If for some reason, let's say you don't get the kind of result that you want, you still have cyber weekend to pull like a hail mary off, you know, and do one more event over that weekend, if that sounds good. So this is all about being strategic. It's about pivoting when you need to, and it's about getting in there and getting in front of your customers.
Welcome to Thrive by Design, the podcast for ambitious independent jewelry brands, looking to profit from their products, get ready to make more and sell more doing what you love, without spending every single waking minute doing it. Hey, and if you're a creative fashion or product based business, I want to welcome you to the show. I'll be dropping big tips on launching, growing and scaling your business. So you can spend more of your precious time using your creativity to make money. You ready? All right, let's do this.
Welcome to Thrive by Design podcast, Episode 318. Hey there, it's Tracy Matthews, Chief Visionary Officer of Flourish and Thrive Academy and the host of the thrive by design Podcast. I am so excited to be here today, talking about some of my favorite stuff, holiday sale season. Gosh, Where did 2021 go? we are right in the midst of Q4, which means you are probably super busy and perhaps you've already planned out your holiday sales strategy. Well, if you haven't, then you're in luck today because I'm going to help you kind of think through some of the options of what you can create for your cyber weekend event if you choose to have one. So cyber weekend is typically Friday through Monday, right after Thanksgiving here in the United States and there's historical meaning to Black Friday and Cyber Monday and Small Business Saturday and all the days that happened around the cyber weekend. But I think the history goes and says that Black Friday is the day that the retailer's would end up in the black instead of the red after the entire year. So it's a way for them to make a lot of money and when we think of cyber weekend sales, we kind of think of those old school doorbuster events where people are getting trampled because they're going to buy TVs etc.
But it's a great opportunity to generate a lot of sales as a jewelry company if that's what you'd like. Now, I've done so many episodes about cyber weekend sales and Black Friday events and all the things over the years. So over at the show notes at flourishthriveacademy.com/318 we are going to have a bunch of previous episodes that we've done and other resources. So definitely go check out the show notes it will be worth your while because we'll talk about all the things that we talked about on the show today, and so much more.
Now before I dive in to today's episode, I'm excited because my book is coming live. It's called the Desired Brand Effect. We are releasing the desire brand effect the week of November 8th. Think November night is the official release date. So definitely get on the waitlist if you haven't gotten on the waitlist yet. You can head on over to desiredbrandeffect.com for more info. And we're going to be doing a huge promotion that week was an opportunity for you to get some really great prizes and to get access to some exclusive content that I'm creating over here including an interview series and a whole bunch more. So I would love for you to be to participate in it. It this has been a labor of love for me, this book encapsulates the entire, I guess philosophy of that I've been teaching over here at flourish and thrive Academy for the last nine years. It is the methodology that I use to recover from bankruptcy to scale multiple businesses to seven figures and beyond, and so much more.
So if you're someone who really wants to build a business that has more ease and flow, where you're aligned with what matters most to you and you're moving into that law of attraction space where you're always attracting customers where we're getting people to buy from you more than once and where you're able to scale those results your create a business that stands out in a saturated market with your timeless jewelry brand. So if you have friends in the jewelry industry who might be interested I would love it if you would share the waitlist with them as well. And if you are handmade product business owner or you're selling another physical product, I definitely think this book will be of value to you. Even though he's focused on the jewelry industry. There is so much to be gleaned from building a desire to brand if you're selling a physical product. So thank you in advance for getting on the waitlist we are just beyond thrilled for this process that has taken me years and years to create and I'm just being I'm so excited. I can't even stand it.
So with that being said, we know a lot of people listening to the show might want a little extra hand holding this year throughout the holiday season and beyond into 2022. So if you're someone who is desiring a little bit more hand holding and support to help them grow their business, or you're looking for coaching that can help you move a lot faster, we would love to support you. So if that sounds good, all you have to do is apply for a free strategy audit, over at flourishthriveacademy.com/strategy. On that strategy audit, you will be speaking with my girl Natasha. And we'll be digging deep into some of the goals that you have for your business over the coming months and over the coming years. And then we're going to take a look at what's happening inside your business right now. we'll discover or uncover any roadblocks that might be standing in your way of helping you grow.
