Latest / Field Notes: Creator-led Growth Podcast / Beyond the Discount Code: How Creator Marketing Wins Black Friday, with Kelly MacIvor of Omnilux
Transcript
- speaker-0: Welcome to Field Notes, the operator's playbook for brand creator and growth. This is the influencer marketing podcast for people actually doing the work. Real strategies, real examples, and the parts the other shows leave out. Welcome back to Field Notes. We're here with Kelly MacGyver, and she's joining us from the Omnilux team. We're so excited to talk to Kelly today about all the Black Friday things, how you prepare. speaker-1: ⁓ speaker-0: For the upcoming holiday season, it feels like everybody is selling, everybody's discounted, everything's in your face. ⁓ so really how do you prep for it as an influencer marketer at the end of the day? But Kelly, welcome, welcome. Please give the audience a little intro. speaker-2: ⁓ awesome. Yeah. Well it's nice to meet everyone. I've been in the influencer marketing space for the past probably seven or eight years at this point. ⁓ but have been working at On Mulux for almost four. ⁓ Wow. Kind of was brought in to lead the influencer affiliate program. And yeah, it's been a lot of fun. I've learned a lot. so excited to be here. Hello. speaker-0: Four years is crazy at one risk. Four years. speaker-1: that a startup is actually like a lifetime in this speaker-2: It does. ⁓ speaker-1: And you've always been on the affiliate influencer side, right? 'Cause I remember you and I talking it could be two or three years ago at this point. So you've kind of always been on that team, right? And now you're leading the team. speaker-2: Yep. Yeah, I actually came into the company to like create TikToks and that is not my forte at all. So I very quickly switched over the video. Executive. Telling the influencers what to do instead. yeah, so there's some videos that still circle around the ads account that are me in my like old house from four years ago. It's kind of speaker-0: Crazy. speaker-1: Yeah. I mean I mean just that on its own, it's so I mean, people don't think that being an influencer or being a content creator is a real job. And it literally is so hard to put yourself out there. So being now on the strategy side. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-2: Yeah. That's that's where I think. speaker-1: Speaking of strategy, it is it is September. ⁓ Black Friday, Cyber Monday, holiday sales are right around the corner, which is arguably our Super Bowl and also our scariest time of year. So we're gonna put a little bit of like a little bit of a playbook together for people who if you're not thinking about it already, yeah. ⁓ because it's not only competitive just in general for business. speaker-0: To be. You shouldn't be. It's time. speaker-1: Cyber Monday, but it's incredibly competitive with influencers because there's limited limited space on their channels for those sponsorships. So let's get into it. Sarah. Where are we going? What's our first question for Miss Kelly? speaker-2: Whatever. speaker-0: Sorry. I know. ⁓ my gosh. So I mean, Black Friday's very, very noisy Cyber Monday. When every brand is really saying like buy now, buy now, look at me, look over here, how are you actually thinking about earning attention of either new customers, old customers? How are you guys thinking about it? speaker-2: ⁓ yeah, good question. So I would say honestly, Black Friday Cyber Monday prep starts, at least for us, six to three months before the sale actually happens. ⁓ so it's really important to just like know that you can't just start your Black Friday prep like a month before Black Friday. You have to start it, I would say at least two quarters before Black Friday starts. ⁓ specific to Omnilux, we have a very long sales cycle. So You could get introduced to an Onulex device. It's a $400 product. And it might take you six or seven months to actually purchase. It's not an impulse purchase. It takes a lot of education. You have to really have a need for it. So I think like the biggest strategy that we've taken is really trying to introduce the product and educate, you know, the consumer on the product within like that three, four, five, six month period. ⁓ Then by the time They're like hit with the sale, they've already been like super prime. They understand why they should purchase the device if they have the need. And then that hopefully gets them over the edge to actually purchase during Black Friday. speaker-1: Really interesting. And it's also like such such a good rationale for having an ⁓ an affinity and awareness goal to your influencer program. Because if you have a high AOV product like Omnilux, ⁓ the intent to buy, exactly what you're saying, the intent to buy is longer. Like people aren't just correct to your point impulse buying something that's $300, $400. And so Having consistent marketing throughout the year is really important for brands like Omnilux that have a higher AOB, which is why it's important to have an always-on kind of influencer program and not put all of your eggs in one basket when it comes to, you know, literally November Black Friday