Fear of failure can shadow even the most confident and ambitious minds in the exhilarating entrepreneurship journey. But in the realm of success, failure is not an end; it is a stepping stone to greatness.
As a top digital marketing agency that has worked with hundreds of successful entrepreneurs, one thing is for sure: everyone has some form of fear. That is why we are thrilled to take you on this empowering exploration of how to embrace risks and turn setbacks into opportunities for your business and life to flourish.
Embrace the Mindset of a Fearless Trailblazer
To conquer the fear of failure, first, we must embrace the mindset of a fearless trailblazer. It’s time to rewrite the narrative that failure must be dreaded and avoided. Instead, view it as an essential part of the journey to success.
From the boldest entrepreneurs to the most prominent industry leaders, they have all encountered hurdles and setbacks on their path to greatness. Embrace a mindset of resilience, where you approach challenges as learning experiences, extracting wisdom from every stumble and using it as fuel to propel you forward with unwavering determination.
Set Clear and Ambitious Goals
With your fearless mindset in place, it’s time to set clear and ambitious goals for your business.
Aim high and envision the future you want to create. Ambitious goals ignite the spark of enthusiasm within you and your team, driving you to take calculated risks and embrace growth opportunities.
Define measurable objectives that serve as milestones on your path to success. Divide them into smaller, achievable tasks to keep you focused and motivated throughout the journey ahead.
Leverage the Power of Data and Analysis
In the modern business landscape, data is king. Use the power of data and analysis to make informed decisions and minimize risks.
Perform comprehensive market research to gain insights into your target audience, competitors, and industry trends. Analyze customer feedback and behavior to gain insights into their preferences and pain points.
Armed with this invaluable information, you can make strategic choices that align with market demands and customer needs.
Embrace a Culture of Innovation
Innovation is the heartbeat of growth and progress. Cultivate an innovation environment within your organization where creativity and out-of-the-box thinking are celebrated. Inspire your team to explore new ideas, experiment with novel strategies, and take calculated risks. Create a culture where failure is not penalized but seen as an essential part of learning.
Innovation empowers your business to stay ahead of the curve and seize opportunities competitors may overlook.
Take Calculated Risks
Embracing risks doesn’t mean being reckless; it means taking calculated risks.
Before making decisions, analyze the potential rewards and drawbacks of every opportunity. Understand the level of risk your business can afford to take, and be prepared to pivot if a particular strategy doesn’t yield the expected results.
Balance ambition with prudence and take steps to minimize potential downsides while maximizing the potential for growth and success.
Learn from Setbacks and Pivot
Failure is not an end but an opportunity to learn, pivot, and evolve. When setbacks occur, analyze the root causes and extract valuable lessons from the experience.
Use this newly acquired knowledge to refine your strategies and improve your processes. Flexibility and adaptability are vital in the face of challenges. Embrace change, and be willing to pivot when necessary to stay aligned with your goals and seize new opportunities.
Surround Yourself with a Supportive Network
Building a supportive network is crucial in overcoming the fear of failure. Surround yourself with like-minded entrepreneurs, mentors, and peers who share your vision and are eager to support your growth. Lean on this network for advice, guidance, and encouragement during challenging times.
The collective wisdom and positive energy from your support system will fuel your drive and strengthen your determination to overcome any obstacles that come your way.
Celebrate Every Success, Big or Small
Amidst pursuing ambitious goals, remember to celebrate every success, big or small. Acknowledge the progress you make and take pride in your achievements.
Celebrations remind you of your resilience and determination, instilling confidence and enthusiasm within you and your team to keep pushing forward.
Develop a Resilient Mindset
Resilience is the cornerstone of overcoming the fear of failure. Cultivate a resilient mindset that views challenges as opportunities for growth. Embrace change enthusiastically, knowing that every obstacle you conquer brings you closer to your aspirations.
When faced with adversity, remind yourself of the progress you’ve made and the vision you’re striving to achieve.
