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Using Influencers to Create Product Awareness: Tina Aldatz

 

Tina Aldatz’s Story: Women spend lavishly on their feet: massages, pedicures, and shoe after shoe to show them off. But in the final packaging of these female extremities, comfort has often been the missing ingredient.

“Podiatrists and companies were out there with these gel insoles, but that only put a Band-Aid on the problem,” says Tina Aldatz. “They never took it to the next level.”

When Tina’s feet couldn’t bear the situation any longer, the laid-off dot-commer spent months trying to develop a product that would solve her foot problem…and make her a fortune. She came up with Foot Petals, a line of foot cushions that are both comfortable and, by being available in many fashion colors, blend in completely.

“I worked with a podiatrist because I wanted to make something that was both cute and sexy, and medically beneficial,” Tina says.

She convinced a friend who was a buyer for a big New York City t-shirt producer, Michael Stars, to offer Foot Petals to retailers as well. They got immediate traction in high-end boutiques. Tina generated $60,000 in sales just during the last half of 2001, and revenues surged to $360,000 the next year.

Foot Petals’ sales have climbed to more than $10 million a year in 2005, and Tina has about 10 employees. About 5,000 U.S. stores carry the hot-selling line, and Tina is trying to expand international sales beyond the 18 countries that already carry her wares.

“International markets build brand awareness, and they’re great customers,” she says. “And that helps us to fund more growth in America.”

Tina’s Key Move: Using Influencers to Create Product Awareness

Just about anywhere that Foot Petals is mentioned or shown, there are celebrities hanging around, using and showing off the product.

Women understand what these stars -- whether it’s Teri Hatcher or Daryl Hannah, Daisy Fuentes or Angela Bassett – are saying implicitly. It kind of goes like this: “I’m a verified celebrity, and I think Foot Petals are so hip and comfortable that I’m willing to lend my golden image and priceless persona to the brand. So what’s keeping you?”

Tina says that leveraging this celebrity testimonial effect has been crucial in getting attention and visibility for Foot Petals. And we’re not just talking about buzz, here, but also actual revenues.

“We can trace big surges in sales and orders directly to magazine articles and photographs that include celebrities and our products,” she says.

Tina acknowledges that her location in Southern California makes it easier for her to access the celebrities that have become such important influencers for her. But she says her success in this arena is much more a reflection of her strategy and her determination than of her physical proximity, and that other fashion-product entrepreneurs can use the same approach.

Tina worked for a fashion website during the internet boom, and there she learned the value of public relations. “Having a celebrity endorsement or editorial in a magazine is worth so much more than paid advertising,” she says.

So Tina and her staff pull out all the stops when it comes to soliciting attention from celebrities. Wisely, they start by making sure they know whom to target. “We watch every single hot show and subscribe to every single celebrity magazine, and I make it the job of every one of my employees to stay aware of anything that’s going on in the news and in fashion,” she says. “We try to align ourselves with people who make a splash and are popular and are photographed often.”

Tina also ensconced herself in the “beauty buffets” that materialize in Hollywood during special events such as Golden Globes and Academy Awards. Like many other purveyors of fashion goods and accessories, Foot Petals gets a booth in these style lounges that cater to stars’ wants and whims as they prepare to be showcased.

Tina is really good at taking advantage of these meet-and-greet opportunities. For one thing, she turns the exposure into valuable word-of-mouth. For example, since Brittany Murphy fell in love with Foot Petals at one buffet, the actress now allows Tina to supply products at each of her movie sets.

Personal relationships with celebrities also bloom. When Tina found out, for example, that the grandmother of Nicey Nash recently had died of breast cancer, she proposed a partnership to the TV actress under which she would contribute thoughts about the disease on FootPetals.com – and Tina would donate a share of the site’s proceeds to the Susan G. Komen breast-cancer foundation.

Most important to the Foot Petals brand, Tina manages to leverage the photographs that are taken at the events. Paparazzi are banned, so the celebs typically are relaxed. But they allow Tina and her staff to take digital snapshots all day long of them wearing or demonstrating Foot Petals. Tina often issues the photos through press releases or posts them on FootPetals.com.

Women casually reading a magazine or going to FootPetals.com are suitably impressed by what apparently are the celebrities’ endorsements of the products. “Sometimes we have their permission to post the pictures, sometimes we don’t,” Tina allows. “But I’ve never had a complaint. And I know they’ve worn my product!

Tina’s Bonus Insight

Once a startup acquires a certain cachet as a fashion brand, consumers tend to allow the brand freedom to diversify into related areas, Tina believes.

So now that Foot Petals has become “the Band-Aid of insoles,” as she puts it, Tina is planning to introduce a Foot Petals foot spray, moisturizer and other beauty products, as well as a new “spa line” of pads.

“Anything that has to do with the legs and feet,” she says,” we think is our market.”