Guides for BrandsPunoList Building, Analyze

List Building For eCommerce Brands

Guides for BrandsPunoList Building, Analyze
List Building For eCommerce Brands

Guides for Brands

List Building For eCommerce Brands

Every seasoned marketer has a solid list, no matter what the industry is. If you're marketing on Instagram, you need to get social, and that starts with figuring out who to reach out to. Surprise, it's not all content! Imagine if someone had a list of 10,000 brands, competitors, and influencers that were hand-picked for your brand? You would probably pay some money for that list because you understand how much time it takes to build it. Start organizing all of those gems you come across so that your future self and future team will thank you later.

Lists on PeopleMap

Whether you are looking for photographers to shoot your content, influencers to seed your product to, or editors of publications for PR purposes, List Building is a great way to keep all of those people in one place. That's why we built PeopleMap! We would spend hours manually browsing the Instagram app and loading up our phone with screenshots or entering them in a spreadsheet that would quickly get outdated. Honestly, the desktop is So. Much. Faster. Mouse and keyboard FTW!

 

1. set yourself up for success

Find Product Photographers for e-Commerce Brands

E-commerce brands must have great product photography. This is the first impression you are making with potential customers and it can make or break getting that press mention. If the editor you're pitching can't "see" how your product would look in their magazine, blog, or website, then they'll pass. Make sure that you have an asset library of studio, lifestyle, and editorial product shots. See our list example below of finding top product photographers using PeopleMap.

  1. Think about which media platform or magazine you would love to see your product in (eg, @sightunseen, @thedieline, @byrdiebeauty, @designmilk). If you're looking for lifestyle photography, think about the influencer you would love to see using it.

  2. Add all of those accounts to a list called Press or Influencers and analyze each of them.

  3. When your analysis is ready, search for photo and set Min. Followers to 0. Follower count doesn't matter when it comes to shooting content for your site.

  4. Start adding your finds to a list called Product Photographers.

  5. Next, create an outreach funnel using lists (similar to what we did in the Buyers example):

    • Photographers 1 Pitch

    • Photographers 2 Pitched

    • Photographers 3 In Talks

    • Photographers 4 Confirmed

  6. Move photographers between lists based on where they are in the funnel. It's okay to have multiple convos at once until you both land on a budget and mood board. And maybe, just maybe, once you land on a photographer you like, who knows, you might be together forever. In a professional sense, of course.

 

2. get a few press mentions

Find PR / Editors of Magazines

If you're looking for some juicy, wholesome PR for your brand (who isn't!), it's all about that rolodex. Make sure your product photography matches the aesthetic of the publication or platform, otherwise your chances of getting featured are low. 

  1. If your goal in life is to get in to Vogue, first add Vogue to a Dream Publications list. Analyze Vogue.

  2. We all know Anna Wintour is the editor-in-chief of Vogue, so it could be fruitful to Analyze her as well.

  3. In the analysis results, search for editor. You'll see editors from their own fashion blogs and editors from different publications who interact with Vogue a lot.

    For example, when we did this search, the first result that popped up with no other pre-requisites than "editor" in their bio, was a Nigerian based fashion consultant/editor. The second was an editorial street style photographer based in New York. The third? A fashion editor at Vogue who also happens to have her own shoe line. There's some good variety in here. Add any editors who align with your brand to a list of editors you want to reach out to.

    Tip: By analyzing Vogue, we were able to almost immediately find an editor who works there. If we wanted to find more targeted "editors", we would analyze someone like Tabitha Simmons and search for "Vogue" in her analysis results. This is one way to hone your results a little more.

  4. Next, create an outreach funnel stream using lists (similar to what we did in the Buyers example):

    • Editors 1 Pitch

    • Editors 2 Pitched

    • Editors 3 In Talks

    • Editors 4 Sent Product

    • Editors 5 Featured

  5. Move editors between lists based on where they are in the funnel.

 

3. get your product out there

Find Boutiques, Stores, Shops for Wholesale

When you have a limited product range and you don't have enough inventory for a retail space, wholesale can get your product(s) in front of new customers. For this example, we'll use on of our favorite places to find indie designers: Garmentory. It's essentially a directory that lists Indie boutiques and emerging designers to help get products from their racks into your closet.  We'll walk you through how to find stores and how to organize your pitch funnels.

  1. Go to Search and type in garmentory. Click the profile pic to open the profile detail panel, then click Analyze.

  2. In the analysis results, first search for online. Set Followers: low to 0 and sort by Engagement: High. Click Filter.

  3. You'll see accounts that have an "online" shop in their Bio. Immediately, we see an eco-luxury brand, a clothing label focused on sustainable pieces and shops/boutiques that have an online component to them. There's a lot of great variety, even in the first five accounts!

    Tip: You should also search for keywords like retail, appointment, sales, local, goods, store, visit, clothing, boutique, designers, handcrafted. This is a great way to explore different types of accounts.

  4. Next, create an outreach funnel stream using lists (similar to what we did in the Buyers example):

    • Shops 1 Pitch

    • Shops 2 Pitched

    • Shops 3 In Talks

    • Shops 4 Testing Product

    • Shops 5 Deal Terms Finalized

  5. Move shops between lists based on where they are in the funnel.

 

or... 

Find Buyers

Another way to get into stores is by finding the gate keepers of those coveted shelves. 

  1. Create a list of retailers that you want to carry your brand. Let's say you're looking to get in to Target. Search for Target's Instagram account on PeopleMap and add it to your Retailers list.

  2. Then, click Analyze.

  3. When your analysis is ready, search for buyer in the analysis results. You can filter by engagement or number of followers, but those things don't really matter when you're looking for people that aren't trying to promote their Instagram accounts.

  4. Scroll through the results and click on promising ones to verify that they are buyers. Then add each match to a Buyers list.

  5. Once you have a good list of buyers going, create an outreach funnel using Lists. Outreach funnels separate people into easily manageable work streams. For example:

    • Buyers 1 Leads

    • Buyers 2 Emailed

    • Buyers 3 In Talks

    • Buyers 4 Confirmed

    • Buyers 5 Denied
      Tip: The same person can be added to multiple lists. And you can easily move different users to different lists within the outreach funnel by deselecting and selecting the list you want them added to.

  6. Utilize the notes section like you would in a CRM. This way you and your team will be on the same page. You can write something like "Target Buyer, Left Target Dec 2017. She said she will introduce us to the new buyer in a few weeks."