals and signs that you are serious and you do want to form a long-term relationship with them.

15:34Very true. Super true. What was that like in terms of that first order? So discussing minimum order quantities, pricing, timelines. Can you share a bit about that with us? Yeah, it was very surprising. Again, when you don't know anything about e-commerce, it's like, and I understand why most people give up or most people don't push through because it's really expensive. Sampling is expensive. You know, shipping is expensive. The timelines as well, you know, it can take, they will tell you it takes a month to have a sample, but really probably six months. It will take you until you're happy with your sample.

16:11If you're lucky, I have some products in the making that are one year old from my brain, you know. so it takes a long time and you have to be patient and you just have to stick with it and it's very rewarding process but it is expensive and it is lengthy and the mock-up as well the moq as well were very surprising and at first when now i'm like risk adverse i'm fine but at the beginning when one you know they tell you like it has to be 300 even 300 is nothing number at the time I was at 300 pieces that's crazy yeah okay and so could you share us some numbers there so was 300 your first order uh yeah I think it was so I had a gratitude journal that one of my first product and the MOQ was 200 at the time I think it was around a thousand dollar more or less and that was my first product and then my bigger MOQ which was a mistake but I didn't know I learned I actually had this little double-sided suction cup phone holder.

17:15And I was actually the first one to create this double-sided thingy because it used to be only one-sided. And I made them cute and everything. And there are 5 ,000 units because I had to do my own mold for it. And the whole, you know, the total, I think it was like$5 ,000, over$5 ,000. And I have all those units. and they actually, they don't really work well. So I had to take them out of my shop because I didn't want to risk my reputation. They have something, they don't work for everybody. So that was, you know, I lost money with that. Okay, so that was a huge learning experience for you. Yeah, that was a huge learning to have, not to start with such high mock-up and MOQ and to spend more time with the product, you know, to gather more feedback as what I didn't do.

18:05Yeah, that's life. And so that, the first products that you ordered, those journals, so you ordered 200 journals, that was the minimum quantity. What did it cost per unit, per journal? What did it cost per journal? Probably, I don't want to tell you something wrong, but I would say maybe like three, two or three dollars, I would say. And what would you say that first run all up cost you? So it was only, the journals was your first real order. Can you remember the total cost? Yeah, I remember that it was around$1 ,000 just to place my order to order my products. And on top, you obviously have the shipping fees.

18:47And I don't remember if I ship by air or by sea. I can't tell you the exact figure for that. But yes, I would say I started with maybe, let's say, spending$1 ,500 altogether. All right. and let's let's move on to the the memory boxes so the journals were the first products that you ordered and then how did you go with the ordering of the memory boxes because it's a larger product yeah complete delusion I I started so I launched a few things in between another journals and stuff and once I had a bit more confidence I I used to have a memory box myself on the top of my shelf in my bedroom and I was so, I have to do something with this.

19:30And I was like, I look at my husband and I was like, should we just do it? And he say, let's do it. And we actually borrowed some money to do it because it was crazy expensive to start. I didn't actually know how much volume they would also take. So naively, I thought that it would fit in my house. Absolutely not. It was a complete disaster. Luckily, we had a friend that had a warehouse, so we were able to kind of rent the top of his warehouse to store the boxes. But yeah, that was a huge order. I ordered around a thousand memory keepsake. This is a minimum order of 1000 memory boxes that are about the size of a shoe box.

20:10No, they are much bigger, actually. Much bigger than a shoe. Yeah, they're much bigger than a shoe box and I ordered the first order was 300 units. I had two colors, two SKU, 150 of each SKU and it was blue, it was green and pink and they sold quite well. So then I replaced a bigger order and this way I ordered over a thousand units. So now we nearly sold out and I'm going to place a new order very soon as well. But we've been a bit delayed with the Middle East situation, but I'm very excited. Okay all right so I am keen to ask you Chloe a bit about your marketing right so can you tell us a bit about what was the first channel that consistently brought in sales and why do you think it worked so well for your brand?

20:59I started with only organic content which only you know Instagram posting very very diligently every day on my social media but I wasn't bringing enough sales. So then I discovered meta ads and that is what really changed the game for me. As soon as I started placing ads, I was able to, you know, amplify my reach and get attention to my products. And because I was creating so many videos, it just blew up with meta ads. So it's a mix of, you know, paid and organic. Okay. And so did you do a bit of trialing of the creatives that worked well in your organic posts and then using that for your paid ads?

21:42Yeah, exactly. I would see what, but it's very different as well. So that works, but it has this limitation. I think for meta ads, you can't be, you have to be kind of straight to the point. People need to be able to understand exactly what you are setting right away. You can't really be, you know, you have, it needs to hit. And whereas on social media, you can be a bit more like poetic or, you know, a bit more creative. So it's still, I think, a different edit. I edit them different. Even what works on organic social media, I will make them shorter or, you know, more straight to the point for my ads.

22:17But I do that taste a lot on my social media. Okay. All right. So social media being your main channel, tell us what that was like. Like how frequently did you post? Did you do face to the camera content? Tell us a bit about your social media as a key channel. For me, it's essential. Every time my sales goes down, I just triple the amount of posts I put on social media. The founder, you know, face, I don't know how to say it in English, I forgot. But, you know, I am the founder and I see my face on my brand social media. And I talk directly to my customer. I actually sell a lot for a DM because when people have a question, they tend to DM.

