Eric Bandholz: Give our listeners a fast rundown of what you guys do.
Drew Fallon: Mad Rabbit is the web’s first direct-to-consumer tattoo skincare firm. Our firm gives an entire suite of skincare merchandise optimized for the tattooed group and geared toward serving to individuals’s ink keep as vibrant and recent for so long as potential. The thought is to supply options to merchandise made by massive corporations similar to Procter & Gamble and Unilever, that are formulated for the plenty and usually include elements dangerous to tattooed pores and skin.
We began in 2019, the identical yr my co-founders and I graduated from Miami College in Ohio. All of us had full-time jobs for about two years after graduating. We grew the enterprise as a facet hustle for the primary two and 1 / 4 years. We went from zero to three million with one product, one social channel, and one promoting route. Within the winter of 2021, we determined to go all in and do that full-time. The three of us are 25, so we’re comparatively younger. We’re early in our tattoo journeys, and so is our major buyer. Many are 25-30 years outdated and solely have a few tattoos. However as soon as of us get one, it may be addicting, and so they are inclined to get extra.
Bandholz: How do you develop a $3 million firm as a facet hustle?
Fallon: For one, my co-founder Selom nailed Instagram adverts, which is all we have been doing for promotion. Our first Google Advert was in 2021, the identical time we made our first Amazon sale. Selom did an unbelievable job of scaling the Fb adverts account. However in the end, I feel it got here all the way down to giving the market one thing individuals wanted that didn’t exist prior, a minimum of not in a brilliant accessible approach. The necessity was mirrored at scale and nonetheless exhibits within the firm’s development at the moment.
Bandholz: How did you guys determine to make the transition from a way of life model to a hyper-growth enterprise?
Fallon: Effectively, remember the fact that we have been worthwhile with out the wage expense of three workers. I haven’t gone again and accomplished the mathematics, however we in all probability would’ve been unprofitable had we needed to pay three individuals a dwelling wage. However the thought course of was that by the tip of 2020, we had simply completed filming on Shark Tank. We nonetheless didn’t know if it was going to air. We had accomplished a take care of Mark Cuban, which was nonetheless going via then. We ended up closing a $500,000 deal; Cuban is our largest investor now. He’s participated in subsequent financing rounds along with his Shark Tank notice.
We launched our soothing gel that January, which did effectively. Then we put up a sunscreen in March, which went berserk. We offered 10 thousand items in a matter of per week. At that time, we stated, “Okay, that is in all probability a reasonably particular alternative. And we have now two choices right here. Primary, we are able to preserve coasting, or we are able to pursue the last word of what we expect this may turn into.” We consider we’re constructing a model that’s the final authority in tattoos and goes approach past skincare. You’ll be able to have a worthwhile on-line way of life enterprise that makes cash or create an industry-leading model. However constructing a model is pricey. It requires loads of funding. We determined to blitz after it and confronted little or no competitors.
Bandholz: I assume that the majority of your clients are ladies, although the floor stage really feel is masculine.
Fallon: So it’s a superb gamble, and you might be proper, but it surely’s about 55-45. It was once extra males two years in the past, however our feminine viewers grew as we launched extra merchandise. Ladies have a tendency to purchase extra skincare merchandise. However at the moment, our branding is masculine. We’re going via a model refresh proper now. We’re going to do white packaging and a impartial really feel. It was the three of us for the primary couple of years, and we weren’t doing viewers segmentation or designing flows for various individuals.
When you consider tattoo tradition, it’s extremely numerous. My 18-year-old sister has three tattoos. So take into consideration any person like that who has a few tattoos, after which take into consideration the Harley Davidson motorbike rider with tattoos. There’s this huge spectrum. Cooks are actually into tattoos. Athletes are actually into tattoos. So, studying to talk to every section is a chance that we haven’t cracked.
Presently, we speak to nearly everybody as in the event that they have been the identical particular person. However we’re hiring individuals with the expertise and bandwidth to assist us flesh that out. You already know there are totally different buying cadences. A feminine will purchase the balm, then is extra inclined to take a look at the SPF two months later, whereas a person would possibly buy the lotion first after which need to strive the physique wash subsequent. There’s a lot low-hanging fruit for us in that regard.
Bandholz: How did you guys react to the iOS monitoring and privateness modifications?
Fallon: In April 2021, about 85% of our advertising and marketing spend was on Instagram adverts. When iOS hit, it was just like the prepare got here off the rails. We didn’t know what was occurring. Our gross sales mirrored not solely the iOS change however the provide chain scarcity and Amazon points. Quick ahead to 2022. We’re spending extra money on social than we ever have at higher advertising and marketing effectivity ratios. We did two huge issues to navigate via what was imagined to be the dying of DTC. First, we did an fairness for providers take care of Inked Journal, a digital media writer. They’ve about 60 million followers throughout their social media channels. They solely and aggressively promoted our model, merchandise, and our content material throughout their social channels to an viewers of 60 million individuals. In order that exploded the highest of the funnel for us.
The second factor that we did was TikTok. It’s not the first driver of our gross sales, however in the identical vein because the Inked Journal stuff, we have now TikTok movies with over 20 million views and 400,000 followers that we’ve gained within the final six months and have a large top-of-funnel impact.
With a whole bunch of tens of millions of views from TikTok and Inked Journal, our Fb began working once more. We scaled Fb once more in January, and we’ve been rising month over month. Fb now drives loads of our gross sales. You would possibly ask, how are you aware that? And get into the entire attribution state of affairs. Wanting on the advert textual content, the campaigns, and the return on property, all of it seems to be like crap. However so long as we are able to handle a sure a number of on promoting, that’s what we discover necessary. What we’ve ended up doing for attribution is we take every single day of promoting by channel and every single day of gross sales between Shopify and Amazon and do a easy linear regression in Excel. We will discern that Fb continues to be driving a ton of our gross sales, together with gross sales to Amazon. So, we did a few issues deliberately to explode the highest of the funnel, after which we began to have a look at attribution extra holistically.
Bandholz: The place can individuals comply with and assist you?
Fallon: You’ll be able to take a look at our web site and Amazon retailer or comply with Mad Rabbit on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Fb, Pinterest, or YouTube. Look out for us within the tattoo parlors coming quickly, too. We’re in a pair hundred of these proper now. I’m on Twitter and LinkedIn.
Selom Arbiter (Co-founder)
Oliver Zak (Co-Founder
Erin Murray (Model Advertising Govt)
Marc Zuzolo (DTC advertising and marketing)
Andrew F. COO
Sarah Perez (Social Media Supervisor)
Amy Turman (Digital Advertising Supervisor)
Noah A. (Group Supervisor)
Evan Folder (Designer)
Mark Cuban (Investor)
Garin Chadwick (Content material)
