Daniel Snow Explains How to Leverage Social Media For Growing Brands

In the Champ life series this time, we have Daniel Snow, founder and the CEO of The Snow Agency, with us.

Daniel launched and scaled several e-commerce brands in just three years, producing over $50M in revenue. The best part – he didn’t raise any funding or loan to establish his brands. He loves to help brands and unlock scalable growth for operations.

Also, he is the founder of RAPTV, one of the most significant hip-hop communities in the world today.

Since 2014, he has founded several brands, and his journey has been exceptional and inspiring. He and his team have perfected the art of creating and marketing content that converts.

He also loves to speak at events and has been featured as a guest at many podcasts, such as The Formula, The Employer Blueprint.

Muneeb: What’s the one thing that got you into social media marketing? 

Daniel: I got started in the digital/online marketing space in a very interesting way.

I was in college studying Biology to be a dentist, and I had a friend who had started to monetize a Twitter account. He was telling me how I could be making really good money. So, I started helping him with the Twitter account in the hopes of making 45 dollars a day.

I left after a while, but I had learned to grow a social media following. In the next 12 months, I grew to 8 million followers on Twitter. After growing this substantial following, I focused on monetizing the account, creating content, apps, and Google ads.

Muneeb: What challenges did you face at the beginning of your career? And how did you overcome them?

Daniel: On our first Black Friday, we were very understaffed and did not realize how busy the week would be. We were 20,000 orders of phone cases behind on the Black Friday weekend. We had to completely shut off marketing because we could not keep up with the demand.

I was in the warehouse helping out my team with orders, and that’s when I realized that was the result of us not relying on experts. It was a massive learning experience of what happens when you try to grow without understanding the demand. We had to focus on fulfilling orders that were growing beyond our capability.

I started reaching out to experts on how we could make this process better for my team as I did not want them to go through another chaotic experience working with me.

Muneeb: You started two companies during your college, “Caffeine Digital” and “Snow Media.” Could you tell us more about them? 

Daniel: I started creating apps and getting my following to make my apps go viral on Twitter and the app store. I had a few apps on the app store in the top 50, and then I got into affiliate marketing.

I found out how powerful leveraging a social media following can be. I then created a self-serve advertising platform for influencers. We did everything from building pages to content creation and made it super easy for influencers to monetize their audience. This idea proved to be a pretty big platform for influencers.

It also gave me many insights and relationships needed for leveraging all this information and how we can grow our e-commerce brands.

Muneeb: During your career, is there any particular achievement that you are very proud of? 

Daniel: For four years, we grew our own ecommerce brands. We were doing a ton of influencer marketing and celebrity marketing, and eventually, we got into paid ads, which took our company to the next level.

We mastered this in four years after spending 20 million dollars in advertising. We sold our brands, and after really understanding what is required to grow an e-commerce brand, we started doing it for our clients, and that is how The Snow Agency was born.

Muneeb: How far do you think has the “Snow Agency” come and grow? 

Daniel: The Snow Agency has grown immensely. In January of this year, our agency was named the #1 Digital Marketing Agency by DesignRush.

Muneeb: Who’s your inspiration? Who do you look up to for advice?

Daniel: My brother has been my partner and very helpful along the way. I’m really appreciative of everything he has done for me. He helped a lot with operations, growing the organization, and managing all of the employees. He got in when I started the platform, and I showed him how to work with influencers, buy traffic, and understand marketing, and he grew to have a passion for it. It is nice knowing that he shared my passion, and we can rely on each other for advice and guidance.

Muneeb: What would be your advice for newcomers who want to start their marketing agency?

Daniel: You have to learn how to break through the noise.

To illustrate this, here’s a real-life example for one of our clients, Hollywood Hair Bar.

They had been building their customer and fan base organically for a year without doing any paid ads. She came to our agency to help turn her extensive social media fan base into customers and build a sustainable customer acquisition method, so she didn’t have to rely on influencers entirely. Moreover, the website was far below industry standards for conversion rate due to the on-site user experience.

We installed a Facebook pixel on the website and made custom website audiences and lookalikes based on events triggered on the website. We started by retargeting anyone who engaged with her Instagram or visited her website and saw outstanding results. We then made lookalikes based on these audiences and began to prospect customers who had similar characteristics.

In our first week of testing, we saw EXPLOSIVE results, and we were able to quickly identify our ideal market and what content & ad copy resonated best with them. These insights allowed us to curate appropriate content to portray the unique business value and website adjustments required for improving the conversion rate.

Muneeb: What are the main objectives to consider when starting a social media campaign?

Daniel: Social media is powerful for e-commerce because it allows businesses to remain top of mind and deliver value or entertainment for free –  this builds loyalty and interest among current and future customers.

The best practice is to have a content strategy plan with core pillars of information and messaging that aligns with your brand. Show up consistently and engage. Avoid selling and focus on storytelling and sharing the transformation your product or services deliver to the customers. And remember to tie traditional advertising to your social accounts with coupons, offers, and promotions.

Muneeb: How important is social media automation for a business? What would you like to say about Social Champ?

Daniel: Social media automation for any business is vital. It saves business owners time and helps them maintain their posting schedules on all social media platforms. Social media automation enables you to schedule your posts in a way that fits your specific requirement. I like the work that Social Champ does. It’s an excellent service that you offer, and you help to simplify the whole process.

Muneeb: How would you like to spend your free time? We see you are a huge fan of hip-hop and rapping. Do you participate in events in the hip-hop community? 

Daniel: I schedule time every day for something I look forward to that’s fun, makes me happy, healthy, or all of the above. A long bike ride, dinner with my girlfriend, savoring time near Miami’s crystal blue water. Having something to look forward to each day makes even the most demanding days worth it, and it never feels like a grind. Yes, I still attend hip-hop events!

Rapid Fire Round 

Muneeb: Lastly, who do you think we should interview next?

Daniel: My brother, Jonathan Snow! He was the top-earning marketer at Caffeine Digital, where he formed numerous relationships with influencers and celebrities while managing a team of 100+ marketers. Jon earned his Doctorate of Dental Medicine from Rutgers, finishing top 5 in his class before serving Active Duty as a General Dentist and Captain for three years in the US Air Force.

Social Champ is glad to have Daniel Snow for this interview.