719. Why Product Based Businesses Flop During the Holidays and How to Fix It Now

Hi, I'm Jacqueline Snyder and this is the Product Boss podcast. I've helped launch and grow thousands of product based businesses, even one of my own. And over the last 20 years, I've seen behind the scenes of businesses just like yours. Whether they are makers, manufacturers, artists, or food and beverage businesses. I have spent so many hours studying it all. I've discovered what makes them successful, what mistakes they could have avoided, how did they turn their ideas into a successful business, and what are the strategies that they have used to make more sales and be discovered by more customers. And this is what this show is all about. Whether you're just starting out or you're looking to become a million dollar product boss, I'm here to give you the permission to chase your dreams, no matter how big or small. All you need is the right mindset, a little courage, strategy and support, and you too can be the next million dollar product boss. Let's do this. Oh my goodness. Friends, if you are anything like me, you probably spend more time running errands than running your business. Am I right? Like, everything needs something, we gotta run around. And I knew that this was like a major issue for me back in the day, which is why I decided to get help where I could. And I decided to let Instacart handle all of my grocery shopping. So I no longer had to worry about running all the errands and having to run out and get more alm milk for my lattes. Rather, I was like, you know what, we're just gonna let Instacart handle that. So I want you to imagine skipping the store and getting back to designing packaging, orders, making, or maybe actually taking a break, even a nap. Remember those? Okay, so with Instacart, you can get groceries and essentials delivered in as fast as an hour so you can focus on growing your business without sacrificing a meal. Plus, less stress and more focus. And here's a tip. I've actually used Instacart before to order gifts from my daughter's friend's birthday parties because I haven't had time to run out and get presents. And I've been able to get the packaging like the gift bag and the gift gift, like hello Sephora, delivered to my house while I was in the middle of coaching sessions so that I could have the present right. It's like having a personal assistant without having a personal assistant. So if you want to do what I do and get the help where you can, you can try it. Now, if you head to the productboss, dot Com Instacart. Hey, hey, product bosses. Okay, really, really quick. Are you spending more time making all your products or maybe packaging your boxes and actually growing your business? I know. Okay, so if you've ever wished that someone would just tell you exactly what works when it comes to scaling your product brand into real money, right, like the good profit and making sales and growing this business that I know you've dreamed of, then I have something really special for you. I pulled together a special bundle of our top podcast episodes that every product based business needs to hear. So think of this as your shortcut straight to the strategies that help you grow your sales, build a brand that lasts and avoid that burnout that no one is actually talking about. Enough. So we're talking mindset shifts and marketing strategies and those behind the scenes lessons. And yes, you're going to have some quick action plans and strategies that we're going to share in here as well. So it is my top episodes playlist and it's totally free. We just wanted to gather it up so you didn't have to scroll through hundreds of episodes and think, what do I want to listen to? Right? Let's make it easy. So all you have to do is head to www.theproductboss.com top or click the link in the show notes, pop in your email. I'll send over those exact episodes that have helped thousands of product based business owners like you move from the hustle to sold out. Right? I want you to go from where you are to getting you seen and sold. And that's all going to happen with this compilation of episodes for you. I just want to make it super easy. So let's start building your business with clarity, strategy, ease, and freedom. Hey, hey, product bosses. All right, my friends, I see you. It is the first week of September. Can you believe it? And you're either thinking, I've got so much time to prep for the holiday season or I'm already behind. So whichever camp you're in, I want you to hear this. Your holiday sales success is being decided right now. I know. And listen, I don't say that to stress you out. I say it because I've seen thousands and thousands of product based business owners wait too long and then they wonder why their Black Friday Cyber Monday didn't perform. So let me tell you a really quick story. Years ago, I had a client, super, super talented who thought that she could just wing it, right? She's like, I'm just gonna roll in. I'm just gonna figure it out. Like the week that it's happening, I'm gonna put up my products and then hope to God that they sell because it's Black Friday. Of course people are gonna buy and they're going to sell, right? Listen, she had