Latest / Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast) / Pitch practice opportunity; Hype Club learnings; & 5 minutes

Transcript

Pitch practice opportunity; Hype Club learnings; & 5 minutes · Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast)

• 0:00
  Hello, Dune here, your host and hype girl. Happy Saturday, by the way. By the time you hear this, I will be sitting in Paris with my best friend Beck and my godson Laith enjoying the Parisian cafe culture. I hope you're doing some nice things this weekend for yourself and taking some you time, the stuff that's good for the soul kind of vibes. Yeah.
• 0:25
  Let's get into today's episode. It is a quickie. This is me for Female Startup Club. Hi, hello. Let's jump straight into our short and sweet weekly update. I wanna start with Hype Club because I feel like I haven't spoken about Hype Club for a hot second, actually. And there's a few cool things I wanted to share from the group in this past week. But first, if you don't know what Hype Club is, let me give you a quick recap.
• 0:54
  It's our private network for women who are building e-commerce, direct-to-consumer brands, CPG brands, all that good stuff. And we learn a lot from each other. I actually learn a lot from the women in this group. We share wins, we share fails, we share struggles, we share interesting resources, collaboration opportunities. It's a real vibe in there and I'm pretty excited about our 2022 plans and everything
• 1:21
  My God, I cannot believe we're talking about 2022 already. I'm still in 2020, which, you know, it's just crazy. The whole thing's just crazy. But I digress. First, I want to give a quick shout out to welcome our new members who just joined Hype Club this past week.
• 1:40
  Carla is the founder of a company called Pure You based out of Germany. She started the business with her partner after she was struggling with her own skin and acne issues. And Lisa, who is launching a luxury women's wear brand that's actually made in London called Kay Jensen, and she's launching that in 2022. So welcome to both of you. I'm so excited to have you in the group.
• 2:09
  Next, let's just quickly touch on Black Friday. Obviously, it's in full swing right now. It's finally here, the biggest sales period of the year. Well, I guess there's the holiday season in general, but I feel like Black Friday is a pretty big deal.
• 2:24
  And I'm interested to know how everyone else is approaching it this year when it comes to discounting and the different kinds of initiatives. I feel like we've seen in the past couple of years people just heavily discounting everything and not kind of having too much strategy. But this year it felt like people were really taking a different approach and not going for that blanket discount. One of our Hype Club members in particular is Amy Bateman.
• 2:51
  And she's the founder of a company called Pleasant State. Great name, by the way. And they create better-for-the-planet cleaning products that live under your kitchen sink. And their approach to Black Friday is actually to call it Green Friday. And they're using it as an opportunity to promote mindful and sustainable consumption. Yeah.
• 3:12
  During Black Friday weekend, they sell their seconds bottles that have slight imperfections at a 40% discounted rate to prevent them from going to landfill. How cool is that?
• 3:23
  They basically have a limited number of these, so they encourage the community to sign up to a specific landing page for early access, which started last Thursday. And the early subscribers receive a text to let them know when it's live before it gets opened up to their whole audience and, you know, social media, email, et cetera, et cetera.
• 3:42
  Sounds like a really strategic Black Friday plan. And I'm interested to know what the impact and results are once it's actually finished. But my guess is that, you know, besides obviously...
• 3:53
  not putting their products into landfill. It drives true customer loyalty and really drives home their core values with their community. So I really love this one. And I'm wanting to know how you're standing out from the crowd this year. What are you doing? What's your approach? What were you doing different than last year? Keen to chat to anyone about their Black Friday.
• 4:15
  initiatives. Maybe it would be cool to do a bit of a compilation episode with a few small business owners on the impact of Black Friday. So I'm just going to put this out there. If you are happy to come on the show and share numbers and share your specific strategy, we should catch up next week and record a quick episode with a handful of you, small business owners. Let me know.
• 4:39
  One more thing while we're on the topic of Hype Club. One of our members, Jade, has a natural deodorant company called Lina, and it's based out of Australia. And she's trying to source or she's trying and struggling to source post-consumer recycled plastic containers. And she's basically looking for any recommendations, anyone who's doing it at the moment and has a bit of guidance or advice or advice.
• 5:02
  just information. So if you are someone that uses post-consumer recycled plastic containers in your business and you have some insights, please feel free to get in touch with me so we can point her in the right direction and I can connect the dots together.
