Why you should build your business publicly
Plus: great holiday campaigns, Black Friday recap, and more. 🎁
Good morning, happy Cyber Monday, and welcome back to Brandscape! I hope you had a great weekend.
Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about founders who use their platforms to share their entrepreneurial journeys. I started to come up with the following questions: What unique advantages does this strategy provide? What role does founder-led content play in building buzz around a brand? And, most importantly, how can you involve the community you build along the way in the process?
Let’s dive in.
About a month or so ago, I began following Kiki Couchman (@couchwoman), who’s leaving her job in private equity to start a yogurt company called Beny. 🥣 Her TikTok vlogs feature different aspects of starting the business with her co-founder, Elan. She’s shared videos about everything from recipe sampling to brand identity development to restaurant supply store trips.
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Kiki’s approach for Beny isn’t just interesting to brand enthusiasts like me—it’s engaging for anyone who’s curious about the product or the founder journey. The videos become a way for Beny to build trust and an authentic connection with viewers and potential customers. As viewers continue tuning in, they become increasingly invested in the brand’s evolution. This generates initial loyalty as they come to feel a personal stake in the brand’s creation, which could translate to great brand loyalty down the line.
Kiki has engaged her followers in crafting Beny’s brand by crowdsourcing name, font, and color ideas, allowing them to shape how the final product looks. In addition to her recent friends & family launch, she’s even started handing out yogurt samples locally in NYC to excited followers.
Further, through her content, Kiki is able to build credibility in the probiotics space and break down the science behind the product. She’s also able to reach customers who may benefit from the gut health support the Greek yogurt seeks to provide.
In summary, this founder-led strategy humanizes new brands and allows for the creation of an engaged and loyal community. I’m excited to continue watching Beny’s growth and to see other founders build in this way.
What are your thoughts on this trend/strategy? Comment below!
Check out these holiday campaigns 🎁
Crown Affair’s tablescape-themed photoshoot
Tekla’s Patchwork Bear video, directed by Jack Brown
Kiehl’s Holiday Advent Calendar release with an interactive, AI-generated, larger-than-life box in NYC
Ghia’s Holiday Collection announcement (reminds me of vintage Apple ads)
Headlines of the week 📰
Online shoppers spent $10.8 billion on Black Friday, according to Adobe Analytics. This figure is a 10.2% increase from last year. Top categories included apparel, skincare, and toys. Retailers offering more budget items performed better among price-conscious consumers than retailers that depend on discretionary spending. Note that this data is all before Cyber Monday.
Online shopping overshadowed in-store shopping, and initial research estimates that in-store spending will only grow by 0.7% YoY.
Skincare brand The Ordinary closed their online store for Black Friday.
In an effort to discourage impulse purchases, The Ordinary closed their online store last Friday. However, they offered a 23% discount for the entire month of ‘Slowvember.’ While #underconsumptioncore may no longer be trending on social media, it’s clear The Ordinary still embraces it.
Brands found a creative way to quickly respond to the recent $6.2 million sale of Comedian by Maurizio Cattelan (aka the duct-taped banana). See the following examples from Liquid Death and Cheetos:
Original / Liquid Death / Cheetos 62% of U.S. adults that use TikTok state that one of the reasons they use the app is to view product reviews and recommendations. Of these users, 27% say it’s a major reason they use the app, according to Pew Research Center. Given this statistic, it’s easy to make sense of TikTok Shop’s meteoric growth.
Thanks for reading!
-Henry