Cracking the TikTok Code

For many small businesses, TikTok has become a marketing must.

The popular social media company says it supports small-business growth, pointing to a recent study it commissioned showing it helped small businesses boost their sales by $14.7 billion in 2023. And despite ongoing debates about a potential ban, U.S. entrepreneurs are actively leveraging TikTok to boost sales and drive growth. 

Gabrielle Brulotte, co-founder of Austin-based cookie dough company Hot Take, says the platform has been a game-changer. “TikTok’s been the thing that blew us up,” she says. “So we really put a lot of attention on TikTok. And I think it’s such an organic platform, so we post everything on there.” The company’s TikTok account has garnered more than 60,000 followers and its videos have a total of four million likes. 

But how can companies best use TikTok to drive growth? In the latest episode of Inc.’s From the Ground Up podcast, three successful entrepreneurs delve into their top strategies with Inc. executive editor Diana Ransom.

Build transparent relationships for authentic growth

Zoya Biglary, founder of FYSH Foods, a plant-based raw fish company in Los Angeles with 11,000 TikTok followers, attributes her success on the platform to harnessing the power of storytelling and authentic connection.

Initially, Biglary gained popularity on TikTok by sharing videos of peeling fruit and showcasing recipes. She says once her audience got to know her “as a person,” the transition to selling her product on the app felt easier. “I think it just helped people understand what I was doing a bit more rather than just, ‘Here’s this block of vegan fish,'” Biglary says.

Brulotte says she and her sister Elise, a co-founder of Hot Take, have taken a similar approach to connecting with their customers. She says it’s all about sharing the good, the bad, and the ugly with consumers. “Keeping them super informed with what’s happening with the business, even if it’s not necessarily the sexiest thing, it really worked for us,” Brulotte says. “I think people felt like they were able to watch us grow.” 

Recognize the limitations of a personal brand

For Mari Llewellyn, founder of Bloom Nutrition, a supplement and wellness company based in Venice, California, the goal for TikTok marketing was to ensure the company wasn’t reliant on her personal social media presence.

Llewellyn had gained a following on Instagram after documenting her weight loss journey and sharing her workouts and results. “We didn’t want the company to be entirely reliant on me; that is not a sustainable business plan,” she says. “That’s why we didn’t call it Mari’s Supplements. We called it Bloom Nutrition, thank goodness.” 

But Llewellyn’s following didn’t extend to TikTok. To reach more people, she says, she had to recognize that she was “not the best creator on TikTok,” and instead look for creators on the app who had big followings. “There are so many different types of people on TikTok, which is kind of the magic of it,” Llewellyn says. “I’ve definitely begun to focus on my podcast more and just lean into where I feel like my skill set is.” 

She says that by collaborating with TikTok creators, the company — which now has nearly 715,000 followers — has become a topic of conversation on the platform, rather than a company that talks about itself. “I think that’s more powerful,” she says. 

Llewellyn credits Bloom’s ability to secure shelf space in stores like Target, Walmart, and Wegmans to its TikTok strategy. “[People] go into the store and they say, ‘Oh, I’ve seen that on TikTok. My favorite influencer uses that. I’m going to grab it,”’ she says.

Partner with influencers selectively to drive success

All three founders agree that selectively partnering with influencers drives the best results.

Llewellyn says when Bloom looks to collaborate with TikTok influencers, the company doesn’t fixate on the number of followers a creator has. “Someone could have a massive following and have no connection with their audience. We really try to make sure that their community is locked in and they trust who they’re following,” she says. 

Brulotte says that to date, Hot Take has not paid any influencers for any sort of advertising. But the brand is open to unpaid partnerships, and recently established one with influencer Paige Lorenze. Brulotte proposed the collaboration to Lorenze because she felt the pairing was “very organic.” 

For her part, Biglary says that because FYSH Foods is still in a growth phase, she’s focusing on B2B partnerships and considering influencer partnerships slowly. She wants to ensure there is enough supply to meet people’s demands, which influencer partnerships can make difficult. “Whenever one of our videos does go really viral, we have thousands of people who will message from across the country who want it, but I can’t send it to them yet,” Biglary says. “So that’s a bit of a waste of effort.”

