Marx Succès’ passion for entrepreneurship began during his college years at Purdue University, where he earned his degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Building successful businesses, like engineering at its core, is a matter of strategic and imaginative problem-solving. This problem-solving mindset helped create the vision to start Côtier Brand, along with his wife, Amber. Before launching their brand, Amber served as an FBO Manager in the private aviation sector. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Aviation Management from Purdue University and a Commercial Pilot License.
Together as founders of Côtier Brand, Amber and Marx help people celebrate life’s special moments by building a highly successful line of home-entertaining and party products that complement any gathering. They enabled the everyday hostess with the ability to create unforgettable events through the power of human connection. Côtier Brand has become synonymous with authentic, imaginative fun for events of any occasion to truly make them a big hit by offering innovative products designed to create meaningful and inspiring interactions. Reaching customers worldwide through their website, Amazon.com, and Target.com, Côtier Brand has become a rising star in the event planning space. It continues to innovate and develop new products for hosts and hostesses everywhere.
What is Côtier Brand all about?
Côtier Brand is a party supply and home-entertaining company that creates unique products that empower the everyday hostess. Côtier Brand has become synonymous with authentic, imaginative fun for events of any occasion to truly make them a big hit by offering innovative products designed to create meaningful and inspiring interactions. Reaching customers around the globe through their website, Amazon, and Target.com, Côtier Brand has become a rising star in the event planning space and continues to innovate and develop new products for hosts and hostesses everywhere. Founded in 2017, Côtier Brand makes it easy for the everyday hostess to make regular gatherings into unforgettable events.
Tell us a little bit about your background and how you started your company?
Marx: I earned a degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Amber has a degree in Aviation Management. After our first child’s birth, Amber left corporate America and sought ways to utilize her experience and expertise to continue working from home. We set our sights on innovating in the baby shower game space and decided to launch our product through Amazon because it presented the best opportunity to reach the most potential customers. We put a unique twist on baby shower lottery scratch-off cards that made them more modern and an all-around conversation piece. From there, we expanded our product line to more party and home-entertaining products that inspire connection and relationship-building. Some of our biggest highlights of running this company have been securing an online retail partnership with Target, and most importantly, receiving pictures and videos of customers using our products at events.
What are your plans for the future, how do you plan to grow this company?
Our ultimate goal for Côtier Brand is to be the go-to party and home entertainment resource for the everyday hostess. We plan not only to continue to release innovative games and activities that hosts can use to engage and drive connection between guests but also to keep growing our blog’s authority and presence online.
How have the pandemic and Lockdown affected you or your new business?
The pandemic completely changed the way we communicate and market to our customers. By being forced to slow down and really listen to what the customers needed in such a difficult time, we were able to transform our business and really become a trusted resource to them. 2020 is the reason our blog exists today. We became relentless in finding ways to add value to our customers, and our business flourished.
How do you separate yourself from your competitors?
We separate ourselves from our competitors by being truly original and unique with the products that we release. Also, as mentioned before, we put resources together that genuinely help our customers plan unforgettable events. We find that most of our competition is simply not interested in being this invested in the customer.
What were the top three mistakes you made starting your business, and what did you learn from them?
When starting our business, our top three mistakes were centered around understanding our customers and executing swiftly on the data collected and given to us. For a long time, we did not communicate with our customers to truly understand what their pain points were and their genuine experience with our products.
Secondly, not advertising where our customer likes to gather information online before making an informed purchase.
Thirdly, not offering value in the form of educational content to help educate our customers and build trust before asking for the sale. All in all, we learned that putting our customers first and listening to their needs and wants while educating them along the way is the best way to go about business in our industry.
Tell us a little bit about your marketing process, what has been the most successful form of marketing for you?
The most successful form of marketing for our company has been through the utilization of Facebook and Instagram retargeting ads. The attention span of the modern consumer is less than 6 seconds today, which has made it critical to show up multiple times a week or daily in their feed to capture their attention.
If you started your business again, what things would you do differently?
We wouldn’t do anything differently in our business because the lessons we’ve learned have enriched our lives both professionally and personally. All the adversities and challenges were great growth opportunities and experiences that we would never want to be taken away.
What are the top 3 online tools and resources you’re currently using to grow your company?
Our top online tools and resources that we’re currently using to grow our company are Picmonkey, Canva, and Animoto, all online video and image design tools. Since our brand is 100% internet-based, it is critical to creating dynamic visual assets for ads, email, social media, websites, and much more. We would not be where we are today if it weren’t for these amazing tools.
What’s a productivity tip you swear by?
Everything doesn’t matter equally. This is a productivity tip I learned from the book “The One Thing” by Gary Keller, who built the multi-billion dollar empire Keller Williams Realty Group. It essentially means that 80% of the results you’re experiencing in any area of life are due to 20% of the inputs you are making. So your job is to find the 20% and make that your #1 priority.
Can you recommend one book, one podcast, and one online course for entrepreneurs?
We would recommend “The One Thing” book by Gary Keller, a God-send if you struggle with productivity and growth in your business. It teaches you how to systemize your way of thinking to come out ahead and be more successful in everything you do.
We would recommend the Freedom Slay Podcast by Gaynette Jones if you’re looking for ways to monetize your passion to start generating online income and become free from the 9-5. And as far as a course, all we can say is that there are many great courses out there, but it highly depends on your goals and what you want to achieve. Interested in monetizing a blog? Well, then you should find the best blogging course you can get your hands on.
If you only had $1000 dollars to start a new business, knowing everything you know now, how would you spend it?
We would start a service-based business helping eCommerce business owners advertise their products on Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram. Essentially, we would launch a digital marketing agency specializing in eCommerce and use the $1000 to build a website, run ads and create proposals for potential clients.
What valuable advice would you give new entrepreneurs starting out?
I heard this piece of advice from a good friend of ours, which is, ” You’re living your worst-case scenario right now by not taking action, so do it anyway.”
How can readers get in touch with you?
We love to connect with our customers and the best way is on our social media channels – mainly on Instagram and Pinterest as cotierbrand, and Facebook as cotierbrandofficial. We always have fun content to share with everyone and looking forward for everyone to try our products.
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