Format 01
Satisfying process
Unbroken setup, start to finish, locked off. Cuts to time-lapse or stays real-time. Needs: a tripod and nobody walking through frame.
Brand & Social Rebrand Kit · v1.1 · Aug 26, 2026
The Backyard Solar brand, end to end.
One document that defines who Solwel is to a consumer, how it looks and sounds, what every social profile says,
what gets posted on TikTok, and how creators get recruited and paid. Built to match the V3 brand site already
approved as the lead direction — same charcoal, same solar orange, same plain-English rule.
What's inside
Updated · Aug 26, 2026 marketing meeting
What Changed in This Version
v1.1 folds in the Aug 26 call with Tony, Lukas, David and Kyle. One change is a correction, not an addition — read that one first.
Correction · the certification claim
v1.0 made "Certified to UL 3700" a headline claim across the bios, the hooks and the creator script. That claim does not survive contact with the product. Tony walked through it on the call: UL 3700 caps output at 3.5 amps per dedicated port, and two panels bridged with a Y-cable lands around 7 — the APsystems two-panel configuration measures about 7.5. In his words, it "does violate" the standard.
A single panel has no such problem — no permit, no utility approval, essentially nationwide. So the brand leads with the single panel, and multi-panel becomes a guided purchase with state restrictions at checkout. Every place the old claim appeared has been rewritten below.
| Decision | What was agreed | What it changes here |
|---|---|---|
| Single-panel lead | One panel is clean nationwide; two-plus needs a dedicated circuit, a meter, or a utility conversation depending on the state | Pillar 03, all bios, hook bank, creator script, product architecture |
| Smaller panels, one box | Move from 400–450W panels to a custom 2 × 230W = 460W kit in a single carton with foam corners — packed like a TV, shipped by UPS instead of freight. Section 232 tariffs make small panels the cheaper import anyway | New "arrives in one box" story, unboxing content, setup messaging |
| Pre-sale launch | Racking from the China factory lands end of October. Launch pre-sales at a discount rather than waiting; buyers are told the timeline up front | Rollout sequencing, launch content, ticker and product badges |
| State restrictions at checkout | Gate multi-panel kits on the shipping address (David's model: how online firearm sales work), plus the interactive state-law map now live on the FAQ page | Site FAQ callout, voice guardrails, creator claim rules |
| EcoFlow partnership | Final agreement signed. EcoFlow products — foldable panels, DELTA 3 power stations — carry the Nomad line at launch, using EcoFlow's own imagery and video | Nomad page rebuilt around EcoFlow; solves the van-life photography gap |
| Free shipping | Wellbots offers it; Lukas wants to match. Single-box UPS is what makes it affordable | Flagged as an open decision — not claimed anywhere until the math is done |
| California timing | California is heavily promoting its backyard-solar policy change right now | PR angle and a launch-window content pillar |
Also removed from the live site
The draft claimed "Free 2-day shipping" and a blanket "No permits required." Neither is currently supportable — shipping quotes aren't back from Old Dominion, and the permit claim is only true for a single panel. Both are rewritten on all five pages.
01 · Scope
This Is a Repositioning, Not a New Logo
Solwel's name, mark, and colors are staying. What changes is who the brand talks to, what the products are called, how the company sounds, and where it shows up. Solwel stops presenting as a distributor with one SKU and starts presenting as the consumer brand that owns backyard solar.
✓ What stays
- The SOLWEL wordmark — it already works small, reads at a glance, and survives on photography
- The charcoal + solar orange palette pulled from the mark
- The Shopify catalog, checkout and fulfillment
- The Prometheus Power / Solwel Pro relationship — it just moves behind a separate door
↻ What changes
- Audience: from installers and distributors → renters, homeowners, van-lifers aged 20–45
- Product language: from spec sheets → three named lines and appliance-level promises
- Voice: from technical → plain English, sixth-grade reading level, zero jargon
- Channel: from B2B relationships → TikTok-first, creator-led, UGC-fed
- Every social profile — handle, avatar, banner, bio, pinned content, link-in-bio
We're trying to chase after the Signature Solar clientele. We want to take a portion of their market share.
— David Lee · Prometheus Power Solutions · Jul 30, 2026
Signature Solar owns the whole-home DIY buyer, and they own it with YouTube. The gap is one tier below them: the person who wants power without a garage full of gear. That buyer lives on TikTok, has never watched a 45-minute wiring tutorial, and will not learn a new vocabulary to give you $599. Everything in this kit exists to make Solwel the obvious brand for that person.
02 · Brand Platform
What Solwel Stands For
The four lines every piece of copy, ad, and creator brief traces back to.
Positioning statement
For renters and homeowners who want real electricity without a contractor, a permit, or a five-figure quote, Solwel is the plug-in solar brand that turns a backyard, balcony, fence, or van into a power source in an afternoon — certified, under $1,000, and simple enough that the hardest part is deciding where to put it.
Pillar 01
Plug it in. That's it.
Every message leads with simplicity. No permits, no electrician, no roof. If a claim requires a caveat about your electrical panel, it does not belong in top-of-funnel copy.
Pillar 02
Power you can picture.
Never sell watts — sell the fridge, the freezer in the garage, the Starlink, the CPAP, the string lights. Appliance-level promises beat specs at every stage.
Pillar 03
Start with one panel.
One panel needs no permit and no utility sign-off, just about anywhere. That's the honest, frictionless entry — and it's the whole offer. More power is a conversation we have with the customer, not a claim we make at them.