And then if it seems like a good fit, we'll share how we can help you implement the desire brand effect in your business. So if that sounds good, once again, you can head on over to flourishthriveacademy.com/strategy and apply for your complimentary strategy audit today. And let's see if we're a good fit to work together. All right, let's do this several weekend sales, another weekend, another year, another holiday season. And even if you don't plan on doing anything for your cyber weekend, and you don't want to run a discount or anything, hopefully, you'll get some ideas on different things that you can do at other times of the year for your business. Now, as I mentioned before, we have tons of episodes I've done that are literally evergreen, even if they have a year attached to the name of ways that you can really dial in a cyber weekend strategy. And what I'm going to talk about today are mostly just promotional ideas.
We talk a lot about different marketing strategies and things that you can do to really lean into making this the best like text marketing, really leaning into your email marketing strategy, backing that up with a direct mail strategy in other episodes of the podcast. So definitely check those out. because there'll be super valuable. So you want to be as you're thinking through what kind of promotion you're going to do, I want you to also be thinking about how you're going to market that promotion. And one of the key things that you want to remember as you're marketing, your cyber weekend is to create engagement and excitement well in advance of your promotion. And that's why sometimes, you know, like it's easy to get lost. And all the cyber weekend events that are happening, people kind of save their money in early November is, there are different ways that you can stand out so that you're not just getting lost in all these offers. So perhaps consider doing your cyber weekend strategy a couple weeks before or the week before, or starting at the weekend before so that you have a competitive edge over all the other people promoting at that time.
Or, you know, if you don't want to get lost in the crowd, then don't do it at all. But one thing that I would recommend, if you are thinking about doing something is to get ahead of it instead of behind it you I would say that a lot of times after the cyber weekend is over people have spent a lot of their holiday budget. So you probably would want to if you're going to do some sort of promotion. And you don't want to get lost inside the cyber weekend event. You can do something before. And the nice thing about this is that if you do do it before, the cool part is that if for some reason, let's say you don't get the kind of result that you want, you still have cyber weekend to pull like a hail mary off, you know, and do one more event over that weekend, if that sounds good. So this is all about being strategic, it's about pivoting when you need to. And it's about getting in there and getting in front of your customers as soon as you can.
So the first thing I want to kind of dive into is strategy. So this would be like what you're going to offer, right. And as I mentioned, keep in mind that you want to build your list, you want to build your audience, you're going to be competing with others, you can extend your event to a longer period of time, not too long, or just do it before the holiday weekend even starts. So here are a couple of ideas, create a blanket discount, keep it simple. Sometimes I've heard from people that this is the best strategy, getting things that are more complicated, sometimes, I don't know, it gets lost in the crowd. And the confused mind is a no so you want to make sure that people are very clear on what it is that you're doing. So a blanket discount the entire weekend can be helpful.
Another way to handle this is that you can have expiring discounts. So maybe like on Black Friday, you can start with a bigger discount and as the weekend goes on the discount kind of gets smaller so that way you're still giving people a discount, maybe you start with like 40% on Friday 30% on Saturday 25% on Sunday and then 20% on Monday or something along those lines. So you can have expiring discounts or you can do it all on one day like expiring discounts that start like the biggest discount start for the first two hours of an event. That way you get people there really early and then you reduce Reduce the discount as the day goes on, it's a little bit more complicated, you have to really be in front of your computer and watching this discount strategy, but it can work to get people buying super early on.
Another one of my favorite strategies is a buy more save more strategy where you're offering a tiered discount. So the more they spend, the more they save. This works really well, especially if you have a really dedicated customer base, who buys from you often. This is one of my favorite strategies, one of the stores that I shop from that I have for many years called Intermix has been a great store for me. And I love it when they ever they send me something in the mail that says like, oh, we're having our buy more save more event. And I end up always going to the top tier, because I want to get the biggest discount. So it's really, really helpful. And they know that if they send it to someone like me, who's a dedicated customer that I will shop. So think about that. And you can also do this something like this for your top customers as well.
Another strategy that you can host over this weekend is to host a sample sale, this is a great time for you to get rid of extra inventory at a deeply discounted rate. Typically, when you're selling things on sample sale, the majority of the items, or at least 40% off typically 50 that's what kind of in the mindset is a sample sale and you're basically selling off old samples, or extra inventory that's in stock that you're trying to get rid of. The idea behind this is to not like discount your best sellers, it's to get the old stuff out of the door. And I will tell you that my in person sample sales and anytime I would do a digital sample sale online, around the holiday season was an awesome way to get rid of extra inventory at the end of the year. And my strategy was always to do it at the end of the year during the holiday season. Because it's good to reduce your inventory. Right before you are closing out the year.
