Growth Strategy, Social Media Development, and Funding for a Home Goods and Apparel Company
Our client is a lifestyle brand specializing in home decor, fragrances, apparel, and candles. The majority of our client’s products are versatile and contain clean ingredients, and they encourage the multi-use of products. Many products have the ability to be customized to customer preferences.
Situation
When Rem came on board, the company was looking for feasible means of expansion. They wanted to figure out how to spread their business into new consumer groups. The other major goal was to figure out new forms of funding. Our client recognized that the current forms of marketing and social media use were not as efficient as they could be in terms of reaching new audiences as well.
Challenge
Our client works hard to provide quality home goods to clients. Currently, the business has its largest reach through in-person sales. The founder of the company has worked hard to create a loyal customer base through the use of personal relationships in in-person sales. She aims to broaden her sales by implementing new marketing strategies and capitalizing on our client’s social media presence by highlighting what makes her products unique.
While our client has a great customer base now, our client hopes to expand the reach of her business across even more demographics. She is open to exploring various advertising strategies that highlight different aspects of her products in order to cater to certain audiences.
Our client runs most of the operations herself and has tried applying to various grant opportunities. As she continues to push her business to expand more, she would like to identify more opportunities for different forms of funding. Additionally, our client wanted to explore the possibility of getting a permanent storefront. In the past, she has applied to some subsidized storefronts but it did not end up working out.
Approach
From our first meeting with the client, our team identified three main objectives: growth strategy, digital marketing strategy, and funding. Our first priority was identifying opportunities to strengthen the current customer market or expand to new customers. While the company already markets and successfully sells to their primary target demographic of women ages 25-50, they have a harder time marketing to males of the same age despite the majority of their products being unisex. To grow their sales, men must also be attracted to the products by marketing more specifically to men using the products. We also recommended a loyalty program to help maintain the high level of customer retention as they add more customers.
Our second step in our project was to recommend various digital marketing tools. While our client does maintain a social media presence, we recommended Tik Tok and Instagram reels which have become far more engaging than traditional Instagram posts. Along with this unpaid marketing, we showed the client the strengths of both Google and Facebook ads, creating mock ups of ads for both platforms. We recommended utilizing paid Facebook ads because they can more easily target a specific customer segment, which would help with the growth strategy, and the use of multimedia more effectively highlights the products. Finally, we created a list of influencers in the home goods industry who could help bring to a new, massive customer market.
Finally, our team researched a variety of grants that could help boost the company by providing them with the capital they need to expand. We walked through each individual grant and the best steps to make the company more attractive in grant applications.
Impact
We helped our client develop a growth strategy in order to enter a new market. We did this by analyzing the current market and developing customer personas. Next, we analyzed the market and developed strategies for broadening the secondary market. We also helped establish new social media and marketing strategies. In order to do this, we first analyzed the current analytics and then researched the best social media practices to maximize brand awareness. Lastly, we helped find new sources of funding by researching grant opportunities that our client was eligible for. We came up with a long list of opportunities and included important dates and relevant application information.
Team Breakdown
Team Lead - Maya McDonald
Strategist - Louise Lerner
Strategist- Sarah Kennedy
Jr. Strategist - Liam Donohoe
Jr. Strategist - Fred Hargett
Relevant Background Information
Business Type: Small Business
Industry: Home Goods and Apparel
Location: Washington, D.C.
At Rem and Company, we're on a mission to keep doors open and dreams alive. Rem and Company started as a social impact initiative offering free consulting services to small businesses impacted by COVID-19. Rem and Company has become an information hub and digital community platform for small businesses in need. At Rem and Company, small businesses stay up to date on trends in their industries, learn new approaches from peers, build a network, and develop the capacity to adapt as the world around them changes. Our consulting teams provide small businesses with the opportunity to identify and prioritize issues facing their business, propose innovative strategies and facilitate execution. If you are a small business owner and want to learn more about how we can help, request a free consultation.