Tagline options
Recommendation: #1 for the site and packaging, #3 as the social bio line — it does more work in a 80-character field.
| Line | Best for | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| Solar you plug in. | Master tagline · site, packaging, ads | Four words, defines the category, and does the objection-handling before the objection ("do I need an installer?"). Recommended. |
| Power where you park it. | Nomad line | Portability without saying "portable." Travels well as a sticker and a van decal. |
| Your backyard makes electricity now. | Social bios · TikTok hooks | Reads as a fact, not an ad — the highest-performing tone on TikTok. Doubles as a hook. |
| Renting is not a reason to pay the power company. | Paid creative · renter audience | Pointed, shareable, and speaks to the single biggest unserved segment. |
Who we're talking to
The Renter
25–38, apartment or townhome, can't touch the roof, watches the bill climb every summer. Needs permission-free. Biggest volume segment.
The Yard Owner
32–50, owns a house, has been quoted $22k for rooftop and said no. Wants a first step that isn't a loan. Highest AOV segment.
The Nomad
24–40, van / RV / overlander / weekend camper. Already buys power gear. Fastest to convert, most likely to post about it.
The Just-In-Caser
35–60, bought a generator after the last outage and hates running it. Buys on weather news. Seasonal spikes, high referral rate.
03 · Voice & Tone
Talk Like a Neighbor Who Happens to Know Solar
Confident, plain, a little dry. Never hype-y, never a spec sheet, never a lecture. If a sentence would make someone feel stupid for not already knowing something, rewrite it.
6
Grade reading level
Target sixth grade on all consumer copy. Short sentences. One idea per sentence.
0
Unexplained terms
Microinverter, LiFePO4, bifacial, kWh — banned in body copy. Allowed only in a spec table clearly labeled as such.
1
Idea per screen
Each section of a page, and each 3 seconds of a video, makes exactly one point.
Say this, not that
| ✕ Don't write | ✓ Write |
|---|---|
| 800W bifacial array with dual microinverters | Two panels. Enough power to run your fridge. |
| 5.12kWh LiFePO4 battery storage solution | Keeps the lights and fridge going about a day when the power's out. |
| Grid-tied plug-in photovoltaic system | It plugs into a normal outlet. |
| Optimize your energy independence journey | Take a bite out of your power bill. |
| Balcony solar | Backyard solar — renamed Aug 2026; "balcony" stays only as a placement example, never as the category |
| Contact us for a custom quote | $599. Add to cart. |
| Industry-leading efficiency | One panel. No permit, no utility paperwork, just about anywhere. |
✓ Tone rules
- Lead with the outcome, follow with the product
- Answer the objection in the same breath as the claim
- Use real numbers — prices, hours, appliances
- Say "you" more than "we"
- Dry humor is fine; exclamation points are not
✕ Never
- Promise savings figures we can't source
- Claim it's legal everywhere — that's only true of a single panel; multi-panel is state by state
- Give electrical or permitting advice in comments or chat (hand off to Houston / Dallas)
- Use "free energy," "beat the grid," or doomsday framing
- Quote a certification as a blanket product claim — it applies per configuration, and two panels on one plug exceed it
- Promise free or 2-day shipping until the freight math is signed off
- Talk down to installers — they're a different door, not an enemy
Liability guardrail
The site chatbot is deliberately scripted, not generative, for this exact reason: a wrong answer about permits or electrical code is a real liability for a solar retailer. The same rule applies to social. Anyone replying to comments follows the same script — if the answer touches code, permits, or panel capacity, the reply is "great question, our team in Houston can answer that properly — DM us."
04 · Naming Architecture
Three Lines. Names, Not Specs.
The single biggest brand change. Products stop being configurations and start being named things a person can want. Ride Rich sells armor as streetwear by naming it; we sell energy hardware the same way.
Line 01
Solwel Backyard
Plug-in kits. Yard, fence, patio, railing, balcony. The volume line and the front door of the brand. Leads with the single panel; the two-panel kit moves to 2 × 230W in one carton. Pricing lands from Tony this week.
Buyer: renters, first-time yard owners. Hook: "no roof, no permit, no electrician."
Line 02
Solwel DIY
Off-grid builds. EG4 / Sol-Ark class gear for people who want the full system and will wire it themselves. ~$1,299 entry.
Buyer: the Signature Solar crossover. Hook: "same gear, better bundle, human support."
Line 03
Solwel Nomad
Portable power, running on EcoFlow at launch — foldable panels and DELTA 3 power stations, under the signed dealer agreement.
Buyer: van-life and overlanding. Hook: "power where you park it." EcoFlow's own imagery and video carry the page until we shoot our own.
Naming formula
Solwel [Line] · [Kit name] — then the plain-English promise
Examples: Solwel Backyard · The Fridge Kit — "two panels, plugs into an outlet, runs your refrigerator." Solwel Nomad · The Weekender — "keeps the fridge, lights and phones alive for a long weekend." Solwel DIY · The Whole Shop — "power a detached garage without trenching to the house."
Never lead with "APsystems EZ1 800W 2-Panel Kit." Model numbers live in the spec table, below the fold, where the shopper who wants them will look.
Where the Pro business goes
Installer and wholesale demand doesn't disappear — it moves behind a Solwel Pro door: one gateway link in the site nav and footer, a gated portal, and nothing else on the consumer surfaces. No Pro language on the consumer social accounts. If Pro needs a presence, it gets its own LinkedIn, not a share of the TikTok.
05 · Color
Two Colors Do the Work
Sampled directly from the SOLWEL mark. Solar Orange is the only accent — it means "act" (buy, tap, follow). Everything else is paper, ink, and one dark tone for photography-led panels.
