How To Have A Successful Black Friday As A Sustainable Fashion Brand
Does the upcoming holiday season have you stressed? Are you worried about profitability and how you’re going to meet your sales targets as a sustainable fashion brand? Well look no further - this post is going to give you the best tips as to how you can successfully navigate Black Friday and the upcoming holiday season!
After working with numerous brands over the years, we know the holiday season can be extremely overwhelming and cause slow fashion founders to burn out. These months are typically the most profitable ones so it’s important to have a strategy that works and execute that plan.
Tip #1: Plan In Advance
The secret to not getting overwhelmed, stressed or burning out during the holiday season is advanced planning. The more work you do upfront, the less you have to do during the peak holiday months, so planning is key!
We recommend dedicating a couple of days to figuring out your strategy, goals, execution plan and tasks. If this isn’t your first holiday season, you have an advantage! Leverage your strategy, plans, graphics, copy, etc. from previous years so you don’t have to start from scratch. Gather those files, find those assets and then when you’re planning out your holiday season, have those items with you.
Tip #2: Know Your Goals
When planning a successful holiday season you have to know what your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) or goals are going to be. What does good look like? What does better look like? What does GREAT look like?
You can’t make a solid plan unless you know exactly what you’re working towards. If you have team members or even contractors/interns who are helping you, make sure you share your KPIs and goals with them so that everyone is collectively working towards your goals.
Now it’s time to work out what your KPIs are going to be! We suggest incorporating sales numbers, revenue numbers, profitability numbers and anything else that might make sense for you. Instead of having one target, we also recommend you set good, better, and best targets. That way, if you and your team hit your first “good” target, you know that you can work towards the “better” and “best” target. Make sure you have lofty goals, but not unachievable ones because that can be demotivating for you and your team. Be realistic, but ensure it’s challenging!
If you’re having trouble setting targets, you can use historical holiday sales data (if this isn’t your first holiday season). Alternatively, you can also see what your average monthly sales are, and potentially try to double it since people are usually in a buying mood during the holidays.
Once you’ve brainstormed and solidified your KPIs, feel free to transfer them to an Excel spreadsheet or Google spreadsheet so you can track against it and share them with your team.
Tip #3: Create A Plan
Now that you know what you’re working towards, it’s time to create a plan! Set aside some time to brainstorm the answers to the following questions and figure out your tactics for this holiday season.
QUESTIONS:
What products are you going to heavily push? (e.g. gift cards, cashmere sweaters, etc.)
What cool marketing campaign/taglines can you use?
What marketing tactics can you use?
What sales tactics can you use?
Tip #4: Make Use of Project Management Tools
Once you have a brain dump of all the tasks that need to get done, it’s time to organize it into a project management tool, like ClickUp! We love using ClickUp at Recloseted to manage our internal tasks, as well as using it to help our clients manage their own brand’s tasks. You can type out all your to-do’s, put a due date and priority level, assign it to various members of your team, and more!
After you’ve inputted all your tasks and you know exactly what you’re working on for the next little while, be realistic with yourself and see if you’re able to complete everything without burning out. If the workload looks a bit much, there are two things you can do:
Cut down on some items (e.g. do you need to do another Christmas-specific photoshoot?)
Enlist some help
Try to take work off your plate by either not doing it, especially if it will not help you achieve your goals, or assigning it to someone else. Remember that you can hire some extra manpower just for the holidays in the form of an intern or contractor. Or if you have existing team members, see if they can do more hours.
Once you have more clarity on what tasks need to get done and who’s going to do them, make sure you update everything accordingly on ClickUp, that way everyone knows what’s expected of them and when things are due. The beauty of having a project management tool is that it keeps everyone on the same page so there are no surprises or last-minute things you need to frantically get done!
Tip #5: Take Care of Yourself
What self-care can you implement into your daily routine to get you through the holidays without burning out? Remember that you need to delegate and delete - which is something we’re doing more of nowadays! If you’re still unsure of where to start with self-care or want some more tips, listen to Episode 47 of Recloseted Radio where we overviewed some tips for recovering from burnout.
Self-care doesn’t have to be expensive - it can be free and easy to implement like sleeping more, meditating, or making time to stretch, do yoga, and move your body!
