I Tried StickerMule Give
I’ve used StickerMule for ordering bulk stickers and magnets to sell locally and in my Etsy shop in the past, and I’ve always been super impressed with their quality and competitive prices, plus setup is really easy, and they ship fast.
I recently had the opportunity to try out StickerMule’s new feature for artists: Give. The way it works is you set up a product giveaway (stickers, t-shirts, etc) and then make your giveaway page live. You pre-pay for the prizes and then run the giveaway. The whole process was very easy to set up. I used it as an opportunity to grow my followers on Instagram and get more email subscribers. Not a bad incentive for joining someone’s email list and following them on Insta, right? A free t-shirt? Plus, since it’s my art with my name on it, I also get to share my art with more people, and advertise myself every time someone wears it. Win win!
I used their Create Giveaway feature, chose my product (t-shirts) and I could even choose a t-shirt color. Because my design has a lot of colors, and the cat is black, I ended up selecting a basic white tee (which, by the way, sells better than any other color). I chose a start date for the giveaway and off I went!
I uploaded a high resolution transparent PNG (very important for things like t-shirts, because you can choose your own background color) and it was placed perfectly on a shirt for me. I paid $5 for the proof, and then just a few hours later, got this mockup of what my will look like on a shirt. It needed no retooling or tweaking, it looks great right out of the gate!
In my case, I gave away 5 t-shirts with my bestselling Reach for the Stars design. I’ve never done a product giveaway, so I needed to brainstorm how best to make this work for me. I thought to myself: what do I need? More Instagram followers? More email newsletter subscribers? I decided I wanted both, so I used this giveaway as an incentive for people to join my email list and follow me on Instagram. First, I set up a form in Flodesk that would redirect to the super secret giveaway link once someone fills it out and joins my email newsletter.
One thing I thought was very cool (it’s the little things) was my transparent PNG proof, I was able to use this t-shirt proof image right in my Flodesk signup form, so I could choose any color background I wanted for the form page. I chose the feature in Flodesk to redirect to a URL once someone signs up with the form, that way there would be no frustrating period of waiting or having to check your email once you join my list. I really thought about this from a user perspective, and making this as easy as possible was very important to me. I also made sure to name my form (on the back end in Flodesk) so I can track who joined my newsletter through the giveaway.
Once I’d set everything up, I got this confirmation page that would allow be to share the secret giveaway. This also allows me to see how many people have entered so far and watch the contest grow. I love that people entering the giveaway can choose their t-shirt size (super important) and then enter their mailing address for the contest, so if they win, everything is already chosen and will be mailed to them, I don’t have to do anything on my end! This reminds me of an awesome print-on-demand hands-free passive process, where I just set up the design, prepay for the prizes, and StickerMule handles everything from there.
I also wanted to use this as an opportunity to show some love to my existing email subscribers, so I first sent out a thank you email with the link to the giveaway to everyone on my email list. Plus, I snuck a little promo of my Etsy shop into the email, since I sell this design on tons of products in my shop, I even sell tees with this design. The mockup of the woman wearing the t-shirt came straight from StickerMule in my Give assets, which made it a really easy plug-in for my newsletter.
I also wanted to use this to help grow my Instagram followers. I created an Instagram post that incentivized people to follow me and join my email newsletter. First, I added the link to my email form as a link in my bio site. I made it the first link so it was easy for people to find. I just had to remember to take the link down once the giveaway ended.
Then, I created this Instagram post to get everyone excited about joining the giveaway.
Overall, I absolutely loved how easy it was to set everything up, and my favorite part is I just did the initial setup, created the tee with a quick upload, dropped the prepayment, and then StickerMule did the rest for me. They handled running the contest, choosing the winners and fulfilling the “orders.” I ended up gaining a bunch of Instagram followers and email subscribers, I got my art out there in the wild, and I helped strengthen my brand. Honestly I don’t see why I wouldn’t do this again. I love knowing that when the giveaway winners receive their t-shirts, they’ll be delighted with the quality of the tees, and my art will be printed beautifully, because StickerMule always creates absolutely top-notch products.
I even got an update when the giveaway ended, both via email and on the web page.
My overall impression: StickerMule Give was fun, easy and totally worth doing! As an artist, it was a win-win for me and my followers. I got my art out there on t-shirts, welcomed some new people to my community, and some lucky folks got free t-shirts. I highly recommend trying it out!