great products, she had loyal customers, but she didn't have a plan. So when she really kind of rolled into it, she rolled in. She's a jewelry company and she's like, all right, I've got new products. I was thinking about these products. I'm just going to list them two weeks before Black Friday, right? I've got the idea. I'm sure so many of you have ideas that come up to you. And if you're a maker and you can turn it out really quickly, then you're probably making and creating and like last minute putting it out there. Some of you who are in the manufacturing realm, maybe you're working with factories or you're working overseas, you've had to come up with your ideas and your designs way ahead of time. And so you have probably been in process. But you might also be thinking, like, I actually still don't know what I'm actually going to sell, what I'm actually going to promote for Black Friday, right? So this jewelry company waited and waited, and she didn't have an email list. She wasn't prepping for an email list. She didn't have a following or like any algorithm that was like, warmed up. She had no offers, no promotion scheduled, no bundles, like, nothing. Nothing that I actually teach, right? But this, this was happening a few years back and she was looking at it. And so this is what she told me, right? She's like, I worked so hard and made less than last year. And then she realized that hope is not a sales strategy. So if you are thinking that you're going to hope, like you've got hope as your strategy and you're like, all right, well, I'm just going to kind of figure this out as I go and wing it, and then it's going to happen. You're hoping to have the results that you want, but not planning for it at this point. Not planning early, then, my friend, in today's episode, we are going to walk you through what actually needs to happen in September, not in October, not in November, if you want to have your biggest, most profitable Q4 yet. And this is going to sound crazy, but guess what? This isn't about hustle. It's not. Because if hustling was true, if doing more was true, then we'd all be gajillionaires right? It's not about being everywhere because I'm sure a lot of you feel like you're running around with like a chicken with your head cut off, being like, I need to be everywhere. But nothing's really working. What this is about is having a real plan, right? A real plan for how your products will be seen and sold, how people will discover you, what that visibility will look like, how you will start to sell. Because the deal is, is that most product based business owners, especially, especially handmade ones, small batch ones, boutique brands, people who are building out of their living rooms and their garages and, you know, their dining room tables, people who are self funded, people who are working full time jobs to fund this business that they're thinking of or that they've saved up over the years or their business started to make money and the money goes back into the business over and over and over, right? These are legacy businesses. These are businesses that we are in, that we are creating, that we have our own blood, sweat, tears and our own money invested in them. But here's the problem, this is what I see for so many product bosses out there is that they're running blind when it comes to holiday marketing. And guess what, you're listening to the show. You deserve better than that. So let's get honest. Right now you might be saying, I don't even know what I'm promoting yet. Or I thought I would just ride the Black Friday wave, right? Like, well, people are going to be buying and selling and I'm going to be in a place, I'm going to be in person. I'm gonna have my website, I'm gonna be, you know, trying to sell the retail stores. I'm gonna be on Amazon, wherever you are. And you might be like, they'll just find me, right? Or maybe you're thinking, the weather's so warm, it's still September. I'm gonna wait until October hits. But let me ask you this, what happens if you wait too long, right? What happens? Well, this is what I've seen. You'll be scrambling to finish inventory when you should be promoting, right? In marketing and sales, you'll miss early bird shoppers who buy gifts in October. I know some of you are like, yep. Some of you are like, what, you'll fall back on discounting because you don't have a real promo plan. And let me tell you, when I teach, we have a challenge coming up called Rock youk Holiday Promotions Challenge. We teach it every year, like over 10,000 product based business Owners come through it. Now, the difference between the 10,000 people that register for it and the people who show up, which if you're listening to the show, you will register and show up, right? Because registering is not going to get us any further. But showing up and doing the work and being supported in a week together, that is where we're going to actually build things together. But the deal is, is that we are going to talk about offers that you can make that might be discounts, that might be promotions, but either way, how do we get in front of our ideal customers, right? How do we get in front of their eyes? How do we get them to say yes? Because I