Cyber Monday. Because at Superbloom at least, we've had some brands come to us being like, we would like to launch an influencer program right for like for Black Friday Cyber Monday. Okay, but that's not gonna yield the kind of results that you want. So speaker-0: Then you're like, speaker-1: You know, by the time that Black Friday hits, is it already too in your opinion, like is it already too late ⁓ to build the creator relationship that drives the sale? And kind of how are you thinking about your influencer program throughout the year and leading up to Black Friday, Cyber Monday? speaker-2: Yeah, I don't think, I mean, I don't think it's too late for every brand, but I will speak to Omnilux specifically. I think the only way that we would activate a creator that we've never worked with before, specifically for Black Friday, is if we were really paying attention to the type of content that they were posting, and it made a lot of sense. So, for example, if there was a creator that, you know, had been sharing with their audience very recently that. They wanted to invest in red light therapy or they had some sort of skin concern and their audience was very primed and was like, okay, what are you gonna do? Then there's a chance that we could activate that creator and just say, like, hey, I just started trying this red light device. By the way, guys, there's a huge sale. but for the most part, I would say like try and steer away from that as much as you can. ⁓ I think it's important to really like work with creators that have been priming their audience for. At least a couple of months prior to the sale because at that point they, you know, the audience will know if they are going to purchase on Black Friday. People are starting their Black Friday list like months before Black Friday. And especially for a device that's so expensive, you know, you're probably, if you are considering getting the device in August, you're probably not going to purchase it until November, unless there's like, you know, a crazy need for it, like you're getting married in three months or something. But most of the times they're probably going to wait until the sale comes. ⁓ but I think it's so important that you're educating that consumer all the way up until Black Friday and really giving them all of the information that they need. So that once that discount comes and that sale comes, they're just like, okay, I'm ready to purchase. This has been in my cart. so yeah, I I think that's kind of at least the strategy that we take. We don't really like to To get new creators like the month of the sale. speaker-0: One thing I've loved listening to you already talk about is that you really, really understand your customer. I think a lot of times talking with influencer marketers, especially like younger influencer marketers, they're really, really obsessed with like the aesthetics, the visuals, the like identity that they want their brand to have, but you're really, really concentrated on what already works as a customer and what your customers are already thinking, especially for something like red light. I think the same could be applied to supplements. You don't see an effect the first few times you use it. So it is really, really hard to not work with a primed audience to like convert them immediately over. ⁓ it's almost like you're when you're a higher AOV where something also you have to see it actually work to want to invest in it, you're working for the wish list, not for the purchase almost, if that makes sense. speaker-2: Yeah, totally. I know. We're definitely on a lot of wish lists. And then we just hope that by the time Black Friday comes around, these creators have done their job kind of educating their consumer on, you know, is it worth it? And and how also just how they integrated the device into their everyday life. I think if you're a consumer and you really trust an influencer and you follow them consistently and you're seeing that it's working for them, like week over week, month over month, then you're so much more likely to be able to envision it in your own mind and kind of like incorporate it into your daily habits as well. speaker-1: And I even think like I think when it comes to like beauty, skincare supplements, like that's such a c obvious narrative where it's like, well, there has to be more education around it because there isn't literally such an obvious before and after. Like the good things take time. But I think that same kind of mindset can be applied to quite literally any, any category in any product because mo the market is so competitive. Like there's thirty thousand variations of every one thing. And if you it like consistency, I think, is what is what consistency and education is really what we're talking about here, where it's like you have to be consistent in your messaging and who you're working with and how you're positioning your product in the education of your product, even if it's something like an electrolyte packet. You know, like where the technically that's a supplement, but it's also just salty water. You know, like it's You know, there's staying consistent