Read the full transcript of this episode below

Diana Ransom: I’m Inc. executive editor Diana Ransom.

Christine Lagorio-Chafkin: And I’m editor-at-large Christine Lagorio-Chafkin.

Ransom: And you’re listening to From the Ground Up. Today’s episode, “Cracking the TikTok Code.”

About a month ago, I went down to Austin for South by Southwest, where Inc. hosted our Founders House. I spoke with a bunch of fascinating founders.

Lagorio-Chafkin: Yes, you sat down with FYSH Foods founder Zoya Biglary, Hot Take dough co-founder Gabrielle Brulotte, and Bloom Nutrition founder and president Mari Llewellyn.

Ransom: Mari explained how it took her a minute to get comfortable on TikTok and how she learned to harness the energy when people actually started talking about her business.

Lagorio-Chafkin: Yes. And Gabby, who didn’t have a huge social media following at first, talked about how she dipped her toe in gently and then learned to broadcast the real unvarnished view of building her cookie dough empire. Empire? Empire company. It’s not an empire.

Ransom: Not quite an empire yet. And Zoya shared just how much being able to tell a good story resonates across all platforms.

Lagorio-Chafkin: Here’s Mari Llewellyn on how she brought in new customers for Bloom Nutrition.

Mari Llewellyn: So we definitely had dipped our toe in the business world just through selling PDF workout guides, which I still feel like is the best business plan because when you have a PDF guide, there’s really no overhead. You can just keep selling the guide, keep marketing, you don’t really need employees. So it really was a great way to get started.

Launching Bloom in 2019, we definitely relied on my personal social media following. So for anyone who doesn’t know, I lost 90 pounds in 2017, and that was really where I began sharing tips and tricks online, recipes, workouts, really sharing the ups and downs of fitness. And I think building that community first was a really important step to having success with Bloom when we did launch. But obviously we didn’t want the company to be entirely reliant on me–that is not a sustainable business plan. That’s why we didn’t call it Mari’s Supplements. We called it Bloom Nutrition, thank goodness.

So in terms of expanding, I think it’s really important to get the product out there. We sent out a lot of free greens. I mean, we still do that. We really hope and want everyone to try it because I think once you try a good product, people want to keep taking it. They want to keep spreading the message. So really getting the product out there as much as we could and talking about it. And, obviously, my co-founder and husband, Greg, who’s in the crowd right now, is a fantastic marketer and really has a great understanding of how to get content out there and put it in front of people’s eyes. So I have to give him credit there. And since then we’ve established an influencer program, which I know we’ll talk about–

Ransom: Yeah, we will.

Llewellyn: At some point, but yeah.

Ransom: Don’t jump the gun. We’re not ready for that. Zoya, you were also a food influencer. OK. She has gained prominence by, I guess, basically peeling fruit.

Zoya Biglary: Peeling fruit, yes.

Ransom: So I’ve been peeling mangoes wrong, like horribly wrong my whole life.

Biglary: It’s OK, I’ll teach you.

Ransom: Yeah. No, we’re good. So when you launched FYSH Foods, it’s obviously like a sort of fish alternative company, but you were appealing to people who came to you for fruit. So how did you reconcile that?

Biglary: Yeah, I mean, fruit was maybe the launch point, but mostly it was storytelling. So I happened to be, I’m Persian, we eat a lot of fruit. So I happened to be good at peeling fruit, and that is what really launched this whole series of storytelling and having my audience get to know me as a person, as a business owner. So then the segue was easier when I was like, “This is my plant-based fish business, and here I am as a creator. I’m not a vegan, but I have a vegan company.” And I think it just helped people understand what I was doing a bit more rather than just, “Here’s this block of vegan fish.”

Ransom: Right, it can be a little jarring I can imagine–

Biglary: It’s a little jarring.

Ransom: You just went for the hard sell. And then Gabby, you didn’t necessarily have a prominent social media following when you were getting started, so what worked for you?

Gabrielle Brulotte: Oh, gosh. We tried everything. Our whole premise at the beginning was showing how we built things. So showing all of the horrible things, all of the good things. There was a lot that happened, especially in those early days. And it still happens. Keeping the consumers and, for you, Paige, and anyone else, keeping them super informed with what’s happening with the business, even if it’s not necessarily the sexiest thing, it really worked for us and I think people felt like they were able to watch us grow. And we have grown quite a bit since the beginning. So just keeping people super informed in that way, whether or not it’s good.

