How to open an online clothing store in 2020

Clothing sales through e-commerce are in the top 3 sales of all goods along with electronics and gadgets. Fuel to the fire has been added to restrictions in offline stores due to quarantine. It has become convenient to choose clothes in an online store due to the fact that detailed measurements of each unit of clothing have been added to the product descriptions. But let's start from the very beginning and tell you how to open an online clothing store in step-by-step instructions.

Stage 1: Detach from the competition

Before opening your own online clothing store, you need to immediately think about how to distinguish your brand from competitors. Clothing is the second most important commodity after food and essential goods, so there will always be a demand for clothing. But the competition in this direction is just gigantic. Here are some tips for choosing your niche in the apparel industry:

1. You can give preference to some narrow circle of target audience: for example, only big size clothes or clothes only in casual style, clothes for business women or for expectant mothers. Today, a healthy lifestyle is gaining popularity, so you can also sell sportswear for yoga or jogging.

2. Service uniqueization. The advantage of small shops is fast and high-quality service and advice to each client. Due to the fact that e-commerce giants have large flows of requests and calls, they do not always cope with the task of providing quick customer service. Many stores have made the decision to move to a self-service system, but not all customers are able to quickly adapt to modern digital technologies.

3. Gifts, buns, bonuses. If you put a small gift in a box with a product, you will achieve several goals: increase customer loyalty and be remembered, most likely, family and friends will be told about gifts from your online store, and this works as additional advertising. Ask customers to leave video and photo reviews on social networks with a note about your online store. Not all 100% of customers will agree to this, but even if 10% agree, it will not be enough for your brand.

And more "5-point checklist: how to make your e-commerce business special and simple"

Stage 2: Search for suppliers

The second thing to start with is finding suppliers. With the advent of dropshipping and, in general, the transition of wholesale stores to online, there are an incredible number of suppliers. But not everyone will suit you. Here are some tips for choosing suppliers if you decide to start selling clothes online in Ukraine:

1. The competition in clothing is very high, which is why you need to stand out. Today, the trend is to create a capsule wardrobe, which consists of basic things. Perhaps you should study the topic in more detail in order to understand what kind of clothes they will buy.

2. Delivery times. This is a very important criterion, since waiting for an order for more than 3 days already causes a lot of dissatisfaction among customers. If you work on a dropshipping system, be sure to check with the supplier for how long the goods are sent to the buyer. The ideal option is the same day or the next day after placing an order.

3. Methods of payment and delivery options. Today, most clothing suppliers work with payment through a payment card, but it will not be superfluous to clarify. You should also immediately clarify the point with delivery options. For many clients, the tariffing of private carrier companies has become high and they prefer delivery by Ukrainian postal services.

4. When looking for a supplier, you should immediately evaluate the quality of the content - photos, descriptions, dimensions, etc. Check the speed of order processing and the conformity of the goods in reality with what is in the picture. For this, many make the first trial purchase.

5. Another point to consider: if you have several suppliers of clothes and you are working on dropshipping, how will the delivery work. The buyer will not wait long to collect the order or pay twice for delivery, his goal is to place an order and receive it by the selected courier service. Perhaps today this is the most painful question of many intermediaries, since it is necessary either to purchase goods to your warehouse or wait for an order from different suppliers, and then send it to the client, and this is a waste of time and money. Logistics must be organized prior to opening an online clothing store.

How and where to find suppliers for your online store

Stage 3: Development of structure and filters for products

Before creating a website for selling clothes, you need to carefully consider the structure of the menu and filters by which users will sort their search among a large assortment. At this stage, it is better to entrust this work to SEO specialists who will help develop the so-called "framework" for further SEO promotion. At the same stage, you can immediately order the semantic core of the site, according to which your online store will be displayed in the search.

