Marketing your fashion business — where to begin

When you're marketing a fashion business from scratch, it can be hard to know where to begin.

By now you've probably got stock and a website. But how do you get traffic, conversions and sales on your ecommerce store.

I’m going to share a few important steps that will get you moving in the right direction.

1) Install Google Analytics

That's right your first step is to install this free and very helpful tool that will show you what is and isn't working in your marketing. after all time is money. And you need to find and fix your mistakes ASAP. By going deep in to GA you can learn which source, channel, and content is bringing you the most (and best) traffic. You can also learn where and why people are leaving your website.

2) Check that your website loads fairly quickly

Head over to pingdom.com and run speed tests on all your important web pages in all the territories that matter to you. Pingdom is pretty cool in that you can choose to test your site from Australia, UK, L.A., Germany and many more places. You’re looking for a load time of less than two seconds — any longer is going to kill your business — people are impatient and simply won’t wait a slow site to load.

Once you’ve got the basics sorted...

3) Set up an Instagram account and choose a theme

If you’re a fashion brand and not on IG are you really a fashion brand? Anyway, if you want to maximise your IG engagement, clicks and sales you’ll need a winning Instagram theme. Make sure you also create an interesting BIO that makes people want to click your link.

4) Facebook

It’s not as essential as Instagram (although for older demographics it might be). If your time is limited set up your profile and pipe all your IG posts to your FB — this will be a real time saver.

If you’re planning to build your business round a tribe (and in 2018 you should be) you’ll probably want to set up a FB group too.

With the following steps, you don’t having to do them all. Start by picking the one that you most comfortable with and once you’ve nailed that one, move on to the next one on your list.

5) SEO

Work with a SEO professional and optimise your site and pages so that you get free traffic from Google. Alright, I’m super simplifying here. Don’t expect to get thousands of visitors overnight. If your main niche keywords are super competitive, focus on SEO driven blog posts instead...

6) Content Marketing

Content marketing is a multi-purpose tool. 1) It give you SEO content which increases search engine visibility. 2) Helps your audience, adding value to your offer and differentiating you from the competition. 3) It also give you something to share on social and possibly helps to trigger word of mouth — the ultimate marketing weapon.

7) Set up PPC Ads

I’d actually set up a minimum of two campaigns. One for on the money (near or exact match) search queries and one for broader searches. Allocate the majority of your budget to the first campaign — as these matches are closer to your product, these searches will be more qualified for your offering.

You should also consider setting up a remarketing campaign.

8) Influencers

Yep, those people who can shape and influence the behaviour of other. Do your research — influencers come in all shapes and sizes and you could end up paying anywhere between £50 to £1000 to work with one — check that their followers are real and not bots, essential!

9) Affiliate programmes

Finally, if you’re struggling with marketing your own clothing brand, consider working with affiliates on sites like ShareASale. They’ll help you find people who will promote your clothing line for you (for a cut of the profits).

Whichever digital marketing platforms you use to promote your business, make sure you keep an eye on your results in Google Analytics. What you learn there could help you sustain and grow your business.

This post was inspired by my epic guide to fashion digital marketing