Acquisition project | PlayVerse Toys

A Toy Company that actually cares

PlayVerse Toys is a Made in India toy brand crafting toys that help accelerate learning milestones.
What is learning milestones you ask?

Every child in his/her growth journey must learn essential skills that build the foundation of future learning for them.

We build toys that help children achieve these skills by introducing hands-on learning which is also fun.

Some things we do the best

1. Build the best quality toys right here in India
2. We don't build fancy colour toys even though it might add crores to our topline
3. We focus on international safety standards while also building environment safe products
4. Our major competition is not other toys, but screen time on smart phones/tabs
5. We help build a better learning-play relationship between the parent and child
6. We are essentially tackling the rote learning methods of child growth

Understanding the product, user journey , product's presence in the market

• We are at Pre-PMF stage with a seed round done at $1.5 Mn USD
• The product 's core value prop - is accelerating learning milestones
• Child education experts are the biggest WOM ambassadors for us

• We are an Omnichannel brand - selling through our own website, marketplaces and recently experimenting with GT/MT with presence across 100 major tier 1 cities in India
• We have experimented with an Amazon First Global GTM strategy with launches in USA, UAE and Australia to test the waters.
  
  https://www.playverse.toys/

Partnerships and collabs

Who is the User?

• Typical User journey happens on discovery on Instagram to conversion on website
• Discovery on Amazon/FirstCry to conversion on marketplace
• Age group we cater to - 3 years to 7 years

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ICP Prioritisation Framework

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ICPs Chosen and Why:

Based on High perceived value, Appetite to Pay and Low CAC

ICP - 1 , Founder - Children Activity Centre

This is a B2B2C type of customer, tapping to this segment automatically opens up a large market where trust is gained on word of mouth of children activity centre. Faster feedback from both types of users - B2B and B2C.
This ICP can itself be used as a great referal pillar.

ICP - 2
Independent professional and Mother
A typical D2C customer, who is spending a significant amount of time researching learning focused toy, and is part of many similar communities. Easy to get faster feedback on the use cases of the toy and get a sense of parent communities at large

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Why PlayVerse Toys should target these ICPs initially?

• At Pre - PMF stage , the number one priority is getting SKU specific feedback faster for both types of ICPs who are going to make a significant size of TAM. This type of feedback is only possible from users spending enough time in the education toys space we are in
• The effective and genuine feedback on two major points - Product utility and Pricing is possible through these segments at scale faster.
• With Bulk orders and high appetite to Pay with low CAC - makes it possible for us to keep running while doing more product experiments.

Product Category/Market

• Though each of the PlayVerse Toys' product has a different competitor based on research on key insights from Google / Youtube and Marketplaces search data(Attached below), the top 3 competitors based on overall product category i.e Learning and education toys are the following
  
  1. Skillmatics
  2. Shumee Toys
  3. Webby Toys
  
  Other : Curious Cub, Zudo, StepstoDo, ariro toys
  

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Key Insights from collated data

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Market Size

TAM for the Selected ICPs only

ICP 1
Insights that led to me choosing the Tier 1 India only for ICP - 1

• Focus on 30 Mn households with avg income $14,000(Indus Valley Report)
• Rise in Nuclear Families in India resulting in purchase of premium categories
• Significant growth in percentage of families where both partners are working
• The above three points help in : a) Ascertaining appetite to Pay b) Higher purchase frequency c) Need of child day care/activities centres/ special ed centres in Tier 1 India

Primary/pre primary schools would be a appropriate reference to take in case Total no of child day care/activity centres/special ed centres in India .

