Developing Digital Marketing Strategies to Promote Fashion Antidote - Assignment Example

Developing Digital Marketing Strategies to promote Fashion Antidote 0. Introduction Fashion Antidote is an independent fashion school and studio. It is majorly based in London where one would find other vibrant businesses like restaurants and fabric shops (Fashion Antidote, 2012). The major aim for Fashion Antidote has always been to provide fresh alternatives to Fashion Education to have people that are more skilled in this field. They place a lot of emphasis on teaching fashion as well as fashion related subjects. Their main specialization has been in technical and creative skills, which involves courses and workshops on fashion business (Fashion Antidote, 2012). They further teach their clients how to set up their own fashion companies. In this perspective, they offer the training in an informal manner and ensure all are treated equally whether they are beginners or fashion professionals (Fashion Antidote, 2012). Fashion Antidote as well, has a program entitled Professional Garment Construction and Pattern Cutting that also aimed at giving professional, business and creative expertise without one being in enrolled in a full time study (Fashion Antidote, 2012). In a bid to achieve its aim, Fashion Antidote has a Facebook page in addition to their website (Fashion Antidote, 2012). Through this page, feedback from its customers and clients on the performance of the company is got directly. The main interest in developing a digital marketing strategy for Fashion Antidote came with the interest this group had in fashions and fashion designs (Fashion Antidote, 2012). In addition, Fashion Antidote is a well-established fashion company that has many customers both in the field and in online (Fashion Antidote, 2012). As well, the group has the feeling that Fashion Antidote needs to upgrade its website and especially their Facebook page to be able to be at purr with current fashion trends (Fashion Antidote, 2012). As well, with increased innovation at the fashion school, there is need to expose all these to customers so that the company can grow. This means that if Fashion Antidote has a fashion show or unique fashion taste it wants to share, the Facebook page is the best way to share all these (Fashion Antidote, 2012). Thus, this paper aims to develop a digital marketing strategy to be used by Fashion Antidote in upgrading their website in order to gain new customers and gain more. In doing this, the paper will focus on literature from different sources like magazines, journals, websites, fashion blogs and even other fashion websites. 2.0. The Concept of Digital Marketing Strategy 2.1. Digital Strategy Understanding the concept of digital strategy in this case is very vital if a good strategy must be developed. Digital strategy is that overall approach that a company takes after making a decision that they want to invest in online business in order to achieve their goals (Wind & Mahajan 2002, 06). It can involve building the reputation of the business online especially with the focus of being a leader in the area of business (Wind & Mahajan 2002, 06). This can also extend to overarching digital strategy of a business in order to migrate the major sales transaction from online to offline (Wind & Mahajan 2002, 06). In the development of such a strategy, a company is required to have one major goal as opposed to numerous goals even though there is no much restriction in this (Ryan & Jones, 2012). For the Fashion Antidote in this case is to be able to capture the latest fashion trends and use it to improve the company’s reputation online (Ryan & Jones, 2012). A clearly written digital strategy for business helps that particular business to map out tactics that the company plans to enable it fulfills the strategy (Ryan & Jones, 2012). This will go along with constant examination of the potential activity or tactic that supports the overall strategy stated. If it does not support the strategy drawn, then it is left out (Ryan & Jones, 2012). A good digital strategy also needs to clearly state who the target audience is. This includes stating the sectors involved, the geographical locations of the audience and even the job titles (Venkatesh, Carpenter & Allen 2012, 01). For the Fashion Antidote, the first target are those located in London and particularly East London. The extension is normally drawn to those in other parts of the world and majorly users of the Fashion Antidote website and Facebook page. This will also include a clearly stated account of the target audience’s motivations, drives, needs, habits and preferences (Venkatesh, Carpenter & Allen 2012, 01). Lastly but most importantly, the strategy should also look at the size of the market being addressed and go further to articulate how its success will look like in the end (Venkatesh, Carpenter & Allen 2012, 01). 2.2. Digital Marketing Strategy Once one has a strategy to employ on the business, a digital marketing simply outlines the tactics that are to be used alongside the plan (Wind & Mahajan 2002, 06). This includes the campaigns, timings and the deliverables that will determine the period for the implementation of the plan (Ryan & Jones, 2012). An example is having a mix of general outgoing tactics one plans to employ. In the plan, the target audience is normally defined together with their habits and preferences. Thus, the tactics would involve designing or improving website, optimizing communication for search engines, social media interactions (Ryan & Jones, 2012). Other includes promoting special seasonal offers, creating new packages and services to meet customer needs (Wind & Mahajan 2002, 06). This should not leave out promotion of news service such as twitter to manage customer service enquiries or competition (Wind & Mahajan 2002, 06). The plan actually outlines when all these will be run (Ryan & Jones, 2012). A digital marketing plan focuses much on the traditional marketing principles by making use of the opportunities and challenges offered by technology and digital medium (Venkatesh, Carpenter & Allen 2012, 01).. Being high empirical, the strategy remains to be the strongest. Through the strategy, the company involved can watch behaviors, actions and actions paths until the results are realized (Venkatesh, Carpenter & Allen 2012, 01). The plan should as well have a framework to test its ability to remain flexible and dynamic in medium that changes more often (Venkatesh, Carpenter & Allen 2012, 01). 