Wholesale Fashion Buyers

A place for boutique owners to learn and share!

By Leave a Comment

How to Brainstorm Vine Video Ideas For Marketing Your Shop

Vine Video Ideas

Video is a strong content form. It’s easily shared, viewed, and prospects connect to it. Short videos tend to work better than longer ones because they’re easier to view. People tend to have limited attention spans and an unwillingness to spend more than a few minutes to watch a video.  Vine allows 6 second videos to be made and shared on your phone.

Introduce the Vine video which takes short form video to a new level – a six second level. Vine videos are easily shared and are growing in popularity. The trick is to come up with a creative and compelling idea that your prospects finds compelling.  I know you may wonder how you can say anything in 6 seconds, but go to vine now and look at what other people are doing for some ideas.

How to Brainstorm Vine Video Ideas For Marketing Your ShopEmbrace Your Customers

There are many ways you can use your customers or focus on them to create a Vine video. Here are just a few ideas, listen to your customers for ideas as well. They’re full of information.

1. Show your customer using your product.

2. Highlight a success study.

3. Show your customer making a common mistake.  Think about all the common complaints you get and try to be proactive and create a short explainer video.

4. Show your client sharing a testimonial or a favorite benefit from your products or services.

5. Include a mini-interview with a client.

Embrace Transparency

A Vine video presents you with the opportunity to show your prospects and customers what goes on within your business. For example,

1. Share mini bios for you and your team.

2. Share your mistakes.

3. Share behind the scenes bloopers.

4. Share a sneak peek of a new product or service.  Share what you are excited about from the latest Market that you attended.

5. Share a glimpse into what goes into your workday.

Other ideas that can help you get started brainstorming Vine videos for your business include:

1. DIY tutorials – show your prospects what they can do for themselves.

2. Conduct a how to video – how to use your products or how to manage a task.

3. Give a tip or a bit of advice or insight.

4. Answer frequently asked questions.

5. Promote events or product or service promotions.

Finally, don’t forget to have fun with your Vine videos. Invite your customers and prospects to contribute their own Vine videos and hold a contest. Create a theme for the contest or establish a challenge. Tell a joke, share a funny story, or create a visual anecdote.  It’s a fun way to interact and endear yourself to your customers!  They love being a part of something – let them into your shop in more ways than one.  Don’t forget – you can do this whether you are in a brick and mortar store, preparing to open one, or have an online boutique.  These ideas work well anywhere.

Brainstorm ideas but don’t overthink it. Vine videos are forgiving. You have six seconds to say it and then the video loops. You’ll know when you have a successful video by the response to it and the traffic it generates. Have fun. Embrace Vine as a new way to market your business.

By Leave a Comment

How to Prioritize Your Boutique Shop Marketing And Get Better Returns

How to Prioritize Your Boutique Shop Marketing And Get Better ReturnsSetting Marketing Priorities

Setting marketing priorities can be overwhelming. You need to send emails to your customers. You have to decorate the shop and put out new items, and let us not forget social media, advertising, word of mouth and the list could go on and on. With so many important marketing tactics, how do you decide where to focus your attention?  What attention do you have left, you might ask yourself sometimes!  Here are some tips to keep you on the right track and make sure you can get better returns with your marketing.

1. Goal Setting – Take a look at your various ongoing and planned marketing ideas and tactics. What is the goal for each of these tactics? What do you want it to achieve or what is it currently achieving? Review the goals and ask yourself which goal has the strongest impact on your business success.  It’s the 80/20 rule.  You get most of your results from a few of your efforts.  But before you can determine what results you are getting, you need to know what your goals are.

For example, your email marketing goal may be to increase sales by 10% whereas your social media marketing goal may be to build your email list or number of followers. Which of these has the most potential to help your business grow and prosper? That’s the goal you prioritize.  Only you know which will make more of a difference, but if you have a lot of followers and you are using social media wisely then you can generate increased revenue through that channel as well.

