The direct-to-consumer model of business is an effective one. It gives small and medium-sized organizations the ability to control the experience they offer customers by bypassing the need to work with wholesalers. They can collect their own customer data, maintain better margins, and offer lower prices.
While DTC brands have their benefits, there are also some drawbacks. One of those is finding a healthy path to growth without the support of a retailer’s larger distribution network.
Sparking growth with a DTC brand is a problem, but not an unsolvable one. There are resources available that can help a direct-to-consumer brand scale effectively. Here are a few resources that help these brands accelerate their growth while maintaining that direct lifeline to their customer base.
1. Profit-focused Marketing Agencies
With the rapid growth of direct-to-consumer brands, the same trend in DTC-focused agencies has followed suit. Most offer an all-inclusive expertise, focused on all things growth, but they oftentimes miss the mark in understanding true profit creation through channels like paid, email, SMS, and influencer. And they understand even less about how to tie it all together.
The biggest differentiator of a successful DTC is its focus on first-order profitability and retention techniques to increase lifetime value instead of promising unrealistic returns on ad spend or worse just focusing on top-line growth. Try to identify agencies, freelancers, or partners that understand all aspects of growing a DTC brand.
There’s no shortage of marketing agencies, each with their own expertise. One company might excel at social media marketing. Another could lean heavily on improving your onsite content. A third might invest heavily in SEO. These are all important pieces of the marketing puzzle. But they don’t work well in a vacuum.
For your consumer brand to excel, you must develop a holistic marketing strategy focused on your customers. When choosing a marketing agency, ask about their expertise and strategies. You might even request examples of their previously successful customer-centric campaigns.
For example, one often-overlooked way to prioritize your audience is to improve your website or app to include a clear and concise microcopy, which quickly gives them the information they need. Boomn, a direct-to-consumer growth accelerator, encourages the companies they partner with to craft their microcopy while prioritizing brevity, context, authenticity, and clarity. This ensures a smooth and straightforward navigation process for customers.
Remember that customer-focused marketing is not a one-time effort but an ongoing commitment, and collaboration is key. By selecting the right agency, you’ll be well on your way to building lasting relationships with your customers and driving business growth.
2. Data-driven Email Platforms
Zooming into the marketing process a bit, email is one of the most powerful forms of DTC marketing, in particular. It gives a brand a direct lifeline to an audience that has opted in to hear what they have to say. In addition, the intimacy of an email allows companies to make stronger pitches and include more robust CTAs.
One factor that can add synergy to each marketing email is personalization. The more you can tailor an email message to its intended recipient, the better you can align your brand’s message with their needs.
To accomplish this, you want to work with an email platform that makes it easy to integrate user data. MailChimp is a good example of this in action that many people are already familiar with.
The email platform utilizes segments, which it explains are used to create target audiences based on shared data. This allows brands to target emails based on up to five unique conditions, such as location or how they interact with your marketing.
As DTC brands look for ways to accelerate growth, they should seek to personalize their marketing. Cultivating an intimate, data-driven list of loyal email subscribers is a great place to start.
3. SaaS Spend Management Tools
While marketing is critical to growth, efficient internal operations are as well. Ranktracker concisely defines the importance of a SaaS spend management platform, explaining that it’s designed to enhance and simplify the processes related to procurement, spending, and expense management for SaaS applications.
The SEO manager adds that a good SaaS spend management platform can integrate with multiple areas of business. It can plug into your finances, your human resource information system, and even cybersecurity.
Once integrated into your system, a good Saas spend tool provides a detailed analysis of how your tech stack spending compares to its value. Your IT team can use this to improve the efficacy of each tool, and you can eliminate unnecessary spending, as well. This sets the stage for growth by avoiding waste and fueling efficiency.
There are multiple high-quality SaaS spend management platforms. CloudEagle is a top recommendation that offers a comprehensive suite of services, including app management, cost optimization, and even a user-friendly interface.
Regardless of your specific selection, it is wise for DTC brands to use this kind of tool to manage SaaS spending as it grows. It keeps things clean and stable in your tech stack and frees up resources as you go along.
Accelerating Growth as a DTC
Direct-to-consumer brands don’t have the luxury of riding on a retailer’s coattails to gain attention and widespread distribution. They must spark their own growth if they want to succeed.
Partnering with customer-focused marketing agencies, personalizing email marketing, and reducing SaaS spending are three unique and powerful ways to help your DTC brand gain momentum and scale its operations as you seek to expand your market share.
Featured image provided by Akil Mazumder; Pexels; Thanks!