3.0. Fashion Antidote Digital Marketing Strategy In a digital marketing strategy for Fashion Antidote, there must be a clear definition of the identity of the company, the services they offer, the reasons for the services as well as the manner in which the services are offered (Fashion Antidote, 2012). As well, the customers of the business must be well defined as well as their needs and wants (Fashion Antidote, 2012). The competitors of the business are not something to leave out as this plan is going to be modeled (Fashion Antidote, 2012). The Fashion Antidote is a fashion company that offers courses and services in the fashion industry (Fashion Antidote, 2012). The fashion house serves those who are interested in training as fashion designers. It does this by offering courses on the different areas that deal with fashions designs and shows (Fashion Antidote, 2012). As well, other professionals in the fashion industry get their training and capacity courses at Fashion Antidote thus are able to upgrade on their skills. Apart from training, Fashion Antidote sells the latest fashion clothes in the market (Fashion Antidote, 2012). The marketing is done by posting photographs of such fashion designs on their website as well as Facebook page. Fashion Antidote has the strength in that it trains most fashion designers in London and across Europe (Williams, 2014). This creates for it an opportunity for it to expand other branches and covers as many countries as possible (Williams, 2014). As well, it has the opportunity to become the largest consultant company when it comes to issues of fashion (Williams, 2014). Fluctuation in the economy is a major threat for the Fashion Antidote especially when it comes to purchasing raw materials (Williams, 2014). When the price of the raw materials goes down, the consumer has to pay high prices in order to get the goods and this brings about change of attention to competitors in the field (Williams, 2014). 3.1. Objectives The objective of developing this strategy is to enable Fashion Antidote to reach out for its customers by taking advantage of the technological advancements that exists. The plan will help in developing the Facebook page of the Fashion Antidote thus giving more room for consumers to share on their experiences. 3.2. Website Promotion Strategies Fashion Antidote will employ certain online marketing strategies like the use of social media, Search engine optimization, e-mail marketing among others (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). All these are meant to promote the Fashion Antidote website or Facebook page. 3.2.1. E-mail Marketing Fashion Antidote will use e-mail marketing to deliver business messages to its audience. This will start by first creating accounts to its clients who will have to register and become members in the website (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Through this Fashion Antidote can easily contact the customers. The reason for this strategy is that it is cost effective to the company. As well, it highly targets almost all customers and is easily customizes on a mass scale and measurable (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). This advantageous part of e-mail marketing rates it as the best digital marketing strategy for the company (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). The Facebook accounts can as well be a tool to get the contacts of the customers and reach them with the latest news. Another reason why e-mail marketing is recommended for Fashion Antidote is because it is a good avenue for the company to build relationships with customers who are potentials and existing (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). It will thus assist the company to put more emphasis on customer retention. In addition, it will also maximize on the value of these customers thus contributing to a great profit for the organization (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Fashion Antidote has got segmented sectors of customer base in which e-mail databases can easily take care of. Direct messages can easily be sent to these sectors in order to get desirable results (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). 3.2.2. Online Advertising Fashion Antidote has both a website and a Facebook page, which are good avenues for online advertisement. This involves developing search engines within the Facebook page so that customers can easily find information that they need (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Through the e-mails, online advertising will be achieved by placing the ads on the e-mails being sent to the customers (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Online advertisement will also be done through social networks like twitter and Facebook. The Google display network is another way to achieve online advertisement for the sake of marketing products (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Fashion Antidote will rely on online advertisements in order to increase its sales. The online advertisements done through e-mails and social media will raise brand awareness online (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Online advertisement will give the company an opportunity to interact more with customers in a continuous manner unlike traditional advertisement or non-interactive (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). This is because users of these forms of media through which advertisement is done can get a chance to give comments about the advert. For example, on Facebook, they can easily comment in a series of entry thus the company should employ that as a means. The best way for Fashion Antidote is to sub-divide the customers’ base along geographical lines, specific markets and contextualization (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). 