Many fashion entrepreneurs make mistakes that hurt the business for years to come while trying to make sales. Since sales are a very big part of any fashion business, you must do all you can to get it right because they determine how much revenue your business gets. Statistics show that about 20 per cent of small businesses fail in their first year due to low revenue and other reasons. You definitely don’t want to be one of them.
In building your fashion business, here are the top 5 common sales mistakes to note and how you can avoid them.
Top 5 Sales Mistakes and How to Avoid Them
1. Targeting the Wrong Market
Knowing who your target market is is extremely key to making sales as a fashion entrepreneur. If you don’t know them, you cannot create products that are well suited to them. Now, knowing them is not just about saying, “I am targeting working-class women between the ages of 20 and 50.” Rather, it is more about knowing exactly what they like and what their pain points are. This is a sales mistake many fashion entrepreneurs make.
To avoid making this mistake, you must first create a buyer persona for your brand and study them. What do they like and what problems do they want solved? Before you begin trying to sell your product or service, pinpoint who your customers are. Look at their age, gender, location, and occupation. Also, know their interests, hobbies, and personalities. Then, you can tailor your solutions to suit them.
Another thing to do is to observe your competitors in the fashion space and study their failures and successes. From what you see, you can then bring a solution to the market that everyone has been waiting for.
2. Making Price a Priority
Of course, price is a big subject in making sales but making it a priority is a sales mistake you must avoid. No customer wants to first be met with the price of your fashion products before anything else. This is why you should not make a sales call and start with the price range of your products.
Instead, you should focus more on the client’s needs and the benefits your products offer them. Let your customers see the value and benefit your fashion products will provide them before they see the price. So, let the conversation first build-up to the point where the customer asks for the price or you naturally provide that information. This way, you have a better chance of landing sales than if you had started with pricing.
3. Not Having a Sales Process
In building a fashion business, having proper processes and structures in place can save you plenty of headaches. Picking up the phone to market your products to every and any customer without a plan in mind is a bad idea. You also cannot sit back and expect that word-of-mouth referrals will get you all the sales you need. You must get up and do something.
So, in making sales, design for your fashion brand a sales process. You can do this by putting yourself in your customers’ shoes. Find out what you can do to solve that person’s problems because your products are more about them than about you. Understand what pushes them to buy your products or services and dissect their sales journey. This way, you can better sell to them in future.
Along with doing this, make sure that your phone and email marketing is targeted at customers in such a way that problems are solved. Following up with prospects also should be a big part of your sales process. Remember that a well-defined sales process helps you optimise the entire prospecting process.
4. Relying on Your Expertise Alone to Make Sales
Doing your fashion business alone is one the biggest mistakes you can make – in sales and otherwise. Yes, your startup is your baby and you want to make sure everything goes on well. But doing it alone will lead to burnout. You must always find ways to take the burden off your shoulders and make things easier for yourself.
In building your fashion brand, delegating responsibilities to others is important. Since sales is a huge responsibility that drives the success of your business, you must be wise with it. Consider hiring a salesperson if you are not good with sales or hiring someone to take other tasks off your hands so you can focus on sales. Also, always ensure to consult with other members of your team before making sales calls to get varying opinions.
If you cannot afford to hire extra hands, consider automating some processes. You can automate your sales, marketing, and customer relationship management responsibilities by using software or online tools. These tools have you keep things organised with you in charge.
5. Making Promises You Cannot Keep
Customers often complain of how fashion entrepreneurs always make promises they cannot keep. This is one sales mistake you must avoid like a plague. Making promises you cannot keep hurts the credibility of your fashion business. Never over-promise just to seal a deal, it will backfire on your business.
Also, it is a bad idea to rush into the market before you are ready to sell. You must take all the time you need to do accurate market research before you dive in. If you know you cannot deliver on a client’s job, let them know and maybe even refer them to someone who can. This will save your business from negative reviews that can hurt it.
Sales are a big part of your fashion business, so you must do all you can to avoid these common sales mistakes. Your business will be all the better for it. Which of these 5 areas are you going to deliberately try to get better at in the next 30 days?
