Sales results from getting 3M views on YouTube
candyjapan.com
candyjapan.com
40 USD gets you a shoebox of stuff with the same day dispatch and 2 day air delivery to EU. It's a lot of items and we have leftovers for weeks. It also tends to take the novelty edge off for a while, so boxes this big can't be a monthly thing.
For this to work as a monthly subscription, the package size needs to be much smaller, which is what CandyJapan seems to be offering, but then they want 29 USD per month and that's just way too much.
From where I'm sitting, their problem is that it's expensive and it is a subscription. This limits their their target audience to true Japanese candy conneseurs willing to pay twice the market rate for... what exactly?
That's not even getting into the existence of local Japanese (and Chinese!) shops that carry similar inventory, and where 20-30 USD will easily cover a month worth of supply of weird stuff.
Many people are interested in trying out Japanese candy, the issue arises in knowing where to order from and what to order. Getting a subscription service to CandyJapan offloads the choosing to a credible service.
In addition to that, there's also the appeal of the surprise. Of course, this is of no benefit to you - you're simply buying this for other people. For people ordering this for themselves, however, it's kind of like being gifted something every month, an always welcome surprise.
Here is a blog post from Candy Japan from 2 days ago, about experimenting with youtube giveaways: http://www.candyjapan.com/youtube-marketing-horror-story
0 sales.
Given it would be close to impossible to notice a lift from that viewership, I'd suggest this 'test' failed more from being too small.
Edit: removed redundant word.
It seems like instagram influencers and facebook ads are working out better for them.
(Candy Japan is making 10x less in comparison: https://www.indiehackers.com/interview/candy-japan-81315f627...)
1) No direct link means no one is actually googling for your page. People are lazy. Without a direct link, they won't go out of their way to google your website.
2) If you're able to retarget the video, this is how I would use it: Retarget anyone who watched the entire video with more YouTube Ads, Google Display network ads, etc... Send it to an optimized landing page that sells an ENTRY LEVEL box (like $9/month) and upsells to a much bigger subscription "Candy fiend" or some such for like $49/month. If people don't buy that, DOWNsell to a $19/month subscription.
In general people underestimate the value of BIG, BRIGHT COLORED buttons, mobile optimized landing pages with the buttons above the fold, upsells, downsells, "Squeeze pages" (enter your e-mail, get free stuff) so you can do e-mail marketing, etc...
Marketing is not a hit and run. Once in a great while you might post 1 thing in 1 place and it will magically make tons of money, but that isn't the norm. Most of the time Marketing is a tedious, boring thing that involves lots of micro-optimization, setting up retargeting, e-mail marketing, making more endless content to drive organic traffic, etc etc...
I think your product is more aimed at an audience of geek-adult otaku than a market of children interested in reviews of candy (so ordinary products that you can buy at the supermarket).
In my opinion a strategy that would bring results is to do cross-marketing with similar niche sectors (manga lovers, otaku geek, japan lovers, animé fans, etc.). In my experience the japan culture lover is willing to spend constantly in this type of products.
An idea could be to diversify the product (eg including Japanese magazines, gadgets, or other). So make more expensive packages and cheaper packages for different market segments.
Sorry for my english :)
I wonder if having a direct link would have helped. Odd the video creator didn’t do that.
Is this some geoblocking nonsense, or has it just been forgotten?
https://screenshotscdn.firefoxusercontent.com/images/4421736...
Here's the video link I used https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSCgXVkYQcA