📦 – Beards, They Kinda Grow on You

DTC 199 – How DTC powerhouse Beardbrand tackles SEO [DTC]( Banter Monday, July 4, 2022 The ambition is there! 😂 In this newsletter, you’ll find: 👇 📦 A farewell to “more is better” in your ad creative 📦 Ending the game of influencer broken telephone with Aspire 📦 How DTC powerhouse Beardbrand tackles SEO (ps. It’s easier than you think) 📦 A whole new way to think about digital retail with Reaktor Read till the end to access exclusive DTC swag. 😎 👉 If a pal forwarded this to you, [subscribe]( , so you never miss out. Creative Say Goodbye to ‘The More the Merrier” Ads are ads. Plain and simple. 👏 Scrollers know when they’re looking at one… so take the time they’ve given you and tell them why your product provides value Consumers are looking for information upfront. No searching and no reading between the lines. [TruEarth’s]( a pro at this. The ad above features: - A straightforward layout - A bold title that strikes an emotional response (laundry, right? 🙄) - A product image in its native setting and in use! Remember that a picture is worth a thousand words, souse them to your advantage. Showcase your product so that even people who scroll right past still get the gist! In simple ads, the less = the better. You don’t need to break the bank or empty the idea jar to create a winning ad. Drop a message to the [beasts of creative generation]( – they’ve got inspiration (and the metrics to back it) out the wazoo. 🚀 Sponsor The Worst Part of Influencer Marketing Does your influencer campaign feel like a game of broken telephone? ☎️ The endless back and forth can be painful and time-consuming. But with a good brief, your brand can offer influencers access to clear guidelines so they can create content that aligns perfectly with your brand's vision. Aspire has put together a go-to template to help you create the influencer brief that's essential to the success of your influencer marketing campaign. 👉 [Click here to end the game of influencer broken telephone.]( SEO Beardbrand SEO and Content Analysis Born on social media, [Beardbrand]( started in 2012 as a blog and YouTube channel. The goal? To encourage and inspire "beardsmen," gathering them into a community. Eric Bandholz, one of the founders, shared beard growth and grooming tips. Bandholz knew someday Beardband would develop an audience of loyal followers and customers. 👏 "Many people would doubt the potential of the company and call it a niche market with no room for growth (no pun intended). They would ask, 'what happens when this beard fad ends?' The simple answer to this question is; 'the shaving fad is ending now, and Beardbrand will be leading the charge,'" wrote Bandholz on the company's website. Over the last decade, the team has grown the business into a multi-million dollar DTC powerhouse. 👊 Behind every great brand is a highly thought-out social and content marketing plan to drive SEO performance. Borrow these ideas and apply them to your DTC brand too. 👇 🧐 Content marketing Content and SEO together are a form of inbound marketing. They seek to attract customers and forge trusting relationships with them. One of the very best ways to do this is with content that "helps." 👍 Helpful content creates reciprocity Sure, funny and entertaining content will attract its fair share of fans… but when a company's content helps a potential customer solve a problem or reach a goal, the company has earned a place in the customer's mind and wallet. The idea? Reciprocity. When someone gives you something of value *like helpful content* you feel obligated to give them something of value in return. People are simply inclined to return a favor or pay back a debt. For a DTC brand, this reciprocation is often a purchase. 🤑 🔎 Customers search for answers When looking to buy a product, you want to have all your concerns crossed off. People likely to convert will go looking for answers, so make sure you have them available! If someone wants to grow a nice beard or make their beard look better, Breadbrand is there to help. The company consistently shows up on the first page of Google search engine results pages (SERPs) for loads of keyword phrases directly related to the products it sells. Frequently these search queries are questions that need to be answered. ✨ Steal these tips: - Content and SEO work together to attract customers. Don't underestimate the value of your brand's blog. - Helpful content creates a sense of reciprocity that could drive sales. Do your best to ensure your brand's content is useful! - Customers search with questions or concerns, your content should provide the answer. 