Ransom: And it probably helps that the cookies are amazing.

Brulotte: They’re pretty, I’m biased, but they’re good.

Ransom: Well I actually haven’t tried them yet, but Mari tells me they’re fantastic.

Llewellyn: Huge fan of Hot Take. Obsessed.

Ransom: So, Mari, you have an interesting story in the fact that you were prominent on Instagram long before even TikTok was around. How did you segue into the new platform and what worked for you on TikTok versus what works on Instagram?

Llewellyn: Yeah, so I’m definitely leaning toward the Millennial side of things. We call our customer the Gen-Zennial. So she’s young, she’s cool, probably cooler than me. So it took me a minute to kind of get comfortable with TikTok.

I personally would not say I’m the best creator on TikTok. That’s really where we’ve focused our influencer program. I remember, Greg and I were sitting down and talking about who did we want to work with to promote our greens? And we dabbled with some Instagram influencers. But I said to Greg, “I really feel like the people having the biggest impact right now are on TikTok. It’s the TikTok creators who have that cult following.” And that was where we began to dabble in the TikTok community. And there are so many different types of people on TikTok, which is kind of the magic of it. And although I wouldn’t say it’s my priority, I’ve definitely begun to focus on my podcast more and just lean into where I feel like my skill set is. TikTok has become the place where people are talking about Bloom rather than Bloom talking about ourselves. And in my eyes, I think that’s more powerful.

Ransom: And how do you harness that? People are talking about you and do you chime in or what do you do?

Llewellyn: We are definitely active. I think commenting on your creators content, being super present, being in on the jokes, understanding the trends is really important. And I always say I think it’s important to hire young. I think a lot of companies are afraid to hire younger people, but our social media team is all under the age of 25. I mean, a majority of our team is under the age of 30. We have almost a hundred people now, and it’s majority young women. And I really feel like they have the pulse on TikTok and what’s happening more so than Greg and I do. So we really rely on them to keep us young and cool and figure out what’s going on on TikTok. ‘Cause I think it is important. Even if the content isn’t always coming from us, to be engaging on the creators content and also keep our content on brand and keep spreading the message. I love what Gabby said about showing them what’s happening, ’cause then they feel really invested in the journey. And that’s something we did from the beginning as well.

Ransom: And Gabby, what’s your view on TikTok versus other platforms? And how do you kind of harness or how do you be successful on TikTok versus the others?

Brulotte: Yeah, I mean, TikTok’s been the thing that blew us up. So we really put a lot of attention on TikTok. And I think it’s such an organic platform, so we post everything on there. Instagram, we’re a bit more selective. It’s a bit more formal. I think I was telling you this when we talked earlier, but TikTok is the epitome of casual for us. We will post anything on there, whether it’s like … we’ve even posted things that aren’t necessarily Hot Take related, but just that we think kind of show … Elise, my sister, is my co-founder, so we post sister things on there. It’s just a lot more casual in a place that we kind of treat as a personal blog for Hot Take.

Ransom: This is an excellent segue of the idea of feeling like you have to put yourself out there personally. Have you ever, I guess since you do put stuff out there between you and your sister, has it ever been uncomfortable for you or do you just get over it and do it?

Brulotte: Well, for me, I mean I’m 28 and she’s 23, so there’s five years between us. She’s definitely younger and more … She was much more comfortable on the camera. It took me a long … I feel like I’m still uncomfortable sometimes. It’s taken two years for me to get comfy on there. So every time I put myself on, I felt like I was putting myself out there. But yeah, it’s definitely, we’ve had some things happen that we have posted we knew would get feedback from customers that is a little bit uncomfortable. Everyone, it’s the Wild West on TikTok. People are great, they’ll comment things that are hard to see sometimes too, but it creates so much engagement. So, yeah, we put ourselves in situations that have felt a little bit uncomfortable, but it’s gotten a lot of followers.

Ransom: It’s worked out so far.

Brulotte: It’s been OK, yeah.

