In this episode of Add To Cart, we are joined by Sarah Hamilton, founder of Sand and Sky.
Today we bring you a special bonus episode from a live event! Add to Cart was in Sydney for Impact.com’s iPX partnerships experience for 2023 and we were lucky enough to be invited on to have an Add To Cart chat in person. And better still, we were able to record it and share it with you today. To say Sarah Hamilton has done a few things is a huge understatement – she’s a founder – of success story Sand and Sky, bellabox and newly launched Straand (a scalp health brand). She has a background in financial management and marketing, previously working in London at Dazed and Confused magazine and New York for Spin Magazine. She’s currently an advisor for Mermade Hair and Hunter Labs and leads the Private Label team at Adore Beauty. The theme for our conversation at iPX was how to create cult brands and hero products. And we discuss this at length. But we also dive into the influencer strategies she’s employed over the years, the role of Amazon in her growth and I also get seriously schooled in all things beauty…not a huge surprise there.
“I think in 2023, it’s always that test and learn, it’s not about spending a million dollars on a brand awareness campaign”
Sarah Hamilton
Not everyone can be sexy
“The product has to work. I think that’s still the sexy part but it’s hard at the start. It’s got to be sensorial, so people have to open it up and it smells good I think the unsexy part is…and I really like operations…now needs to be delivered really quickly, so you need to be despatching really quickly, you need to have really strong customer service, you can’t have website issues, everything really needs to be seamless, but in the businesses I have been involved in, we try and separate those teams, but they are just as important. So yes, there’s probably that glory team on the sexy side, but the team that really makes a big big difference is that operational team. You can’t ignore it.”
You have to be on Amazon
“From a US point of view and Australian brands find this hard, for beauty, you have to be on Amazon. It’s where people shop and I met with Alta in the US about Sand and Sky and they were like we don’t want you to be on Amazon and I’m like, okay well how many times do you get packages from Amazon? And I’m thinking as if they’re gonna fall for this question and they’re like everyday…and I’m like ok, that made it easy!
So it’s understanding in those different markets what works. I’m such a fan of Amazon, it’s certainly the cheapest in terms of the commission that you pay and you’ve got to go where the shopper is.”
Partnerships
“I love doing collaborations with brands and I know with Sand and Sky we did a collaboration with Go To and Frank Body. Actually in beauty in Australia there’s lots of brands that really like to work together.
I think alot of influencer is moving toward more long term ambassador type deals, so people don’t want to just see a one off and someone does another shampoo next week, it’s about how you’ve got that long term relationship and obviously affiliate on top of those partnerships works really well, so you’ve got that dual income source.”
