Social Media Marketing for Fashion Brands: A Simple Step by Step Guide

Social Media Marketing for Fashion Brands: A Simple Step by Step Guide.

Let me guess…

So you know you have the huge opportunity ahead with using social media but…

• You don’t know where or how to get started or
• You are probably using social media for a while now winging it but not seeing the results you wanted…
• Or even though you are posting every single day, it’s like crickets…

It doesn’t matter which one you relate to, but the fix you need is the right strategy that’s specific to your brand…

That’s what we discover in this post…

Here’s my promise to you. By the end of this post, you will walk away with complete clarity on how to use social media specifically to your brand which includes:

• The benefits of using social media and common mistakes to avoid
• How social media fit into your brand
• How to choose the Best Social media platforms for fashion brands
• Social media strategy for fashion brands
• Social media metrics for fashion brands
• Social media tools for fashion brands

If this sounds a lot, It’s way easier than you think.

But hang on… If you are looking for a complete fashion marketing strategy for your fashion brand, I would like to invite you for a Free training that I created called Fashion Marketing Bootcamp. 

Now Let’s jump right in…

Why social media is important for Fashion brands

Think about the old times where newspapers or tv or radio are the only source of commercials and if you have to shop, you need to visit the store in person. 

But now, social media has changed everything. We were able to talk to people around the world with the phones in our hands and with the tips of our fingers. 

Fashion brands like us got an amazing opportunity to interact with our customers directly which was so amazing.

If you are not using social media to your potential or just winging it, You were missing a lot of cash on the table.

Before we get into the nitty-gritty stuff, let’s talk about the benefits of social media and why you should use it.

A recent article from social sprout shows that social media statistics like 

• Globally, over 3.6 billion people use social media and they project to increase to 4.41 billion by 2025.
• Internet users spend an average of 144 minutes on social media per day.

Now, what does this mean to you?

Your People are out there! at your fingertips. They were hanging out there every single day. All you need to figure out is to get in front of them and make them notice you.

When you can do that, there is a pool of opportunities that helps your brand grow. More on that later in this post.

Here are some benefits when using social media in your fashion brand correctly:

Social proof: 

People are more likely to buy things when they see the reviews of other people wearing your products or when other people talk about your products. Social media is a great place for social proof and building your brand authority.

Traffic: 

This one is obvious though… You have people right there and it’s your chance to drive them to your store.

Conversation: 

You have a whole new power of surveys which tell you exactly what colors they like or what designs they like, basically, you have the opportunity to create your product with your people which avoids a lot of loss in your brand. 

Think of you spending months creating a product and spending a lot of money to manufacture and then when you take it to the world, No one buys it… No more of that! Brands and customers have the ability to talk with each other directly which is so cool.

Brand awareness: 

Just create a post and hashtags takes your posts all over the world. It’s that simple. You have a million opportunities to take your message and brand to the world in a matter of seconds.

Retargeting: 

This is huge… They say money is in the follow-up and I couldn’t agree more. Hopefully, you capture your traffic into your email list so you can email them whenever you want to but even if you haven’t, you now have the power to retarget those people who visited your website or people who interacted with your social media to spread your message and ask for a sale.

Referral: 

This is huge too… Remember those days, your friend got some dress and the next day you rush to get one? That’s the power of referral marketing. People can easily refer to you or spread your brand through word of mouth through social media.

Now that you know what social media can do to your brand, let’s see how it fits in your business and the do’s and doesn’t.

Common mistakes fashion brands do in their social media marketing strategy:

Try to be everywhere: 

If you are trying to be on every social platform, you are spreading too thin and at the end of the day, it’s nothing but overwhelming. Instead, try to focus on one social media until you figure it out and automate with some software or a team member. Then move on to the next platform.

Spamming: 

Last week I posted a question on a Facebook group. The next thing I know, people commenting like “hey buy from us, this product at this price, here’s the link” even though the question is totally unrelated. 

Stop trying to sell to everyone on social media by leaving tons of links and spamming. It only pushes people away and trust me… there is a better way which I let you know in a minute.

Posting random stuff and hoping for sales: 

Before you even post anything, do you have a strategy that helps you achieve your big goal? Posting for the sake of posting is not helpful either.

Making it a primary content channel: 

I know a handful of people who totally depended on Instagram and built their accounts for years and overnight, those accounts were blocked and all their hard work is gone! 

Social media is not something you own. It’s run by other people, you need to put all your efforts to bring people from Social media to your email list which you own. 

Just imagine what you would do when you woke up tomorrow and you lost your Instagram or Facebook? 

Prioritizing followers: 

Are you competing over followers? Trying to grow the vanity number of followers? End of the day, it doesn’t really matter. All it matters is the clicks you are getting to your website. A.K.A Traffic.

No captions: 

Your caption is what converts. People are busy with their own stuff on social media, When you create a post, Your image should capture their attention and then your caption tells the story followed by a call to action which is telling people what to do next.

These are a few mistakes that are costing you tons of effort yet not giving results. 

Action Step: See which mistakes you are making and stop doing them.

Another question I see a lot of people struggle with was:

What are the Best Social media platforms for fashion brands?

There were hundreds of social media platforms now right? choosing the right one might seem a lot difficult. But to give you the answer I want you to understand the content layers. 

Why?

Understanding content layers helps you see the big picture of how social media fit into your brand.

• The Center of the heart is your products. 
• The next layer is Emails, 
• followed by Main content 
• and then social media.

Or let’s look at the other way called customer journey:

• People find you on social media and 
• click on some posts and 
• visit your main content like blog or youtube etc and 
• from there they get into your email list and 
• Finally, buy your products through your emails. 

Few points I want you to understand here is:

Every layer has a specific goal. If someone is at the top circle, its goal is to push them to the next circle and then to the next circle and finally to your products. 

So your social media circle goal is to push people to your main content or website. The Traffic, so you can capture them into your list.

P.S Save this post to Pinterest so you can refer back when needed. Pin the image below to save it to your account.

Now that you understand how social media fits into your business, It’s time for you to pick a platform.

I want you to consider 2 things when choosing your platform.

First is your time:

• Would you like to be present on that platform every day?
• or would you like to hands-off with an Automated platform?

For example, Instagram is like you need to be present on that platform every day, responding to comments and engaging. Instagram doesn’t like scheduling posts, so you need to manually post.

Whereas Pinterest is like you spend an hour a week scheduling your posts and you don’t have to touch a thing.

Think about the time you have and what’s possible for your current situation.

Second is What do you enjoy?

• If you like writing, choose a platform like Twitter or long Instagram posts.
• If you like posting a lot of images, go for Instagram or Pinterest
• If you like videos, again Instagram, YouTube works for you
• If you like audio, Clubhouse or podcasts, etc…

Hopefully, this gives you some clarity in terms of choosing your platform.

Action Steps: 

• Think of how much time you have to spend on social media and think of what content types you enjoy creating (Writing, talking, Video or images)
• Based on your answers, Choose the right platform 
• Tip: If you are still not sure, try each content type for a month and see which one you enjoy the most.

Now let’s look at the strategy on what to post and when all exciting stuff.

P.S Do you know one other friend that could benefit from this post? Please feel free to share it with them and spread the word.

Social media strategy for fashion brands

Let’s talk about The 1-2-3-4 Strategy

All you have to do is choose 1 channel, Make 2 people happy, Use 3 ways to grow your channel, and do 4 things each month.

• 1 Channel
• 2 People
• 3 Ways
• 4 Things

Let’s deep dive into each one of these.

1 channel

First things first, I want you to focus on one channel and let go of all the other. Just put all your efforts into one channel for the next 6 months. 

2 people: 

When posting on social media, you need to make 2 people happy.

First is the platform. 

Every social channel wants to give their users a great experience so the users stay longer on that platform and finally they can sell ads. That’s how social media channels make money.

The second is your people. 

They hang out on social media to share their lifestyle with friends and family. They wanted to look good and have positive and entertaining conversations. You should not post things that make them feel bad or boring. they don’t really care. They are not hanging there with credit cards on their hands to buy stuff from you. 

Action Steps:

Whenever you are posting, I want you to ask yourself these 2 questions:

• Does this post make the platform happy?
• Does this post make a positive conversation with my people?

3 ways:

There are 3 ways you can build your social platforms with followers and traffic.

Owned: 

Use what you already have to reach people. Your daily posts, business page, profile, Bio links, About section, messages and make the most of every option your platform gives you.

Borrowed: 

Using other people’s audience to grow your brand. Things like collaborations, interviews, Shout outs, guest appearances, referrals, etc…

Paid: 

Things like Ads, affiliates, Influencer marketing, or anything that involves paying cash or free products.

Action Steps:

Decide which one of these 3 will you focus on… If you have no budget, you could skip the ads, If you are an introvert, borrowed may sound difficult. 

Depending on your situation, pick one or 2 ways that you can implement it in your brand.

4 Things:

Here are the 4 things you need to do each Month with your social media… More on that strategy here at fashion marketing post. 

Attract: 

How are you going to attract new people from social media? Think of Ads, pages, posts, collaborations with complementary brands. 

Engage: 

How are you going to engage the people who are already following you? Even if you have a lot of followers, if you don’t show up for them, they forget you. 

Engaging is where you build relationships with them and keep your brand on top of their mind. Think of Giveaways, games, responding to comments and messages, liking their posts, etc… All the ways to interact with your existing audience. 