Ransom: And then, Zoya, part of the reason why what you do has resonated so much with people is that they feel like they see themselves in you. Because you have put yourself out there, and you’ve talked about your relationship with your girlfriend, you’ve talked about your heritage. Can you talk a little bit about what goes through your brain when you’re posting and why put yourself out there like that?

Biglary: I so desperately want to create content that I wish I could have seen a decade ago or maybe 15 years ago. I didn’t get to see a lot of queer Middle Eastern people who were living happy lives. I feel like so much of the queer community still to this day is a lot of doom and gloom. So I want to be a, hopefully, beacon of light, of just, “Hey, look how nice my relationship is. We bought a house together, we have a business.” It’s really nice and I like to just kind of lean into that more. But yeah, I mean you get comments that aren’t lovely sometimes.

Ransom: So are you going to propose?

Biglary: Listen …

Ransom: That’s the latest.

Biglary: Offline.

Ransom: Yeah. And then I guess similar question is what’s too much? Is there a point where you’re kind of sharing too much or is oversharing kind of the norm?

Biglary: Yeah, I mean it’s a fine line. I’m a relatively private person actually. My girlfriend’s been making content for the past decade, so she’s kind of the one who got me more into it. I was more reserved before. And truthfully, I don’t think that I would be making content or leaning so heavily into it if I hadn’t seen the impact it had made. The second that I started going viral with my videos, there were hundreds and hundreds of DMs from people who were similar to me in some way and were just so happy to have the content. So then I was like, OK, it’s something that’s bigger than me, so I can just take the stomach punches every now and then of some stupid comment if it makes people happy to see this content.

Ransom: Right. Can all of you talk about how meaningful the platform has been to you? I guess Mari go first.

Llewellyn: Me personally or the brand?

Ransom: The brand. No offense.

Llewellyn: It’s been extremely meaningful to the brand. I feel like TikTok was a really pivotal moment for Bloom. I think a majority of people who come up to me and say they take greens have seen it on TikTok. And it’s an interesting evolution because when we first started in 2019, people really only knew of Bloom if they knew of me. Now people know of Bloom and they don’t know who I am, which makes me very happy. That to me is a great growth. And TikTok has allowed us to get in front of… I mean, it changed the trajectory of the business. It was a huge reason why we were able to launch in Target with the success that we had. We’re now in Walmart, we’re now in Sam’s Club, we’re now in Wegmans.

And for these retailers, I think they tend to think a little more old-fashioned. And I think having an online influencer brand hit the shelves was a new thing for them. And to see the success and see that it can do well has really opened up the door for us. And I think these retailers are kind of catching on that TikTok and social media is how people shop now. They go into the store and they say, “Oh, I’ve seen that on TikTok. My favorite influencer uses that. I’m going to grab it.” So it really is just changing the way the consumer shops.

Ransom: Yeah. Let’s talk about influencers now. So I have to ask you Gabby about this Paige Lorenze oatmeal cookie thing you’ve got going on. How did that get started and who is Paige Lorenze? And why oatmeal cookies? We have so many questions.

Brulotte: Yeah, so we slid it with all the influencers we’ve ever gifted or talked to. I slid into their DMs, “Be a Hot Take.” So I slid into her DMs, asked her if she wanted cookies. She said yes, and then she kept asking for them, which I am like, “Well great, we’ll send them to you.” And then it got to the point I just was like, “Would you ever want to do a collaboration? We’ve never done this before, but you love the cookies.” It felt very organic. And for those who don’t know her, she’s an influencer but she’s dating Tommy Paul. So some people know Tommy Paul, some people know her.

But oatmeal cookie, we just said, “Whatever your favorite cookie is, we’ll do it.” And hers was oatmeal chocolate chips. So it’s something we’re definitely going to focus on in the new year. There’s some things happening on the back end that will allow us to be able to do more and more of that, but it’s something that’s been super exciting and just put us on the map with a completely different demographic. That’s been really fun.

Ransom: So you’ve taken a more selective approach to the influencers that you work with. Mari, what’s Bloom’s approach to influencers?

Llewellyn: I have to say that’s how I learned about Hot Take. So I felt like that was such a great move for you guys, ’cause that’s how I learned about the cookies and now we’re obsessed. In terms of our selection process, I mean, we were just talking backstage and the second your content blew up, my team reached out. We have a fantastic team-

Ransom: We were on it.