don't want you to just fall back on things. I don't want you to feel like you're falling back or scrambling last minute. And here's the worst part of all of this. You're going to be exhausted. You're going to be exhausted and you're going to be underwhelmed by sales, not overwhelmed. But there's so many of you that are going to feel super, super tired. Like you've been hustling and trying all the different things. You've worked your booty off this whole year, and then you're like, but why are my sales not representing the effort I put in? Right? Or some of you are like, actually, I'm so busy, I would like some more structure and systems built into this, right? Like, I'm going to be exhausted and I overwhelmed. Well, don't you think both of you deserve to be supported? So this is why most physical product business owners will plateau during the holidays or they won't see their revenues jump and skyrocket, which I've seen so many people do, right? I had one student write in once and she's like, I made $9,000 from January to September, and then from October through December, she made $30,000, right? Tripled basically all the revenue she made in an entire year. Because she went about the holiday season correctly, right? She was planning, she was prepared. She knew how to promote. She knew how to get in front of her ideal customers, Right? She didn't plan this all later down the road. It was in September. And let me tell you, when I see businesses not succeed at the holidays, it's not because their products aren't good, but it's because they didn't treat September like their starting line. So here's what I want you to take away today. Hot flash ready? Because it's the beginning of September. September is your power month, okay? The decisions you make this month will set up your success next month and every month after that for sure to wrap up this year. And guess what? We have a holiday to Halo period. The Halo period kicks off in January and February, right? Sales will keep flowing. It's what you do now that's going to matter with how we end the year and how we roll into the next year. And here's what I teach you all. You don't need a huge following. If you have one, Great. If you want to build social, great. If you don't want to, you don't have to. You also don't need to discount. Now we will talk about, especially in Rocker Holiday Promotions Challenge, we're going to talk about what type of discounts to offer, why a version of a promotion is going to work, Black Friday, Cyber Monday weekend, or if you decide to do a whole like cyber month, right? But these are not the moves, right? These are not the things that are going to be like, you're guaranteed. If I have a huge following and I offer discounts, I'm for sure going to sell. No, no, no. Here's what you really need to think about right now. In September, you need a clear product focus. So what does that mean? You've heard me talk about bestsellers or what you're known for. So taking it back because some of you are brand new or newer and you're like, I don't know, I make one offs or I'm just starting out. I don't have data on my bestsellers. Great. So what I teach you is what you can be known for, right? Like the cake pop lady, the goddess necklace jewelry lady, the matcha person, the phone cover company. Right. Like what can you be known for that they know they can refer to you like that. And then we talk about whether you have a core collection for the seasons or hero products that stand out. It doesn't mean you only sell the one thing, but it means you're pretty focused and you know what you're promoting. Because a lot of my students, you know this. If you've been through any of my bootcamps or my challenges or in any of my courses, you know, I say a confused customer doesn't buy. So a confused customer is not going to buy. They're not going to buy all the things that you post or everything on your website or everything, everything, everything. No, no, no. They want you to tell them what to buy. And that's what we got to dig into in September. You also need a simple and executable promotion plan. What Are you selling and when? What are we talking about every week? How are we building our audience, right? Are you building your email list? Are you building a following, right? Or are you building customer bases? How are you getting in front of other people? How do they know you exist? So how are they going to do that? And then when you have a promotion plan, what are you promoting to them? How are you selling to them? But here's the deal. Here's the thing you're all looking for, right? You need a strategy to build buzz and visibility before Black Friday, Summer Monday. In fact, you need a strategy to build buzz and visibility yesterday, right? Yesterday. You know this to be true. Hey, friends. Okay, so I don't know if you're anything like me, but sometimes it feels like my self care routine is slipping through the cracks. Because when I'm juggling and wearing all the hats in my business and doing all the things, I mean, the last thing I have to do is like really fulfill that self care routine that my doctor's talking about. She's like, mom, so listen, so when it comes to running a successful business, you