The Top 10 MUST-DO Apparel Marketing Tips for 2010

December 22, 2009

 Well, its that time again, New Year’s Resolutions. This year, far too many companies did the exact opposite of marketing, they pulled the plug on all of it, thereby dropping off the radar, sending the market the signal they were in crisis. A crisis is a terrible thing to waste and many did. So, for 2010, we scoured the files and the feedback to produce this short list of things you can do to get seen, found, understood and reached because what you are trying to sell is exactly what someone is trying to buy.

1. Define Yourself, your Expertise – use all the words, the internet does: its all about you. Its a what-have-you-done-for-me-today world. Like Norm said on CHEERS, “it’s a dog eat dog world and I’m wearing Milkbone underwear”. Show what you know. Be the go-to person. Stand out from the crowd. Have you solved a customer or technical problem? Share your experience. Customers will love the extra information. Prospects will have reasons to choose you. Create content on one of the busiest websites in the industry, aapnetwork.net. What are the issues? What are you doing? Display your passion for all to see, and update it constantly.

2. Control Your Content, Counter the Bad Data – Blog, Video, Articles, Press Releases, Slide Shows: you would be amazed the amount, the volume and the detail available on you right now either free (and growing) on the internet or through expert services like Panjiva. Shipping data, with exact volumes; who your customers are, with exact volumes; annual sales; your credit score; officers; issues and much more. There is no-one to call to fix it. But you CAN counter it with content that is under your control, the ‘good news’ about your company and someone to call to help you – us at AAPN and aapnetwork.net online.

3. Catch the Wave, Which Right Now its Sustainability: sustainability is the new status symbol, except this one isn’t a fad, its a commitment, its taking responsibility, its the right thing to do. But what are its elements? We think there are three – the environment obviously, the water, air, land; the people, society, the community, a living wage, a higher standard of living; and finally the company, the country, the economy, making a profit to fund sustainability, creating wealth. At AAPN, we believe ‘nothing stops a bullet like a job’ so our focus is ‘people’ and the helping the ‘company’ make a profit. Jobs are the easiest measurement we can track over time, it tells you how a company is doing, countries too. Our annual meeting May 2-4, 2010 on Sustainability is your time to take ownership of jobs.

4. Question Trade Shows, Ads, Meetings, Travel and all ‘Claims’: hey, its the old 40/40/20 Rule of Marketing - 40% of Marketing is the List (the tighter the target, the better pre-qualified); 40% of Marketing is the Offer (always nice to solve a problem prospects agree they actually have); and 20% is what you spend all the Money on. This is the year to market smart and direct. The big supply chain that is our membership runs up and down this hemisphere and is the spinal cord of the industry connecting factories to brands and retailers. A good network saves money, reduces travel, speeds up information, makes introductions and puts you 1 or 2 phone calls away from anyone you want to meet.

5. Show Up; Be Seen; Get Known; Stay Safe: 80% of success in life comes from just showing up. Belonging to AAPN or any other organization asks you to give what you have the least of, your time. The one thing you can give and still keep is your word. Just as eventually all great ideas degenerate into real work, great relationships start from showing up, doing face-to-face networking. That’s why we always open our meetings by SLOWLY introducing everyone so networking starts by design up front instead of by accident, if at all. AAPN is about creating relationships that buffer the shock of change, before the change hits you and its too late. We have your back.

6. Sponsor Something, Be a Benefactor, a Stakeholder: 7 years ago, Sue Strickland had the radical idea to create a special Reception for Sourcing Managers at Material World the night before the show opened. It was going to cost $10,000. Suzy Ganz of Lion Brothers made it easy for us by donating half. Her investment in us will live forever. She showed the industry she cared enough about factories, suppliers, members and prospective ones to sponsor an event that quickly grew to 350 people at Versace’s on Miami and put AAPN on the map!

7. Blame Nobody, Expect Nothing, Do Something: the industry does not change because “something needs to be done” but because individuals say “I need to do something”. The aggressive agenda for our annual meeting in May is riding on the backs of over a dozen of our members. It has to be a killer event. It has to be an event where people go back and do something that needs to be done. We hear it more and more, “we are doing this because it is the right thing to do”. Doing something that is right, and still business, is a double whammy.

8. Use it or lose it (not that it cost anything anyway): this year, more original work was published and posted on the internet than was written in all the books ever written in our entire history! The power of the internet, the channel accessed by the mobile device in your hand, the amount of information being organized in the ‘cloud’, the speed of innovation and that most of the tools being used for all of this are “freeware” means use it, because someone in Asia is!! The world is what it is. The most common language spoken worldwide is bad English. If you can speak it, you can talk to anyone. And now you can do this anytime, from anywhere, to anyone.

9. Leverage the Supply Chain: all companies compete as supply chains, period, statement of fact. Take sustainability. Consumers literally believe that their brands and retailers are taking care of all the risks and wrongs of the world on their behalf. So, whether you own the factory or know who made the zipper, in the end, in the court of public opinion, its your fault. That’s why we believe you must ‘sell as a team’ with your suppliers and why we work to help customers ‘buy as teams’. Eight of ‘us’ met with 12 of ‘them’ earlier this year and it worked. Now we’re working on how to keep score of all of this.

10. Meet your Customer’s Customers’ Customer: and you’ll learn something. Just because we have a network of world class suppliers as members does not mean we have a world class supply chain in AAPN, but we’re REAL close. A meeting where you’re at one end of the chain hearing someone from the other end read you the riot act about why Asia is so much better than you is uncomfortable, to put it mildly. That’s why meetings like ours, of a supply chain, where each person is outside the comfort of their own industry silo, is tough. Nobody gets away with playing anybody. And nothing beats watching a brand meet a factory, a mill, a trim maker and shipping company to put together a sourcing deal over a drink. We know. We bought the round.

So, there you have it. What are your ideas? Do you have tips you can share with us and about 600 others out there waiting?

And in the spirit of the season, another of my favorite Norm exchanges on CHEERS goes:
Bartender: "Hey Norm, Jack Frost nipping at your nose?"
Norm: "Yep, now let's get Joe Beer nipping at my liver, huh?"

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