Can crowdfunding work for confectionery?

Candy Kittens is the latest confectionery company to set up a crowdfunding campaign in a bid to raise £300,000 to pay for an above-the-line marketing campaign, helping it to grow to £2.5million by 2017. Launched in November and running until March, the company is using Seedrs as its online platform. Not a new idea, but a rather interesting idea, Hotel Chocolat is possibly the best know confectionery company to harness the idea of crowdfunding.

But take to one of the 500+ crowdfunding platforms now online and you’ll see a huge collection of campaigns competing for attention. We took a peek at crowdfunder.co.uk and identified 1,144 food and drink projects – many of which related to confectionery. Is this going to become the savvy way to build your business or will it not stand the test of time?

Interestingly, the very first crowdfunding project to make use of the internet was set up by rock band, Marillion in 1997. They could not afford the $60,000 cost of their tour and managed to raise it from lots of willing Americans, prepared to pay their bit online. 19 years later and the creative method to find funds has grown legs and become a significant business in itself.

So if you’re wondering about setting up your own crowdfunding project – perhaps you want to build your confectionery brand or expand your confectionery retail business – how should you go about it? Here’s a few key considerations before you go any further:

1.     Know who your audience might be. Key crowdfunding participants include those aged 24 to 35, men and high income earners. If this fits with your plan, you might be lucky. If it doesn’t, you might be less successful with this route.
 

2.     Know your brand. It might sound silly but many people don’t. What does it stand for? What are its USPs? What is it not? If you need some help to develop this, now would be a good time to do that.

3.     Ensure that you have a good story. People buy into stories, so make sure that you can tell yours well. Again, if you need help with the copywriting, please do so. Get passionate and emotive so that you get your target audience on board.
 
4.     See what others are doing. There are no end of examples to view online, so take some time to see what works for you and what doesn’t. Also understand who you might be competing with in the same time-frame.

5.     Do a pre-launch and get talking early. Don’t simply rely on a crowdfunding platform. Use your own marketing strengths to communicate with your target audience. This might be your customers via email or even in person (if a confectionery shop for example), or perhaps your social media network. Consider PR in your local area.

6.     If it doesn’t work first time, try again. Don’t give up, it might have been bad timing or you might have got the message or target audience a bit out of kilter. Review your results, seek some advice and try again.

So we leave you with (hopefully) a thought provoking idea to raise the funds you might be after. It might not work for everyone, but looking at the growth in the market and the companies giving it a try, perhaps you ought to take a closer look at crowdfunding too?

www.sweetretailing.co.uk
 

Growing online sales

A recent report by Clavis Insight, a leading ecommerce insights company, suggests that online confectionery sales in the UK are currently growing at 30% year on year; far more than offline sales.

The report states that the UK online grocery market is worth £8bn, growing at 20% year on year, whilst UK online confectionery is worth £100m. Online purchases for the take home market are key to the growth in UK confectionery sales online.

This makes interesting reading for any confectionery retailer in the UK, whether large or small. The factors around an online and an offline purchase are very different and therefore those that find success offline will not automatically replicate it online. Consider firstly, the offline confectionery purchase. A big colourful display of different products, often at the point of purchase. The shopper might not consider buying any confectionery until they are faced with the display. They can look at and touch the products in order to make their decision and consume their confectionery immediately upon purchase.

In contrast, an online confectionery purchase cannot be particularly impulsive; it’s a more considered thing, looking at each product in turn, making a careful choice based on need and budget, knowing that delivery is required. Clavis Insight suggests that more premium brands and larger products (as oppose to single serves) perform best online.

Three things are extremely important to help consumers successfully buy more confectionery online. Firstly, they have to find it! We’re not writing an SEO article here and so we’ll just mention the importance of such activity and the challenge of ranking highly on Google. Online directories such as our very own UK confectionery suppliers directory can pay dividends too. Secondly, images are key. They cannot see the confectionery and hold it in their hands so they need great images, quite possibly of the front and the back of the pack. Thirdly, product information is essential. Optimising the product name is important (also for search) but consider also the product description (does it showcase the product at its best?) and product information such as dimensions, ingredients and nutritional information.

Selling confectionery online is without doubt, a fantastic opportunity for smaller confectionery brands wishing to reach a larger audience. Present yourself with the above considerations in mind and there is little reason why you could not grasp some of that 30% growth for your own business.

www.sweetretailing.co.uk