As extended lockdowns, social distancing and working from the confines of home become the new reality, fashion brands and retailers across the world struggling to mitigate cope up with revenue reductions.
While it is hard to predict the post pandemic scenario, players across the value chain can definitely utilise the time to prepare for future retail success. Here a few basic steps that will help you prepare your brand/business to shine though these harrowing times of uncertainty.
5. Keep Up the Communication
The COVID-19 pandemic has tagged along massive shifts in consumer behaviour and it is utterly important for brands to change their behaviour accordingly. Resort to social media platforms for direct interaction with customers and gatherable data on their preferences. These will go miles in establishing a deeper connection with consumers and ensure positive returns in the long run.
4. Work on your Digital Footprint
Ramp up your digital footprint – it’s your biggest lifeline in these times of crisis. Use social media to assure your existing consumers and advertise your product and services to new consumers. Expand your google search marketing by keeping a close tab on keyword ranking and searches. Check your PPC too because keywords targeted yesterday may not be the most relevant today. This is also an excellent time to grow your digital follower through contests, engaging content, or via targeted ads.
3. Ante Up Your Branding Game
Utilize this time to quick-fix your branding strategy. Prepare a plan of action and start with the basics – like your website. Our busy schedules seldom leave us with extra time to look into the fundamentals like – SEO, user interference/user experience, etc. Use this time to improve your website’s user journey user and ensure that your website convey the right brand message.
2. Think Smart and Be Quick in Adapting to Changes
It’s a crisis and no one knows what it is like on the other side. Control cash flow, assess inventory, relook supply chain management, review marketing and advertising, engage in sale forecasting and evaluate how operations will be carried out once the lockdown comes to an end. Thinking smart and modifying the value proposition in line with the realities of the market, are the only ways to keep the momentum going once the state of normalcy returns.
1. Rely on Technology
While the retail industry’s increasing reliance on technology over the past few years goes unsaid, the challenges posed by the pandemic will compel us to accelerate our rate of adoption of new technology and tools. Learn how successful brands are leveraging on technology to mitigate the challenges and adopt to your own capacities. Post the epidemic, digital-retail will be the mainstay and we will no longer be able to afford to not utilize modern technologies like Artificial Intelligence, Data Mining and Machine Learning and Data Mining.
In hindsight, the novel coronavirus crisis might have helped brands and retails with the rare opportunity to reflect and introspect, and come up with the much-needed changes required to take fashion retail to the next level.