2. Review What’s Working – Take a look at your analytics. What marketing tactics are currently working well and generating the best results? For example, maybe your social media marketing isn’t bringing in the traffic you thought it would.  You can have “in person” analytics as well.  Ask your customers what they read – blogs, the newspaper, etc.  Consider advertising there to increase your returns and measure what the result is.

Perhaps your blog content is more effective at generating organic search traffic than you thought it would be. You’d then prioritize your blog content marketing efforts over your social media marketing. That’s not to say that you’d disregard social media, however it’s often more effective to spend time repeating systems and efforts that are generating results.  Know where you started, where you want to go and how close you are to getting there.

3. Evaluate Your Resources – It’s quite possible that some of your marketing tactics can be outsourced or automated. Leverage your resources wherever possible and spend your time, energy, and attention on those marketing tactics that need you to be personally involved. For example, creating partnerships with industry leaders in your market needs your involvement. Scheduling and even writing blog posts does not necessarily need your input if you have good contractors on your team.  You need to personally attend business events, but you don’t have to write all the blogs.

4. Money In, Money Out – What marketing tactics fit into your budget? Certainly you probably have some fantastic marketing ideas that you’d love to do but just aren’t sure you can afford them.  You could do a simple punch card to give a discount for returning customers and find that it’s one of the best marketing tools you have but newspaper ads just aren’t cutting it.

For example, creating a mobile application is a wonderful marketing tactic, but it can be expensive. It’s important to evaluate the cost along with the realistic potential. You might realize that while a particular marketing tactic may be a bit pricey, it has the power to generate tremendous income.  If you set up shop at a local event that is for “special” holidays, like a Christmas market at the state fair, it might cost $2,000 for the booth but your sales and exposure are worth 10x that – you might consider those options and how you expect the return to help your shop.

Writing a book can cost a pretty penny. You have to have it edited, formatted, and a compelling book cover created. And if you’re outsourcing the writing then you’ll also need to pay a ghost writer. However, a book can generate income and sales for years.  It’s also a great credibility resource, and can open doors for you.

Prioritize your marketing based on what it can do for you and how well it’s working. It may take some time and research to learn the answers to these questions. However, you can then be sure you’re placing your attention on the most powerful and productive options.

What’s your favorite way to market and what are your results?  I love the idea of crowdsourcing some new ideas, so share in the comments, please!

By 2 Comments

How to Involve Customers in Your Next Product Unveiling

How to Involve Customers in Your Next Product UnveilingInvolve Your Customers In Creating Buzz

Seasonal changes in products are exciting times. It’s important to create a good deal of buzz for any new product unveiling well before you’ve even finished getting all of it. The more excitement you can build in your current customers, the more people will purchase the new product.  While you don’t want them to stop buying the current season’s clothing, having a few hints and teases out will let them know that you are always getting new and exciting things for them to come and see.

Getting your current customers involved in your new product changes can go a long way toward building that excitement. A few ideas to getting customers involved in your product unveiling are below.

* Ask Them to Choose Which Product You Buy For The Next Season – The best people to ask about anything new you want to find are current customers. They likely have some strong ideas about products they need and solutions they crave. Asking them directly will give you many different ideas for products.  You will have catalogs and you could even go to market and bring back some pictures and ask for opinions.

* Let Your Customers Build Your Bundle – As you’re building buzz for a new product, send out a survey to your current customers regarding the new product to come. Give them a choice of two or three groupings for the new bundle and let them vote. Announce the winning name as a way to increase the buzz about the new items.  You might not always do a bundle, but a way to increase your ASP (average selling price) is to create bundles of like items that are typically bought together.  Ask your customers what they think should go together.  Voila!

* Feature Customers on Your Blog – Ask for feedback from current customers on all your products, then feature them on your blog. People love seeing their own story and pictures and they feel closer to a business if they can know other customers.  You can show pictures of how they used the items, or just pictures of them buying or trying on.

