021: Sarah’s Framework for a Live Unboxing

Does a live unboxing make you nervous? Not sure what to do or what to say? I've got a simple framework for my monthly unboxings and I'm sharing it with you today. Come listen.

Welcome to the Launch Your Box podcast with weekly tips, tricks, and strategies to start, launch, and grow your subscription box. Now here's your host, Sarah Williams.

Hey everybody, it's so good to be back with you today. I am talking about one of my favorite things that I get to do every single month, and that is the unboxing video. So every month I take my subscription box and I do a live video unboxing it for everyone to watch, and it's super fun. It's a way for people, not just a subscriber, to connect with you, to learn about what products you offer in your subscription box and really see it in real life. Viewing those those items being taken out of the box for the first time is exciting. Even if you have subscribers watching that you— that already have their boxes, getting them to be involved in your unboxing is super fun. They love to be a part of it, and it just creates this super fun community event. So sometimes doing an unboxing or thinking about doing an unboxing can feel a little bit scary, especially if you're not used to doing lives. So today I'm going to share my step-by-step process of how I create the unboxing, and it's not just about the unboxing, but it's about the unboxing experience. So if you're a note-taker, grab a pen, get some paper, and let's take some notes. So the very first thing I do is set a date. So choosing a date for your box reveal, put it on the calendar, let your followers know. The more people that you have show up for this live unboxing, the better the experience is going to be. Now I use a program called StreamYard to do my lives, and so with StreamYard I can pre-schedule an upcoming live. I love it because when I do a live, I pre-schedule it and then people can click on it to get a reminder. You could also do this in the event section of a Facebook group, but I love StreamYard because it's posts on my page, they can get a reminder. It's awesome. I also love to use text messaging and emails. So I might email out the day before that we're going to have an unboxing and invite them to come. Here's the link where they can come see the unboxing, and it would just be a link to the StreamYard post. Or I like to send a text right before I do the unboxing. People that receive the text that are on their phone, they're immediately going to come over and watch the live. So I usually send it just a few minutes before I go live, and that usually drives a lot of traffic over to my live unboxing. You're building excitement when you set a date. People are looking forward to something. Every time you share a little sneak peek, every time you share a behind the scenes, you want to share that date. Like, come do the, come do the unboxing with me. It's going to be on Wednesday at 7 o'clock, or whatever day that you choose. Let them know when it's happening. It builds up that excitement. Now the second piece is called setting the stage. So this is where I'm creating an inviting background. This could be maybe your subscription boxes all stacked up behind you. This could be in front of a wall of relative items, maybe different products, anywhere that gets people excited and seems interesting and intriguing. You just want to make it fun. The last thing you want to do is to go in a room with a blank background, in a dark— with dark lighting to do your unboxing. They want to see what's going on. I like to do unboxings in my warehouse because there's always lots of fun stuff sitting around my warehouse, and so my background always looks inviting. Make sure you have good lighting. So the lighting at my house is not the best when I do an unboxing, especially when I do it in the evenings. So I like to have my ring light, a really simple way to add lighting to your lives without having to have a bunch of equipment and stuff. So I is a ring light, and I always like to wear items that either coordinate with the box or they might actually be in the box, but they don't know that yet because I haven't unboxed it. So if you can put on something that really would coordinate with your theme or your colors, I would encourage you to do that so it gives an overall good aesthetic. And when you're doing the unboxing, or if there are items that are wearable and you can't do like a You know, add it to what you're wearing by unboxing, like I'm saying bracelets or earrings. If you need to wear the shirt or something that's in your box, put it on before you do the unboxing, and then as you pull it out of the box, they're going to see that you're wearing it. So that would be a couple tips for really setting the stage. So backdrop, good lighting, make sure you're coordinating your outfit with what's going on in the box. Now the next step is creating your hook. And I like to write this out before I go live so I know exactly what I'm saying. I don't get tripped up because that first 15 seconds of your live is super important. It's either going to stop the scroll or they're just going to keep on going by. So if you have your hook prepared so that when your screen says you are live, you know exactly what you're going to say, that's going to help— be helpful. So that 15 seconds you need to talk about what is about to happen. And so I would usually say, I'm so excited to be here tonight. We're going to unbox the May Monogram Box. I can't wait for you to see all the fun things that I've selected inside. So it's, it's not anything cheesy. It's not anything that you're revealing. You're letting them know what's about to happen. So if I'm scrolling through my feed and I see this, oh, somebody has a box in front of them and you might not know what it is, and I say, I'm about to show you what it is, I'm going to stop and watch. Um, so I want you to have your hook prepared before you go live. The biggest thing I can tell you not to do when you hit the go live button is wait. Don't wait for people to join. Now this first 15 seconds, generally no one is there. So