• 5:19
  Coming into January 2022, we are launching our new Q1 program for Hype Club members with a few killer resources that will help you whether you're pre-launch or chipping away at building your business. And I am pretty damn excited. So that's my spiel on Hype Club for today. You can learn more at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club, all one word, or drop into my emails and DMs as per normal with any questions. I'm so happy to chat and meet you and get to learn what you're up to.
• 5:50
  Next up, let's talk about the survey. If you haven't filled out our survey yet, I'm linking it again in the show notes. It takes less than five minutes and we're giving away five female startup club merch packs that money can't buy. It has female startup club sweaters that you might have seen me rocking lately, some exclusive phone cases thanks to our pals at the Dairy, and a little fun sparkly thing –
• 6:17
  The point of the survey is for me to learn a little bit more about who you are and what you're up to, where you're at in your business journey, if you even have a business, so we can make sure that we're providing the most relevant products and services coming into 2022.
• 6:32
  It's been pretty interesting to read the feedback so far. And one of the things that came up was a suggestion that we make our newsletter daily instead of weekly. So instead of what we have right now, which is one big juicy recap on a Monday, splitting it up into quick bite-sized segments daily that take a few minutes to kind of skim through. I'd love some opinions on that. And if you're an avid reader of the newsletter, let me know what you think.
• 7:01
  And lastly, just about the survey specifically, there was someone who responded to the survey that I would love to touch base with again. You gave a few tips and suggestions on email marketing and deliverability, and I would love your help. And I would love to ask you a few more questions because it sounds like you know what you're talking about. If you're interested, just reach back out. Let me know it was you. I would love to chat with you next week if you're around.
• 7:28
  Now, let's move on to some quick resources that will make your life easier in business. I just heard about this thing called Spark Tank. And basically, it's for founders who are looking for fundraising pitch practice opportunities. It's a monthly thing and you get to pitch your company and get feedback from serial entrepreneurs, angel investors, and VCs, while also giving you the direct opportunity to connect and make relationships with these people. Okay.
• 7:58
  I'm linking the application form in the show notes if you're interested. And if you get accepted, let me know. Let me know how it goes. And if we can come and watch virtually, also let us know because we will. And secondly, if you're in need of a comprehensive marketing template and calendar to plan out your year, I've linked a free download in my TikTok at Dunrosheen, D-O-N-E-R-O-I-S-A-N.
• 8:24
  That helps you look at your wider marketing plan for the year, but also breaks down a social media content calendar that makes my life 10 times easier. You can access it via the link in my TikTok bio and it's free.
• 8:39
  And last but not least, on the non-alc side of things, we are getting really close to having our branding done. I'm talking maybe even by the end of the year, if not early January. This week, we made our way through visual territories and what the vibes will be moving forward. And oh my freaking God, it is so cool.
• 9:00
  I want you to think old school French vibes. Think 1920s Parisian cafe culture. Think glamour. Think grandeur. Think provocative. Think hazy, late nights, laughing and ranting and cheersing. It's like so my vibe and I'm going to be soaking all that in while I'm in Paris this weekend, by the way.
• 9:25
  But I can't wait to have the designers behind the brand and the name come onto the show to talk about it with all of you and the journey that we've been on for like the last five or six months building this thing and bringing it into the world. We are one tiny step closer and that's just
• 9:41
  a quick update I wanted to share with you, especially I know a lot of you are on the edge of your seats about the name and being able to join the wait list and all that kind of good stuff. And I so appreciate everyone who drops into my inbox to follow along with me. We've really taken our time on this one to be super intentional about what the brand is, what it stands for, why we're doing it, the vibes we want people to feel when they're part of the community. And
• 10:11
  all that good stuff. It's been so fun and a really interesting process. And of course, I can't wait to share everything with you soon. That is all for today, folks. See you next Saturday and have a great weekend. Bye.
• 10:45
  Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
• 11:09
  And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
• 11:32
  As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show, and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that.