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A podcast built for founders and aspiring founders in the fashion industry.
In this podcast we will be sharing industry insights, talking with fashion business owners and experts and debunking industry myths and problems!
Hello and welcome back to the Fashion Founder Podcast. If you're new here, let me introduce myself. I'm your host, Charlotte, and I'm a fashion business consultant. And I help founders to start and scale their fashion based businesses. I'm coming to you with episode 49 today, and we're going to be talking about why you feel like your fashion brand might be failing right now.
Speaker 1:So this is for the founders who are post launch and things just aren't quite where you thought they would be by this point. There are so many reasons why a fashion brand might not be on the tracks that you thought it would be and that things aren't quite clicking the way that you'd expect them to be by this point. But these are the top three reasons that I see time and time again. So let's talk through them. We'll also talk through what you need to do to fix them and how you can make sure that your business is on an upwards trajectory and that you feel like things are going in the direction that they're supposed to be.
Speaker 1:So reason number one is that you don't have enough visibility. So people don't know that you exist. Or should I say your ideal customer doesn't know that you exist. And if your customer doesn't know that you exist yet, then they can't buy from you. It's as simple as that.
Speaker 1:In order to fix this, it's making sure that your brand is getting onto the radar in front of the eyes of your perfect customer. So first and foremost, you need to know who your customer is, right? And if you go back to not last week's episode, but the episode before that, we talk through figuring out who your customer is, why they should buy from you and how you can reach them. So first and foremost, to make sure that you can reach your ideal consumer, your ideal customer, you need to know exactly who they are and how you're gonna reach them. And in the modern world, nine times out of 10, your visibility is probably going to come from social media.
Speaker 1:So it's knowing what channels they're using, where they're spending their time, what content they're consuming and how you can reach them in line with those things that you know about them. So first and foremost, the reason why your fashion brand might feel like it's failing right now, it could be that you're just not visible to the right people. You could have a fantastic product. You probably do have an amazing product. But if people don't know that it's there and that they have no idea, they've never heard of it, then it's going to be impossible for them to purchase it.
Speaker 1:So first and foremost, we need to fix your visibility. We need to make sure that you're getting in front of the right people's eyes. Okay, this leads me really nicely onto reason number two why you feel like your fashion brand might not be working the way you thought it would. So you could have visibility, right? You might have community members, followers, email list subscribers, but they're still not buying.
Speaker 1:And this could be because you're just shouting into the void. You're trying to sell to an audience who doesn't quite trust you yet. They haven't got to know you yet in a way that's going to encourage them to feel like they trust you enough and connect with you enough to want to buy from you. Great. You've got visibility from the right people.
Speaker 1:Now you need to get them to trust you. They need to know that when they purchase one of your products, it's going to arrive with them. The quality is going to be fantastic. It's going to be worth the investment that they've paid. The perceived value is where it should be and that they're going to want to tell other people about you and hopefully repeat buy.
Speaker 1:And in order to do that, you need to create trust between you and your audience. We all look at reviews when we're buying from a brand online, especially a brand that we haven't heard of yet or that's new to us. We look at reviews because that gives us a bit of proof that this brand is what it says it is, that the quality is where it should be, that we can trust parting with our money. We need to be able to generate that same kind of trust from our audience for them to feel comfortable and confident enough to put in their bank details onto your website and then purchase one of your products. So right now it might feel like, yeah, you're showing up every day.
Speaker 1:You are building your audience on Instagram, TikTok, you've got an email subscriber list, but it could just be that you're actually creating content, but just shouting into the void. And you're trying to sell to an audience that just isn't quite warm yet. They don't 100% know, like and trust you at this point. So if we go back to reason number one and making sure we're visible to the right customer, It could be that yes, you're visible to people but you're just not visible to the right person. You need to get hyper visible to your specific audience and make sure that your brand is discoverable to the right people and where they spend their time.
Speaker 1:So it might be that you actually need to take a few steps back and figure out who your customer is and make sure that you are reaching them. And then in order to get that like factor, we need human connection. People buy from people that they like. If you're one of these businesses that's, or one of these fashion brands that's faceless, it can be quite difficult to show your human side, to demonstrate that you care about your audience, that you understand what they need from your products. So this is a time to show up and create that human connection.
Speaker 1:Tell your story, actively engage with people, show that there's a human behind the page and that you understand what they need from your products. People don't just wanna feel like a transaction. They want to feel that you care about them. The trust factor comes in when we see social proof. So this is when we see reviews, feedback, customers in products, transparency around what it is that you offer.