Llewellyn: We have a really great team at the Bloom HQ who are looking for influencers who match the brand. And I think the thing with Bloom is our mission is to be as accessible as possible and really align with women of all walks of life. So it really isn’t for anyone in particular-

Ransom: Why just women? Just curious.

Llewellyn: I mean, men do take it as well, but I would say since I’m the… Kenny loves the greens, he’s sitting right there. Men definitely take it too. But in terms of our branding and story, since it came from me, I definitely feel like we connect with women on a deeper level, but it really is for everyone and any walk of life. So when we are looking for influencers, we work with mothers, nurses, students, whoever it may be. And our ethos is to really let the creator create the way that they do best. We don’t try to put any guidelines or boundaries that are going to restrict their creativity. We want them to do what connects with their audience the best.

With that said, we do keep in mind our brand values and mission and try to make sure the content aligns with that. But it’s been really fun working with so many different types of people and we do events every now and again and we get to meet them face to face, which is really special.

Ransom: And what are the stats that you look for in somebody you want to work with?

Llewellyn: Oh, that might be more of a Greg question, he’s more of the numbers guy. But it’s less, I think with TikTok now it’s less about the following. Because someone could have a massive following and have no connection with their audience. We really try to make sure that their community is locked in and they trust who they’re following. So for example, we just did a collaboration green’s flavor with Mama Carls. I don’t know if anyone’s heard of her, but her name’s Carly. She’s a mother. She lives in South Carolina and she has such a loyal following. We did a new flavor with her, orange passion fruit, which is delicious. And people loved it and it sold out very quickly because she has that cult following. So it really isn’t about the number of followers anymore, it’s about what connection do you have with the community?

Ransom: Right, how dedicated they are. And then Zoya, honestly don’t really know if you have an influencers program, but I do know your co-founder Paul is the personal chef for John Legend and Chrissy Teigen. So has that worked for you? Have you been able to parlay that into something?

Biglary: We do have a lot of great celebrity supporters, but mostly right now we’re B2B. Because I like to consider us the early stage of Beyond Meat and Impossible Meat, but for seafood. So similar to that experience, I want the consumer to try it in a restaurant setting first where you can have it as sushi or ceviche or poke and be like, “Wow, that’s really spot on. Pretty close to the real thing.”

We do ship out to consumers with a spicy tuna blend, but we haven’t done a whole lot of influencer marketing quite yet. So far the main influencer is you’re looking at her right now. But we do have a lot of, I mean we’re food content creators, my girlfriend and I, so we have a lot of friends in that space, we’re very lucky in that way, and people are starting to post about it a bit more. We haven’t gone super heavy because as I’m sure you guys realize, it’s a lot of effort. And whenever one of our videos does go really viral, we have thousands of people who will message from across the country who want it, but I can’t send it to them yet. So that’s a bit of a waste of effort.

Ransom: Right. Yeah you don’t want to necessarily grow too much yet.

Biglary: Exactly.

Ransom: Yeah. So how do you hit the B2B folks?

Biglary: Slide into their DMs. That’s where it’s very helpful for myself and my girlfriend have a big following. Because when you slide in someone’s DM, you have a much better chance at getting a response. Our very first partner ever was Arawan and I slid into their physical DM. I walked right in and I said, “Hey, the vegan fish that you guys have is not excellent. Mine’s better.” And then I took that account that day. So sometimes you just have to be very, very ballsy. But yeah, sliding into DMs really works.

Ransom: So what do you do if TikTok goes away? There’s the prospect of it getting banned. There’s legislation now, who knows what’s going to happen. But then just generally speaking, Medica changed its algorithm. You’re sort of at the mercy of this platform. So what’s the strategy there?

Llewellyn: It’s a great question and it’s something that we’ve definitely thought about. I mean, TikTok came close to being banned a couple of times, and that really made us look at our plan and say, okay, we need to diversify and think about this. I think the fact that we’re now in so many retailers gives us a really strong base and it doesn’t make us so reliant on TikTok. I also think if TikTok got banned, people would go somewhere else and just start something new. Because people want to create, and people are on social media, so they would just gravitate somewhere else and we would be ready for that. I think something we’ve done really well over the years is just pivot quickly. Anytime there’s been a shift in the industry or online, we’re quick to move over to that platform and we’re not afraid to make pivots. So I think we have that in our heads, and I’m sure that TikTok creators would simply move somewhere else and we would move with them, so.

