AP 0965: How Do You Measure the Impact of Giving Away T-shirts?

AskPat 965 Episode Transcript

Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up everybody? Pat Flynn here and welcome to Episode 965 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me today. As always, I'm here to help you by answering your online business questions five days a week.

All right, now here's today's question from Borja.

Borja Giron: Hi Pat, this is Borja Giron from SEO Para Bloggers Podcast. I just prepared my own brand t-shirt, and I'd like to know if there is any method you use to measure the impact of giving t-shirts to people who send in a question like this, and also by selling your own t-shirts online. Thank you very much, see you.

Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up Borja? Thank you so much for the question, I appreciate it. You know, these t-shirts that we've been offering for AskPat listeners, it's been really fun to see people wear them, and to get pictures on social media. I've even seen and have heard stories of people having conversations about what is on the shirt, like at the gym. Like, “Who's Pat? Who's this Pat guy everybody's talking about?” Or, “Who's this Pat guy on your shirt? What does he do? What kind of questions does he answer?” It's kind of cool, because it kind of opens up that conversation. I've even seen and have heard of people at conferences spot each other because they realize that they also know and have listened to AskPat, which is really cool.

The specific ROI though? It's hard to tell. I mean, it's one of those things that it's almost like when you buy swag, and you give it away at an event. How can you track that? There's really no way to do that. For me, it's more about these kinds of stories that I'm hearing. It's about, just again, thanking people for being here on the show—which I always think there's un-trackable ROI that comes with just offering thanks for when people offer some of their time to you—and that's why I do it. I mean, I love offering these t-shirts, and it's just one of the funnest things, and I just get a kick out of seeing all the pictures come in.

Yeah, I'm going to continue to do it. Now, there are some people who actually sell shirts. I don't sell these shirts; well, I sell a shirt that's on SPI, you'll see it. It's the Serve First shirt. That was a shirt that was designed, and it's a unique design to me. It's something that I'm selling for charity, for Pencils of Promise. There's value in that for me, because I get to help an organization that I am an advisor for, that I absolutely love. There's ROI in that for me in terms of just—it's fulfilling to do that, and I think as a byproduct people get to wear a cool shirt with a cool message, to serve first.

Some people sell shirts, specifically for businesses. There's a guy, his name is Benny Hsu from GetBusyLivingBlog.com, a really cool blog. I think he generated over six figures selling a t-shirt, or a bunch of shirts, and he uses a site called, I think it's called Teespring that many people can use, and have used to generate an income. And actually some, that's their full time business because you can design a t-shirt there, and basically create kind of like a Kickstarter Campaign to sell that design to people. What people do is they pick a niche, and then they create a shirt for it that they just know will resonate, and they sell it using T-spring and their engine, and once it reaches a certain point, they're successful. It's much easier said than done obviously, but that's something you could do if you wanted to create a business out of selling shirts. For me, I'm not in the t-shirt business, I'm not in the garment industry. But I am here to just serve my audience, and build brand awareness, and I think that's the last and most important point. When it comes to swag and those kinds of things, brand awareness is really where it's at. It's not about collecting an ROI, but it's more about the long term—just feel, and culture, and community that I'm trying to build.

There you go, Borja, thank you so much for the question, I appreciate it. I want to send you an AskPat t-shirt for having your question featured here on the show. For those of you listening, if you have a question that you'd like potentially featured here on the show as well, just head on over to AskPat.com and you can ask right there on that page.

Now to finish off I want to end with a quote, and today's quote is from Alexandra Ripley. “Should-haves solve nothing. It's the next thing to happen that needs thinking about.” Thanks so much everybody, appreciate you, and I look forward to serving you in the next episode. Thanks guys, cheers.