* Host an Interactive Contest – You already have loyal customers, so give them a chance to win your new product by bragging about your old products. Have them send in a video that’s one minute or less about why they want to win the new product. Let other people vote on it as this will encourage sharing. The winner gets the new product free.  You can have this contest on your facebook page, or even instagram if your audience is that savvy.  You can do short videos on any cell phone these days.  Just make it fun!  Have your staff do a couple videos to get the videos rolling!

* Have A Special VIP Night – Invite all current customers to a kick off night where they are able to discuss your new and upcoming items and get a sneak peak. Let them ask questions and show them some of the benefits of the new product to come. Give participants in the event a discount on the product.

* Give Current Customers an Early Bird Special – It’s always nice to launch a new product to your current customers first, giving them an exclusive opportunity to buy at a discounted price if they provide a testimonial. You can ask for these by video or written, or both.  They will love you for showing them how special they are to you and you will gain more loyalty.  Plan for this as part of your VIP night and it will go like a blast.  You can have 3-4 of these kick off events a year and really create a loyal customer base.

Any way that you can discover to involve your current customers in your product finding and merchandising will build up excitement. Get them to share that excitement with their friends and increase your following exponentially – just by talking about a product to come. Allowing customers to give input into design, bundling items together and more will also increase the buzz by making your product that much more compelling to your target audience since they essentially helped to create it.  When people feel like they are a part of a store or product, they are more likely to promote it to other people.  Make them special!

By 2 Comments

Finding Products for Your Target Customer

Finding the Perfect Products for your Target CustomersYou Make Money Finding The Right Products

One of the ways in which a business owner makes money is by creating and selling products to their target customers. But first, you have to find the products. A lot of thought needs to go into each product, from who will find it, to how it will be marketed, and what technology will be used to implement the entire sales cycle. It’s a lot to think about, but if you get it down to a science, you can continuously find or create products for your audience that they will buy and love.

Know Your Target Audience

In order to find products, it’s important that you are clear about who your target audience is, and the frustrations or pains they have, so that you can create solutions for them. In addition, you need to have a thoughtful sales funnel and know where each product fits into that funnel. What’s really great about all of this is that you can always ask your customers what they need. If you’ve done a good job at building a list of your target customers, all that’s left to do is find products they will love that are exclusively for them.

Some people are great at coming up with ideas, just not so great at finishing them. Others get stuck in the idea phase and are not satisfied with the ideas that they do have. If you have a lot of ideas, it’s important to write them down, and categorize them according to where they will fit in your sales process. You should also be able to clearly identify the frustration or point of joy that the product is solving for your audience.

Answer this question: What problem is this product solving for my audience? Start with the simplest idea on your list and work your way up to the biggest idea, building buzz as you go along.  Is it a hard to find gift they will enjoy giving to the person who has everything?  Is it a cute and inexpensive item they can accessorize with?  What do they want in a product that you can find them?

If you have trouble coming up with ideas, then you need to practice brain storming of some kind.  Nothing is off the table, just let it flow out, writing it all down. Categorize and analyze the ideas later to ensure that they do address a need that your target audience has and that they fit into your boutique, you don’t want to add stuffed animals to a victorian antique style shop, but you might think about some fun corsets and garters that your target audience could use for fun. Once you have at least one solid idea, you can get onto the search and find phase.

Product Search And Find Cycle

The product research and find cycle looks like this:

* Idea
* Planning
* Research – going to market, looking on the web
* Customer Feedback from a small group
* Price Analysis and Order Placed
* Add To Shop and Market, Market, Market
* Rinse and repeat

It doesn’t matter if your product is as simple as a pair of earrings or as complex as a 5 piece suit, or any other physical product. It’s important to complete the product search and find cycle to ensure that you bring the very best products each time for your audience. Products that they need, want, and are willing to pay good money for. Products that they also actually use or give as gifts and implement into their lives or family.

If you follow this process each and every time you find any product, you’re going to be exponentially more successful.  Let me know about what products you have recently found that you used this process for and how did it work for you?

Follow Us

Follow

Pages