In this post, I want to share my favourite tips for fashion marketing and attracting customers to your brand. The good news is, these tips are perfect for any brand - even if you have a tiny marketing budget because many of these marketing strategies can be implemented for free.
If you’ve been following me for a while, you’ll know that I love to get feedback and suggestions from my audience, so that I can provide you with even more useful and relevant content. Recently I was asking subscribers what they struggle with the most and many said that getting customers through the (virtual) door was something they found hard. And not only that, converting browsers into buyers, on the few occasions that they do get website traffic.
Make it about them
It’s super important to think about your customer when you do anything for your brand, but especially marketing. Sales is so much about psychology, emotion and making a connection with someone, so it’s important to know who your customer is (or who your customer will be, if you’re a new brand). If you’re not sure what information you need about your audience, there’s a blog post here which can help.
I see so many brands talking about themselves, their collection, their promotions, but you really need to change the conversation and make it about what’s in it for the customer. How will your product help them or make their day better? Talk about the benefits of your products and how they will effect the customer, rather than just listing generic features of them (tip - this also works for product pages on your website, too).
Also, make sure that you’re not just talking about yourself. Think about your customer’s other interests too and create content (like blog posts, videos, social media posts, even podcasts) on a few key topics and try to problem solve for your customer - people are a lot more likely to click on something which offers a solution to something they’ve been struggling with. For instance, if you have a fitness brand, you could share tips for smoothies that give you energy, your favourite workout routine or ways to minimise feeling sore the next day - whatever you think your customer would find helpful.
Think past social media marketing
There’s a lot of other options out there, both free and paid, so it’s important to consider if social media is the best option for you. I’d encourage brands to choose 1-2 marketing methods to start with and do them really well, rather than doing too many things and not achieving much in reality. Some other effective marketing ideas are;
Improving your SEO, so you appear in search results
Pinterest; although technically a social media platform, this works more like a search engine and your posts last a lot longer
Email
Referrals - encouraging previous customers to share their experiences with others
Podcasting
Collaborating with other brands
Affiliate marketing
Influencer marketing
Guest posting on other websites and writing articles for magazines
Pitching to the press and being featured (one of my favourite marketing methods - it’s free and gives your brand credibility)
Holding events relevant to your audience’s interests
Online ads
To name a few. As you can see, there’s a lot of options out there and chances are, you chose social media marketing because it’s familiar, free and easy to set up. If you are stuck for what to post and are spending a lot of time on social media with minimal results, you might want to check out The Fashion Sales Kit here, which has 90 days and beyond of content ideas for your brand.
Think about the whole ‘journey’
It’s really important to think about all of the steps between a customer going from never having heard of you, to making a purchase. If you read my recent article on Instagram, you’ll know that you need to do more than just tag some pretty pictures on social media in order to make the sale! Data tells us that customers need to see our brand multiple times before making a purchase, but as most of your followers won’t see your posts online due to social media algorithms, you need to come up with a strategy for not only getting the customers interest in the first place, but keeping their attention, giving them a functional and engaging web experience, getting them to keep coming back and helping them to trust you. Eventually, when a customer is invested in you and trusts you, you can make the sale. I have specific steps I follow for this process, which I call the A.C.E.S method.
It sounds like a lot of work, right? Sales do take work, but the great thing about this method is that you build a community of ‘raving fans’ (a concept created by Ken Blanchard which refers to a customer who loves a brand so much, they can’t stop telling people out it). Raving fans not only become your best customers who keep coming back to buy more product, but they also spread the word about you and your brand. Plus, you can actually automate a lot of the process so that you spend less time on marketing and more time working on things you enjoy. It’s always an amazing feeling to wake up to sales and I know that with the ACES method in place, this is possible for any fashion brand - it’s true there’s a lot of competition out there, but with the right marketing proposition, any fashion brand has the opportunity to make it.
I hope you’ve found these tips helpful! If you’d like to learn more about growing your business and marketing, I’d like to invite you to checkout my Fashion Sales Kit. I’m super excited about this kit, which includes content ideas, swipe files and links to high quality photography that you can use for free. Basically, the kit is designed so that you can spend less than 10mins a day on your social media marketing. Sound good? You can view all of the details and register by clicking here. Alternatively, if you have any questions on the course, I’d be happy to answer those for you - you can click here to get in touch, or email contact@thefashionbusinesscoach.com
Pickleball outfit inspiration……