and and, you know, whether that's having a more evenly distributed budget throughout the year and then cons and you know, spiking it a little bit over Black Friday, Cyber Monday, I think what we're really talking about here is like it is so important to be consistent in general, but especially with influencers, because that is how you that's influencers can lend trust and credibility to your brand if they're consistently speaking to that brand and if they're obviously speaking compliantly about your products. So ⁓ I think that's a really refreshing take that a lot of people just kind of oversee or like completely forget about. They're just there's just they're like, you know, we can but we can just start working with creators one month out or the month of Black Friday Cyber Monday. And for some brands that works, but for most it doesn't because it's not enabling like those audiences don't necessarily trust that brand just yet. speaker-2: Right. So it takes some time. Yeah. And I feel like it's so funny. When I first started an influencer marketing like five years ago, I didn't realize that about strategy. And so I would just activate a creator one month. And then if you know they didn't kind of get the results that I was hoping for, we just cut them off immediately. And like ⁓ obviously over the years, it's so obvious that like you have to work with this creator for multiple months in order for them to actually be able to get their audience to to purchase and like feel like this is actually something that's worth the investment. It's not just a gimmick or, you know, it's not just like some viral trend. And so I think like over the years, just working really hard to identify those types of creators that you can work with month over month. And like you might not see a one-to-one ROI in month one, month two, but like month three, four, five, you're really starting to see the impact of That consistency and like that partnership. speaker-0: Yeah. Sarah. speaker-1: ⁓ sorry. ⁓ go ahead. I was gonna talk about like pre it's five years ago though, Kelly, like that was what, twenty twenty one, twenty twenty, twenty twenty one. ⁓ Like you could do one offs with creators and they would convert. Like the industry has just changed so significantly over the last five years that like yeah, now more than ever, like that consistency and those more longer term partnerships, even if longer term is two or three months, like it is a night and day difference than what the industry was five years ago. speaker-2: Yeah, that's true. It still makes me laugh though. I'm like that's crazy. That used to be what I thought made like the most sense. speaker-1: Like basically starting over every single month work. What do you mean? Like now you literally can't do that anymore. You just can't. speaker-2: Yeah. speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ one of the things that Lily brought up earlier too was I think I I wanna ask a little bit of the off the cuff question because of it is budget. When we're talking about Black Friday budget and like a lot I think a lot of brands save a lot of concentration of their budget for that time, but when you guys are looking at a longer education period, does that mean a lot of your budget is spent like around the month of September? Or how are you guys positioning your budget for creators throughout the year? speaker-2: Yeah, so with our budget, we typically like ramp up our budget about three months prior to a sale. so that then like like I was saying, like we are able to test into a bunch of different creators, audiences, demographics, and really understand who's going to convert for us once we get to that sale period. November is obviously like our biggest, you know, budget of the year just because. We have so many winners that we can pick from throughout the whole year. For example, there are some creators that we just cannot work with month over month because they're just too expensive. But we have tested in them, tested into them enough times that we know, like, hey, I can work with you for this month and then I'm gonna take two to three months off with you, and then I'm gonna reactivate you again for the sale. So I would say, yes, our budget is always bigger on sales months. But we do really work on kind of like ramping up our budget from like August, September to October. It gets like higher every month. And then it's the highest in November. And then we kind of start ramping it down again December and January. And then January is obviously a whole new year and it's a whole new year for testing. So I would say like that's when we do the most testing is in this like January, February time period, because ⁓ we don't have like some crazy sale that we're kind of like ramping up for, if that makes sense. speaker-0: For sure. I hope, hope there are some creators that end up listening to this because that is such important context when you're a creator and pitching yourself at different times of the year for different brands. I was recently listening to ⁓ someone who runs Influencer for a chocolate company, a pretty big chocolate company. And so a lot of their