The internet is full of interesting blogs about aspects of our everyday life. But more and more fashion businesses are using blogs to communicate with their target audience. Blogs for fashion brands should be ‘focused’ and ‘behold a purpose’ (Williams & Portney, 2011). This purpose could be to generate traffic to the website, enhance brand awareness and to highlight the different social media channels available e.g. Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Blick (2011) expresses that to successfully utilise blogging for your fashion brand, the posts must be ‘enriching, relevant and well communicated’.

The benefits of blogging to a fashion brand, is the improved quickness of reaching the market place. Cho (2012) portrays that the modern day access to blogs means a brand can showcase new collections and concepts instantly, rather than waiting for magazines to be printed the next calendar month. In addition Cho (2012) dismisses the concept that creating a blog would ‘add to the millions in existence’, as he discusses that ‘you have some unique to say still’. This is poignant for a fashion brand as the whole existence of fashions social media presence, is the ability to be unique and the consumer can relate to certain fashion trends and behaviours.

Ultimately a blog should serve to ‘feed off the web, digest it, recycle it and infuse it with new life’ (Stone, 2003). The content generated to the consumer, should take aspects of what they enjoy and deliver new ideas to invoke intrigue with what you are saying. Most software applications which support the platform for blogging ‘feature archives’, which maintains the blogging content previously posted by your fashion brand (Stone, 2003). The use of the same niche tags for posts and keywords, will create a database of information for fresh consumers to access when they are exposed to the blog.

 

 

Why Enhance Your Google Ranking?

Blog posts are an excellent way of driving traffic to your fashion brand site. But how can you attract interest over competitors? Wertz (2017) interestingly details that by ‘identifying long-tail keywords’ you can ‘optimise’ your ‘visibility in google searches’. This is crucial for blogging to be a success as by differentiating your keywords and blog content, it can drive your blogs to the top of google searches and reach out to many new consumers. The keywords should be expressing your niche and the unique selling point of your brand. For example, Fresh Ego Kid may use key phrases such as ‘ego clothing’ and ‘niche designed clothing’ to enhance their unique brand. The blog acts as an initiation for a long-term relationship with the consumer, and by maintaining business from these consumers the benefits can extend to vital word of mouth marketing.

You can find out how to utilise this theory by looking at Google’s Keyword Planner!

 

Best Practice – Fashion Brand Blog (Topshop)

Topshop demonstrate how to effectively display current product lines. The subscribe button helps to initiate email marketing. The ‘Follow Us’ function serves to create more social media channels and allow for consumers to share their findings. The call to action at the top of the page is in perfect eye line, and the catching message serves as a brilliant marketing tool for gaining business (TopshopBlog, 2017).

 

 

The personalisation of the blog creates a rapport with the consumer, which increases the chances of them revisiting the blog. The ‘How to Wear’ section is a nice touch, and serves to educate the consumer. This creates a trust that Topshop wants to satisfy the needs of their consumers.

 

 

 

Reaching out to different users interests and lifestyles

Positioning a fashion brand is a very important tool, as it dictates how you express your clothing items and overall brand identity. By segmenting the different consumers, it creates a uniform approach to each segment that aims to satisfy the consumer with either content or products that they love.

Adidas have recently begun a blog, which is directly focused towards their fitness and sport loving market. The Adidas blog serves as a perfect example of how blogs can be hugely successful in being widely viewed, as they have connected with correct content with the right user. They have achieved their aim of ‘delivering a personal insight’ into their affiliation with different sports (AdidasBlog, 2017).

 

 

This quick video lists the top 20 benefits of blogging for small businesses. Most interestingly, it states that blogs can help to ‘inspire your social media’ and ‘help to give your company a voice’. Give it a watch!

(Source: YoungEntrepreneursForum, 2017)

 

Are there any risks when corporate blogging?

 

Huyse (2007) expresses blogging can adversely affect a brand, due to the instant nature of a blog being visible to the world. This is further condemned by the hostile world of the internet and social media, so blogging must be utilised in line with Blick’s (2011) concept of making it ‘well-communicated’.

Huyse (2007) highlights the following risks when corporate blogging;

• Negative comments – Poor consumer comments may influence new readers of the blog
• Loss of control over the message – Message may be miscommunicated e.g. Fresh Ego Kid may be perceived to be endorsing arrogance rather than being yourself.
• Neglect – Social media channel for blog needs to be maintained and new fresh content needs to be distributed across Twitter and Facebook to avoid content becoming stale.
• Misunderstanding the culture – Anything communicated that construes ‘banter’ must be considered and any personal insight must be appropriate for the type of user/consumer it is aimed at.
• ‘Loose-Cannon’ employees – Delegation of ownership for blogging process is vital! When blogging for a fashion brand reputation is the most important foundation for success. Harmful blogs and comments can result in detrimental damage for the brand.
• Losing trade secrets – For niche fashion brands, element of design and creativity are paramount. To give insight into production, marketing and culture would be a risk as competitors can monitor the blog posts as quickly as consumers. Fine line between oversharing and a personal and open blog.

 

Fresh Content Shared Through Social Media

Blogs can take on a power of their own and content can be re-generated through social media shares. For example, if your fashion brand has 100,000 followers on Twitter, then that is potential thousands of differing reactions and shares that reach a wider audience.

In terms of engagement, Instagram is the ideal market to share content from a blog to entice the consumer. The picture below expresses poignant images from a brand such as Nike (Oetting, 2015) will grab the attention of the consumer, and generate traffic from Instagram to a blog. They say a picture can communicate many different messages, so if the media uploaded to this social media channel is fresh, creative, niche and invokes curiosity within the consumer then it will generate leads.

 

 

 

 

The below video shows exactly how to maximise the benefits of social share buttons when corporate blogging;

 

Pedersen (2010) simply dictates that in order for a blog to be beneficial to an organisation, it ‘cannot be imposed’ but ‘must be clearly defined to be enthusiastically taken up’. Thus, for a fashion brand it is important that all involved understand the direction they want to take the blog in and how it will be perceived in the market place.

 

Thanks for reading! You can follow me on Twitter for more Digital Marketing content- @JR_DIGMARK

 

References

AdidasBlog. (2017). AdidasGroupBlog. Available: http://blog.adidas-group.com/. Last accessed 13th Apr 2017.

Blick, D (2011). The Ultimate Small Business Marketing Book. Surrey: Filament Publishing. p232-235.

Cho, J (2012). Blog, Inc.: Blogging for Passion, Profit, and to Create Community. California: Chronicle Books LLC. p12-16.

Huyse, K. (2007). Top 10 Risks for Corporate Blogs. Available: http://www.zoeticamedia.com/top-10-risks-for-corporate-blogs. Last accessed 12th Apr 2017.

Pedersen, S (2010). Why Blog?: Motivations for Blogging. Cambridge: Woodhead Publishing. p135-137.

Stone, B (2003). Blogging: Genius Strategies for Instant Web Content. New York: New Riders Publishing. p10-16.

TopshopBlog. (2017). Blog – Style. Available: http://www.topshop.com/blog/style. Last accessed 12th Apr 2017.

Wertz, J. (2017). 4 Things You Can Do Today To Boost Your Website’s Google Ranking. Available: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jiawertz/2017/01/19/4-things-you-can-do-today-to-boost-your-websites-google-ranking/#658edbe2163f. Last accessed 13th Apr 2017.

Williams, D & Portney, D (2011). Mastering Blog Marketing: How To Launch Your Website To The Top Of Google. London: Williams. p101-104.