can't really pour from an empty cup. And a lot of times that self care is like one of the first things to get yourself recalibrated. So that's why I want you to meet Glossy. Now Glossy is my favorite daily beauty supplement designed to transform your skin and gut health from the inside out. And I'm actually an investor in this business because I so believe in this idea of science backed ingredients for digestion and skin hydration. And Glossy makes it really easy to look and feel your best without that whole tense step routine in the mirror. The thing I don't actually have time for, all I have to do is simply mix the stick into my water and I'm good to go. So if you want to try this, because I so believe in this business, I think it's amazing. It's done so many wonders for my skin and my gut, which are two things that I need help with. And you want to simplify your wellness and your beauty. All you have to do is click in the show notes and you can use the code Jaclyn Snyder. So it's my full name. Use the code Jaclyn Snider and I'm hooking you up with 15% off your order. So cheers to glowing skin and a thriving business. So we dive deeper into this and next week we'll give you an opportunity to sign up. But I'm just letting you know if you're like, ah, Help me. We are going to do this together, over a week together. It's rock your holiday promotions challenge. It'll be coming out like the last week of September, like in the 20s. So keep an eye out. Next week, we'll give you all the ways to sign up and make sure you get on our email list because we send emails for early bird registration and all the amazingness. Okay, here's what I want to give you today. I want to give you a mini win today. So here's what we're going to walk through. We're going to call it the holiday sales prep triangle. Are you ready for it? So there are three things I want you to focus on this week. First, I want you to think about your product. What are you selling? Right? What are you going to sell? What are you going to focus on for the holiday season? Even, let's call it November even that Black Friday, Cyber Monday week, or leading up to the holidays, what are people buying from you? So. So we're gonna pick your core offer. What is it? Is it your bestseller? Is it limited edition? Is it holiday scents or flavors? Is there a new launch? I don't want you to launch 20 things. You get to choose one to three products to go all in on to market, to get in front of people to talk about. I know this blows people's minds. They're like, how do I only talk about one thing? This is literally what I teach inside of all my programs. I just got off a coaching call today with my product boss, sales accelerator students, and this was a question because we were really mapping out, what are we going to promote every single week? How do we create these promotions? How do we get people excited to come in and buy every single week? And we do this, we figure out what we're selling. Now the next thing I want you to think about for this holiday sales prep triangle is the platform, the sales channel, the sales engine. Where are you selling it? We've been calling it the sales engine because a lot of you have your main sales engine, the thing that's driving your sales right now or your main place that you show up. But we also get to have. I like, kind of, I think about it as like an old vintage car, right? A car that needs a tune up, needs you to pull, like, lift up the hood, look at the engine and be like, what do I need to fix? Right? That's a lot of times what we're doing in our business every single day. But what I also want you to add on is an additional sales engine. That's kind of like a self driving car, like a Tesla or a Waymo, right? Something where you are like, oh, I don't have to do very much here. Like I set it up, I create it and then it's, it self drives, it's a self driving engine. I want you to have a sales engine that works without you all the time. That's what we talk about inside a sales accelerator. That's what we talk about, you know, in our bootcamps, we talk about when you're known for something, where you're going to sell it. So what are you going to focus, what are you going to fix and then what are you going to expand on? When you kind of have solidified that, where else do we get to expand? So right now, when we think about your current platform, your current sales engine, where you're currently selling, does it feel ready for the season? Does it feel updated? Right? Does your website convert? If you have a website, does your Etsy store convert? Are you posted on listed on Amazon? Are you selling? If you're not having predictable consistent sales, and we gotta work on this, if you're doing in person markets and you're not crazy crushing them, then we get to work on that, right? So I want you to run a test where wherever you're selling, whether it's your website, your social media, an Etsy shop, an Amazon listing, an in person market. If you had a stranger walk up and either land on your page, walk up to your booth, land on your product listing, land on your store, could they tell who you are, what you sell, and why? What you have is a great gift or perfect for the season in three