Seek Professional Guidance
Finally, don’t hesitate to seek professional guidance from experts and consultants who can offer valuable insights and strategies. Collaborating with a confident, assertive, and enthusiastic marketing agency can provide fresh perspectives, refined marketing strategies, and expert guidance to help your business thrive.
In conclusion, overcoming the fear of failure is not an impossible feat. With a mindset of a fearless trailblazer, ambitious goals, data-driven decision-making, a culture of innovation, calculated risks, and a supportive network, you’ll be equipped to face challenges with confidence and resilience.
Embrace setbacks as stepping stones to greatness, celebrate every achievement, and seek professional guidance when needed. Embrace the growth journey with enthusiasm and an unwavering belief in your vision.
Remember, success is within reach for those willing to embrace risks and grow beyond their fears. So, let’s embrace this empowering journey together and watch your business soar to unprecedented heights!
It’s no secret that the cannabis and CBD industry has been growing at light speed for the last couple of years. Both cannabis and CBD are mainstream where every day people are talking about the health benefits and are curious about learning more about them.
In fact, the cannabis industry is projected to hit $66.3 billion by 2025 and the CBD industry is growing to all new heights as well. The CBD industry is expected to reach $22 billion by 2022.
With those times of numbers with a big fat “B” behind them, you know there are a lot of people trying to rush into a goldmine and make a huge profit.
In this article, we’re going to talk about how our client, 3Win Corp, decided to skip the gold and sell shovels to all the gold miners like back in the 1800s during the gold rush.
Who is 3Win Corp?
3Win Corp is a wholesale CCELL® distributor, in 29 states in the US and 5 foreign countries. The company originated in 2015, growing from 6 employees to 38 employees within the last 12 months, with over 50 in 2019.
Their main clients are dispensaries, research labs, and extraction facilities. 3Win Corp is one of only four distributors worldwide that can sell and distribute CCELL® products, known for being the industry standard.
Selling Shovels in the Gold Cannabis Rush
Ever since the cannabis boom, everyone is trying to get in somehow. The majority of business owners and investors try to break into the industry by owning dispensaries, growing cannabis, or launching cannabis products.
Not 3Win Corp. They noticed a need in the market. Marijuana and CBD aren’t going anywhere and they knew that. Instead of offering the actual product itself, they offer the highest-quality accessories.
3Win Corp offers CCELL® products that are known for being the industry standard in vape technology. The vaping market is estimated to reach almost 55 million adults who vape by 2021. That’s a lot of people who need high-quality products to go with their marijuana and CBD products.
The Cannabis Market is Cut-throat Competitive
In 2018 alone, the cannabis industry had over $10 billion in investments that went towards marketing, advertising, and R&D. Some might think that the marijuana industry is a bunch of “hipsters” or people that just like to smoke pot. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Everyone is wanting a piece of this pie.
With that said, it has gotten more and more difficult to grow your cannabis brand over the years. Major investors and funding have got involved, which has made the playing field a bit unfair unless you have some massive firepower behind you.
This is one thing that 3Win Corp has ran into as the majority of its competitors are doing over $100 million per year in revenue and have major funding. They knew that they had to put forth more marketing firepower to saturate the market. They’ve since done just that but first, we’ll go into what they were dealing with.
Poor UI/UX/CX – Lack of Clarity and Consistency
3Win Corp was experiencing slower growth and loss of revenue. They had a website, but it wasn’t converting. Call-to-actions on the site were poorly displayed, and the customer experience was lacking – the site was not leading to an increase in sales.
The site did not highlight 3Win Corp’s phenomenal product offerings and capabilities. This made it nearly impossible to close deals unless they were in person, resulting in high costs for travel and print collateral. The sales team was frustrated with the sales process, and customers were frustrated with the lack of clarity and accessibility of 3Win Corp’s product offering.
Poor Search Engine Visibility
3Win Corp had little no SEO work done prior to working with Avintiv Media. With how many laws and regulations hinder how the cannabis and CBD industries advertise their brand, SEO and content creation have become the most important tactic in growing these types of brands.
3Win Corp was resting close to the 26th page of Google for every keyword that they wanted to rank for, which put them very far behind their competition.