It's less for you to count in the new year when you're preparing for taxes. And also it gives you that extra cash influx at the end of the year, which is great, this is always already a busy time. And it's a great opportunity for you to use that cash influx to invest in other things that you might need for the coming year, or educational programs or coaching or whatever. So we're always trying to think of like, how can we get rid of inventory? And then also how can we reduce our tax liability. So there's that's just a little extra bonus tip in there that you might want to think about as you're moving into the season. Now as far as non discount strategies, you know, one of the things these are great things that you can test out and try. There are incentives to doing these. And I also want to remind you that a lot of times what ends up happening is that people on the cyber weekend holiday are really looking for discounts.
So what I've heard is sometimes they work and sometimes they don't so in the mind of your shopper or your dream customer you want to be thinking through like what is it that they want from me would they be most would they most appeal to a discount would they most appeal to a bundle offer or something else. So some of the other non discount strategies which you can test out before or after the weekend as well are buy one get one. This means that like when someone buys like or buy three get one free or something like that, you can use this as a gifting incentive like buy three pairs of earrings and get an extra pair of earrings as a gift with purchase something along those lines or you know buy this necklace and get a pair of earrings as a gift with purchase.
Another non discount strategy is bundling items together. So let's say you had a necklace and earrings that the necklace is $100 and the earrings are 50 if they buy it together, they get it for $125 this incentivize increasing your average order value because what ends up happening a lot of times it's like maybe someone would only buy the necklace before instead of buying both pieces. So you even though you're giving them a little bit of basically a discount for buying both together, it increases your average order value. And one of the ways that Justin Crane who he was a coach in our program for a minute he would come in as a guest and work with our students is the psychology behind this is like when you can kind of combine the investment What do you want to be thinking of is like how can I make this financially work without like, I'm gonna say losing money on the on the deal.
So you want to be really strategic about how your pricing and how those things work together so that it makes sense to bundle items together. And this is a great strategy. Mentally, what it does is it helps build the average order value in the mind of or in your business and also in the mind of the customer. They feel like they're getting a great deal so it's not necessarily discounting. And the best way that I can describe this is there is a company that I buy my workout clothes from. It's called bandier highly recommended. They're kind of like More trend focused workout clothes. I some A long time ago kind of got over a little lemons. But I didn't really feel like the fit was great for me. So I found some brands that I really liked on this bandier site. And they will bundle brands like all access together. So if I buy a workout bra, along with leggings, it's a cost less as a bundle, they call them kits, like workout kits, cost less to buy that as a bundle than it does to buy the bra in the pants separately, which I didn't even realize they had these kits until one time I was perusing around on their site and it's suggestive sold me on that. And I was like shoot, I could have saved like 20 bucks buying them both together each time. And I hadn't realized it. So think about ways that you can do that and use technology to show your customers that these things are available.
So buy one get one bundles and also a gift with purchase. And I kind of alluded to this before they are a little bit different. Like buy one get one with the positioning would be like if you buy one, you get a second one free or you buy one you get this piece free gift with purchase is basically positioned as like if you spend more than this amount, you get a gift with purchase. This one's pulled from the makeup industry. I don't know if you remember like Clinique or Estee Lauder back in the 80s. Like it, they would incentivize you to buy more cosmetics, because when you did, you would get a bunch of other cosmetics for free. And the reason why they do that is they're trying to get you to test out a bunch of products, so you end up spending more money over time with them, right. So it's a good idea, it also is a great way to incentivize people to buy from you or buy more from you, you just want to make sure that the financials work when you're doing this.
Now another option that works really well. And you can kind of pull this from like a subscription box service, and others that do this, but to create a like gift boxes for the holidays that have multiple items in them. And maybe it's other stuff included, besides just your jewelry or the other products that you sell. So you might want to collaborate with some other brands, you'd have to do the financials to see how this would work for you. And what ends up happening is a lot of times people assort items like maybe they would have like a, you know, relaxation kits where there was like a healing gemstone that promoted relaxation, then they had a candle and then maybe it was some bath salts in there. And so you would partner with other brands, where you'd buy their products wholesale, and curate them in a gift box. So this is kind of like a hybrid direct to consumer strategy and wholesale strategy where you would be like bringing in other brands or other things that can be boxed together. Or if you sell a variety of products like some retailers do, then you can bundle different items together inside that gift box as like a pre package deal to make it super easy for people to buy.
