UnderTheCover was the brain child of entrepreneurs Juliet and Felicity. They approached us with a clear ambition, they wanted to create and grow an Instagram channel that celebrates “the faces behind your favourite books.”
The goal wasn’t simply growth. It was identity.
The platform needed to:
Feel premium but not corporate
Maintain authenticity and independence
Release content twice weekly
Be sustainable from a production perspective
Build genuine engagement with book lovers
And importantly — it had to become a community that authors and booksellers wanted to be part of.
The Challenge
The challenge was to publish two pieces of high-quality content every week.
We needed to create a consistent production style where every post would feel intentional, socially crafted and high-end while still being turned around quick enough to sustain momentum. The channel had to develop a recognisable identity, something audiences could immediately associate with UnderTheCover without becoming boring and repetitive.
We also refined an edit process that allowed for speed without sacrificing quality. We shaped a narrative rhythm that viewers would begin to recognise while keeping every conversation feeling fresh and personal.
The content couldn’t feel like a brand pushing product or a corporate sponsor promoting an agenda. It needed to feel warm and intimate, like you’d stumbled into a brilliant conversation in your favourite bookshop.
Visually, the channel had to be premium and considered but unmistakably independent.
The Results (8 Months In)
70 interview posts created
100,000+ followers on Instagram
Growth currently at ~10k followers per week
Highly positive, organic engagement
Regular audience endorsements in comments:
“This is my favourite place on Instagram.”
“I love these posts so much, thank you.”
UnderTheCover is now being approached as an influencer platform. The format is working, the community is forming and the brand is recognisable. But how do they make money?
The Bookshop
The channel has built its audience, now it needs to generate its income.
The first step towards this is a recently launched online bookshop in partnership with Bookshop.org. The store has a unique format that allows users to buy the recommended books from the bookshop owners and authors that feature on their channel.
Not only does this help fund the channel but every sale supports independent bookshops at the same time.
This is the first of several revenue ideas designed to make the channel self-sustaining while still keeping in place everything that made people fall in love with it.