Ransom: Yeah, I’m super curious what’s going to happen. There’s the idea of it getting purchased by a US company, who knows? So maybe TikTok wouldn’t go away necessarily, so we’ll have to wait and see. And then so Gabby, what’s your strategy for diversification?

Brulotte: Yeah, I mean, we’ve talked about so many different things. We’ve actually talked about physical implications. Would we ever do something like multiple cookie windows in different cities? It kind of depends how we want to push. We’re really trying to figure out what we want to do with the business in general. I’m going to talk to her after about retail. We’re just trying to figure out where we want to go. So it just kind of depends. But I think if it were to stop, honestly, I’d be not excited but it would just be another challenge. And I think that there’s so much that you can do outside of social. I think we’d focus a lot on the physical implications like how are we getting into communities? The old-fashioned way, I guess. But I think the physical connection with community is something that’s really important for us and something that we’ve talked about tapping into already. So I’d probably go that direction, yeah.

Ransom: And then Zoya, what’s your strategy if TikTok were to go away?

Biglary: Probably what they just mentioned. Yeah, move on Instagram. Instagram is still very strong, honestly. I think that TikTok took a lot of Instagram’s shine for a second, but now it’s starting to revert back. On the more influencer side, interestingly, I’m way bigger on TikTok, but so many brands actually pay me specifically just for Instagram. So I think that Instagram will still kind of reign supreme. But yeah, there’s a lot that can be done.

Ransom: So part of the sort of scuttlebutt right now with working with influencers is some brands have gotten criticism for just sending product. Because maybe you’re just sending stuff and they don’t really want to make anything with your product, and so it just ends up being wasted. There’s videos of people just having closets filled with merch and never doing anything with it. I want to know, are you strategic in how you send stuff or do you just send stuff to people who may be influencers?

Llewellyn: Good question. I get a lot of PR that I feel is wasteful, honestly. And I would say we are very intentional when we do send PR boxes. We only send them for new launches, and we’ll often only send one bottle of greens. So it’s like the one flavor that we’re launching along with a couple accessories, but we really try to not do it excessively and just be really mindful. Also, PR boxes are really expensive to make. So they have, there’s a lot that goes into them behind the scenes: the way the box opens, the way that everything’s placed. So I do very much respect the brands that are putting time and energy into PR, but I do feel like a lot of them are sending every shade of the foundation, and it’s like I definitely don’t need every single shade.

So I think being mindful about it and just really focusing on a specific list of people you’re sending it to. I mean, this has evolved over time. At the beginning, we were definitely sending more out because I think that’s important when you’re starting a business, but now we’re definitely more selective.

Ransom: Yeah, that’s great. And then with Hot Take, I mean your dough is tough to send, right?

Brulotte: Yeah. I mean if she ever sends to influencers, she’ll have the same problem being frozen. But because we’re frozen, we aren’t able to just mass send it. So we have to get confirmation, make sure they’re going to get home. We have a form they fill out that’s like, “Will you be gone any dates? We’re going to send it this day, will you be home to receive it or can someone receive it for you?” So it’s really limited us on just sending it out to people, which has honestly been good though because the people that get it are very intentional about it.

And we still to this day have not paid any influencer for any sort of advertising. We have only done organic and only gifting, so we have just we’ll send it sometimes hoping that they post. Most people are actually because they are intentional with it and it is frozen, they know it’s coming, they will actually post about it. But obviously we’ve had people that don’t and that’s totally fine too. But just trying to be intentional with it. But yeah, it’s more out of the circumstance of the dough rather than just not wanting to.

Ransom: Yeah, I guess you know it won’t end up in some closet somewhere. Right?

Brulotte: It’d be a little melty in there.

Ransom: A little gross. We do have time for questions. Anyone have a question for our great panelists? Yes.

Amelia: Hi, my name’s Amelia. Just interested as a PR person in the room, great work on all your brands. I’m going to look ’em all up. Love hearing all about the work you’re doing with content creators and influencers. My question is, are you pitching or sending product to media personalities and the media? My colleague and I, we do a lot of sending things out to media the way you’re doing it to influencers, or have you found that the media just isn’t responsive?

