SDH 249: How to Generate Sales Through Authenticity with Amy Zitelman

What's your biggest struggle with your business? Is it managing cash flow? Is it customer related? How do you educate customers about your product or service and what's the best way to communicate with them and get feedback to foster authentic relationships? Maybe it's a combination of these questions, and you want to make yourself known in the market. Today's guest and Tahini queen Amy Zitelman is the VP of Business Development and Co-Founder of the certified women-owned brand Soom Foods. Soom Foods speaks to the versatility of tahini by offering unique products and recipes to make tahini a staple food product in America. Tune in to hear how three sisters and one boyfriend developed a brand of love for food, family, and community. In this episode you will… Hear how her understanding of market and customer changed over five years Learn ways to educate customers when your product isn’t well-known Know about metrics of returning customers Uncover the benefits of working with resellers on Amazon Discover different ways to manage cash flow Find out ways to stay focused during the day INSIGHTS: “I would say the lack of strategy created our strategy. Because once you go out there and realize what’s working and what’s not, it really helps define the strategy better than making these assumptions; because you have the product and it’s a real-life experience.” Amy Zitelman “The challenge with selling to restaurants is you need several restaurants to want to buy your product or already be buying your product before a distributor will pick it up. That involves not only selling to the restaurant but delivering to it.” Amy Zitelman “I’d say that was one of the biggest challenges at first, the operations and the supply chain, just doing it easier. It was not easy at first.” Amy Zitelman “What we’ve been trying to prove for the past five years is that tahini is good for more than just hummus.” Amy Zitelman “Restaurants influence retail these days.” Amy Zitelman “What's amazing about the restaurant industry, and especially chefs these days, is that they’re celebrities and that kind of was  brought into a wider scope of just finding the influencer for your product.” Amy Zitelman “At the end of the day the best thing that’s ever influenced our online sales has been traditional press.” Amy Zitelman “Our main goal is to create sincere relationships with people...Our press has been organic and it really led to our success. It’s the only thing we have been able to see a significant return on investment from.” Amy Zitelman “The best ways we’ve been able to generate sales is through authentic relationships.” Amy Zitelman “What's really great about these resellers are these are people that really understand the algorithms and ways to make Amazon more successful for a company, much more than we could’ve by just having the product up and hoping people would search for it.” Amy Zitelman “After the first three years we went back and we looked at where we were spending our money and we projected out our budget based on experience.” Amy Zitelman “Take a deep look at what is the most important thing for you to do to get more business and invest in that heavily.” Amy Zitelman RESOURCES: Soom Foods Website Soom Foods Facebook Soom Foods Instagram Soom Foods Twitter Soom Foods Pinterest “Presence” by Amy Cuddy