Adina is an artist and entrepreneur in Mexico City. She is the creator of Enjoy The Deep - a card game that fosters deep conversations and meaningful connections.
She reached out asking for advice after I sent my last email — and today, we’re going to help her make more sales.
First, we’re going to give her a “big marketing idea” to play with, and then - the “actionable secrets” she can implement to build sustainable and predictable sales around her product (aka, a real business).
Let’s begin with a quick marketing lesson before we get into the “secrets”
Product Performance is the difference between what your product is (cards) and what it does (creates connections/intimacy).
You cannot create desire for what a product is —- you can only take the hopes, dreams, fears, and desires that already exist in millions of people— and then focus that onto your product.
In my previous business, I wasn’t selling cannabis — I was selling relief from pain! — until the FDA came after me (that’s for another post).
You’re not selling a card game — you’re selling a social/emotional benefit — and maybe even sexual — for couples in stale relationships.
Part of your job as an entrepreneur is experimenting with different marketing messages and targeting different consumer segments — many different ways to package the product — it’s best to not have any assumptions, and treat everything you do as a science experiment.
The first thing I would recommend is finding the most powerful desire that can possibly be applied to your product — and then your job is to show how your product helps satisfy that desire.
For best results — you want to satisfy a desire in the “Life Force 8”
So, what problem does your product solve?
From the outside looking in — it could help with loneliness and boredom, a break from the status quo.
You could sell the benefits of “deep conversations” and then show how your product satisfies that.
Sell the BENEFIT and then give them the TOOL to satisfy that desire.
If I was Adina, I would sell “socializing” — and do some sort of party-kit (or host parties) — because people love when you make life as easy as possible and brain-dead simple for them.
Help your customer be a hero.
Show them what’s possible, and then teach them how to do it in the simplest way:
Host a Deep Party! Call 3-4 friends for an unforgettable night!
Buy A Bottle Of Your Favorite Wine (I like Argentinian Malbec, or Italian Nebbiolos personally)
Light Candles and Incense (you could sell these as part of a party kit)
Use this playlist (make one for your customers)
Invite people over! Copy and paste this text :)
Share it on social media #EnjoyingTheDeep
Basically — picture the absolute most ideal way to get the max benefit from your product — and give that to people — so they receive the best possible experience and become brand loyal and help spread your message.
You’re not just selling cards now — you’re selling a beautiful and unforgettable experience.
Now with that out of the way, here are a few ways to build sustainable sales for your product….
Direct To Consumer
Everyone defaults to “hiring influencers” - but this is less than ideal (for many reasons) and there’s a much better avenue that provides predictable sales.
Enter — online publishers.
These guys control all of the online traffic and one relationship with a good publisher can change your entire business life.
Here’s an example — if you google “Best Card Games For Adults” — you’ll see plenty of results.
The people searching these terms are your customers — this is a buyers intent keyword — these people are looking to buy “the best” right now.
You’ll want these publishers to feature you — because this will put you in front of these buyers daily, for a long time.
How do you get featured? Typically, these publishers take a percentage of sales from the products they promote.
You can easily set this up with a platform like ShareASale— but the real game is winning the deal.
You want to become the best choice for these publishers, so the top publisher will feature you as the top product.
How do you do that?
First, you have to have a good product.
Second, you must develop a relationship.
And most importantly:
You have to pay more than your competitors, and give the best possible terms to the publisher.
In my space, the big money keywords are “best CBD oil” and “buy CBD online” — and when we discovered how much traffic those keywords were responsible for — we tweaked our entire business model — so that we could not only pay our partners more than anyone else and give them the best terms — but so that we could profit handsomely on every acquisition.
This was responsible for hundreds of new customers per day — for years — until well funded competitors with seemingly unlimited money came in and thought it was OKAY to lose hundreds of dollars per acquisition (most of them are going bankrupt now, losing many millions of dollars for their investors).
You can determine the best keywords with keyword search volume.
Competitor Analysis
Identify your competitors, even if not direct.
Let’s use Cards Against Humanity as an example.
You can learn a lot from how they built such a massive global brand around a party game.
Use a tool like SimilarWeb to see exactly what they’re doing online, where they are advertising, and where the traffic comes from.
Remember — imitate, and then innovate!
Retailers
After you identify your competitors, you can find all the stores that carry them (they’ll often have a “store finder” on their site).
Contact these stores and develop the relationship.
Trade Shows
This is where business gets done.
Find out when and where there are trade shows that you fit into — hobbies, games, cards, gift shops, spiritual stuff — there are trade shows for literally everything.
It’s also valuable to show up to trade shows that are completely outside of your industry.
For example, I know an entrepreneur that sells apparel. He tells me that he does OK in the apparel trade-shows, but he really does WELL in trade-shows outside of his industry, because he has no competition there. He recently went to a grocery store trade-show with his apparel brand, and “crushed it” (in his words).
It just requires a bit of creative thinking —- what if you went to a hotel trade-show, got to meet all the decision makers, and one hotel chain decided to carry your cards in every room — as a surprise perk or gift for guests?
The biggest breaks in business often happen randomly and unexpectedly - you just need to constantly show up so that you’re in a position to seize the luck when it presents itself.
And there we have it —- hopefully this was helpful for you Adina, and for anyone else who might be reading.
My sixty minute writing timer has just expired, and I must get to work now.
Till next time’
Alon
P.S. I wrote a book about this years ago — it will teach you how to create mass desire for any product or service — and how to use that to make sales, right now.