Extremely Slow Load Times
3Win Corp had a landing page with not much usability or functionality. The older website experienced extremely slow load times which made it harder to grow the business. Due to slow load times, visitors would leave before engaging with the site leading to little to no conversions.
Slow load times were hurting 3Win’s Google rankings and increased bounce rates exponentially. Google now expects every website that wants to rank to have their website built properly with an amazing customer experience.
Over 47% of users expect a website page to load in two seconds or less. Even worse, over 40% of users won’t wait more than three seconds before leaving the site. Everything is customer-centric and to win in a competitive market, you must focus on the customer and not the competition.
The Solution – How 3Win Corp Grew 2000% in 2018
Custom UI/UX Design and Development
3Win Corp knew they needed a higher converting website and reached out to a couple of agencies, but the others didn’t play the part of what they were looking for. 3Win Corp stated, “When we reached out to Avintiv Media, we knew it was a no brainer with how professional you guys are and the experience you gave.”
Brand awareness and consistency built into the user interface and experience
Mobile-first and device responsive design
Conversion focused on engaging CTA’s built with clarity and consistency
Easy navigability, mobile-friendly and clean functionality
Built each page with on-page SEO enhancements
Website currently gets over a 92% rating with Google
“We get so many compliments on our website and brand, which gives more confidence to the employees and people that work with 3Win Corp.”
SEO Strategy and Implementation
We implemented SEO initiatives, strategies and campaigns focused on Google algorithms and visibility growth. 3Win Corp’s competition has invested heavily in SEO so there was a lot of catching up to do.
3Win Corp now has a convertible website and ranks on page 1 of Google for many of their targeted keywords.
3Win has experienced consistent growth and the ability to build out entirely new teams for customer service as a result of steady traffic flow and lead generation.
3Win Corp has experienced 8x growth in hiring employees since our campaign launch. In 2018, they increased 35% in sales, getting 8+ new leads per day, and their website traffic has gone up 2,000%.
As you can see, 3Win Corp experienced crazy amounts of growth in 2018. We can’t wait to share what we’re up to for 2019-2020 as it’s MUCH BIGGER!
If you’d like to see how Avintiv Media can help your brand become an industry dominator, reach out to us.
With the boom of the cannabis industry over the last couple of years, it’s no surprise that an easier go-to-market solution has emerged and is BOOMING. Cannabidiol (CBD) is the new craze and everyone wants in. Even if you already own a CBD brand, keep reading to learn how to start and market your CBD brand correctly.
Starting and marketing your CBD brand is not as easy of a task as it was two to three years ago. The market is extremely saturated and there are some extremely big players in the game now with unlimited funding. CBD is officially mainstream in the entrepreneur and investor world, which makes everyone want to join the bandwagon.
We’ve been waiting for our 80yr old grandparents to give us a call saying how they are launching a CBD brand. All jokes aside, it seems like everyone is wanting a piece of the pie. How big is the CBD pie?
What is CBD?
Before we dive into how big the CBD market is, we want those of you that don’t know what CBD is.
CBD is short for Cannabidiol. CBD is one of over 100 known compounds found in the cannabis Sativa plant. This compound is found in both THC-rich strains of marijuana and also hemp. These plants are both classified as cannabis but the difference is that hemp produces only small amounts of THC, which are less than 0.3%. The compound carries much higher amounts as CBD, which is non-psychoactive eliminating the “high” feeling that THC has.
How Big is the CBD Industry?
Before we dive into how to start and market your CBD brand, you need to know how big the industry as a whole is.
Brightfield states that the market for hemp-derived CBD products was around $591 million for 2018, and speculated to grow to $22-23 billion by 2022. Yes, that is a B for billion!
Below is a chart of the industry’s growth and future sales forecasting.
• 2014 – $108 million industry
• 2017 – $190 million industry
• 2018 – $591 million industry
• 2022 – $22 billion industry
Is CBD Legal?