business is surrounding the holidays. And she was saying that there are some creators they work with over the holidays and perform really well and they're really great. But the same creator will reach out around, you know, like Father's Day, assuming they're gonna get the same budget, and then they get mad that they were offered something lower. And she's like, My budget concentration like has to kind of be this way. So you have to kind of think about that from a creator's perspective too. So it's interesting that you guys have have it like more so in the middle of the year for that education piece. speaker-2: Mm. Yeah, it is interesting. I mean, the other thing, it I think it's different, a little bit different with our device, just because it's not something that you're personally seeing over and over again. Like you, you know, you're probably saving your money to spend four hundred dollars on this device, right? ⁓ for the most part, or you just like have a very high household income and we have creators that sell to those audiences really well. But A lot of people are saving their money. So by the time they've purchased the device, we're essentially we need to go after a whole new audience because that that consumer has purchased now. So they've kind of checked the box. Maybe they'll come back for, you know, if they purchase the face to get the neck and deck at some point, but or a gift. But yeah, we're not like unfortunately, like at some point our audience does kind of fatigue and we have to like. Find a whole new audience to test into, which is where like the the new year really like comes into play. speaker-0: good point. And I think Lily and I can both attest to red light therapy working. If anyone now at this point is like, does Omnilux work? It works. speaker-1: I well I have ⁓ I I ⁓ was using a different brand that shall r go nameless ⁓ for years. And I saw results, but then I'm also ⁓ Sarah and I are both like acne prone skin and so I I have the clear one that's blue. It's incredible. ⁓ speaker-2: Well, I think that's the other thing that's so important. Like it has to work. Yeah, like I I it would be so hard for me to work for a brand that I didn't genuinely believe in the results. Like I had really bad acne. I used the clear device for like six or seven months. It completely cleared up my acne and like I was the biggest believer, obviously, in the product after that because It really worked for me and I could when people would come up to me and be like, Okay, does the device actually work? And I'd be like, Look at my pictures, like you it really speaker-1: Like that, literally, yeah. speaker-0: You also have to be consistent. speaker-2: Totally. Yes, you do. That's like so important. Yeah. Yeah. It's hard to be consistent, but Yeah. speaker-1: one so ⁓ honestly, not to like w I literally made the joke about codes and discounts. ⁓ but everyone under the sun has a discount for Black Friday Cyber Monday. Like, does the discount actually differentiate anymore? Like, what's the differentiating strategy for Black Friday Cyber Monday nowadays when everybody's like spend X, get X, this percentage off GWP, like speaker-2: Yeah. What may I mean I feel like it's more so the creator than the discount itself. I think I mean influencer marketing is what it is because there are so many influencers that can build this credibility and trust with their audience. So I think as long as you've been working with creators that have built that trust with their audience and then Like I said, like for three to four months or something, and then they share with their audience, hey, there's a discount. I do think that will move the needle in terms of like pushing the person over the edge to purchase. But I think I mean, I don't know if it's like the discount did it, right? I just think it's like the cherry on top. ⁓ I also think it like depends. For like red light therapy, like you're probably have done a lot of research to decide which device is going to be the best for you. And so if there's two competitors during Black Friday having a sale, like I'm not actually sure the a discount would really be the thing that would change someone's mind, at least for like a device like that. I'd say maybe if you're in between like I don't know, a couple like makeup products or something, that might be different. Like A discount could really move the needle there for you. But in my opinion, you know, we try and stay away from discounting like all season long and really like keeping it to a couple different periods. ⁓ but yeah, I don't know if like the discount is like really the biggest the biggest selling item. Yeah. speaker-0: I almost feel like the discount, they're just anticipating it to be there at this point, at that time of year, more than it being the actual draw in to your point. It's they're educating themselves and they're leading up to it, and then they expect a discount to be there because to your point they didn't buy in August or September because they were expecting it to be on sale in November. Have I also purchased things, assuming that, and then seeing that they didn't do a Black