C R E AT I V E
B R A N D I N G
Brand Community
Best Practices for
Apparel
Industry Marketers
A Blade Creative Branding e-Book
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
1
TABLE OF
CONTENTS
The Secret to Success for Apparel Marketers............................................. 3
Your Brand is a Community.......................................................................... 4
What’s Your Role?........................................................................................ 5
“So How Does This Apply to My Industry?”.............................................. 6
The Right Stuff for Apparel Marketing....................................................... 7
Get the Right Stuff Now!............................................................................ 9
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
2
THE SECRET TO SUCCESS
FOR APPAREL MARKETERS
Everyone wears clothes and footwear. But not every style
of clothing or footwear is suited to every person. Duh!
Choice is essential to consumers but, with that choice,
comes confusion, competition, and the critical need for
differentiation. The apparel industry relies on establishing
character, promoting personality, and aligning with trends
to build awareness and buzz. Because your customers’
brand choices are on public display, your core values the ones that create your brand community - are also on
display in virtually every setting imaginable. You must
look good all the time. That’s a lot of pressure.
In this e-book, we’ll share with you some of the best
practices for outfitting your brand community so
well they return to you season after season. But first,
we’ll introduce you to the basics of brand community
marketing, and how this perspective applies to every
industry in which we’ve worked.
Attracting loyal followers to your label or store is a
function of integrated marketing – branding, messaging
and customer engagement – that creates energized word
of mouth compelling consumers to choose you from an
endless collection of options. Every aspect of the product
experience, not only the garment itself, is an essential
part of your customer’s brand experience. However well
each element is handled has a direct effect on how well
you build community around your brand and keep it
growing.
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
3
YOUR BRAND
IS A COMMUNITY
At Blade, we see your brand as a destination your
customers populate, creating a community. These people
are attracted to your
brand, and stay with
it, because of the
values they experience
from your brand.
Your brand’s ability to
consistently deliver on
those values establishes
a dynamic relationship
that needs to be nourished and managed.
Seeing your brand as a community offers you a clear view
of the important amenities, points of interest, core values
and beliefs that attract community members, keep them
in the fold, and encourage them to enlist others.
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
Best of all, seeing your brand as a community provides
clear insight as to where your marketing resources should
be invested. If you know where and how people live in
the community, you know what their priorities are and
how to reach them.
It’s all About the Relationship
A successful brand today owes its creation and growth to
a set of core principles:
• Your brand is a destination, around which a
community will form.
• Your brand must create a connection with the
members of its community.
• You don’t own the brand or the community.
• You’re part of a relationship based on values and
experience.
4
WHAT’S
YOUR ROLE?
Because a brand community creates a working
partnership, your role is to be the diligent guardian of
the brand. That doesn’t entitle you to a lot of arbitrary
control—mostly because you have a lot of obligations
first.
Internal
Internal
Stakeholders
Stakeholders
Shared
Key
Values
Shared
Key
Values
THE
BRAND
External
External
Stakeholders
Stakeholders
Shared
Key
Values
Influencers
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
1
Ensuring you do everything you can to deliver on
the brand’s promises. Sounds simple, but it can
be tough as nails.
2
Anticipating the expectations of your brand
community—and sometimes gently guiding them.
3
Regularly exploring new ways to keep the
community buzzing by communicating the core values
of your brand.
4
Align your brand and your promises with only those
media or partners that share the same values.
5
Recognize that your brand community is a living,
organic thing that can be evacuated at a moment’s
notice if you do something toxic, or just plain dumb.
6
Never forget that your internal brand community
(your employees) is the most important group of
people you need to enlist.
5
“SO HOW DOES THIS
APPLY TO MY INDUSTRY?”
Here are a few key best practices for apparel marketers.
1
Look around for what may be hiding in plain sight
Sometimes, the most important part of your brand
story can be overlooked. Maybe it’s a performance
guarantee, or an important longevity milestone.
Whatever it is, look at what is in place right now and
see how you can add more life to it.
4
Encourage membership in your brand community
Building a database of your customers is absolutely
essential. And the technology to do it is easy to
access and can be just as easy to manage. Give your
customers an incentive to sign up on price tags, instores, and on your website.
2
Encourage your customers to tell their stories
Stories are the best way to build a community around
your apparel because they encourage new members
to join the fold. When your customers share their
experience with your product, the result is powerful
and lasting.
5
If you’re in retail, focus on more than just product
Your retail location is a bricks and mortar opportunity
for your staff and customers to experience the core
values of your product, in a real life setting. Make that
setting happy, comfortable, and irresistible to enter
for your staff and customers.
3
Avoid the trap of chasing the hip factor
If you happen to attract a trendy fringe group to your
brand, be careful not to chase that market and
leverage it for growth. These members are often
capricious and chasing that flame can cause you to
easily alienate your core brand community.
6
The sales channel is part of your community too
Grow and celebrate your channel! Tell stories about
channel partners successes! Give your sales channel
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
the opportunity to demonstrate their identification
with your community. And give them every reason to
smile when they engage with your brand.
6
THE RIGHT STUFF FOR
APPAREL MARKETING
Dickies Workwear
Blade’s relationship with
Dickies was all about
realigning the core values of
the brand with the right community. After an exhaustive
Canadian market audit, Blade worked closely with
Dickies to rationalize the clothing company’s promotional
investments to more closely connect with Canadians.
Moving away from NASCAR and into hockey was a classic
case of “They shoot, they score!”
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
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THE RIGHT STUFF FOR
APPAREL MARKETING
KODIAK Boots
Not many Canadian
brands can claim over a
century of quality and tradition. Blade discovered that
KODIAK could. Then we created a Centennial marketing
communications campaign program to elevate the
company’s profile and re-establish KODIAK as a powerful
Canadian icon known for innovation and excellence.
©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
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GET THE RIGHT
STUFF NOW!
At Blade, we value strong collaborative partnerships
dedicated to creating results-oriented solutions—and we
are keenly interested in pursuing working relationships
that embrace that approach.
T: 416.467.4770 ext. 23 | Toll Free: 1.800.392.5233
you@bladebranding.com
www.bladecreativebranding.com
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©2012 Blade Creative Branding Inc.
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