Everyone wants to know, “Is CBD legal?” If you’re growing industrial hemp with the sole purpose of extracting high-quality CBD, that sole purpose is currently backed by the federal government. In December 2018, the 2018 farm bill was enacted. Among many of its other provisions, it removed hemp (not cannabis) from the list of prohibited substances. Hemp is now a legal agricultural commodity, and so are the products made from it.
Some individual states have taken a much different stance on this and have chosen to ban CBD products which is key for anyone who has an eCommerce CBD store. You can always see which states CBD is legal.
CBD is still available to purchase and consume across the majority of the United States and in most places products still appear to be available, although some cities have banned the sale of food containing CBD. “CBD cannot be lawfully added to food or be labeled a dietary supplement,” was stated by the FDA with their public hearing on May 31st, 2019.
How much THC can your CBD have to be Legal?
Hemp and certain forms of CBD are federally legal, but you need to understand what aspects to look for when purchasing a CBD product. Many CBD brands that start decide to work with white-label CBD manufacturers because they don’t have the necessary capital to go to some of the larger manufacturing companies. Do your homework before deciding to work with a white-label manufacturer.
For CBD to be considered legal, the industrial hemp must contain .03% or less of THC. Any more and the plant is classified as marijuana and has many different laws that will drastically affect you and your customers.
There is still much confusion between CBD vs THC, which leaves a lot of questions for the general public. Federal agencies have started enforcing 0.3% or less THC policy much harder, which will keep the public much more well informed and safe.
Start Your CBD Brand
After reading the above information, you now realize how much work you have in front of you. At Avintiv, we are very data and research-driven. Everything we’ve done with building and scaling over 200 successful brands, starts with research and strategy.
This information will help new start-up CBD brands and CBD brands that have hit a plateau. We highly recommend building a brief business plan or investor pitch deck that you can use as a roadmap towards success.
CBD Business Plan
Writing a business plan is a good idea even if you never plan on getting a loan from a bank or bringing on investors. You are able to use this business plan as a road map and allows you to benchmark your progress to see how on or off track you are. We won’t go over all aspects of a business plan today. We will point out the key factors to focus on.
Market Analysis – The market analysis will give you a break down of the CBD market, what segments there are, and what type of consumers your company will be marketing to.
Competitive Analysis – You must research and present a clear comparison of your business to your direct and indirect competitors. You need to know your strengths and weaknesses between your business and the competition.
Products and Services – What type of CBD products will your brand carry? Are you launching CBD oil, edibles, topicals, cosmetics or vapes? What will differentiate you from the competition?
Marketing Plan – Your marketing budget must clearly explain how you’re going to reach your ideal customers to hit your sales forecasts. You must clearly define how it’s going to be done and what your marketing budget is.
Sales Strategy – This portion of your business plan explains how you’re going to be selling your CBD. Are you only selling on your eCommerce website or do you have national CBD wholesalers or retail accounts?
Funding – From personal experience, Avintiv Media is currently growing many CBD brands, and the average monthly marketing budget is $10,000 – $20,000. You need to list out how you are going to fund your CBD brand. Whether that’s personal cash infusion by the owner or going for funding.
Sales Forecasts – You must create a realistic sales benchmark of what your business can do in sales over the next 3-5 years. Break the first year down to monthly sales goals and then do years 2-5 by year. This will help you determine if you’re on or off track from your goals.
Grow and Market Your CBD Brand
Growing your CBD brand in 2019-2020 is going to be much harder than it was years ago. The market is flooded with new CBD brands every single day, so what is going to set you apart from the competition? We’re going to go over how we’ve been able to grow our CBD clients.
Branding for Your CBD Brand
Branding is and will be one of the most important aspects of your CBD brand. This part is often overlooked as many business owners want to rush to market. They care more about Instagram, influencer marketing, and getting sales. Don’t fall victim to this or you won’t stand a chance with how competitive the CBD market is right now.
Company Naming
A lot of business owners pick a company name that they like for some reason and it never becomes a massive company because the owner was thinking about themselves versus the customer. When picking a company name, ask yourself these questions:
Can I build a $100 million brand with this type of name?
Will customers know exactly what we do when they hear the name?
