Within the capricious fashion industry, the importance of fashion marketing is the one thing that remains constant. In 2017, more than 1785 fashion retailers shut down their operations – was a lack of proper marketing at the heart of this?
If you’re running your own brand and are not keen on becoming another statistic, you’re in luck. On this week’s post, I take a look at how you can execute your fashion marketing strategy without spending millions.
Continue reading for a closer look at the strategies that are suited specifically for your brand – the first, crucial step in nailing your marketing game.
Settle on a captivating brand story
Within your niche, you will find that it’s a struggle to differentiate yourself from your competitors. In fact, one of the biggest challenges in the fashion industry is the death of brand loyalty due to a high level of competition. This is exactly where strong brand values and self-image can come in handy.
Much like Versace’s very own sibling duo, Gianni and Donatella Versace, who successfully created a brand that embodies values of luxury, family, and free-spirited design, create a brand with either a captivating story or compelling values.
While you may be confused about how this relates to generating greater sales, creating a strong and evocative narrative will help you position your brand more strongly in the minds of buyers. Over time, this lends your products a specific appeal, which can’t be found anywhere else.
Perfect your Instagram marketing
At a time where millennials and Gen Zs are dominating the fashion market, Instagram is everything; especially as a marketing platform.
In terms of social media usage for fashion marketing, many of the traditional rules don’t apply. One such rule is the need to maintain pages on multiple social media sites. Arguably, the most relevant platforms for your type of business would be Facebook and Instagram, although it is the latter that does most of the heavy work.
Instagram analytics
On Instagram, make sure that you’re not only posting Instagram Stories on a daily basis (posting every day is crucial in order to engage and retain your followers) but also that you’re curating your feed according to what your followers want to see.
Not sure how to do that? Simply make use of the analytics based on your profile and your posts.
Apart from Instagram Insights – the app’s inbuilt analytics tools – there are a number of other platforms, which can help you track metrics including follower behaviour, engagement rates, and even the best time to post a video or picture!
Content curation
Another tip – don’t only post pictures of your products, either on your feed or stories. Humanise your brand and be creative!
Share pictures of your customers styling your products, share relatable Tumblr posts, and anything else you feel is relevant and will generate positive reactions among your customers. As you should be able to tell, there’s nothing more boring than a brand that only promotes its products.
Engage with your followers
Additionally, make sure that you’re being responsive to your DMs and are engaging with your followers in the comment section – followers don’t like being ignored!
Consider influencer marketing
Another solid way of capturing market share is to promote your products through influencers. While this is applicable on almost any platform, it is the most successful on Instagram.
This is made evident by what bigger brands, such as Gucci and Louis Vuitton, are doing. While they don’t necessarily engage in direct influencer marketing, they specialise in endorsements, where celebrities are paid to wear their merchandise.
If you can’t afford big names, don’t be afraid to scope out micro-influencers – even those who are new to influencer marketing. By tapping into several smaller networks, you can gradually build yourself up to affording more popular Instagram models.
Key takeaways
Given the tools available and the insatiable demand for clothing and accessories, I find fashion marketing to be one of the most exciting areas to be involved in this year.
While it can be somewhat nightmarish if you don’t know what you’re doing, driving traffic and enjoying sales is easy if you market your brand using the right strategies.
What else can I do to improve my fashion marketing?
At Hype Insight, we help you perfect your fashion marketing strategies. Find out about our services here!