To boost your website's conversion rate, you may have considered various strategies to improve user experience and increase customer engagement. One such strategy is product seeding, which involves giving away a company's products to influential individuals or organisations in the hope that they will promote the product to your target audience.
Here are five reasons why you should implement product seeding to your influencer marketing strategy to boost your CRO (Conversion Rate Optimisation):
1. Increase visibility and brand awareness
Product seeding is a powerful marketing tactic that helps to increase visibility and brand awareness for a product or service. Putting your product/service in the hands of important influencers, bloggers, or social media stars can give you more reach and get significant attention for your business.
Product seeding allows you to demonstrate your product in actual conditions, allowing potential customers to observe how it would fit into their daily lives. It can be especially effective for products that are difficult to demonstrate through traditional marketing channels, such as beauty products, fashion accessories, or home decor items. For example, Maybelline frequently sends sample sizes of its products to influencers and bloggers for them to try and review. This creates buzz and interest in the brand.
Moreover, product seeding can help generate positive word-of-mouth marketing for your brand. When influencers or bloggers share their experiences with your product, their followers are likelier to view your brand as trustworthy and credible and to talk about it with their peers. This kind of word-of-mouth marketing can be powerful in spreading awareness of your product and making it more visible. It can lead to more people discovering your product and potentially becoming customers.
Adobe used product seeding by providing their latest software and tools to graphic designers and influencers to use and promote on their social media platforms. By targeting this type of influencer, the brand reached its target audience and increased word of mouth tenfold.
2. Improve credibility and trust
Product seeding is essential to build credibility and trust, which are necessary for a successful CRO. Placing your product with influencers, customers, and prospects gives proof of its value and quality, resulting in greater trust with your target market.
Here are some critical ways that product seeding can help to improve credibility and trust:
- Third-party endorsements - Product seeding can help secure third-party approvals from reputable sources such as industry experts, publications, and review websites. These endorsements provide objective validation of your product's quality, can help to build trust with potential customers and are crucial for your product marketing strategy. For instance, Patagonia used product seeding by providing outdoor adventurers and influencers with their latest clothing and gear to use on their adventures and share on social media.
- Demonstrations and reviews - Product seeding can allow potential customers to see your product in action and hear about its features and benefits from people who have already tried it. Nike used product seeding by providing sports teams with their latest sports apparel and equipment to wear and use during games and practices. It helps build trust and credibility by providing tangible evidence of the product's performance and value. Product seeding also gives you customer comments on your product's usefulness and value, which build trust and confidence.
- Hands-on experience - Finally, product seeding allows potential customers to try your product for themselves, providing them with a hands-on experience that can help to build trust and credibility. By allowing potential customers to test your product, you can give them the confidence they need to make a purchase decision. Revlon regularly sends sample sizes of their products to customers who have signed up for their email list or participated in promotions. This allows customers to try the products before making a full purchase.
3. Boost engagement and social proof
When you give away free product samples, you allow people to try them out for themselves without making a purchase. It can be incredibly compelling for potential customers, as it will enable them to see the value of your product firsthand. As a result, they are more likely to engage with your brand and share their experience with their friends and followers on social media.
Additionally, product seeding can help to increase social proof for your product. When influencers or key individuals try your product and share their positive experiences with their followers, it can help build trust and credibility for your brand. Influencers with a large, active fanbase can help increase the worth of your product in the eyes of potential buyers.
Overall, product seeding is an essential strategy for boosting your CRO because it can help to increase engagement and social proof for your product. By giving away free samples and leveraging the power of influencers and social media, you can create buzz and interest in your product, ultimately driving more conversions and sales.
💙 Bigblue Tip: Dermalogica uses Bigblue for their product seeding strategy
Dermalogica uses Bigblue’s gift-App feature to offer free products to their client’s orders. How does it work? Dermalogica can either establish conditions to add gifts (promo codes, purchase amount) or launch seasonal marketing campaigns to automatically offer a gift to each order on a given period.
👉 Discover Dermalogica’s success story
4. Grow sales and revenue
One of the primary goals of product seeding is to increase sales and revenue for your business.
By placing your products in front of potential customers, you can showcase your brand and its offerings more engagingly and compellingly. It can drive traffic to your website and increase sales, ultimately leading to increased revenue for your business.
Another benefit of product seeding is that it can create a sense of exclusivity and scarcity. When people see that a product is only available to a select group of individuals, they may be more likely to want to try it for themselves. It can help drive interest and demand for the product, ultimately leading to increased sales and revenue.
5. Increase customer loyalty and retention
In addition to increasing sales and revenue, product seeding can also help to increase customer loyalty and retention.
Collaborating with bloggers/influencers with dedicated supporters allows you to gain access to their fanbase and interact with prospective customers genuinely and dynamically. It can help build trust and loyalty with potential customers, leading to increased customer retention and loyalty for your business.
If you offer subscriptions, you could give your products to influencers or bloggers with a big following in your target market. It can increase brand exposure and drive traffic to your website, ultimately leading to more sales and increased customer loyalty and retention for your business.
Moreover, allowing customers to try the product before committing to purchasing it can build trust and confidence in your brand. Receiving a free sample can also create a positive emotional connection among the customers, leading to increased brand loyalty.
In conclusion, product seeding is essential for leveraging your CRO strategy as it helps to increase brand awareness, drive traffic to your website, and generate positive word-of-mouth. Giving your product to influencers and experts to try and review allows access to their networks. It provides valuable input that can help enhance your product and promote it more effectively.
In 2021, Lululemon and Glossier successfully leveraged the power of product seeding by asking fitness influencers and beauty bloggers to advertise their activewear and skincare products on their respective social media channels. Implementing a product seeding strategy can take your CRO to the next level and improve the success of your brand.
💙 Bigblue Tip: Check out the [Playbook] Product Seeding: The Key to Becoming an 8-figure Brand with Influencer Marketing for more details on using product seeding to boost your sales!