App of the Month: HerHeadquarters Wants To Make Fashion Partnerships Easy To Find
Want to collaborate with other like-minded businesses? There’s an app for that called HerHeadquarters and its mission is to connect doers with other doers. It’s no secret that doing business in 2019 requires digital savviness and this app needs to be in your 360 marketing plan. Now in four major cities, you can scroll potential partnerships and gain access to brand building deals on HerHeadquarters. It’s an easy signup process as the platform vets users and also sends customized welcome emails. Plus, the users are also exclusively in the fashion, beauty, pr and events categories so it makes it easier to pull off any forthcoming experiential event campaigns. Off the heels of their successful launch of the app built to help women build their empire, founder Carina Glover, is already plotting to add more features and functionality that their current and future girl boss users will love. Go inside our conversation about the brand’s inspiration and what’s next.
Mel Writes: What is your background? What inspired you to get into the tech space?
Carina Glover In 2014, I launched an event planning business. My toughest lesson as an entrepreneur came on the first day. I experienced devastation when no one showed up to my business’ launch party, though feeling defeated it planted a seed. My perspective at the time was that people who were good could do everything alone, they didn’t need partnerships. I turned down many opportunities to collaborate with other brands on the launch party. While my event planning business eventually saw success, that lesson stuck with me and I immediately saw the value of having allies and brand partnerships. The more I worked with female founders over the years, the more I noticed that women were open to partnering with one another, but that process often came with various struggles. I reached a point where I wanted to do something bigger and more impactful. I wanted to make the process of securing quality brand collaborations easier and more accessible, while also changing the image of women who build businesses through collaborations, to show them as bold and powerful.
What was the journey to lead you to start HerHeadquarters app?
My event planning business gave me the opportunity to work with many high-profile brands and clients, more importantly, it connected me to women entrepreneurs across the country. Although my business became successful, I always had a desire to work with & serve women building empires. After the idea of HerHeadquarters came to me in 2017, I reached a point where I wanted to commit to building the vision. Shortly after I applied to and was accepted into a startup program for entrepreneurs in tech. I spent the past 18 months establishing a strong foundation for HerHeadquarters, researching my target audience, creating wireframes, testing, and more. In May of this year, we released in four major cities.
What are some unique features/ functions users will get out of the app?
HerHeadquarters is an app exclusive to women entrepreneurs in collaborative industries (fashion, beauty, entertainment, events, pr) with a vetting process. The benefit to users is that this creates a platform full of women who are intentional about collaborating.
Some key features include users having immediate access to a Rolodex of local and national brand partnerships opportunities, posted by fellow women entrepreneurs. We’ve removed the time that it takes to find promising, quality collaborations. Once a user discovers a collaboration opportunity they’re interested in, they immediately receive details such as length of the partnership, an overview, collaboration perks, information about the brand they’d be partnering with, and more.
Users can discover partnerships based on location and industry preferences, as well as view their potential collaborators' history and rating prior to committing to a partnership.
Mel Writes: Why do you think women are either so competitive or intrinsically collaborative?
I honestly think it depends on their environment, upbringing, and the experiences they’ve had. I’ve met women who are competitive and collaborative.
HerHeadquarters is trying to impact both types of women: giving the naturally collaborative women access to an easier, quicker, stress-free way of securing brand partnerships and helping the competitive women realize the value in collaborating.
What are you most excited about for HerHeadquarters in 2019?
We’re excited for our HerHeadquarters Version 2 campaign that we’re hosting on iFundWomen. The success of this campaign will help us develop, launch, and market HerHeadquarters 2.0, the second version of the app that’ll introduce new features to our users based on their feedback. A successful campaign, meaning that we hit our $15,000 goal, will also give us the opportunity to expand to additional U.S. cities, giving more women entrepreneurs access to powerful partnerships and allies.
Tell me about the iFundWomen campaign. Why this platform?
HerHeadquarters is intentional about supporting women-owned brands in every capacity. With iFundWomen being a crowdfunding platform designed for female entrepreneurs and our brand’s being so aligned, it made sense to use their platform and it was the only platform I considered because of this. I also met the founder, Karen Cahn, and many members of their staff recently at a conference. Every single member of their team was authentic, I genuinely felt that they wanted to see me and my campaign be a success.
How many members do you have thus far?
We have over a hundred users currently, a great number for a platform that released only last month. Our user base continues to grow with a 45% user growth rate since our official launch. Those users stretch across five industries: fashion, beauty, entertainment, events, and pr.
What success stories have you seen with clients using the app?
I’ve seen a lot of success and each story excites me. One user, who owns a fashion line, landed an opportunity to headline fashion week. As a new brand, she wanted to maximize the momentum and build up press coverage surrounding her brand and the September fashion week opportunity. She was able to secure a collaboration with a fashion publicist, both women are ecstatic about working together. They have some very strategic and creative plans in place to boost her brand’s exposure and make additional headlines.
Other users have been able to secure partnerships for major events, discover stylists to contribute onset during campaign and photoshoots, and more. Last week we had several users secure a partner within only 24 hours of posting a collaboration.
Any advice for new business owners?
Mental preparation is crucial. I’d suggest business owners be aware and accept that this journey will have setbacks, unexpected obstacles, and occasionally some disappointing moments. I’m not saying that you wake up every day expecting negative things to happen, but there’s a reason they say ‘there’s no-hit worse like the one you don’t see coming’. Those are the ones that knock you down, that we have a hard time bouncing back from. Being prepared mentally and having back up plans in place prevents unexpected hits from destroying you.
What is your go-to advice for networking online?
Embrace being authentic and having integrity. You cannot be everything to everybody, but your passion, work ethic, and authenticity will attract the people who align well with you and your business.