Source : udise_21_22.pdf

ICP 2

Insights that led to me choosing ICP 2

• Rise in Nuclear Families in India resulting in purchase of premium categories
• Significant growth in percentage of families where both partners are working
• Increased awareness to inclusion in Child's Education
• Bragging of child 's achievements by Tier 1 working Moms

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Source : Indus Valley Report, https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/economy/shrinking-households-50-of-indian-families-are-nuclear/article67126676.ece

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Core Value Prop

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Acquisition Channels

JTBD Frame work

Acquisition Channel Prioritisation Framework

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Based on Flexibility, Scale, CAC and Lead Time, the following are chosen :

Paid Ads

ICP 2

Wait,Paid Ads for Pre - PMF ?
Well yes - however using Marketplaces Ads to get early signal of PMF

• Amazon Ads are cheaper, more flexible, take less time to convert and scale profitably
• Build a strong back bone for organic growth
• My ICP are always spending time on Amazon searching for stuff, so our GTM requires us to be on Marketplaces
• Higher conversion rates
• Easier feedback loopes
• Higher Trust by Buyer
  
  Amazon is a search driven platform, and hence the focus is going be on Sponsored Products Ads
  
  - Sponsored Keywords Ads
  - Sponsored Product Ads - Potential competitors
  - Sponsored Categories
  

Amazon Ads Strategy

• Start by creating auto ads campaigns for each SKU to gather initial data
  
  This will gives us the following three things ;
  
  1. Customer Search Terms we can target initially
  2. Competition keywords to target
  3. Categories to Target
  
  - Build separate ad campaigns for each SKU
  - Track key metrics Week -on - Week for optimisations
  
  Budget 80 % only for keywords ads and the rest for Brand Ads
  
  Keywords ads would be categorised into the following
  
  - Generic Searches
  - Brand Searches
  - Competition searches

SKU 1 Ad Strategy

Metrics to track Month -on Month to work towards PMF

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Others

FirstCry is also a platform where the ICP spends a good amount of time, however the core reason for buying is discounts .
Hence Listing our products on FirstCry would be another immediate setup

Referrals/ Partnerships
ICP 1

Experiment 1 : B2B Partnerships/referrals

Aim : Partner up with activity/special ed/pre primary centres in a B2B capacity for faster feedback and gaining trust while also reaching a wide customer base through Partner-Cum-Referral Program.

1. What is brag worthy about the product? - A Happier and engaged session in the child activity centre
2. Platform currency for this experiment : Money, Fame and Access
3. Who will we ask for referral : Repeat B2B customers who have purchased atleast 2 times with AOV INR 1500 - 2000.
4. How will the user discover the referral program : A WhatsApp Campaign for these users
5. How will the referee share the code ? - Both one - to - one and one-to -many forward over WA
6. How will the referral invite look to non-user - (A WA forward with the referral centre sending a video with centre kids playing with
7. How will the referral keep happening - motivate referee to move from Money -> Access -> Fame



Platform used for the WA Campaign : QuickReply

The WA forward will include series of Automated replies to help ease the process for referring further.

The flow is as follows

1. Introductory Message from PlayVerseToys

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2. Details about Referral Program
   

3. The message with the code
   

At MVP stage, I believe tracking referrals should be done using google sheets and WA API triggers which if faster than building a whole UI system for it

Referral Tracking System

Experiment 2
ICP 1 : B2B2C Referral

AIM : Encourage activity centres to spread WOM about PV toys and tap into the larger segment of their users using our ICP as a referral engine.
We reach to more engaged B2C users easily and get direct feedback.

1. What is brag worthy about the product? - Every parents go-to play-way learning resource
2. Platform currency for this experiment : Money and Access
3. Who will we ask for referral : Repeat B2B customers who have purchased atleast 2 times with AOV INR 1500 - 2000
4. How will the user discover the referral program : A WhatsApp Campaign for these users
5. How will the referee share the code ? - one-to -many forward over WA
6. How will the referral invite look to non-user - (A personliased WA message through the horse mouth i.e the owner of the centre to the parents describing benefits
7. How will the referral keep happening - motivate referee to move from Money --> Access

Platform used for the WA Campaign : QuickReply

The WA forward will a series of Automated replies to help ease the process for referring further.

The flow is as follows

1) Introductory Message to the owner of the activity centre

2. If interested,the following message will be shared with code and tracking

Tracking 😀

With use of utm link and exclusive discount code, we can easily track every commission through Shopify backend.

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Why betting on referrals at PMF Stage?

• While every other toy company is selling toys to centres, we are selling integrations to their cirriculum
• These Centre have the highest WOM and trust from parents
• Rarely any toy companies take detailed feedback from these centres.

Working on this project was fun, and I got my AHA moment as well