Usage ratio & contrast
60 paper / 30 ink & photography / 10 orange. When orange starts feeling like a background color, the layout has lost its accent.
Accessibility: #F59A00 on white fails contrast for body text. Orange text is for headlines 20px+ or bold 16px+; for small text on light backgrounds use Deep Amber #D98700. Orange buttons always take white text, never charcoal.
06 · Typography
Montserrat, Top to Bottom
One family, four weights. Montserrat's heavy geometric caps are the closest widely-available match to the SOLWEL wordmark, so headlines feel like they came out of the logo. Free on Google Fonts — no licensing cost, works in Canva, CapCut, Shopify and WordPress.
Solar you plug in.Display · 900 · −3% tracking
Runs your fridge for about a daySection head · 800
Two panels. One outlet. No permit.Lede · 700
Set it in the yard, hang it on the fence, or lean it on the railing — then plug it into a normal outlet. Most people are done in an afternoon.Body · 500
Most popular · Buy it right hereEyebrow / badge · 900 caps · +14% tracking
Rules
- Display headlines: max 13 characters per line, tracking tightened to −2 to −3%
- Body copy never below 14px on web, 15px on mobile
- Eyebrows and badges are always uppercase 900 with wide tracking
- Never letterspace body copy; never use Montserrat Light for anything
- Prices are 900 weight — they should read as loudly as headlines
Video & social type
- On-screen captions: Montserrat 800, white, subtle dark shadow — never the TikTok default font
- Hook text sits in the top third, above the UI chrome
- One orange word per frame, max — usually the number or the promise
- End frame: logo centered on Dusk, one CTA line, nothing else
- Legacy note: the V1 dark concept used Anton. If V3 ships, Anton is retired brand-wide.
07 · Logo
Using the Mark
The wordmark is the identity. Protect it, don't decorate it.
White knockout on dark
✓ Do
- Clear space: keep a margin equal to the height of the "S" on all four sides
- Minimum size: 90px wide on screen, 0.75in in print — below that, use the S monogram
- On photography, place it over a calm area or a solid Dusk bar
- Use full-color charcoal on light, white knockout on dark, and nothing else
- For 1:1 avatars, use the S monogram in white on Solar Orange — the full wordmark is illegible at 40px
✕ Don't
- Recolor it (no orange wordmark, no gradients, no drop shadows)
- Stretch, rotate, outline, or add a tagline lockup that isn't in this kit
- Place it over a busy part of a photo without a scrim
- Rebuild it in Montserrat — the mark is drawn, not typeset
- Put it inside a circle or a "badge" for anything other than a social avatar
Needed from the client
We currently work from a raster PNG only. To finish the kit properly we need the vector source (.ai / .svg / .eps) plus the S monogram as a standalone file. Without vector, large-format print, embroidery on creator merch, and clean video animation are all compromised. Ask: does the original designer still have the working file?
08 · Photography & Art Direction
Real Yards, Real Light, Real People
The single fastest way to look like a $10 marketplace listing is stock-render product photography on white. Solwel photography is golden-hour, lived-in, and shot where the product actually goes.
✓ Direction
- Golden hour or open shade — warm light matches the palette
- A person, a pet, a chair, a grill: something that says someone lives here
- Ordinary houses and ordinary yards. Aspirational-but-attainable
- Shoot vertical and horizontal in the same setup — social needs 9:16
- Leave headroom in the top third for caption text
✕ Avoid
- Panels floating on white, 3D renders, or lens-flare stock
- Hard midday sun and blown-out skies
- Luxury-home cues that make the product feel expensive
- Hard hats and installers on consumer surfaces — that's the Pro door
- Any image where you can't tell what the product does
Licensing — action needed before launch
Every photo in this kit and in the V3 previews is a placeholder for a design comp, not launch-ready art. Three known problems: cc-balcony-rail, cc-power-station and cc-van-6824 are CC BY-SA 4.0 — they require visible attribution plus share-alike, which is awkward on a commercial storefront. A handful of images added after the credits file was written (the yard-panel-* and yard-portable-station shots) have no documented source at all and need a provenance pass before any commercial use.
All of it must be attributed, replaced, or verified before a live site or a paid ad. The half-day shoot below solves it permanently and gives us footage nobody else has. Current record: PHOTO-CREDITS.md.
Where the shoot went
The speculative "half-day shoot" in v1.0 is superseded — it's now a real four-day production, Sept 8–11. Full call sheet in section 09.
Three locations were confirmed on the Aug 26 call: Solwel HQ (prototype units and the showwalls), Tony's second home — 2,800 sq ft with a solar patio and a freshly installed battery system, backyard cleared for staging — and Prometheus install jobs in the Dallas area for the Installer Pro rebrand. One caveat carried over from the call: the retail box will not exist in time to film. Tony was asked directly and said the turnaround is too short, so the unboxing sequence is storyboarded now and shot later.
09 · Production · Sept 8–11, 2026
The Shoot That Feeds the Whole Rebrand
Four days, two cities, four locations, and two distinct brands to shoot — consumer Solwel and Installer Pro. This is the call sheet, the shot list, and the formats each clip is cut for. Everything the site, the ad account and the first two months of organic need comes out of this week.