So those are some non discount ideas. Do keep in mind, though, that the non discount holiday sales ideas have a tendency not to do as well over a weekend like cyber weekend. You can try it out or maybe it's that each day of the cyber weekend you have a different offer going on. Jeanna and Jared Rushton we did an interview with them a couple of years ago, and they ended up like totally exceeding their online sales goal for that weekend, by alternating offers every single day. So like they started a site wide discount on the evening of Thanksgiving, then they carried that through on the Friday then they had a trunk show on Instagram on Saturday that was more like a sample sale with specific items that were not available on the website. They did the same thing on Facebook on Sunday, and then another event on Monday. So you can think about how you can bring in and filter in different strategies for this. Because I do really believe that using virtual trunk show elements or in person trunk show elements, different things can be super helpful to help you grow.
And we have an amazing bundle. If you haven't grabbed it yet, well actually two that I wanted to mention here that will really help your strategy. The first one, actually, there's three, I mentioned them all. The first one is the virtual trunk shows that sell bundle. This is our best selling bundle. It's like the emails that sell bundle is a close second. This bundle is responsible for helping our students and purchasers of the bundles make 10s of 1000s of dollars, hosting virtual trunk shows, it really works. I think the best virtual trunk show that I've heard of is one of our students that I interviewed did $39,000 with 10 hours of work. Preparing for the trunk show is pretty awesome. was a sample sales style trunk show so that her customers were getting a discount. And but I would say the average person who has one of these trunk shows who's just starting out ends up making about $2,000 which I think is awesome. So I would say on average, most of the people who pull this off assuming that they have an audience already are doing anywhere from two to $10,000 in a two hour show and they really work so I highly recommend that you consider doing that.
Then And that the other strategy that I'm going to talk about is email marketing, because this is one thing that is going to continually be awesome and a great thing for you to lean into. People are still buying from email, and you need to know how to get people to open the emails. And so we have an emails that sell done for you bundle that has which I think the most important part of this are the subject lines we have over 600 is probably like we keep adding to it since probably more like 700 now, swipe and go subject lines that you can use to get your emails open for all different scenarios, which is awesome. And then there's a bunch of other things included in both those bundles. But the emails itself w bundle, I think the the most attractive thing is just that it gives your mind a break. And you don't really have to think about what it is that you're going to write in that email.
And then if you really want to know how to map out a solid cyber weekend, then I'd highly recommend that you get the ultimate holiday sales machine bundle. This bundle helps you basically plan, promote and execute an epic cyber weekend event. It's also great for anytime you want to do a short promotion. So if you're just going to do a flash sale for a day, or you're gonna have a birthday sale, or you're doing some sort of promotion for Valentine's Day or Mother's Day, you can repurpose all the content in this it's an incredible bundle. And we've shared this strategy or taught this strategy in our programs for a very long time, we pulled it out just so that you can use it to execute your holiday sale season. So if you want to learn more about those, you can head on over to the show notes over at flourishthriveacademy.com/318 and grab those bundles today.
Now, you might want to be thinking about how you're going to actually execute your cyber weekend sale. So the execution of this is totally up to you. You could do something in person like an in person trunk show, you can have the event solely on your website online, you could do a hybrid event where you have an element of things in person in your local area. And then an element online. I already mentioned this before you can post your event on social media by maybe doing an Instagram or Facebook event or some sort of promotion on the application right there where you're selling, you can host a virtual trunk show where people come to zoom or viewing it on stream yard or somewhere else where you can actually sell in the comments. And the options are endless. So you want to really be thinking through right now how are you going to execute and promote the sale? So that's that's a key part of it is where are you going to be selling is going to be online? Is it going to be offline is it going to be on social media or you know other places as well.
Alright, so that's what I have for you today. Also, as I mentioned before, we are going to be delivering in our show notes a bunch of links to other episodes that will give you inspiration for your cyber weekend event. So make sure that you head on over to flourishthriveacademy.com/318. And we'll curate all those episodes for you. So if you want to binge listen while you're making inventory for the holiday season, then we would love to support you in that. And yeah, get excited, I would love to invite you to once again get on the waitlist for the book, The desire brand effects, you can head on over to desiredbrandeffect.com and get on the waitlist right there and be part of our promotion party. And if you buy the book during our initial promotion period early November, then you will get access to a bunch of amazing bonuses and fun stuff that you can use to help grow your business. So definitely check that out.
Alright, this is Tracy Matthews, signing off. Until next time.
Thank you so much for listening to today's episode. It's my mission to help thousands of creative businesses inside and outside the jury space use their creativity to make money. Make sure that you're subscribed to thrive by design on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, and wherever podcasts are played. And we'd love to hear what you think. Please rate and review the show and if you're inspired, please share this with your friends. Cheers to seeing you flourish and thrive.