23:00So if you are fast answering your DM, you will sell a lot for your DMs. And it's just a new way of, you know, approaching building brand. But I always say like, you know, founders, we know our stories and there's no one better than us to tell our stories. And oftentimes we give the power away to agencies or social media agency thinking that they know better, but they don't. you know nobody cares as much as we do nobody is in the trenches like I don't know there's so much power into just putting yourself out there and you know it's like you have to think of yourself it's not like you have to think of yourself as a celebrity but it's the same principle celebrities have a spotlight on them they are under the light we are attracted to the light you know it's the same you have to put the spotlight on yourself on your brain to be seen and if you really care about what you're putting out there and your products it shouldn't be a problem because you should be proud of what you put out there and and put your own spotlight and and you know take it's like I have I have I don't know how to explain but with social media I have more power with my brain and I can just react fast and you know connect with people and it's just it's a game changer I don't even know how to build a brand without it yeah and you could see it on your face you're obviously really passionate about putting your face in front of the brand And it's like you say, if you believe that you have a good quality product to bring to the world that solves a problem or a gap in the market, then get out there in front of other people and tell them about it.

24:32And I love what you said there around how much you've sold through Instagram DMs because you've got customers checking out your product. And when they've got questions, if you are engaged and you're responsive enough, that's the power of community building on social media. You're making sales through your DMs. You have to remember, like, your ads are on Instagram, like, you know, like, and Facebook. So those people are on their devices, are scrolling through their Instagram and through their Facebook. So it's natural that they will reply within that platform. And even if they see your ads, you know, outside, there's a very high chance they will also go see your page and scroll.

25:15And, you know, they want multiple touch points to trust your brand. And so they will go through your social media. And if they have a question, they're not going to go and check on the website and find the email address or find the box and then wait until somebody replies. You know, they will go on the DMs and try to get an answer as fast as possible. And they know that they're getting straight to you, right? So they're starting to, we like to talk about impersonal branding. One of our founder courses, Monetize Your Personal Brand with Rory Vader. Know you, like you, trust you, and to buy from you.

25:48And then how powerful is that for them to be familiar with the founder and DM you directly and get a response? Yeah. And I make a point to sign my name every time. So they see that I am the founder and I, you know, I am the one replying and there's nobody else here, you know. And people really like that personal, personal touch. And yeah, the more they see me, the more they get used to me, the more they get to know me, the more they trust my brand. And some people, you know, it might take them six months to purchase, but eventually, because they hear me yapping about my boy box all day long every day, they understand like, you know, it's very special.

26:23If I care enough, you know, over time, people will also start to care and see the magic in it. Of course. And they can see that you care about your brand and it comes through in how you communicate with your customers and your broader community. And so share with us, you've grown your brand so much, right? Like share with us what it was like. You joined the Founder e-commerce coaching program. You worked with Jackie DeMallion, one of our coaches. What was that like for you? It was honestly, so I joined because I used to listen to podcasts a lot every day. I would listen to Founder stories, every single thing I can.

27:00I can to try to find formations about how to run my business. I had to listen to thousands of hours of people talking. and I found Nathan podcast founder the founder podcast and it was just incredible to have an insight into all those founder stories and I was like I need to join this platform and see what's like they will give me answers you know I wanted answers and then I joined and then quickly I just upgraded to having my own personal you know coach which I thought was the best approach because again I didn't want to keep fishing for information I didn't want to have to listen to all the recordings, although they're all amazing, but I wanted to have that one-on-one.

27:41I wanted somebody invested in my business that would be able to see what I can't see and help work where I needed help. And so it was amazing. I was a bit worried at first, but it was actually really incredible. Jackie was able to tell me exactly what I needed to do. And she was very respectful, fully about the way I want to be in my brain as well. I'm just giving you the guidance I needed and just to show me what, you know, what are people actually doing? Since I never been to business school I had no clue about many things so it was very very insightful in my business now you know last month we had our best month at over 50 54 000 which I never I never thought I could make that much money so you see it's incredible and I know how much the brand will grow this year so over 54 000 us dollars last month that was last month and it was me also being worried I was worried to scale because I was worried that I would not be able to keep up.

28:35So I was actually being very conservative into the way I was running my ads. But I know that if I had that confidence, I could have probably done more. And so that's why I'm excited to, you know, reorder more stock later this year and launch it properly because now I have all the technique on how to launch something and see what happens. Wow. Okay. And so, yeah, continuing to scale. So that 54, For over US$54 ,000 in one month, last month, you're obviously really scaling your MetaAds. Is MetaAds your main channel, your main channel now? Yeah. I try everything, TikTok, Pinterest, Google. There's nothing like Meta for me.

29:17Yeah. And so you've recently joined our new membership, Founder Operators Membership. Very exciting. We've partnered with Nick Shackelford and his team of coaches to help brands with scaling with their meta ads. So I know that you've just joined the membership, Chloe. What are you hoping to achieve receiving that guidance with scaling your brand? I just want to, again, learn as much as possible. And because, you know, knowledge is powerful. Like I want to be able to be a master of my ads. Even if on there I decide to outsource, at least I know exactly what's happening. I don't want to lose any money because it is very expensive.