Speaker 1:And this is where so many people miss. They need to see other people also really liking your product enough to want to purchase. This is super simple. Things like post purchase surveys and feedback forms and allowing customers to add their images to your website so that we can see what they look like on other people. If you feel like you're speaking into the void right now, it could be that know, like and trust is missing.
Speaker 1:Reason number three and the final reason why you might feel like your fashion brand is failing right now is that you've underpriced your products. You might have a really fantastic product but you've got an expensive hobby if you are not seeing strong enough margins. So I see so many founders trying to sit into an affordable range. They'll say, I really want to start this fashion brand. I want it to be affordable.
Speaker 1:And actually that can in turn mean that your products are not profitable. If you're a small business, you're working with small order quantities, you're working with ethical production, you're working with high quality fabrics, you're working on a much smaller scale in terms of your business model, which often means that your product pricing, so your cost of goods sold, is generally going to be higher, which in turn means that your sell price is going to be higher. Now, if you want to sit into this affordable range, the difference between your COGS, your cost of goods sold, your sell price, your RRP, is going to be really small. And we want that to be a nice, juicy margin so that your business is profitable, so that your collections are profitable, and so that you can keep going and launch more collections in future and actually earn a comfortable living from your business. So if you are generating some sales right now, but you just feel like you're kind of spinning your wheels and not really getting anywhere, it could be that your prices are just not high enough and you're currently running an expensive hobby.
Speaker 1:Now this is a really, really simple fix, but how you execute that is not as easy. Because if you've been charging a certain price point for a while now and your customer has gotten to trust you at that price point, then doubling that number can be quite difficult. What we need to do at this point is increase our prices in line with what works for us and what works for our customer. We need to make sure that our customers perceive value behind a product because value is essentially what we're willing to invest in an item to feel like it was worthwhile for us. So we need our customer to see the perceived value in spending X amount on X product, but we also need to make sure that your business is viable and profitable and that your margins are strong enough for you to have cash in the bank at the end of the month to be able to invest in restocks and more product, and like I also say, to be able to pay yourself.
Speaker 1:So if you identify with any of these reasons, or maybe even all of these reasons, the four simple things that you need to do, and I need to caveat that simple doesn't mean easy, the four things that you need to do is first off have visibility from the right people. Secondly, trust and connection with these people. Thirdly, profitable pricing. And then fourth, consistency. Right?
Speaker 1:You need to be doing this and taking action on this every single day, every single week, and not just starting with a strategy and then kind of falling off. These are the exact things that we're going be working on inside the Fashion Founder Scale Up programme. You might have heard me briefly talk about this in last week's episode. But Scale Up is a group programme for fashion founders who are completely over trying to guess what their business needs and ready to build a brand that is actually visible to the right people and actually sells consistently. It will be a twelve week programme with weekly group calls, a community of founders who also get it, and the strategy that you need to be visible and get consistent sales.
Speaker 1:We will cover three phases. The first is gaining clarity in your business. So knowing your customer, your brand positioning, your messaging, and also your pricing. The second phase will be all around visibility. So an Instagram and social media strategy that actually works, content that converts your audience, email marketing foundations, and also getting seen beyond your audience.
Speaker 1:The third and final phase is all about conversion. So turning that traffic onto your website into actual sales, selling in a way that doesn't feel salesy, why people might not buy and how we fix that. And then finally getting yourself a repeatable sales system that you can keep building and generating consistent sales even after the program ends. If this sounds like something you're interested in, we're going live in June and the doors open soon. But applications are now open where you can register your interest.
Speaker 1:There's no pressure or expectations at this stage. It's just so that I can get an idea of whether you're interested or not. This program will be capped at 15 founders. I want to keep it at 15 so that it's small enough that you can get seen but also big enough that you can learn from each other as well. So if you'd like more information and also to apply for ScaleUp.
Speaker 1:There is a link in the show notes where you can learn all about it and, as I say, put in your application. And then if you're interested and it sounds like a good fit for you, we'll book in a super short call where you can ask any more questions and just firm up on the details before you invest. But this is my very first cohort of Scale Up and this price won't happen again. This is just an entry price. So if you want in at this investment, you should definitely jump in on this opportunity and start quarter three on a really good foot.
Speaker 1:If you've got any questions, any queries, if there's anything else you want to know please just drop me a DM, an email or a message on LinkedIn. I'd be more than happy to chat through but otherwise I'm going to love you and leave you there and I will catch you in next week's episode.