💰Sydney Sweeney, Soap & Super Bowl

G'day Sellouts!

This week, I was scrolling YouTube and the algorithm fed me a Dr. Squatch ad… starring none other than Sydney Sweeney.

I did the quick math, and securing her probably cost them a billion squillion dollars (roughly).

It made me wonder, how does a soap brand pull off getting such a huge name to promote their products?

In case you’re not familiar, Dr. Squatch is a men’s hygiene company that rocketed to $100M success almost entirely through strong, witty Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) digital marketing.

And let’s be honest, they’re funnier than half the comedy channels out there.

But making us laugh is serious work. Let’s break down how Dr. Squatch nailed their voice and turned it into one of the biggest DTC success stories of the past decade.

Solving a personal need

When Jack Haldrup founded Dr. Squatch, he was a Senior Project Manager with a day job and psoriasis.

After years of struggling with his skin, he discovered that cold-process soap – a type of traditional cleaner – helped his condition. 

His trouble helped him discover fertile ground for a new company to grow:

• Product Need: He was buying from farmers' markets because natural hygiene products were largely absent from the mass-products produced by hygiene megacorps like Unilever.

• Marketing Gap: The natural products that did exist had weak marketing, which was leaving men largely ignored.

• Scalability: Subscription-based DTC hygiene products were brand new in 2014, with Dollar Shave Club establishing the model just a few years prior.

Learn as you grow

Today, Dr. Squatch is famous for its funny-first advertisements with Sydney Sweeney, but that voice evolved along with their target audience.

At first, Dr. Squatch started with small-batch sales, including walking into local stores to pitch their product to mom & pop style shops.

All these sales were a method of generating revenue to invest into ecommerce and digital advertising.

The goal was to get their brand in front of as many men as possible. 

This isn't just about sales; it's about data. By getting lots of digital views, Dr. Squatch was able to improve their product, brand and business from what worked and what didn't.

Diversify into emerging platforms

Throughout the 2010s, Dr Squatch had an 80/20 strategy with Facebook Ads acting as their primary channel, but 20% were bets taken on smaller or emerging platforms.

Jack found that relying so heavily on one platform left him worried because little changes could tank his returns by "a couple hundred percent day to day".

Their experiments with other platforms helped them adapt to high Facebook ad costs throughout the late 2010s, moving to new platforms like YouTube.

It also reduced the risk that a single algorithm change could destroy their business.

By 2021, TikTok had grown to account for 15% of their new sales.

Dr. Squatch earned those results affordably by pushing into TikTok pretty much immediately after it launched.

Like investing, eCommerce can be about managing risk and reward. 

You can't get fast growth playing it safe, but you shouldn't risk your whole business on a single ad spend, either.

Adapting your message to your audience

Throughout this journey, Dr Squatch scaled their product offering from soap to a full hygiene suite.

Just as importantly, the brand never stopped adapting their messaging to adjust for the culture of new platforms.

Dr. Squatch's explosive success after 2018 comes from a shift in tone to entertainment-first, edgy and catchy.

Their opening tagline went from "shower like a man" to "your soap is s**t".

As they pushed into new platforms in 2018, Dr Squatch worked with an agency to adapt the brand's voice more toward entertainment, bringing on comedian James Schrader.

The first ad went viral, reaching over 122M views on YouTube. This ad continues to make sales today.

Their success has been driven by variations of this tone ever since, but they never stopped experimenting.

In 2021, the brand secured a spot on the world’s advertising stage – Super Bowl.

The walk matched the talk

Dr. Squatch really teaches the power of knowing exactly who you're talking to. 

They didn't try to be the hygiene brand for everyone – they became the brand for a specific type of customer.

• Create marketing specific to the platform

• Build a brand voice that stood out to a specific audience

• Understand how to use that voice in different contexts

• Scale without losing their identity

Think about your own brand. Are you trying to appeal to everyone? Or could you benefit from taking a stand and speaking directly to a specific customer?

What kind of content is that customer going to watch, read or listen to at the bus stop?

Your marketing should be that kind of content on that kind of platform. Go to where your customers are and give them what they want.

Until next week,

Keep selling out (in the best way possible),

Luke

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