seconds? If not, we gotta work on it, right? If not, that's something you want to work on. I call it the grandma test. My grandma. If she lands on your website, does she know what you're selling? Does she know how to get to what she wants to buy quick? If not, we can get all the eyes in the world, but then you have a conversion problem. If someone walks up to your booth and they don't know what to buy from you, if they feel overwhelmed, they're gonna walk out of the booth. So we have to really think, like think about grandma test. If Jacqueline's grandma walked up to my booth, she would immediately know what she should buy for me. She'd know, like bestseller. She'd know what the season held. She wouldn't necessarily need you to talk to her. If she landed on your product page, on your website, whatever it is, in three seconds, as you know, okay, and then the last part of this triad is promotion. How are you going to sell it, right? What's your actual plan? Are you going to send an email? Three emails, three emails in a day. Are you going to do three Instagram posts? Go on TikTok, start posting on Pinterest, what are you going to do? Right? A lot of you are thinking, email, Instagram. That's your marketing plan, that's your promotion. But that's not enough. What you really need is a holiday content rhythm, right? A clear reason for customers to buy and no, because this Black Friday isn't enough. Because they're going to be so overwhelmed with all of the emails, all of the text messages, all of the influx of everywhere that's got sales. How do you stand out? How do you sell to them? So it's really about building that now. So if this feels like a lot good news, you don't have to do this alone. That's why you're listening to the product boss podcast. That's why you're following the show. That's why you show up to either my paid bootcamps, my free challenges. Maybe you're a student, maybe you follow me on Instagram because what you know is that you don't have to do this alone. This is the most perfect place on the Internet for you if you sell physical products, right? You have a physical product based business. So here's what I want you to journal today or say out loud. Ready? I create my Q4 results now, not later. Now I want you to say it again. I create my Q4 results now, not later. Because the difference between businesses that will thrive this season and ones that hope, stall and spin is just this, that they are starting now in September. So if this episode has you thinking, okay, okay, I know I need a plan, then stick around because next week I am going to give you the link to sign up for the completely free rock your holiday promotions challenge. Okay? This is literally our most popular seasonal event. Over 15,000 small business owners go through it every year. And this year we're going to blow it out of the water. It is going to be the best event of the year for physical product based business owners. Okay? So we're going to map out your holiday sales plan. We're going to come up with promo ideas that don't require discounts and some that do. We're going to come up with visibility strategies that work even if you have no audience. You're going to get real time coaching and community support. There's going to be an option to upgrade to vip, where you're going to actually be able to come into a room with me where I get to coach you in hot seat style and you get to be fully supported. It's going to be so awesome. So stick around. But you've got your prompt for today. You've got the work that you get to think about, which is really thinking. You know, do I have these three things covered? Am I covered? As I've been working on it, what do I get to do now? That's that holiday sales prep triangle. Okay? And then, my friends, I'd love for you to just make sure that you're following the show, right? Pause real fast, click the button if you're listening on Spotify or Apple, wherever you're listening. Maybe you're following me over on YouTube, because we're also, by the way, coming out with a new YouTube strategy and YouTube videos, and there's already content up there. So all of these amazing ways that you get to be supported by. Because over the next few weeks, we are going to be diving deep. You want to make sure that you get the alert on your phone that there is a new podcast drop. Okay? So we're going to talk about how to bounce back, like if there's a slump, like Etsy's been having a slump lately. We're going to talk about promotions that convert. We're going to talk about how to sell more without being on social media, without relying on that. We're going to talk about so many amazing things as we lead up to the busiest time of year. And these next episodes are going to change how you sell forever. And, my friends, you don't want to miss a single one. So you have got this, your biggest season yet. It starts now. So make sure to follow the show, follow me on Instagram, maybe go to YouTube. I've given you three giant things to do. Be prepped for next week. I'm so excited to continue to support you through the holiday season. This is what we do. This is our Super Bowl. This is our time. So I will talk to y' all next week on the next episode of the Product Boss podcast.