How Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez Took Hawkers to The Subsequent Degree of Profitability By way of Social Media

How Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez Took Hawkers to The Subsequent Degree of Profitability By way of Social Media

Many individuals know of Hawkers, the trendy, tremendous cool sun shades which have made their mark on the trade. What many don’t know is how various the advertising for these sun shades was and the way progressive its lead investor wanted to be to take a small-scale idea and switch it into a worldwide effort. Extra so, he did it utilizing social media advertising as the primary advertising instrument, lengthy earlier than different firms have been capitalizing on this market.

A Historical past of Hawkers 

In 2012, 4 younger Spanish entrepreneurs had an concept to make use of a second-hand, buy-and-sell web site to promote merchandise. The 4 labored exhausting at their enterprise, placing all of their cash into it. Nonetheless, 18 months later, that they had solely bought 50 pairs. Over the subsequent few months, they’d work to develop web sites for purchasers promoting instantly by way of eCommerce, which helped them understand simply how essential on-line gross sales have been. Doing this, together with publicity to Knockaround sun shades, a California model that grew due to social media affect, helped to push them within the path of promoting sun shades. 

How does a bunch of entrepreneurs flip an preliminary $300 right into a $78 million sunglass empire in nearly two years? Think about the work Alejandro Betancourt Lopez provided the corporate.

How Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez Remodeled Hawkers

Advertising and marketing is all the time a giant a part of any product launch, however for Hawkers, the aim was to get individuals curious about these sun shades not due to large model recognition like different firms provided however relatively as a result of social advertising. Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez took an curiosity within the firm and helped fund it. With that funding and a few steerage, the corporate shortly grew to become a success.

How Social Media Created Hawker’s Success

After buying 27 pairs of Knockaround sun shades for $300, the group of 4 entrepreneurs designed to resell them for a revenue and located quick success. They continued the method. This time, they used Fb adverts as a instrument to assist them to construct some recognition for his or her merchandise. They didn’t simply promote their sun shades by way of these adverts, although.

Fairly, they used Fb adverts to draw influencers to their model. They recreation every influencer just a few sun shades at no cost in trade for just a few Fb posts the place they’d put on the sun shades. 

Inside six months, the group had turn out to be official distributors in Spain due to their success. At this level, the group was nonetheless utilizing the Knockaround model, not their very own. They determined to half methods with that model and launched Hawkers as a substitute. 

In late 2013, they launched a Shopify retailer with a brand new product that they had manufactured in China particularly for his or her wants. They adopted the identical social media advertising technique and relied closely on aggressive word-of-mouth advertising. 

With early investments from Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez, they have been in a position to proceed to push their product ahead and obtained extra of their sun shades within the palms of worldwide influencers. These influencers continued to speak about, put on, and in any other case have interaction with the model, making Hawkers internationally recognized shortly. 

Over time, they moved away from providing their merchandise to only any influencers and commenced concentrating on influencers that have been almost certainly a goal buyer. They targeted closely on influencers inside their buyer base to create extra traction for his or her merchandise. The extra various their buyer base, the higher. 

Social media allowed Hawkers to achieve traction shortly. Whereas different sunglass firms might have been round for many years and labored exhausting to construct their model by way of a historical past of making excessive trend and high-end merchandise, Hawkers went proper to their almost certainly prospects, discovered the influencers they thought may present the perfect general outcomes, and created success.

Gross sales From Social Media Are Pure Success

With the funding from Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez, Hawkers was in a position to enhance its attain on social media, the place it had unimaginable success. In 2016, the corporate bought about $70 million price of sun shades. Of these, a formidable 90 p.c of their gross sales got here instantly from social media purchases. 

They then pushed their efforts to the subsequent stage with the launch of the Campus Consultant Program. This program introduced collectively some 5,000 faculty college students. They labored as model ambassadors for Hawkers. Utilizing the identical social media advertising success that they had utilized to this college-based buyer group, Hawkers was in a position to encourage an enormous uptick of their gross sales and general model attain. College students wore their sun shades to events, round campus, and on their social media accounts. 

Why Did Hawkers Have That Form of Success?

There are quite a few explanation why Hawkers was in a position to thrive by way of the social media market. First, it had very particular targets when it launched its merchandise. In contrast to its competitors, it saved its product price low – at round $30 to $40 for a pair of designer sun shades, far under the competitors concentrating on the identical viewers at round $200 or extra for a pair.

The associated fee didn’t influence the standard, although. Many occasions, social influencers helped to spur the gross sales of the corporate’s merchandise based mostly on the standard they provided. They regarded, felt, and have been true designer merchandise. 

Along with this, Hawkers acquired important funding by way of Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez. With that funding, and with a few of his steerage and path in advertising on social media, the corporate had the price range to succeed in quite a few influencers and the cash to provide sufficient sun shades to satisfy client wants. 

The place is Hawkers Now?

There are quite a lot of modifications taking place at Hawkers to assist additional develop the corporate. In 2021, the corporate launched the restricted H20 sunglass line. This line helped the corporate to concentrate on its aim of being environmentally pleasant. The brand new market marketing campaign goals to showcase that the corporate’s merchandise are constituted of recycled and biodegradable supplies. Extra so, their line of merchandise now comes with 100% sustainable packaging. 

For firms in search of a method to launch and overcome the large model shadows which might be exhausting to step round, social media advertising could possibly be a core part of the method.