Midday Squares, a CPG brand, disrupted the chocolate industry by focusing on authentic storytelling and building a strong community around its founders. This episode unveils their strategy for leveraging content, community, and unconventional influencer marketing to achieve rapid retail expansion and foster deep customer loyalty, offering a blueprint for brands aiming to scale while maintaining authentic connection.
Key takeaways
Cultivate an authentic brand story by
building in public
showing the good, bad, and ugly of your journey to foster deep emotional connections with consumers and investors.
Empower founders as brand influencers, transforming them into relatable figures whose personal stories and journeys resonate with customers, akin to a 'boy band' approach for your product.
Integrate influencer marketing by first establishing a compelling brand narrative; this makes it easier for external influencers to authentically amplify your message.
Prioritize direct-to-consumer (DTC) for customer loyalty and feedback, even when retail accounts for the majority of sales, to maintain brand control and connection.
Consider internal manufacturing to uphold product quality and uniqueness, especially when co-packers can't meet specific production needs, enabling rapid scaling and differentiation.
In this episode, we’ll be talking to Jake Karls, the co-founder of Mid-day Squares. Today will be talking about how telling a unique story assists Mid-day in building relatability with consumers and attracting the right influencers to work with. TIMESTAMPS
[01:01]: Getting Mid-day into 3000 stores.
[01:33]: Business split. (D2C/Retail)
[02:04]: Size of business.
[03:55]: Family dynamic in a business partnership.
[05:01]: Market penetration secret.
[07:10]: Building a brand in public.
[10:14]: Getting awareness for a brand.
[11:49]: Inbound vs outbound percentage.
[12:14]: Marketing budget spent on influencer.
[13:47]: Budget breakdown.
[15:09]: ROI of Influencer.
[15:59]: Tapping into affiliate marketing.
[17:24]: Driving traffic to stores through ads on Meta.
[18:10]: Scalability of customized photo strategy.
[19:40]: Influencer approval process.
[20:36]: Influencer marketing manager.
[21:31]: Advice to brands working with influencers.
[22:43]: Video customer service. Cody Wittick: Twitter
Taylor Lagace: Twitter
What does this episode say about influencer & creator?
building in public
What does this episode say about retail & omnichannel?
showing the good, bad, and ugly of your journey to foster deep emotional connections with consumers and investors.
What does this episode say about founder & leadership?
Empower founders as brand influencers, transforming them into relatable figures whose personal stories and journeys resonate with customers, akin to a 'boy band' approach for your product.
What does this episode say about brand & content?
Integrate influencer marketing by first establishing a compelling brand narrative; this makes it easier for external influencers to authentically amplify your message.
