Hemp Beverages Are the Trojan Horse for Normalization | Dan Serard, Cannabis Creative Group

Send us Fan Mail Dan Serard is Chief Revenue Officer at Cannabis Creative Group, a full-service cannabis marketing agency near Boston that has worked with more than 600 brands. In this episode of the Ready To Drink Podcast, Dan and host, Nate Fochtman, break down what hemp beverage marketing takes when the shot clock on federal hemp policy is still running. Dan explains why "a hemp beverage for everybody" is dead in the water. He walks through how his team builds a full brand toolkit before anyone designs a logo: messaging, buyer personas, content pillars and positioning. He also shares why people buy from people, why Meta punishes product promotion in cannabis and how one wine-replacement hemp brand went from a 0.8x to a 4x return on ad spend by letting Meta learn who its customers are. Spending $500 a month on Meta ads as an alcohol replacement brand is a budget mistake, and Dan explains why. Nate and Dan also cover email marketing that builds trust instead of customer fatigue, and why beverages are the most approachable format for the canna-curious consumer. They make the case that hemp beverages are the Trojan horse for cannabis normalization. Nate shares a story from the Pennsylvania Capitol during the HB 2309 hemp beverage bill hearings, and both explain why the hemp and cannabis industries need to stop working in silos. In this episode: Building a hemp beverage brand from intake to toolkit Why storytelling and lifestyle content beat product promotion on Meta Programmatic and CTV advertising for cannabis brands Email marketing without discount fatigue Realistic ad budgets for alcohol replacement brands The 30 to 90 day Meta learning curve Hemp beverages as the gateway to cannabis normalization Why unity across hemp and cannabis matters right now Connect with Dan Serard on LinkedIn or at CannabisCreativeGroup.com This is the Ready To Drink Podcast. New episodes drop weekdays covering the alcohol, hemp derived and functional non-alc categories from the operator's seat, not the press release. ReadyToDrinkPodcast.com | Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube Subscribe for more founder stories from the drinks industry. The FreeMind Group Owner-operator market development and PR, built on the street for the last 18 years. Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you. Support the show Presented by The FreeMind Group - FMGStrategy.com