4
Shoot days
Tue Sept 8 → Fri Sept 11
2
Crew
Jordyn + Katie (video)
60+
Vertical clips
Target usable takes
30+
Stills
Site, PDPs, ads
Two brands, one trip — don't blur them
Consumer Solwel is warm, domestic, phone-shot, a person in their own yard. Installer Pro is competent, technical, crews and trucks and load centers. Shooting them with the same look is the fastest way to make the consumer brand feel like a distributor again — which is the exact problem this rebrand exists to fix. Different lens choice, different light, different wardrobe, ideally different days. Days 1–3 are consumer. Day 4 in Dallas is Pro.
Day-by-day call sheet
Times are approximate and built around light. Houston sunrise runs about 7:00am and sunset about 7:35pm in early September; Dallas is roughly five minutes later on both ends. Confirm on the day — a shoot planned to the minute around golden hour is a shoot that gets one usable hour.
Tuesday Sept 8 · Houston · Solwel HQ
Land, scout, shoot product
- Morning — arrive, drop bags, go straight to HQ. Don't burn the day settling in
- Midday (11a–3p): the showwalls and the warehouse. Flat, controlled light is fine here — this is product and detail work, not hero footage
- Prototype units: every angle, clean, on white and in context. This is the closest thing we have to the retail kit, and it has to carry the PDPs until the real box exists
- 3–5p: scout Tony's house in daylight. Find the golden-hour angle before you need it, mark where the sun sets relative to the patio, check drone clearance and any nearby airspace restrictions
- 6:45–7:35p: first golden hour at Tony's — exteriors and drone only. Treat it as a rehearsal for Wednesday
Wednesday Sept 9 · Houston · Tony's house
The big day — everything that has to look beautiful
- 6:45–8:00a golden hour: the hero backyard sequence. This is the shot the homepage lives on. Get it first, before anyone is tired
- 8:30a–12p: the full staged install on the patio and in the backyard — setup sequence, placement variations, the plug going into the outlet
- David's framing: shoot it as though Kyle just finished the install. That's the story — a real system, freshly in, someone standing next to something that works
- 12–2p: the battery system and the solar patio. Interiors, the app on a phone, the fridge
- 2–5p: talking heads and lifestyle. People using the space, not posing in it
- 6:45–7:35p golden hour #2: drone orbits, wide establishing, the dusk look. Bring the drone and the wide lens — David asked for both by name
Thursday Sept 10 · Houston · half day
Pickups, then travel
- 7:00–8:00a: any golden-hour shot that missed on Wednesday. Build this buffer in and protect it
- 9a–12p: pickups at HQ — detail inserts, hands, cables, the app, anything the edit will want and nobody thought of yet
- Shoot the "will it run?" tests here — controlled, repeatable, and they need a power source and a fridge more than they need pretty light
- Afternoon: travel to Dallas (about four hours by road). Reset the kit for a job site: hard hats, closed shoes, high-vis if the crew wears it
Friday Sept 11 · Dallas · Prometheus installs
Installer Pro — a different brand entirely
- Call time is the crew's call time. Real installs start early; you shoot on their clock, not yours
- Full job-site coverage: arrival, unload, racking, panel set, wiring, load center, commissioning, handoff to the homeowner
- Talking heads with the installers themselves — this is the credibility the Pro portal has none of
- Late afternoon: the finished array, wide and drone, plus the crew-and-truck portrait
- Coordinate through Kyle and David — both confirmed on the call they have projects running that week
Shot list · Consumer Solwel
Tick these off. Anything unticked by Thursday noon is a gap the site will have to work around for months.
| Location | Shot | Why it exists | Format |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tony's house backyard & patio | Hero: single panel in the yard, low sun behind it, house soft in the background | Homepage hero, Backyard page, the image the brand is judged on | Stills + 4K horizontal & vertical |
| The plug-in moment — hands taking the cable to a normal outdoor outlet, close, no cuts | The single most persuasive three seconds we own | Vertical, 60fps | |
| Setup start-to-finish, locked-off wide, real time — cut to a time-lapse later | "15-minute setup" has to be provable, not asserted | Vertical, locked tripod | |
| Placement set: same kit on a fence, a railing, a patio wall, freestanding in grass | Kills the "I don't have a balcony" objection in one grid | Stills, consistent framing | |
| Tony's house system & interior | Fridge + phone app — over-the-shoulder, production number visible on screen | The proof shot. Nothing else converts like it | Vertical |
| Battery system, freshly installed, plus the solar patio in context | Storage bundle, "power after sunset" story | Stills + vertical | |
| Drone: low orbit around the house, rising reveal of the patio array, dusk pass | Establishing shots, ad openers, the "this is real" signal | Drone, 4K | |
| Solwel HQ showwalls & warehouse | Showwalls — wide, then slow push-ins on each configuration | Pro portal, comparison content, B-roll bed | Horizontal + vertical crops |
| Prototype kit, every angle, clean background, consistent light | PDP gallery until the retail box exists | Stills, tripod, gridded | |
| Component detail: inverter, cable, mounts, connectors, in hands | "What's in the box" section, spec content | Vertical macro | |
| "Will it run?" bench setup — appliance, meter, verdict. Shoot 6–8 appliances in one pass | Six weeks of the flagship series in a single afternoon | Vertical, repeatable framing |
Shot list · Installer Pro rebrand
Friday in Dallas, on live Prometheus jobs. The Pro portal currently has no photography of its own — it borrows from the consumer side, which is exactly why it reads as an afterthought.