🥇 Social status If you’re looking for Breadbrand on socials, you’re going to find them (with no shortage of followers)! They currently have 7.2M likes on TikTok and 215K+ followers on Instagram. Now you may be thinking, beardcare is a pretty small category, right? Wrong. Beardbrand has 1.8M+ YouTube followers tuned in for all the tips and tricks they can get! Beardbrand's YouTube content is a key part of its SEO performance. Here are some factors to consider: 👇 Keep scrollin’. There’s more where this came from! Sponsor Still creating standard PDP's? It's time to level up to the Product Experience Page. Chances are, your Product Detail Pages are already optimized for conversion. But what if we told you that your customers are demanding more from their online shopping experience than an easy add-to-cart journey? Lucky for you we've got the solution: ✨ The Product Experience Page (aka The PXP) ✨ The PXP framework has been developed by Reaktor while working with some of the world's most innovative eCommerce retailers. It's been crafted over years of experimentation, and it's now been [distilled into a handy ebook]( so you can implement PXPs into your brand's online shopping experience. You'll learn: - The difference between online shopping and browsing that will change the way you think about eCommerce. - How to design a PXP that will raise your AOV and decrease bounce rates. - The secrets behind a product display framework that elevates your product and your brand. 👉 [Download the Product Experience Page guide and learn how to create next-gen PDPs your customers will love](. SEO – Part 2 🖥 YouTube search Don’t underestimate the power of YouTube. YouTube is the second most popular search engine after Google and attracts more than 1.7 billion unique monthly visitors, making it the second most visited site in the world. Once again, Breardbrand's useful content appears on the first page of the YouTube search engine for many important keyword phrases. 👀 YouTube is where the target audience is at Breadbrand's products are aimed at the fellows. How does this pertain to YouTube? YouTube has one of the highest percentages of male users among popular social media platforms. This means their SEO strategy on the platform is incredibly important! According to data from YouTube and the Pew Research Center, about 54% of active YouTube users are guys, and, in the U.S., more than 82% of adult men say they use the platform. 🎥 YouTube videos appear on Google SERPs too Did you know that YouTube videos also appear on Google SERPs? Beardbrand's YouTube content helps it rank even when people aren’t searching on YouTube! Admittedly, although this is one step removed from the company's Shopify store, it helps the company win the race to owning Google screen real estate! Their videos push competitors further down the results page and occupy top-of-mind awareness. Don’t feel left out if you’re a Bing user. We discovered that what works for Google SERPs and YouTube holds true on Bing too. ✨ Steal these tips: - Google is not the only search engine and optimizing for YouTube search helps Beardbrand win with its core audience. Your DTC brand can optimize on social search too. - YouTube content appears on SERPs. Beardbrand's useful videos appear right next to their blog posts in response to Google and Bing queries. Why not hog SERP real estate for your brand too? 🤷‍♂️ 🛠Technical SEO It’s all fun and games to have killer content, but if you don’t have your technical SEO in order, you might be missing a piece of the pie. Luckily for Beardbrand, they’ve got the whole pie to themselves. 🥧 Page speed is a strong signal for various search engines and most definitely for Google. Beardbrands site? Fast as lightning on desktop. The site was slightly slower on mobile but still very fast. Plus, it passes Google mobile-friendly site test. Finally, Beardbrand takes care of the basics/fundamentals of on-page SEO shown here with [Woorank](, an SEO browser extension tool. ✨ Steal these tips: - Sweat the small stuff. Whether it’s a title tag or a good description, build your brand's SEO success on a firm foundation. Your SEO plan should consist of more than just backlinks and keywords. Make sure your content helps searchers and is optimized to help you rank across multiple platforms. Having a fully built SEO plan is a surefire way to win. 💪 M&A 📍 [Pinterest]( CEO steps aside, as former Google Commerce Chief takes the reigns at the app. 💰 [Entrepreneur First]( raises $158M at a $560M valuation, adding Stripe’s Collison brothers to its list of backers. 🏀 NBA invests in celebrity-backed [kids’ social network Zigazoo]( . 🛒 Instacart and Walmart Canada launch [virtual convenience store]( . 💸 With $2.4M seed, [Zing Data]( wants to put data analysis in the palm of your hand. SHARE DTC NEWSLETTER 🔥 We think you’d look pretty dang cool carrying your things in this bag 🔥 Want to level up the marketing skills of your teammates and employees? Just grab your referral link below and you’ll earn points toward cool gear for every new subscriber you bring to the DTC fam. 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