Ransom: I’m going to eat the cookies and try the greens. So if you guys… FYSH Foods, I’m going to try it all, I promise.

Llewellyn: We do at Bloom. Yes. We didn’t until very recently, but now that we work with PR and we have certain people that we love working with, anytime we have a new launch or drop, they are at the top of our list. So when we’re looking at that selective list of people we’re sending the PR box to, we are sending to PR as well, for sure.

Ransom: I actually think that’s a really great question. I mean, it speaks to the idea of do, I mean no offense and to myself intended, but are media people even that important anymore? Are the influencers really the things that move the needle for brands?

Biglary: I think media people are super important on both sides. What I can say, it’s harder to find them. That’s the bigger issue that I’ve come. Because I love getting the story across too and it’s much harder to find media people, whereas for you page will feed you influencers.

Ransom: So they come to you, right? Is that the idea?

Biglary: Just visually they come to you and it’s easier to click on their page and be like, “Oh, they make this content and whatever.” But it’s very hard to find a writer or something unless you happen to read an article that they’ve already written, then find their page. So it’s…

Ransom: It’s a lot of effort.

Biglary: It’s worth it, but it’s a lot of effort.

Ransom: Mm-hmm.

Brulotte: Well, and also trying to not get lost in the mix of people that do try to contact them. I remember back in the day, and we were very small at this point, but we did try to reach out to media and we got no responses. So I think I felt a little bit discouraged just as like, “Well, maybe this isn’t the right situation. We’re just going to have to push on our own.” Maybe now though that we’re a little bit bigger it’s something that I’ll look into more because we’ve got a little bit more on our side.

Ransom: It’s really interesting. It’s like you kind of have to have a story beyond just the company. And you have to develop a buzz somehow that’s ineffable somehow to get that attention. So you did the right thing obviously. It’s working.

Brulotte: Maybe we’ll try though. Yeah. Now that we’re a little bit bigger.

Ransom: Anyone else have a question?

New Speaker: Hello. My company does food and beverage all over the US for a lot of major events, mostly at trade shows. What we do is we build traffic in client’s booths, by the way of food. That traffic gets into the booth and creates buzz on the trade show floor, and it’s free. It’s free for the attendees to have that treat, either aromatic or custom-colored, whatever. My question to you is, do you feel TikTok is best for product or have you heard that it works for services like this?

Llewellyn: I feel like food does really well on TikTok. I think you are set. I really do. I mean, you probably know well as well, people love watching food content. Either the preparation of the food or maybe it’s a really aesthetic food or maybe it’s very different. I think you could really do something with that. I would definitely try TikTok. I think product is actually more challenging than food because people love food.

Biglary: It teeters, but usually it’s the number two category in TikTok. Food and bev.

Diana: We do have time for maybe one more question.

New Speaker: Hi. I’m also Mari, Behind the Blooms, and I was a Blooms subscriber for a while before I got rid of a permanent address, so I couldn’t keep the subscription going. But I received so many little treats and surprises during that time, and it was amazing to get all these little gifts. It was so cute. And so I’m curious about the role of surprise and delight in a product-based company, and also maybe even on TikTok. Do you surprise and delight your followers and your community as well? I’m curious about that.

Llewellyn: I love that. Yeah. We did use to send some, I think we still do send goodies in our Bloom packages. I think consumer experience is so important. Even the fact that you remember that means so much to me, it means we did the right thing. Because I think especially when you’re establishing your brand… I mean, we just launched in 2019, we’re still pretty young. We want to make sure that that customer experience really encapsulates the Bloom brand. We want to be approachable, fun, friendly. We want them to feel a part of the community. So yeah, surprise and really connecting in that way is really important. For sure.

Ransom: Amazing. Thank you all so much for joining us, Gabby, Zoya, and Mari.

Lagorio-Chafkin: That’s all for today’s episode of From The Ground Up.

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From the Ground Up is produced by Julia Shue, Blake Odom, and Avery Miles. Mix and Sound designed by Nicholas Torres. Our executive producer is Josh Christensen. Thanks for listening and we will see you next week.