| Shot | Direction | Feeds |
|---|---|---|
| Crew arriving & unloading | Truck, ladders, racking coming off. Shot from low and wide — make it feel like a real operation, not a stock photo | Pro portal hero |
| Racking & panel set | Hands on tools, torque wrench, rails going down, panels landing. Tight and specific — installers can tell instantly when footage is faked | Capability section, "who we are" |
| Wiring & load center | The technical work, done properly. Conduit, terminations, a clean panel. This is the credibility shot for a trade audience | Pro portal, wholesale deck |
| Commissioning & handoff | System coming online, monitoring on a phone, the homeowner conversation | Case-study content |
| Installer talking heads | Two or three installers, 30–60 seconds each: what they install, what they need from a supplier, what goes wrong with bad gear. Unscripted. Get signed releases | Testimonials, trust section, recruiting |
| Finished array | Wide, then drone. Golden hour if the schedule allows it | Portfolio, case studies |
| Crew portrait | Team in front of the truck, deliberately posed, eye contact | About page — puts faces on the Pro brand |
| Warehouse & stock depth | Back at HQ or the Dallas yard: pallets, racking, inventory on shelves | "We actually have it in stock" — the top wholesale objection |
| Brand/product wall | The lines carried, shot as a clean logo-and-product strip | The Wellbots-style brand strip Jordyn flagged for the Pro refresh |
Formats to shoot for
Don't shoot "content" — shoot for specific edits. These are the formats that reliably carry physical products on TikTok right now; each one has a capture requirement, and if you don't get it on the day the edit can't exist.
Format 02
The test
"Will it run?" — appliance, number on screen, verdict. Needs: the meter or app readable on camera.
Format 03
POV / day-in-the-life
Handheld, first person, install day from the crew's view. Needs: a chest or gimbal rig and permission to move with the crew.
Format 04
Before & after
Empty yard → installed and running. Needs: the "before" shot taken from a marked position before anything is touched. Easy to forget, impossible to recreate.
Format 05
Talking head + B-roll
A real person answering one real question. Needs: a lav mic. Phone audio outdoors is unusable.
Format 06
Silent + text
Reads with the sound off, which is most of the feed. Needs: headroom in the top third for captions.
Format 07
Green-screen bait
Footage clean enough to sit behind a talking head later — for stitches and comment replies. Needs: wide, uncluttered plates with nothing in the corners.
Format 08
Hands-only top-down
ASMR-adjacent component and assembly work. Needs: an overhead rig or a very steady operator, plus close audio.
Format 09
Scale flex
Drone and warehouse, for the Pro side. Needs: airspace cleared and the drone charged before golden hour, not during it.
About "trending sounds"
Don't plan edits around a specific trending audio. Business accounts can only use TikTok's Commercial Music Library — most viral sounds are unavailable to us and using one anyway risks the video being muted or pulled, which is a real problem once these clips are running as paid ads. Shoot so the video works silent with captions, and pick audio from the commercial library at edit time. The formats above are what actually carries; the sound is interchangeable.
Capture spec
Technical
- Vertical 9:16 is the primary format — shoot it deliberately, don't crop horizontal later
- Where a shot matters, get it both ways: 9:16 for social, 16:9 for the site
- 4K so there's room to reframe and punch in
- 60fps on anything with motion or hands; 24fps for talking heads
- Leave the top third clear on every vertical take — captions and platform UI live there
- Flat profile only if Katie is confident in the grade; otherwise shoot it looking right in camera
Kit & logistics
- Drone + wide lens — both requested by name on the call
- Lav mics. Every talking head, indoors and out. Non-negotiable
- Tripod for the locked-off setup sequences
- More batteries and cards than you think, plus a same-day backup drive
- Back up every night. Two copies before anyone sleeps
- Signed releases for every recognizable face, especially installers and homeowners
- Job-site PPE for Friday — hard hat, closed shoes, high-vis
- Sun app for exact golden hour; a compass for pre-marking drone paths
What we can't get this trip — plan around it
The retail box. Tony was asked directly on the call and said the turnaround is too tight. So the unboxing sequence, the "step 1–2–3" carton story, and any packaging photography wait for a second, smaller shoot once the 460W single-carton kit exists. Storyboard it now so it's a two-hour job later.
Genuine van life. Already resolved: the Nomad page launches on EcoFlow's own imagery and video under the signed dealer agreement. Replace it when a creator with a real van comes through the seeding program.
Real customers. Everything shot this week is staged with the team. That's fine and normal for a launch — but the UGC feed still needs real buyers, which is what the influencer program in section 12 exists to produce.
11 · TikTok Playbook
The Channel That Decides This
Signature Solar won YouTube. The TikTok-native slot in this category is empty — that's the whole thesis. This is the content system the new social hire runs from day one.
Five content pillars
Every post belongs to exactly one. Weekly mix: 3 Proof · 2 Objection · 2 Education · 2 Lifestyle · 1 Brand.
01
Proof
It works, on camera. Fridge running off the panel. Meter going backwards. Power station lasting the weekend. Highest converting.
02
Objection
"But I rent." "But it's cloudy." "But is that legal?" One objection per video, answered in under 20 seconds.
03
Education
How plug-in solar actually works, what it can't do, how to not get scammed. Builds the authority Signature Solar has.
04
Lifestyle
The van at dusk. The backyard party with lights running off the kit. Sells the feeling; low intent, high reach.
05
Brand
Who we are, Houston + Dallas, unboxings, customer mail, the team. Makes a hardware brand feel like people.
Hook bank
First three seconds decide everything. These are written to be said out loud, on camera, with no music intro.
Proof
"This refrigerator is running on sunlight and a regular outlet."
Cold open on the fridge, pan to the panel. No intro.
Objection
"I rent. My landlord has no idea this is here."
Highest-performing angle for the biggest segment.
