5 Tips For Small Business Owners to Stay Relevant With Latest Trends

Introduction:

‘Change is the only constant’ suits our fashion industry. Aspiring young entrepreneurs or small business owners like you are striving to stay relevant to the ever-changing trends of the market. Adapting to the changes of the market’s needs as they transpose over certain periods of time helps businesses like yours to sustain longer. However, a budding entrepreneur might not have the same access that a huge business conglomerate has, to analyze the market trends every season before they release their newest collections. Here are some tips that we recommend you try in order to get ahead of the trends to stay relevant and capture the market.

Forecast to Your Rescue

Wouldn’t it be great if you could get insights into next season’s types of prints, textures, fabrics, silhouettes, colors, and other fashion details that enable you to effectively produce consumer goods for your next collection? There are 2 main fashion seasons- Spring Summer and Autumn Winter for each year and Designers usually work at least 1 season ahead on their collections. There are several forecasting agencies that predict the trends that are supposed to capture the market’s attention for the upcoming season.

The best consumer trend forecasts company for small business owners are Trendstop, Trendzoom, Fashionsnoops and etc. which provides insight into these upcoming trends similar to WGSN and Promostyl along with being less expensive.

Examining Your Market is a Must

Analyzing our competitors is the next crucial step in studying different aspects such as price range, target audience, location, materials, and other fashion details. This enables you to understand what the customers are drawn to and gives you a better insight into the past, present, and potential customers for that product. To get a better sense of how to start a market study simply type the keywords that you are looking for and collect the most recent data from that search result. The market study can be defined as the systematic process of collecting and analyzing the market demand for a particular product

Use the Fashion cycle to your advantage

The fashion cycle is a natural cycle in which a fashion trend is introduced, raises to the top, and goes obsolete. It is widely known that fashion moves in cycles every few years. There are 5 stages of a fashion cycle:

1.  Introduction: This is the stage when a new style is introduced into the market usually by leading designers of haute couture houses in small quantities.

2. Acceptance: The next stage is where the trend starts to get some attention in the fashion industry. During this stage, more trendsetters and fashion leaders are seen wearing these pieces.

3. Peak: This is the stage where the trend gains the most popularity and the general public starts to wear the pieces. Most retailers will try to duplicate these styles and sell them for cheaper prices.

4. Decline: In this stage, the public will be jaded with the trend as it will be seen almost everywhere and turn away a lot of customers from buying it anymore.

5. Obsolesce: The final stage where the trend will be completely out of the cycle and will be considered “out of style”.

Doing this analysis will guide you into figuring out which of the fashion trends are in the introduction stage and using the details before they reach the peak stage.

Making Social media an asset

Social media is the widest source of inspiration for both creators and consumers. In the “Acceptance” stage of the fashion cycle, influential people are seen wearing the new fashion pieces that are then set as new trends. In the current scenario, social media influencers are the new trendsetters. This is the case for a wide range of social media platforms such as Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, etc which give great opportunities for new entrepreneurs to reach markets around the globe. This also applies to print media which is a little old school at this point but they still provide some source of inspiration for new fashion trends. Fashion magazines, Fashion articles/ blogs are also a great starting point where the newest fashion trends are accessible to the general public.

Upcycling Your Previous Collection

Owners sometimes struggle in bidding farewell to their designs while procrastinating to cope with new trends but your strongest asset is your creativity & putting it up to use you can upcycle those beautiful products to the newest trends. The market shift from season to season can be anywhere between a minute to major, although upcycling & recycling are becoming mainstream in the fashion industry by both big & small brands. So a survey along with a little snip & snap can help you create something new & trendy without letting your designs go to waste. Let your customers see your skills and make them fall in love with your creation & artistry.  

Hyperlocal marketing for nearby customers

Your local customers can also become your loyal customers. Hyperlocal marketing is when you create imaginary parameters around your store and acquire the within customers through offline marketing or building up your presence in the ‘near me’ section of the search engine. Directional banners, distributing pamphlets, and an event can be considered for offline marketing whereas building your online presence through SEO building, retargeting, and building up reviews on your google store will come under hyperlocal digital marketing. Advertising your store in your local market and providing your best services can help you expand your parameters through word of mouth which will ultimately help you gain more traffic. 

Honing Your Uniqueness 

After compiling all the research, the last & most important step is to understand what the market already offers & what unique element you can add to stand out. Small changes to your branding will contribute to attracting new customers. It can be as small as an appealing business card or making the packaging more aesthetically appealing which can also be another huge contribution to opening up your brand to a new set of audiences. Sustainability is also the key; a lot of customers these days want to shop for sustainable fabric, so taking the extra step to be more environmentally conscious will appeal to a lot of customers. Adding a personalized touch also plays an important role, it can be as simple as a thank you card or your own branding style, these personalized elements help in making your brand unique & ‘Yours’.

Conclusion

You are all set! Be your authentic self and make use of technology that is accessible to everyone. Find a balance between following trends and being creative with your product which will give your brand an edge that can’t be duplicated or knocked off. With that said, buy the haute couture fabrics from Fabriclore.com & start snipping. All the best for your business and I hope you found some inspiration from this article!