Building Reputation: The Key to Successful Product Sales in Social Commerce

Do you consider yourself a builder? Are you planning to launch an NFT project, an analytics tool, or any kind of Web3 product? Or, let's put it this way: Do you plan to offer any products or services through your Twitter and other social networks?

Well, we're talking about social commerce here.

Honestly, I was one of those who often failed to give it the attention it deserves simply because this field is usually seen as sales through social networks. In these scenarios, you often imagine channels like an Instagram shop and similar ones, but in reality, it goes much deeper.

But lets see it, what the social commerce by the definition is:

So before we delve deeper into the practical aspects of what you can actually do on your channels (which will be covered in future newsletters), I want to point out the biggest mistake I see when talking with many project founders today.

How to sell something to your audience?

I spend a significant amount of time on Twitter every day, and I see many good ideas fail to be delivered because of the wrong market approach. Almost every project founder falls into the trap of doing things in the wrong way, and it usually goes like this:

Step 1: Launching the product

Step 2: Doing some branding

Step 3: Starting to build the community

What happens then is something I call the "slow drowning" scenario. You put significant energy into building and shaping your product (for the sake of this text, let's consider anything you want to convert as a product). Then you do some branding, mostly by defining the visual identity and creating promotional materials. Finally, you start approaching the community, hoping that they will recognize your idea and give you their trust. If you are building a Web3-related product, you can read more about the biggest challenges in this approach here. But in short, they will not trust you this way because you missed the most important step: building your reputation.

Because reputation is everything. When you buy a product, you want to know its manufacturer, right? So why do you think you will be the one who will build reputation after someone tries what you offer, i.e., gives you their money? It may happen, of course, but in that case, you should really have a game-changing offering in your pocket (and even then, it's hard).

What you need to do is change the way you approach it and go in this direction:

Step 1: Build the community

Step 2: Do the branding the right way

Step 3: Launch the product

In this scenario, you have built your reputation before offering a product and usually saved more energy and resources, with a significantly bigger chance to succeed. Why? Well, first, you know your buyers better, and then you can create a more relevant strategy that is conversion-oriented. Why? Because your previous performance allowed you to create social proof and position yourself as the point where value is generated.

Let's stop here for now. Soon we will delve deeper into this. Until then, enjoy your weekend and stay awesome as you are!

Much love,

Singer