Education
"Plug-in solar is legal in 8 states and pending in 30 more. Here's yours."
Drives the legality page. Comments do the work.
Proof
"Setup took 40 minutes. Here's all of it, no cuts."
Time-lapse. Screenshot the clock at both ends.
Objection
"Yes, it still works when it's cloudy. Just less."
Honesty converts. Show the actual reduced number.
Education
"Three things a $200 marketplace kit won't tell you."
Ends on support and honest limits, no competitor named.
Lifestyle
"Everything at this campsite is running on that one panel."
Nomad line. Dusk, string lights, no voiceover.
Proof
"Power went out on the whole street. Watch our window."
Bank this footage the moment an outage happens.
Brand
"The whole thing shows up in one box. Like a TV."
The new shipping story — carry it in yourself, no freight pallet.
Education
"California is about to make this a lot easier. Here's what changes."
Newsjack the policy push while it's in feeds.
Objection
"One panel needs no permit. Two is where it gets complicated."
Honesty as a hook — and it pre-qualifies the buyer.
Repeatable formats
Named series so the account has structure and the social hire never faces a blank page.
| Series | Length | Format | Pillar |
|---|---|---|---|
| "Will it run?" | 15–25s | Plug an appliance in, show the number, verdict. Fridge, window AC, space heater, hot tub (no — and that's the joke). | Proof |
| "But I rent" | 20–30s | One renter objection per episode, answered plainly. The flagship series for the biggest segment. | Objection |
| "Legal in [State]?" | 15s | One state per video, 30+ episodes, evergreen, matches the SEO cluster exactly. Comments request their state. | Education |
| "Unbox with me" | 30–45s | Top-down, hands only, real time compressed. Every new kit launch gets one. | Brand |
| "Reading your comments" | 20s | Green-screen a comment, answer it. Free content, and the algorithm rewards replies. | Education |
| "Where'd you put yours?" | 10–15s | Customer placement submissions. Pure UGC engine — costs nothing once it's rolling. | Lifestyle |
Operating rules
Cadence & production
- 1–2 posts daily, seven days. Consistency beats production value on this platform
- Batch-shoot weekly: one afternoon produces 10–14 posts
- Shot on a phone, vertical, natural light. A polished ad look actively underperforms
- Damaris videographer flies in for the quarterly high-production shoot; everything else is in-house
- Repost every TikTok to Reels and Shorts without the watermark — export clean from CapCut
Distribution & commerce
- Reply to every comment in the first hour — it's the cheapest reach multiplier there is
- Turn the best comment into next week's video (the "Reading your comments" series)
- Spark Ads: any organic post clearing 3× median views gets paid budget behind it, same week
- Creator videos get whitelisted so we can run them as ads from their handle — negotiate this in the first contract, never after
- TikTok Shop connected at launch — capture the in-app impulse buy instead of bolting it on later
- Hashtags: 3–5 max, mixing broad (#solar) and specific (#backyardsolar #renterfriendly #vanlifepower)
First 14 days · exact posting plan
D1 pinned rebrand post · D2 "This fridge is running on sunlight" · D3 "But I rent" ep.1 · D4 Unbox the $599 kit · D5 "Legal in Texas?" · D6 Setup time-lapse, no cuts · D7 "Will it run? — window AC" · D8 "Yes, it works when it's cloudy" · D9 "One panel, no permit — two is different" · D10 Nomad campsite at dusk · D11 "Legal in Colorado?" · D12 Reading your comments ep.1 · D13 "Where'd you put yours?" launch call · D14 "One box. Like a TV." — the pre-sale close.
12 · Influencer & Creator Program
Rent Credibility Before You Own It
A new brand's own videos get graded harshly; a creator's don't. The program has one job: produce a library of real people using the kits — which then feeds the site's UGC section, the ad account, and the trust gap against Signature Solar's decade of YouTube.
Who we go after
Ordered by conversion efficiency, not by follower count. Start with the top two.
| Archetype | Size | Why them | Where to find them |
|---|---|---|---|
| Van life / overlanding | 10k–150k | Already buy power gear, already film it, audience is pre-sold on the problem. Fastest yes, best footage. | #vanlife #overlanding #vanbuild · IG + TikTok |
| Renter / apartment hacks | 20k–300k | Reaches the biggest segment with the strongest hook. "My landlord doesn't know" is a viral format on its own. | #apartmenthacks #rentertips #firstapartment |
| Homestead / self-sufficiency | 15k–200k | High trust, high intent, buys real gear. Crosses into the DIY line and higher AOV. | #homestead #offgrid #prepping |
| Budget / frugal living | 50k–500k | Power-bill content performs year-round and spikes every summer. Price-led message fits perfectly. | #frugalliving #savemoney #billhacks |
| DIY dads / garage | 10k–100k | Bridges to the DIY line and to YouTube long-form, where the higher-AOV buyer actually researches. | YouTube + TikTok garage/tools creators |
Fit test — apply before any outreach
Skip follower count. Check: (1) Do their comments ask "where'd you get that?" — that's buying intent, not just reach. (2) Is 30%+ of their content already product-forward without feeling like an ad? (3) Do they live somewhere the product visibly makes sense — a yard, a balcony, a van? (4) Are views steady, or is one viral video carrying the whole account? A 15k-follower creator with a real yard beats a 500k lifestyle account every time.
Three tiers
Product-only seeding is the volume engine; paid is reserved for creators who've already proven they convert.
Tier 1 · Seed
Gifted kit
Cost: hardware only (COGS on a $599 kit).
Ask: one honest video + a bio link for 30 days +
usage rights for 12 months.
