So you’ve got an awesome design ready and waiting to share with the world?

Here are 5 tips to help maximise your campaign and set you in good shape to make the most sales possible.

1: Create a plan for promotion

“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” – Benjamin Franklin

As with most things in life, it is a good idea to make a plan for promoting your t-shirt campaign.  We see those that carry out a plan have more success with campaigns.  A promotion plan serves as a great reference point both during and after your campaign to help keep interest up, monitor progress, drive sales and then to analyse what worked well and what you can improve on next time around.

It can be on the back of a napkin but why not use a free project management tool like Asana or Evernote. As a starting point we recommend you:

List out the marketing & promotional activities you want to carry out.

Put a date and time against them – make sure you have regular promotion throughout the campaign.

Tick each completed action off.

Why not just focus on one or two campaigns to start with? If you focus on them rather than ten, you’ll have much more chance of hitting the tipping point & getting them printed.

2: Optimise your campaign page

You have an awesome product, you also need to make sure that your description does it justice and gives buyers all the context and information they might need!

Create a compelling description
Putting a little effort into your description can really pay off.  Let the buyer know what inspired the design and what you are about.

Promote USPs such as limited edition & time frame
Is your campaign limited edition?  Let the buyer know.  Are you doing something special or charitable with the profits?  It’s a great idea to add that in too.  Your products are unique and it’s important to get this across as it will help encourage people to support your campaign.

Add pictures, video & more text to your campaign
Want to make your campaign really pop?   You can add pictures such as t-shirt mock ups, close ups of the design or even a selfie showing your gratitude to everyone.  If you want to go all out you can record a video explaining why you are running a campaign or if you are a band you could put your latest video.  Maybe you are an artist and you could showcase the process of you creating the design?

However you choose to describe your campaign; the more effort you put in the more likely your campaign will be to convert browsers into buyers, people will notice when you’ve gone all out.

3: Make shareable images to help promote your campaign

You’ve got the plan, you’ve got your page & blurb spot on but now you need some images to promote your campaign! It’s super important that people can visualise what they’re going to buy. Who wants to buy a T-shirt from a description? Your customers want to see what they’re going to wear!

Here’s some ideas for shareable product photos:

Make mock-ups of your shirts.

Make a few so you have sharing options. Don’t forget you can make different size images for social sharing. If you have different colour tee options, mock them up too.

Background shots of images
Use your design as the background image on your social picture – it can make them really stand out!

Design close ups

If you’ve done something really detailed then make sure you make an image showcasing just your design, so people can see it!

Advert images
You’ve designed a cool tee but now you need to make people want to buy it! Make an image to advertise your tee with your campaign link / time frame / limited edition on it. Make sure you add a call to action on it too.

Countdown images
Let people know that they only have a certain amount of hours or days left to pick up your tee! Last 24 hours – last 3 days etc.

Thank you

Don’t forget to thank people who have bought something from your campaign… make an image to show your appreciation & make your other followers feel like they’re missing out on something awesome!

Your final garments
Prove to the world that your product exists and how good it looks… so people know you’re legit and so they buy into your next campaign.

Creating a range of different images will help keep your campaign fresh and help you build traction and trust throughout the campaign. Don’t forget video is important too… so why not create a slideshow or promotional video too?

4: Crush it on social media

Now you have a plan, an optimised product page and some badass shareable images it’s time to share and shout across social. This really is the key part in your campaign’s success….

Instagram
Post regularly on Instagram.  You’ll want to make a few different images (see above) so that it’s not boring for your followers. Consider putting call to actions in the pictures or in the text below and make sure you use relevant hashtags to promote. You can use up to 30 hashtags on an IG post, so don’t be shy. Why not ask your followers to tag someone who’d love that shirt?

Pro-tip: Change your bio link to your campaign link and drive people to buy from that.

Twitter
Tweeter? It’s cool to post your campaign out 2-3 times a day to your audience. Use a couple of relevant hashtags and make sure you have the appropriate Twitter sized image, so people can see what they’re buying. You can use a free tool like Hootsuite to schedule your tweets if you’re busy!

Pro-tip: Ask people to RT your campaign but incentivise with a contest to win a tee / something else cool.

Facebook
We know that Facebook’s organic reach is a tad rubbish these days but if you have a FB fanpage make sure you’re sharing your campaign on there. Check your insights and see what times are best to post. Mix it up.. add image posts with text posts and video content is king on FB. Don’t forget to share on your personal page and ask your friends to get involved with sharing it too.

Facebook groups
You’ve designed a really cool pirate ninja tee and you’re part of the FB Pirate Ninja Group. Makes sense to share it in there really. Don’t be spammy & if you’re part of a charity or an organisation then share it with them too. Make sure the groups are relevant!

Boosted Posts & ads
Your campaign may need a little push towards the right fanbase. You can boost individual posts or create an ad to target people who may have an interest in your tee. Here’s some info for you.

Friends
Your friends love you and want to see your succeed. Ask them to share on their social media. Why not form a Whatsapp group or tell friends in your current groups about the campaign? Snapchat is super popular right now… record a video and show your design on there to your mates.

MAKE SURE:

Tag us in all posts so we can help you promote it.
Promo across all your social pages
Think outside the box
Update your pages with anything new
Keep people updated on sales & how much time is left
Every single post has your campaign link

5: Close the deal with e-mail marketing

Do you have a mailing list?  E-mail marketing still works really, really, well. The key to e-mail is keeping it to the point. People get loads of email on a daily basis but if you make a compelling, succinct e-mail with a great title – then you’re on to a winner.

Don’t have a mail list – set one up
It’s super easy with free sites like Mailchimp. And you can use it whenever you have something new to promote. You can even link your email to go out on your social pages.

Make it look the same as your social campaign
It’s cool to have a cohesive and strongly branded campaign that looks the same across social & email

Strong images and call to actions
Make sure all your campaign have a strong image or two in. Simple text and of course a call to action with a direct link to your campaign.

Send more than one out
Send one out at the start of the process & then remind people towards the end that they only have a certain time to buy your gold.

We hope these tips have been super useful – the harder you work on promoting your campaign, the more likely it is that you’ll reach tipping point & then make yourself some free money! You believe in your design and your idea, it’s your job to make the rest of the world think the same!