Friday? speaker-2: I know it was yeah, it would stink if you were like hoping for it and then then I think you'd probably purchase a different red light therapy device, right? Because you're like, man, I was really thinking I was gonna purchase this one, but they didn't go on sale and this competitor did. Okay, I think I'm gonna try that one. So I guess it can right, like it can push you over the edge. speaker-0: Could push you the other edge too. Like I've made purchases where I'm like, well, they don't discount their product. I did my research. This is it for me. And I still purchase. I think it was Lululemon back in the day used to not have a Black Friday sale. They always had like their sale rack in the back of the store. And this was like also still in the time where a lot of people would go in-store and online, but they wouldn't have a Black Friday sale, and they still had. millions and millions over a normal store day on a Black Friday day just because people were there and they're like, Well, I wanted Lululemon anyway, so I'm not gonna go get Adidas or whatever down the street. So I think it's it depends. speaker-2: Yeah. Yeah. No, that's a good point. speaker-0: one of my favorite questions we wanted to ask you was would you rather have a hundred creators posting during Black Friday Cyber Monday or twenty ⁓ my gosh, or twenty creators who have been talking about you or twenty like a nineteen twenties Hundred creators posting once during Black Friday or 20 creators who've been talking about your brand for the last six. speaker-2: months? ⁓ I would say 20 creators 100%. ⁓ I think like it's quality over quantity at this point. if you're introducing, I mean let's say it's a hundred net new creators, like absolutely no, because why would someone purchase like just then? It's just I mean you're reading right through it. Like they're literally just being activated for the sale. But I still even think like your 20 best creators are tried and true, the people that you've, you know, worked with over the past like year to six months that you know convert, those 20 are probably could even drive like the same revenue as you activating 200 people net new, right? Like I really do believe that. ⁓ especially when you work with influencers that have a very engaged loyal audience. ⁓ So yeah, I would say stick to your like top twenty. Don't try and test into a hundred people around Black Friday. Like test into all of those different people after the sale because you probably have revenue goals that you need to hit and you can probably guarantee those revenue goals are gonna be hit a lot easier if you're activating the creators that you know are gonna convert for you. speaker-0: Yeah, for sure. Working when I was working at Alohawk collection too, we spent so much of our time around Black Friday focusing on our current customers. Like we really, really weren't focused on gaining new customers during that time. Cause also those new customers arguably have a lower lifetime value than a new customer coming in at a time where there isn't a massive sale going on. So to also just focus on You know, these 20 creators that have always posted about you, like you've said before, your their audience is already primed. They know this is something that, you know, is is true to them. ⁓ that was always really big for us, like in the in the fashion world too, of like we we are not focusing on acquiring new customers right now. This is for our loyal customers to increase their lifetime value and we're gonna focus on them spending the most money during this time. speaker-2: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Totally. And like especially with yeah, like a device. I know I said a lot of the times you have to find a completely new audience, but I do find that around the holidays, like gift giving is obviously so big too. So re like coming back as a as like a second time customer to purchase for someone else, like that is huge for us. ⁓ and so you really have to keep kind of like showing up and reminding that person, like, ⁓ this This brand is still very relevant to me and like the people around me in my life. speaker-0: Yeah. As Lily says, our customers can be your biggest ad ⁓ my gosh, what is wow, am I okay? Your customers can be our biggest advocates. speaker-1: Why? New vocal stick for field ⁓ notes. speaker-2: It's a Friday. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: Friday. Holy cow. speaker-2: It's speaker-1: Is it Friday? Well, when this releases, let's hope it releases on a Friday. We're recording this on a Friday, y'all. ⁓ my gosh, Kelly. Well, thank you so much for joining us, especially in the final few days that you are actually working before you go on maternity leave, which is so I think this was so so helpful. And hopefully people are able to adapt some of the strategies that we've talked about ahead of their Black Friday Cyber Monday and just be consistent. speaker-2: Ha ha ha. Thank you. speaker-1: Have some cream loyalty over quantity, you know? speaker-2: ⁓ Totally. Yes. Love it. Thanks Thank you, Kelly. Of course. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it.