I want you to talk as if everyone is there because more people are going to view your live on a replay than will actually be live with you. So don't waste that time because what happens, people are scrolling through and see your replay and you're waiting for people to join. They'll keep scrolling. People's attention spans are not that great. So you don't want to make them wait for, for them to decide if they want to stay or not. So use that first 15 seconds to tell them what's about to happen. Really, then the next thing that I want you to do, you've pressed the live button, you've given your hook. I need you to bring the energy, bring the energy. The last thing you want to do is to watch someone who has low energy in a monotone voice, unbox a box. I want you to be excited. I want you to welcome everybody. I want you to talk to people in the comments, even if no one's watching. I just want you to say, hey Susan, I'm so glad you're here. She may not be there. No one has to know that because most people will watch that on the replay. But if people are there, I want you to engage with them, welcome them. And I like to ask questions. So I'm encouraging you to really get some engagement going quickly from the live. Say your hook. Let me know that you're here. Say hi. Let me know where you're watching from tonight. That will get the chat moving. Once someone starts to comment, other people will start to comment. I always like to ask, are you a subscriber? Tell me which subscription you have. I have 3 different subscriptions, so I want them to engage with me. I want the subscribers to show up because if you're watching and you're not a subscriber, you're going to be feeling that FOMO. You're going to be feeling like you're left out a little bit. So I want to encourage as much participation over in the chat as I can. Sometimes I'll ask them, have you received your subscription yet? And somebody will say, oh, I received it last night. I got it today. I'm so excited. You're just trying to ask questions to get them to start commenting in the chat. So now people are joining, you've given your hook, you've got energy, people are chatting with you. It's not time to show them everything yet. Wait just a minute, let's tell a little bit of a story. So I want you to tell a story about that particular box. What was your inspiration behind it? How did you put it all together? I want you to give them some insight behind the scenes of creating— behind the scenes of creating this box this month. Tell them what you went through. Tell them how long it took. Tell them, you know, just give them some story. This gives you a chance to let more people join the live. People are still trying to find the live at this point. So you're telling a story, you're building excitement on what you're about to show them. So I'm just trying to create a connection with them, um, before I actually show them what's in the box. And once people feel connected to that story, once they can relate to what you're talking about, they feel more invested in that box. So I want you to take the time to tell them what's unique and special about it and get them more interested in what's about to happen. One more thing before you start, check the comments. So I want you over checking the comments and engaging with people through each one of these steps. If you're someone that easily gets distracted when you're trying to give some information, give the information you want to give in each step. Pause, and then go check the comments and engage with the people in the comments. The more you engage with the people watching, the more they are going to engage with you. And you are doing this for engagement, so you want that. I want you to be excited to see your subscribers watching. Get them participating in the conversation. I always discuss the options of each box before I do the opening. So if you have variables if you have different levels of subscription boxes, I want you to show them the highest level box when you do an unboxing. So I show them my ultimate box, and it's okay if someone says, well, I don't have that. Well, they might not have the ultimate box. So I want you to be very clear on which level you're opening, and if they want to upgrade their subscription, you're giving them information on how they can do that. But show them the highest level of box. So that they feel like they want all of it. You want them to want all of it. Now it's time to actually do the unboxing. So this is when the fun usually starts. You can really do this two different ways. You can start with the smaller pieces and build up to the bigger piece of the box, or you can start with the main attraction of the box and then show the smaller pieces and how they complement it. Either way works well, but as you're doing it, I want you to share the story behind it, the inspiration behind it. You showed the overall inspiration when you were talking about your box before we started doing the unboxing, but with each piece, I am showing people the item. I want to show them how they can use it. So if it's something they can wear, what they can style it with. If it's something they can use, different ways that they can use it. I want to tell them why I selected this piece for them and how it complements the other pieces. So I want you to take the time with each piece and really give the backstory and the history and the curation behind adding that to the box. Don't just say, here's piece 1, here's piece 2, here's piece 3, here's piece 4, and here's your box. That doesn't make a very exciting unboxing. I want you to say, here's why I selected this. And, and if it— if you got it from an artisan vendor or a special vendor, or maybe a local vendor, tell a little story about that vendor. If you designed it yourself and had it manufactured, talk to them about the design process. Whatever you want to share in that process. Um, make each piece last a little bit and really give some insight on why you chose that. You want to show them where, why, how— all the behind-the-scenes things. Subscribers really love that, so I want you to engage them by