As you’re starting a new clothing business, there are a lot of factors to consider. Once you’ve firmed up your product ideation, it will be time to take care of the gritty details like how you’ll ship your products and who your suppliers will be. It will even be important to learn all about easily overlooked variables like the requirements for garment labeling, so having a thorough grasp of all the factors that make up a successful clothing business launch is vital to both your long-term and short-term success.
Determine Your Value and Pick Your Name
How will your clothing brand stand out from the competition? Answering this question is a key part of determining your value proposition, which is the way that your brand will offer value to the consumer.
It’s not enough to simply pick out a great product and start making it; every aspect of your business will need to center around the way your customers will perceive it, and clearly expressing your value proposition from the very start is the best way to defend the long-term success of your enterprise.
Next, you’ll need to decide what you want to call your brand. Depending on which brand name you select, this identifier can be either an asset or a liability, so taking this step seriously is all-important. According to Sewport CEO Boris Hodakel, your brand name should match your core values while also expressing your value proposition and fitting in with your customers’ worldview.
Nothing’s worse than having to abandon a brand name that you’ve fallen in love with, so make sure that your chosen name doesn’t violate any existing copyrights or trademarks. The best way to handle this step is to perform a federal trademark search with USPTO.
Set up Your Storefront and Social Media Presence
Next, you’ll need to determine how you’ll sell your products to your customers. Before you set up an online store, you’ll need to pick a logo and determine other key aspects of your brand identity like your brand colors. Once you’ve taken care of these aesthetic steps, it’s time to pick an eCommerce platform.
If you have web design skills or you don’t mind hiring a professional, it’s possible to build your website from the ground up, but many clothing business owners choose to rely on established platforms like BigCommerce, Shopify, or Magento. Whichever approach you take, make sure to keep your site competitive by investing heavily in the beauty and elegance of your layout.
Once you’ve taken the preliminary steps in setting up your website, it will be time to populate your storefront with attractive products. As you take professional pictures of your apparel, pick out a few beauties that you want to feature on your new social media pages.
These days, creating and maintaining Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts for your company is a must. While you may or may not want to invest in promoted posts, reaching out to your customer base with daily organic social media content is an indispensable aspect of operating a successful clothing business.
How to Get the Word Out
When you’re first getting started, figuring out how to get consumers excited about your brand is hard. Some startups go overboard and invest huge amounts of capital into paid marketing, but you might want to take a subtler approach. Make it easy for customers to find you by boosting your SEO with meta information and great organic content, and work hard to build your social media following via word of mouth.
It’s also important to become an integral part of your local community. Host small events in your production space, facilitate giveaways, and try to get your products on display in local businesses. A company with a substantial local following grows faster than an online-only enigma, so don’t be afraid to make friends with other small business owners in your area.
Plan for Expansion
Throughout every step of the launch process, keep an eye on your profit margins. While revenues and cash flow are important, it’s your profits that will fuel your growth, so use these fruits of your success to take your business to ever greater heights.