Promote: 

Finally promoting your offers. This can be your freebies, products, launches, etc… anything that asks people to click and leave that social media on to your website. Think of Retargeting ads, sales ads, collaborations, Influencer marketing… 

Care: 

How are you going to take care of people who already buy from you? 

These people have the power of sharing your products, referrals, reviews, and testimonials which are extremely valuable sales tools for you and if you don’t cultivate them, you are losing a ton. 

Think of Community for paid members or branded hashtags that they can share images of them wearing your products. 

Now here’s how you put this together…

Action Steps:

• Brainstorm a few ideas for each of these 4 categories to include in your monthly content plan. 
• Map them out in your calendar like which post goes when. 
• Block a day or 2 to create the posts
• Finally, post them

P.S. Want consistent sales in your fashion brand? Join this free fashion marketing training to unlock the secrets.

Social Media Marketing for Fashion: Social media metrics for fashion brands

Once you start posting strategically, you need to make sure to measure what’s working and what isn’t. So you keep doing what’s working and continue to grow.

Here are some important metrics that you can measure to analyze your strategy. 

• Cost per lead (CPL): if you are spending on ads, you need to see how much it costs you to get a lead. 
• Average lead value (ALV): how much are you making per person in your email list. You get this number by dividing your monthly revenue by email list size. If your ALV is less than CPL, you are at loss. 
• Traffic from each platform: Most people measure followers but what really matters is the traffic you get from each platform. See which platform or strategy is bringing you more traffic and focus on that one. 
• Top 5-10 posts: Note which posts are getting more engagement and reach and look for patterns. Use this data to create more posts like these in the future. 
• Least 5-10 posts: Note which posts are not getting any traction and stop doing these. 

Yes, there are so many metrics but these are the most effective and useful ones. 

P.S. You may also like:

• 2 step fashion marketing plan
• What to do next in your fashion brand
• Step by step guide to fashion marketing
• How to Grow your email list

Social Media Marketing for Fashion: Social media tools for fashion brands

Here are some helpful tools to create your social media content on the breeze.

Planning tools:

Calendar: a simple blank calendar would do to note which posts are going when. Recently I created this free social media calendar for fashion brands. Feel free to download it and use it for your brand. I also recorded the instructions. 

You can definitely use a digital version of any calendar but I’m all about paper, pretty pens, and stationery.

Answer the public:  If you type your product like jeans in it, it pulls all the data people are searching related to that word. This means you can get unlimited ideas from this tool. Just take those ideas and create them for social media content. Note: you only have 3 searches for free, so you need to be careful.

Content Creation Tools:

Canva: This is a free online tool to create all your graphics. They have this huge library of free templates designed by graphic designers. You can use them to create all your social posts in a matter of minutes. 

Graphics and Templates: I like to buy all my graphics, fonts, images, and templates from the creative market. They all give you 6 graphic freebies each week. They have a huge collection of fashion templates. 

Trello: This is another free tool to draft all your content. I create a board with 3 lists like

• content ideas: this is where I note any idea
• to post: this is where I keep all the posts that are ready to publish. The images, caption and hashtags, and any links. 
• Published: Once I published, I move them to the published list. 

Google docs: you can use google docs to write all the captions for the months instead of Trello. 

Scheduling tools:

Tailwind: 

For Facebook and Instagram, Facebook has an inbuilt scheduling tool and they don’t like using other scheduling platforms. So I use Tailwind for Pinterest scheduling. It helps me months’ worth of pins scheduled in just 30 minutes. 

Also, you can schedule Instagram from tailwind but I don’t risk it. Instead, I would keep an eye on Instagram analytics using tailwind. They have really cool data to look at.

I can’t imagine any of my businesses without this tool. I have 3 tailwind accounts so far. 

You can get $15 free credit if you use this link and try tailwind for one full month and then decide whether or not to use it. 

So that concludes our tools list. Yes, there are tons of tools but my whole idea is to cut down the overwhelm and give you the most useful tools.

So far, we have covered:

• Why is social media important for fashion brands?
• Social media fashion brands statistics
• Common Mistakes to avoid
• How to fit social media into your brand
• How to choose the Best Social media platforms for fashion brands
• Create Social media strategy for your fashion brand
• Learn the metrics of Social media for your fashion brand
• Best Social media tools for fashion brands

I hope you got enough clarity to up-level your social media marketing strategy for your fashion brand. If you like this post, Let me know what was the biggest takeaway in the comments.

Next steps:

Now , While this content is fresh in your mind, take a paper and jot down at least 3 ideas from this post that you want to implement in your brand. 

and…

If you are looking for the complete fashion marketing strategy for your fashion brand, Sign up for this free training here.

P.S. What was your biggest takeaway from this post and tell us about your fashion brand in the comments below.