At the stage of creating a website for an online clothing store, you should immediately develop filters. The main secret: the more, the better. But here you need to observe the “golden mean”, since if the user has to sort by filters for a long time, it is highly likely that he will simply leave the site. So, what filters can you add for an online clothing store: season, size, color, price, brand. This is usually enough, but you can also add fabric and model features. According to the web visor, one of the most visited pages of the site is the "Promotions" section. It can also be included in filtering in addition to the fact that this section should be placed in a separate category.

Perhaps you will be interested in our article How to design the page "Discounts and promotions"

In the future, text content with a group of keywords will be developed for each filter. This is one of the important points of SEO promotion.

Stage 4: Choosing a design when creating an online clothing store

The fourth thing to pay attention to is the design of the online store. The target audience in most cases is women 25-55 years old. If we talk about trends in web design in 2020, then today minimalism, illustrations, motion are still relevant. Women strive for perfectionism, so a gouge-out design will only be repulsive. Minimalism allows you to focus not so much on design as on products. The illustrations add some childish motive, which also attracts attention, and the elements of motion design evoke emotions, if they are on the site in moderation.

You can create an online clothing store using our ready-made designs for an online store

Stage 5: Filling the online store with goods

So, you have already roughly figured out how to open a clothing store on the Internet: you have developed a menu structure and filters, you have chosen a design, now you need to fill your online store with goods. Most dropshipping suppliers provide files to upload products to the site. The information must be constantly updated. Your task is to download the file in Excel format, prepare it for uploading to your online store and upload it to the website. You can find detailed instructions on how to prepare a file here Excel import / export.

Some suppliers also have parser programs that help create an online catalog for further uploading goods to social networks or to a website.

At the stage of filling an online clothing store with goods, you should immediately add a detailed description and a dimensional grid. Since manufacturers sew clothes according to individual patterns, then a standard dimensional grid cannot be dispensed with, measurements are needed.

What measurements should be indicated in the description: shoulder width, product length, sleeve length, bust half, waist half, hip half, stride length, seating height. Such detailed measurements will greatly reduce the likelihood of returns. If you cannot provide measurements, you can add a little information to each product that it is possible to return the goods or exchange for a different size if the clothes do not fit.

Stage 6: Content

After creating a website for an online clothing store, you need to take care of quality content. This applies not only to photos, but also to text content. Each page, category, filter must be filled with seo text, this will contribute to the promotion. You can also add the section "News", "New arrival of goods", "Blog", "Reviews" to the site. Pages "Payment", "Delivery", "Frequently asked questions", "Contacts" should be required. The more payment options are available in the online store, the better the site will rank.

We recommend the article: "What payment systems to connect to your online store"

The "Blog" section can be an excellent source for attracting traffic and, again, for promoting your online store in search results. If you don't know what to write about on your blog, here are a couple of examples.

What to write about in the "Blog" section

1. Trends of the current season

2. Selection of bows

3. How to choose ... (type of clothing) for winter / spring / summer / autumn

4. How to choose the color of clothes for your color type

5. Tips from a stylist on how to hide body flaws with the right clothes

6. How to compactly fold, store clothes correctly

7. Life hacks

There can be a lot of topics about clothes and fabrics. If you have problems thinking through topics, you can contact a specialist to draw up a content plan.
Ask for a list of topics 2-3 months in advance, and then just enter into cooperation with a copywriter.

Tip: Use search questions in the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) section and answer them briefly and clearly, then there is a chance that you will be taken to the section with selected fragments of Google.

Stage 7: how to promote an online clothing store

There are several stages of promoting online clothing stores:

1. Targeting, contextual, contextual media advertising, retargeting

2. FB Pixel

3. Google Shopping

4. SEO promotion of an online clothing store

5. Promotion using social networks

6. Increasing traffic through third-party trading platforms: marketplaces, message boards.

To promote an online clothing store on social networks, you will need to create accounts on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, vKontakte, OK.ru. All social networks will help increase traffic and even good sales, if you first invest in the design and promotion of business accounts. It is also necessary to periodically allocate a budget for targeting and advertising and bloggers.

This is what your online clothing store from SoloMono might look like.