talking about those pieces. There also might be the opportunity where someone's going to ask questions about that piece. During that time, I definitely want you to engage in the comments and answer those questions about each individual piece. So let's run back through the elements before we close out our unboxing. So we've set the date, we set the stage, that's our background and how we're going to show up. We've clearly written out our hook so we know exactly what to say in those first 15 seconds. We're going to show up with energy and engage and create engagement. We're going to give some stories, some inspiration behind the box. We're going to tell them the options that they have with the boxes. So give them the different options. Maybe you have different levels, maybe you have, you know, different options with your subscription. Run through all of that so that you're giving them knowledge. This might be the first time someone has ever seen this subscription. Then finally, we're going to do the box Reveal one piece at a time, slowly talk to them about why you, why it's there, where it came from, and how they're going to use it. And then we're going to give them a call to action. So we've gone through all these steps and now we're going to ask them to take action. And so that action could be join now. If you have spots available in your subscription, give them the link so they can be a part of this awesome thing too. You can ask them to get on your waitlist if you have a closed subscription model, you can send them over to your waitlist so that they can get in the next time you have an opening. You could send them to an opt-in. Sometimes I offer like a free download during my live. So maybe one of the pieces has a quote. I can turn it into like an 8x10 print or a phone wallpaper that they could download for free. And so whatever you choose to do, you need to give them at least, or only, not at least, only one call to action. You don't want to confuse them and ask them to do a bunch of things. So you need to decide, Is it subscribe now? Is it get on my waitlist? Or here's my freebie? So one of those options, you want to give them a call to action. They need to go do something when they leave the live. I always go back and I have taken everything out of the box at this point. So I like to put it back in the box and just repeat what I've talked about very quickly. So as I'm placing stuff back in the box, I say, all right, let's review the main monogram box. It starts with this. And then, and I do it quicker than I unboxed it just to show them. How many pieces they got. And then I show them the actual box with all the stuff in it when I get done. Usually a live unboxing will take me about 20 to 30 minutes. So sometimes it'll go faster, just depending on how much engagement I have in the comments. But I want you to not let it go so fast. Give them time to show up, give them time to engage, give them time to connect with you, and then you can let them go. Give them the call to action again. And then we're not done. Like once we turn off the live, we have one more thing that we need to do. And I want you to do the same thing you just did live and put it into an email. And you can prep this email before you go live. Um, but it's important that we hit people in different ways where you're going to have a lot of people watch your live. Some of your followers will never watch a Facebook live. So we want to give people the opportunity that are not on Facebook or don't participate in lives to really consume what you just did. I like to do an email unboxing. So I usually do this after I do the live, or I can prep it before I do the live and link my video. So you're just going to write a quick email enticing them to come over and watch your live. Maybe they missed it, maybe they didn't see that you were live. So I always put a link and a picture of my live in an email. So the picture looks like I'm live, and when they click it, it takes them over to my live. I just do a quick screenshot of my live, and then when they click the picture, it's linked to my actual live. So one, invite them to, to come watch your video content. That's the best way that they're going to connect with you on a personal level. So you do that first, and then with that email below it, if they're not live watchers, do a quick little unboxing in the email as well. So you can show the different pieces and, and describe them. Do it in a way that's not as in-depth as your live was, so they'll want to go watch the live. But that's how you're going to do an unboxing on your email. Send them to the video or give them the quick little tips and that call to action. That call to action is Join now, subscribe now, get on my waitlist, or here's my freebie. So make sure that is in the email too. You don't want to just send the email with no call to action. When we talked about the hook for the live video, that is also the headline for your email. It could be the subject line, it could be the headline inside the email as well. So that, that's where you share your quick story in the first paragraph link the live, give a few items and tell their story too, and then have your call to action. Just like you would do the live unboxing, do it in an email format. You've spent a lot of time branding that box, finding and making the perfect products, and developing all the elements for that box. It's time to show it off and use all of those elements to make a really great unboxing video. So I hope that helps. I'm going to recap one more time the process that I go through for my unboxings in case you need to jot it down. Set the date, set the stage, give your hook, engage with energy, tell your story, tell them about your subscriptions, and then show off all the things and give them the why behind the things. And call to action. So do all those things and you're going to have a great unboxing. I'll see you next week. Make sure you subscribe to the Launch Your Box podcast. I'd love for you to take a minute to rate and review it. Let me know which episode is your favorite so far. Don't forget to join me next week right here.