If you’re looking for a fresh start in 2021, you might be thinking about starting your own business. One business that has low overheads and high-profit potential is a wristband business. You could be responsible for delivering wristbands for high profile events, fundraisers and companies.
Wristbands are growing in popularity as a method of identification but also as a promotional giveaway. Just remember how popular the Livestrong yellow wristbands were at their peak. Over 80 million wristbands were sold and $100 million was raised for cancer research.
As with any business venture, you need to be well-prepared. In this guide, we’re going to look at some of the steps you should take if you’re planning to start a wristband company in 2021.
Do your research
Research is the core of every good business model. You need to understand the product, the customers and the competition. Starting a company in an already competitive field is going to make life more difficult for you. But if you can find a way to carve out a niche in the market, you could be well on your way to success.
In your research, try to understand why businesses need wristbands and how you can better serve these needs. Will you offer luxury wristbands or economy wristbands? Will you offer super fast delivery or more options than your competitors. Allow your research to inform the next step.
Create a business plan
A business plan is not only great for attracting investors, it’s also a great way to plot your own thinking. When you start thinking about creating a new business, you might feel overwhelmed by the options. A business plan will help you to refine your ideas and create a strong plan of action.
A business plan will also help you to determine your pricing, how much you need to charge to make the business profitable, and how many sales you will need to make it worthwhile. If you think you might struggle to make ends meet, you need to return to the planning stage and think about how you can extract more value from your customers.
Determine your target market
The best part about the wristband sector is that there are so many different customer segments. To give you an idea, people use wristbands for the following purposes:
- Promotional giveaway
- Festival and event identification
- Company identification
- Weddings and parties
- Charities and fundraisers
- Schools and colleges
As you do more research into potential markets, you will be able to define who your ideal customer is so that you can get started on the next step. Your target audience will determine how you market your product and if you can rely on repeat custom. A single wedding party might not generate repeat sales, but if you can target wedding planners, you’ll have a better chance at generating repeat custom.
Create a marketing plan
A good marketing plan can make or break your business. Your marketing plan should include every channel you are going to use, how you will use it, who will manage it, and what you hope to achieve.
You could start with an eCommerce website that makes it quick and easy for customers to place an order. You can then use a combination of marketing channels to drive traffic to your site. This could include search marketing, social media and email marketing.
All of the channels should work in tandem, and you would ideally create an automated sales funnel to simplify the process. Once an enquiry lands on your website, this information would be fed into a sales funnel to help turn enquiries into customers without you needing to lift a finger.
Choose a supplier
A key part of your business planning comes down to supplier relationships. You can either invest in the equipment to make your own wristbands, or you can trust this to an external supplier.
A third party supplier will lower your overheads, but it could also make your business vulnerable to price changes. You might also struggle to offer fast delivery times if you aren’t in control of the production process.
If you decide to make your own wristbands, you will also need to negotiate deals for supplies. Buying in bulk can reduce your costs but this offers increased risk for your business. If you struggle to make sales, you could be sitting on a lot of wasted stock.
Launch your business
Once you have a solid marketing plan, know who your target customers are and have a supply chain established, it’s time to start generating some sales. Don’t forget to tell the local press about your launch using a press release. This is a simple way to generate a little bit of buzz around your new venture.
You could also offer introductory pricing or explore how to establish a presence at events. Being visible at business events can help you to connect with event planners and businesses that have a need for what you are selling.
Drive repeat business
Once you have a few sales under your belt, it’s time to think about how you can turn these into referrals and repeat custom. Create a good relationship with your customers by keeping in touch using email. You can also ask them to leave a review of your business to help drive more interest.
Reviews can be re-packaged as sales materials and help to convince other business owners that you can deliver. If you can automate the process of generating reviews, this can translate to new customers and repeat business without ever having to lift a finger or spend another penny on advertising.
Conclusions
Starting a wristband business is not without its struggles, but anything worth doing is worth doing well. If you set your business up right, you could have a largely automated sales and marketing funnel that brings in warm prospects and turns them into customers and brand advocates. After an intense start-up period, you could find that you are able to focus on other areas to help expand your offering and diversify your income.