3.2.3. Affiliate Marketing Considering that the aim of these strategies is to promote the Fashion Antidote Facebook page, affiliate marketing would be another good approach. The company will decide on using finders’ fee for those customers who give any referrals (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). This will highly promote the website as well as the Facebook page for Fashion Antidote. If the customers introduce a new customer, visitor or subscriber into these websites, they get rewarded. Thus, if Fashion Antidote really wants to brand its products and acquire more customers, then they need to use this strategy (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). Online, affiliate marketing is widely used to promote websites, with the referrers being rewarded for every visitor, subscriber or customer provided through their efforts. It is thus a useful tactic for branding and acquisition (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). 3.2.4. SEO The Fashion Antidote will also aim at upgrading its website and Facebook page in order for them to rank high on the search engine results pages (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). The company will thus pick up the concept of SEO of working within the parameters set by search engines to ensure that search engines index it especially when users search for an item that is relevant to a product or service (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). One of the achievements of this strategy is acquisition thus ensuring that the organization appears in the search results. In turn, the results will easily reach the potential and existing customers (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). This means that any search engine that has been optimized by the company must be clear, relevant and well designed. The search engine actually ensures customer retention as it gives them a unique user experience (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). 3.2.5. PPC Another marketing strategy is the PPC system in which an advertiser only pays for each click on their advert. Normally, the strategy is used for advertisements on search engines results pages as well as banner advertising (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). The main focus and beauty of this form of advert for Fashion Antidote is in the fact that they are key word based. Thus, the advert must come up in response to the search terms entered by the consumer (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). This means an advert will come up in response to the search terms entered by the consumer. Through this strategy, Fashion Antidote will acquire new customers and even retain a larger number (Wilson, 2011 & Alton, 2013). The company can thus easily reach people who are already existing customers and have expressed more interest in the product of the company. 3.2.6. Social Media This is another powerful tool when it comes to online marketing. It is a consumer generated media and exists in form of texts, visuals and audios. Normally, the social media sites create a platform for people to share. In the past decade, social media has changed the face of online marketing. They have enabled companies including Fashion Antidote to create links and connections in a manner that has never been experienced before. Fashion Antidote would benefit much from this strategy because it would ensure that proper branding of its products are done. In addition to that, it will raise awareness of the brand and even give the consumer a chance to be involved in the marketing through collaboration. The social media sites as well exhibit a viral and shareable nature in a manner that they provide a crowd-sourced feedback through graphs and social analytics system. With reference to the above strategy, Fashion Antidote plans to add tags to its website and Facebook page in order to make users find it easily. Furthermore, setting up group discussion pages on the Facebook would be another positive move. People would be able to discuss and comment on the products posted online in order for the company to establish customer tastes and preferences. For example, the company can do this by posting sales news for online shop. Moreover, the Fashion Antidote intends to establish a relationship with other fashion blogs to have a variety in their products. Within the social media, Fashion Antidote will develop slogans on both Twitter and Facebook. These slogans will act as a tool for promotion of the products such that customer awareness of the products will be highly raised. 4.0. ORM Online reputation management (ORM) is the process by which a brand monitors, measures and manages the conversations that are happening around it online. ORM can have a huge impact on a brand’s reputation and its bottom line. It is only through listening to conversations being carried out by its customers and potential customers that an organization can adequately respond and manage its situation in the market. ORM speaks to acquisition, engagement and participation. An effective ORM tool can assist a company in engaging with its customers where relevant and providing better service by responding to queries and complaints. The insights gained from ORM should be considered when evaluating and optimizing strategic direction. 5.0. Web PR Public relations are a set of functions that foster an organization’s ability to listen to, appreciate and respond to those people with whom it is exchanging value. While traditional PR focuses on carefully crafted press releases and a controlled release of information, the Internet means that information is freely available to a wider audience, as opposed to a select group of journalists. WebPR allows companies to engage in a immediate form of communication. Unlike the traditional press release, WebPR is about connecting with customers. It is used to connect with customers and enhance brand awareness, exposure and SEO efforts. 6.0. Conclusion (275 words) References: Read More