Volume: 10–20 in the first wave.
Expect roughly half to post. That's normal — the math still works because the winners get promoted to Tier 2.
Tier 2 · Paid
Kit + flat fee
Cost: kit + a negotiated flat fee, benchmarked to their real average views, not follower count.
Ask: 2–3 videos, whitelisting for paid, raw footage delivered.
Volume: 3–5 proven performers.
Only offered after a Tier 1 video performs. Never as a cold open — it sets a price floor we can't walk back.
Tier 3 · Affiliate
Commission
Cost: commission via TikTok Shop affiliate + a personal code.
Ask: ongoing, unlimited posts.
Volume: open to everyone, always on.
Zero downside — pure performance. Every Tier 1 and 2 creator is also enrolled here so they keep earning after the contracted posts.
The seeding kit
What actually ships. The insert card is the highest-leverage item in the box — it's what makes the video usable.
In the box
- The $599 Backyard kit (or Nomad kit for van creators)
- Branded insert card: their code, the link, and the three things to say
- A single-page "what this can and can't power" cheat sheet — keeps them accurate and us out of trouble
- Solwel sticker + patch (van and toolbox placement = free ongoing impressions)
- The CapCut caption preset link so their video matches brand type
The three things to say
- "It plugs into a regular outlet." — the category-defining fact
- "One panel, no permit needed." — the frictionless truth, and the thing most people don't know
- "Kits start at $599." — price-first filters browsers into buyers
- Everything else is theirs. No script, no approval loop on tone. Scripted creator content reads as an ad and dies.
- Two hard rules: no claims about permits, code, or legality in their state (point at our map instead), and no certification claims — if they want to talk specs, they talk to us first
Outreach templates
Cold DM · TikTok / Instagram · keep it under 60 words
Hey [name] — [specific thing from a recent video, not a compliment about their "content"]. We make plug-in solar kits — panels you set in the yard or on a van and plug into a normal outlet. Given [their setup], I think you'd actually use one. Want us to send you a $599 kit, no strings? If you like it and post, great. If not, keep it. — [name], Solwel (Houston, TX)
Follow-up email · after they say yes
Subject: Your Solwel kit — shipping details + the boring legal bit Thanks [name]. Here's everything up front so there are no surprises: WHAT WE SEND: [kit name] ($599 retail), yours to keep, plus a code your audience gets 10% off with. WHAT WE'D LOVE BACK: one video whenever it makes sense for you — no deadline, no script, no approval process. Say what you actually think. If it doesn't work for you, say that too; we'd rather know. TWO ASKS: (1) mark it as a paid partnership / #ad — FTC requires it and it protects you. (2) Please don't make claims about permits or what's legal in a specific state — send people to solwel.com/legal instead. That one's a liability thing for us. USAGE: we'd like the right to reshare and to run it as an ad from your handle for 12 months. If you'd rather not, we can still send the kit — just say so. Ship to?
Upgrade to paid · after a Tier 1 video performs
That video did [specific result] for us — thank you, genuinely. Want to do three more this quarter, paid? [$X] per video, you keep full creative control, and we'd run the best one as an ad from your handle. Happy to work to whatever cadence fits your calendar.
Terms, tracking & compliance
| Item | What we require |
|---|---|
| Disclosure | Non-negotiable. #ad or the platform's paid-partnership toggle on every gifted or paid post. FTC applies to gifted product, not just cash. A creator who won't disclose is a creator who gets us fined. |
| Usage rights | 12 months, paid and organic, all platforms — agreed before shipping. Retroactive rights cost 5–10× more. |
| Whitelisting | Permission to run the video as an ad from their handle. Creator-handle ads consistently beat brand-handle ads in this category. Ask for it in the first agreement. |
| Raw footage | Requested from Tier 2 up — lets us re-cut new hooks against proven footage without another shoot. |
| Exclusivity | None for Tier 1. For Tier 2, a narrow 90-day carve-out against directly competing plug-in solar brands only — never all of solar. |
| Tracking | Unique discount code per creator (FIRSTNAME10) + a UTM'd link + TikTok Shop affiliate ID. Code redemptions are the honest number; views are not. |
| Claim guardrails | No savings figures, no legality-by-state claims, no "free electricity." Cheat sheet ships in every box. |
What good looks like · 90 days
Program targets. These are goals for planning, not guarantees.
20
Kits seeded
Wave one, Sept
10+
Videos published
~50% post rate is normal
3–5
Promoted to paid
Only proven converters
15+
Assets for the UGC feed
Site + ads + product pages
The real return isn't the views — it's the library. Fifteen pieces of authentic footage feed the site's UGC section, the ad account's creative testing, and every product page, for a hardware cost well under what a single produced commercial would run.
13 · Rollout
Four Weeks to a Rebranded Presence
Sequenced to fit inside the existing 90-day ramp — this is the brand-and-social track running alongside the site build.
