What are fashion retailers doing to attract more customers?

This year, we’ve seen a number of major fashion retailers close their doors because of sales declines and shrinking margins. Among them were the value shoe retailer, Brantano; young fashion retailer, Blue Inc; and of course, BHS, which has been on the UK’s high street since 1928.

According to the British Retail Consortium’s Footfall and Vacancies Monitor, 10.1 percent of shops in the UK were empty as of July 30, the highest vacancy rate since April 2015. Since 2007 when the recession began, a total of 362 retailers have closed in the UK and Ireland, according to the Centre for Retail Research. This begs the question: what can fashion retailers do to retain and attract more customers, and ultimately, keep their doors open?

Don’t follow the crowd

Our research on the ‘Unfaithful Consumer’ found that 55 percent of consumers are tired of using the same stores and brands. This is hardly surprising when today’s consumer has the choice of an unprecedented level of brands, all vying for their attention across a multitude of touchpoints.

Consumers have far more products and retailers to choose from, which means retailers and brands need to work harder to generate loyalty.

Worryingly, our research found that brands could lose more than 120 billion pounds of consumer spending in total from shoppers defecting to other retailers.

Consider the future of the physical store

Many high street shops are now turning to online sales and shedding their physical stores, opting for a leaner business.

Shop Direct, the owner of Very and Littlewoods, has seen growth in the past year after taking both the retailers solely online. No more catalogues, no more stores. With investment in mobile and technology, the firm has recorded a sales boost of 4.3 percent to 1.86 billion pounds in its first financial year after it discontinued its catalogues in January 2015. Leading the way are the retail brands that have invested in customer journey, making the entire online retail experience more enjoyable and therefore, achieving more lucrative sales.

At the end of August, we saw BHS close the last of its stores and this month, the cut-cost fashion retailer, Primark has been buying some of the empty BHS stores in an effort to help its own sales decline. At a time when 61 percent of consumers say they shop around more now than they did five years ago, now may be the time to rethink business strategy.

While an omnichannel approach has been proven to work for many fashion retailers, we could start to see more and more retail brands doing similar, taking their physical stores online, reducing overheads, wages, real estate and focusing more on customer experience on their websites and apps.

Improve website functionality

Asos, the online fashion retailer, has recently been named the ‘most searched fashion retailer on google’ by MediaVision’s annual Fashion Search Performance Report. With a 78 percent ranking in both men and women’s categories, the retailer is going above and beyond and reaping the rewards.

Investment in its SEO, on-site optimisation, searchable keywords and social media branding has placed the retailer high in the minds of consumers. With its strong domain authority of 83 and with the largest number of sites that link back to its platform, asos.com is going from strength to strength.

Provide a unique experience

Following the Ikea model, where the consumer is entertained by the likes of restaurants and children’s play areas, retailers should think about experiences and solutions they could offer their customers to enhance their existing products and services.

Selfridges as an example, has this month opened its doors to a pop-up theatre which is playing an abbreviated version of Shakespeare’s play Much ado about nothing.

Fundamentally, customers’ needs haven’t changed in 100 years – but their expectations have. Retailers must think carefully about how to reach and retain customers whether that be by moving solely online, by investing more in their online channels or by providing an experience within their physical stores.

This wider understanding of the change to omnichannel will help retailers secure loyalty in the era of the unfaithful consumer, and hopefully, keep their doors open.

Written by: Guy Chiswick, Managing Director of Webloyalty, Northern Europe. He has 17 years’ experience in marketing and advertising and has worked for some of the industry's biggest brands as well as emerging start-ups.

Guy leads a diverse team of experts focussed on client development and category growth, and has spearheaded Webloyalty's retail and multichannel client engagement strategy since joining in 2010.

Webloyalty is a leading provider of online savings programmes designed to help companies build stronger, more profitable relationships.