Does this name clash or interfere with any other CBD brand? (hire a lawyer for this)
Is this a name that our company can build a community or tribe of customers around?
Logo and Brand Styleguide
Developing a logo and brand style guide is much more in-depth as this but for this article’s purposes, we are going to go in order with how our creative team decides on branding direction for our CBD clients.
What is this brand’s ideal target market (customers)?
What type of color scheme is this market used to?
What are other major brands these customers buy from?
What does our brand want to look like? Create a storyboard of brands, colors, and styles your company represents.
What does our brand not want to look like? Create a storyboard of brands, colors, and styles that your company doesn’t want to represent.
Hire an agency or freelancer to help begin the logo sketch phase
Have them finalize 3 variations of logos to choose from (black and white – no color)
Choose the top logo direction
The agency or freelancer will then take your market research and decide on the 3 top color schemes to go with
They will then present your main logo in 3 different color options to go with
Once that is completed, the agency or freelancer should create your brand style guide so everything you do moving forward matches your branding 100%
We won’t go into detail on how to develop your CBD product design or packaging as there are far too many steps to list in this article. Just know that this is by far one of the most important aspects of where your money should be going. If you want to win in the CBD game, it’s going to be the companies that products look better, feel better, and gives the customer a far greater experience.
Here are some examples of recent products we’ve designed in the CBD market.
Marketing Your CBD Brand
SEO
Anyone who’s been in the Cannabis or CBD industry knows the trouble everyone has run into with properly being able to advertise or market their brand. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is by far going to be one of the best investments you can make for your marketing plan.
You will want to have an agency that are experts at SEO as the CBD market is a completely different ball game when it comes to SEO versus many other industries.
Just like SEO, content creation for the CBD industry is extremely important. For one, not everyone knows what CBD is just yet and people are wanting to learn more about CBD before investing in it.
Writing content around your ideal customers and your keywords that were chosen from your SEO strategy will help you choose what articles to write.
If you’re a CBD brand, you should be launching 2-4 blogs per week of at least 750 words. Below are things to make sure you do:
Install Yoast SEO for WordPress
Make sure your blog has an A+ readability score
Add in your keywords throughout the blog
Carefully choose what your Meta Title should be
Carefully choose what your Meta Description should be
Make sure your slug is done correctly
Make sure you internally link 2-4 times throughout your blog
Make sure you link external sites 1-2 times throughout your blog
Social Media
Social media has been the craze over the last 5-10 years but it has gotten extremely pricey to play on the advertising end of social media. For today’s purposes, we’re going to focus on posting organically on Instagram with 0 paid ads.
Tips for social media content:
Thinking of your ideal customers, decide on what types of pictures or posts they will want to see
Think of the verbiage or messaging your ideal customers will want to see
Create a grid mockup over posts that all flow well with each other from an aesthetic standpoint (See below)
Use a social media scheduler like Hootsuite to preschedule all of your future posts
Make sure to engage with everyone that DM’s you or comments on your posts
Example of Instagram Grid that we did for our client, Goat Grass CBD.
Advertising
As Facebook and Google start to loosen up with CBD advertising, there are still other ways to advertise your CBD brand.
A number of our CBD clients hire Avintiv to run retargeting ads for their online CBD stores. Below is just one of the options that’s available to advertise for the CBD industry.
Avintiv has access to a private display network that uses artificial intelligence to
aggressively optimize for click-through rate and conversion using a number of different
data signals that generate excellent results. On average our CTRs range from 1-3%
and up to as high as 8% (No this is not a typo). We offer this in the form of standard
display advertising, site retargeting or a blend depending on how much traffic the site
has.
We can run as many creatives as you like and can track conversions from the campaign as well.
This is helpful for tracking ROI.
Below are some examples of display advertising creatives that we’ve created.
In Conclusion
As you’ve read through our article, we hope you’ve learned how to start and grow your CBD. As you can see, there is a lot of information that you need to know before launching and growing your CBD brand. The days of quickly getting to market and making a million dollars are long gone.
If you’re interested in seeing how Avintiv Media can assist you with growth, feel free to reach out to us on our contact page.