Now → Sept 7 · Lock & prep
Everything that has to happen before the plane
- Tony sends final pricing (committed for this week) and the EcoFlow DELTA 3 cost Lukas asked for
- Tony sign-off on positioning, taglines, and the single-panel-first architecture (§2–4)
- Social account inventory, admin access, handle availability
- Storyboards finalized with Katie; Kyle confirms Dallas job sites for Friday
- Request vector logo files; request EcoFlow's brand asset library under the dealer agreement
- Owner: Damaris (storyboards, kit) · Solwel (pricing, logins, site access)
Sept 8–11 · Production
Shoot the whole library
- Four days, per the call sheet in §9 — Houston consumer, Dallas Pro
- Back up nightly; rough-select on the flight home
- Owner: Jordyn + Katie · Kyle (site coordination) · Tony (location)
Sept 15–26 · Build & cut
Turn footage into a presence
- First 20–30 clips cut; profile assets built (avatar, banners, covers, end frame)
- Real photography replaces every placeholder on the site — and retires the CC-licensed images
- Installer Pro mock redesign delivered, using the Dallas footage and the brand-strip idea
- Shopify state restrictions configured for multi-panel; Zoho integration retried
- Creator target list built — 40 names across the five archetypes
- Owner: Damaris · Solwel (Shopify access, product data)
Late Sept → Oct · Pre-sale launch
Sell it before it lands
- Social cutover executed (§10) — all platforms in one day, then daily posting
- Pre-sale opens at a launch discount, with the ship window stated plainly. Racking arrives end of October
- Press release out; California policy timing is the news hook
- First 20 seeding kits ship as inventory allows
- Spark Ads behind whatever clears 3× median views
- Owner: Damaris (launch, ads, PR) · Solwel social hire (organic, comments) · Solwel ops (fulfillment)
14 · Deliverables
Who Ships What
Damaris delivers
- This kit, maintained and versioned on the dashboard
- Avatar, banners, highlight covers, end frame, caption preset — every platform, correct dimensions
- All bio and pinned copy, ready to paste
- Link-in-bio page with UTM tracking into the KPI dashboard
- Creator target list, outreach templates, and the agreement framework
- Hook library, content calendar, and weekly scoring
- Spark Ads / whitelisting setup and management
- Katie on camera for the Sept 8–11 production, plus the edit
- Installer Pro mock redesign matched to the new brand
- Shopify state-restriction setup for multi-panel kits
Solwel provides
- Vector logo files (.ai / .svg / .eps) + the S monogram
- Admin access to every existing social account
- Product and location access for the half-day shoot
- Seeding kits — hardware and fulfillment for 20 creators
- The social hire for daily posting and comment response
- Final sign-off on positioning, naming, and taglines
- Real reviews to replace the placeholder review content on the site
- Legal review of the creator agreement template
- Final pricing — new products and the EcoFlow DELTA 3 cost
- Dallas job sites confirmed for the Friday Pro shoot (Kyle / David)
- EcoFlow brand asset library access under the dealer agreement
Blocking launch
1. The site still shows placeholder reviews and a "4.8 / 312 orders" stat — sample content that must be replaced with real Shopify/Judge.me reviews before launch. 2. Placeholder and CC-licensed photography is live across the site; the Sept 8–11 shoot retires it. 3. Pricing is not final — every price on the site and in this kit is a placeholder until Tony's numbers land, and the pre-sale can't open without them.
15 · Open Decisions
What We Need From Tony
Everything else is ready to execute. These five choices unblock Week 1.
| # | Decision | Our recommendation | Blocks |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Final pricing — new kits + EcoFlow DELTA 3 | Committed for this week. Everything downstream waits on it: pre-sale, PDPs, ads, creator codes | The pre-sale launch |
| 2 | Pre-sale discount depth | 10–15% with the ship window stated plainly. Deep enough to justify waiting, shallow enough not to reset price expectations | Launch creative |
| 3 | Free shipping — in or out? | Price it in and advertise it. Wellbots already does; single-carton UPS is what makes it affordable. Needs the freight math once Old Dominion or Priority One quote | Pricing, all ad copy |
| 4 | Single vs two-panel as the hero SKU | Single panel leads. No permit anywhere, no checkout restriction, no certification caveat — and it's the likelier TikTok Shop impulse buy. Two-panel is the upsell | Site, PDPs, all creative |
| 5 | Master tagline | "Solar you plug in." — with "Your backyard makes electricity now" as the social bio line | Profile copy, packaging |
| 6 | Handle pattern if @solwel is taken | @solwelsolar everywhere — consistency beats a marginally better handle on one platform | The cutover |
| 7 | How deep does the EcoFlow catalog go? | Start narrow — foldable panels + DELTA 3 only. Lukas's point stands: start tight, less product, more marketing | Nomad page, Shopify |
| 8 | Vector logo source | Track down the original working file. If it's gone, we redraw the mark — worth doing once, properly | Print, merch, video |
The way this works the best over time is this just becomes a visited platform that we can drop any product into.
— Lukas Bouton · Prometheus Power Solutions
A brand people recognize is what makes that true. The platform thesis only pays off if the audience arrives already knowing who Solwel is — which is the entire point of the work in this document.
Every Profile, Rebuilt to Match
A brand kit that stops at the website is half a rebrand. This is the profile-by-profile spec: handle, avatar, banner, bio copy, pinned content, and link-in-bio — plus the order to change them in so nothing breaks.
Before anything changes, we need a login-level inventory: which accounts exist, who owns them, follower counts, and whether the @solwel handle is available on each platform. Handles that are taken get the fallback pattern
@solwelsolar— and whatever we land on, the same handle is used everywhere, including any handle that has to be squatted now and used later. This table is the deliverable; fill it in during Week 1.Profile assets · exact specs
(safe area 1546 × 423)
Bio copy · ready to paste
Written to each platform's character limit. Emoji used as line-starters only — they're structure, not decoration.
Link-in-bio structure
One page, five links, in this order. Every link carries a UTM so social traffic is attributable in the KPI dashboard.
Cutover checklist & order of operations
Renaming accounts can suppress reach and break ad assets. Do it in this order, on a single day, not piecemeal.
The pinned "what changed" post