Finding a Brand Voice

In the many-hatted journey of tiny brand indie perfumery, I think marketing is the hat that fits me least.

In an ideal world – one where I win the lottery – I go to far-flung places with beautiful vistas and nestle my bottle in a corner of gorgeous stately homes. Look at the neroli blossoms, at shafts of sunlight darting through the trees – isn't it pretty? Cut to bottle. It's perfume. Voila!

In this reality, I only learned what an Instagram Reel was in the past week. I'm Googling what a skip rate means. I'm on TikTok, researching the etiquette of whether I should follow back. I'm a social media luddite, actually – my social media presence used to be limited to sharing funny stuff I found scrolling on Facebook.

There are no layers of corporate polish between me and my creation, and I'm a true introvert. So there is a certain vulnerability at putting myself out there. The horror of making something and realising people now need to know it exists. I'm Googling how to market for introverts. I don't really have a marketing budget. I spent that, I think wisely, on nicer packaging instead. I may be able to create a makeshift placard from a discarded Amazon box.

So I'm doing this late at night, reevaluating my life choices. I'm realising I don't yet know how to create content that motivates most people to keep watching. Perhaps the captions should be shorter in places. I should linger on the bottle. I really need to find a way to capture that beautiful label and make it glint like a coin tossed by Clint Eastwood. It's a chameleon that shifts from a deep violet purple to a magenta-fuschia, depending on the light the bottle is sat in.

Perfume is an experience that unfolds over hours. But you can't smell through a screen. I'm wondering how to present in an attention economy where you lose people in the first second if you don't intrigue them immediately. So I'm beginning to understand why smaller brands tend to rely on 'social proof' marketing. It goes: This will make you magnetic. We can't fly out to Lake Como, but this is basically a Pied Piper flute with a sprayer. Your boss, who otherwise barely registers that you exist, will be sniffing the air like a bloodhound when you walk in tomorrow. You'll be running the company next week. 😊

I'm being cheeky. But, cheek aside, I put out an unpolished table unboxing video, and the reaction has been really kind. And I think you should know, dear reader, that I am grateful for this sort of thing, because it really makes a difference. The oud perfume market is heavily saturated. Violet perfumes are a smaller category by comparison (which I personally find a travesty, given how beautiful violet is as a note, but ahem). Nobody is searching for a combination of the two. So people resonating with that idea is so lovely. Social media is now training me, like Pavlov's dog, to hit all my reward pathways with surges of dopamine for just a few remarks on my creation. I will be in the therapist's office in a few months' time realising I don't know who I am any more.

Anyway, I shall shortly be moving to the longevity testing phase of what will be my next perfume – Magdalene. White rose, spikenard, incense, and white musks, among others which I will detail nearer the time. Mostly feminine, slightly reverent. Three months in the incubator at 40 degrees. Unlike Rhapsody, which took 200 trials plus to complete, Magdalene was very promising by trial 3, and trial 22 was the point at which it all fused together. But, all being well, it still won't be a quick process – packaging would still need to be sourced, safety clearance, buying in enough materials to make concentrate. Probably early next year. But I'm excited for you to try it eventually. Have you ever tried a perfume that contains white rose as a note? Not a thin, kind of watery white rose – genuine white rose absolute. One of my favourite natural materials…heaven in a tiny bottle.

In the meantime, I'm thinking, "Oi! Perfume!" will go down a treat as my next marketing strategy.