2008
Myspace Marketing Is Bad For Business: Find Out Why
Posted by: Fashion06 in Promotion, Starting your own line |
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What role do social networks like Facebook, Myspace, Bebo, and Blackplanet play as far as in online marketing for companies in the fashion industry or any business? If I forgot any social networks sorry your important also!
I remember writing an article about marketing on Myspace and how to get thousands of visitors back to your site or landing page it had a more then moderate response from online blogs and networks compared to most articles on Dobizo that just receive comments, but not many linkbacks due to the nature of the blog. You can see that previous article by clicking here.
I was reading through the Dobizo Answers page looking for some interesting ideas for topics or questions to answer when I ran across:
Jezzy Asks:
“How can I find out if someone has the same name as my clothing label?
If someone already has the same name I intended to use for my clothing label/company but not legally registered as a business will it affect me if I register my label, get a tax ID and license under the label name someone else has?
Someone in myspace mentioned being a designer, creator and owner of a company and her labels name is the same name I wanted to use for my designer clothing, what should I do to see if this person on Myspace is a serious designer registered or just someone trying to start a clothing label with no business license or patent for their business name and clothing label?”
By the way whoever it may be that has been answering questions on the Dobizo Answers page has been doing a great job and keep up the great work…makes my life a whole lot easier.
How to answered to the question above:
” The odds are if you find them on myspace it isn’t anythIng serious. think about it if you are a designer what does it say about your company if you only means of marketing your clothes is Myspace. Are any established designers on myspace, not that i have seen. If you are a hot chick then myspace is great for you to get noticed. My company name was being used by a person on myspace to sell cheap tees and was obviously going no where. I used the name and blew it up. The name was in another country so things were a bit differents. The name really isnt a big deal more how you put together the design/name/finish=your theme.”
I know for one I have used Myspace for marketing my clothing line when first starting out, but I would definitely agree you will not be taken serious if your only medium of advertising/promotion is on Myspace. I see so many new clothing companies that look at Myspace or other social networks as an alternative to having a real independent website.
Many industry vets frown upon newbies who can’t afford, but to produce t-shirts and having only a Myspace page as their only means of an online presence adds failure in their eyes or they just wouldn’t work with you to be honest. I see advertisements and commercials now that actually show a Myspace page link for the fashion company with no apparent website. Even as far as to offering PayPal payments for garments on their Myspace page instead of building a small shop online. I think spending money on advertisements, promotions and barely making the cost for production rarely leaves a small company any money for building a functional website, which can cost in the thousands, but their are cheaper alternatives.
Now as far as being a completely bad choice for promoting I would have to disagree, but you as a Ceo/founder should leave that to an intern (Sorry interns) or something to do in your spare time. Basically don’t put too much energy into promoting your Myspace page, because there are many better alternatives that will yield far better results or worth your time/investment. I would use the Myspace page as a way for customers to connect with your company on a more personal level and get to know the faces behind the movement.
It’s kind of like the quote I used from the movie How to Succeed In Urban fashion “If you sell your fashion line out of the back of your trunk then most will look at it like a clothing line that is sold out the back of your trunk” You want people to take your business serious then present it in that manner. Sometimes appearance is everything. Same thing with a Myspace clothing line if your company doesn’t exist outside of a Myspace page with a few graphics or t-shirts then most retailers won’t take a second look at what you have to offer..no matter how good your Photoshop graphic skills are. They want the process to be as painless as possible when working with clothing lines and a newbie on Myspace spells “lack of knowledge” with that comes confusion and trouble.
How has Myspace affected your business positively or negatively? What type of marketing activities do you practice on Myspace and other social networks? Do you agree or disagree?
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January 30th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
For us it has been positive especially when we were first gettin going it gave us or first avenue to places outside of the neighborhood but as time goes on and u want more respect from professionals then def get off the myspace
January 30th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
You can check with your state’s Secretary of State for the names of registered companies. It is not hard to do, at least in my state. A Company name might be different from a particular line that they are marketing but it is a start.
January 31st, 2008 at 4:41 am
In my opinion, social networking sites really only reflect your real world scenario, that is, if you have a large social network in reality you can expect to obtain a large online network mostly populated with people from your real world scenario.
Just this month I started a facebook group for our company (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10090532929) but we do not solely rely on this group for the purposes of networking and advertising, in fact, I would never advertise outside facebook that we have such a group. Our official online presence can be found at http://www.kromosome.com.au
So, you’re most likely asking yourself, why have the group in the first place, right? Well, each individual case is different, but in my case, our business is in one country and I am based in another country so I solely use this group to promote to immediate family and friends what we are doing in their markets. I plan on keeping the content as professional as possible so that in the event an “outsider” joins then we wont be detracting from the brands value by virtue of poor content.
So, should “Uncle Bob” just happen to be at a barbeque talking with someone connected to the fashion industry, by virtue of his knowledge obtained from the online social network, he can translate that interaction directly into a valuable networking transaction as he will most likely know exactly what your company is doing in the given market.
It’s too early for me to say what affect, if any, this form of advertising has had on my business, but in my opinion, if we consider that word of mouth advertising is the strongest form of advertising then from that we could deduce that everybody is a potential customer. Personally, I would prefer to correctly inform my customers even though this form of advertising may be deemed “bad” for business.
January 31st, 2008 at 8:03 am
Myspace is good to have as a part of your clothing label but myspace shouldn’t ever be the only way you represent you label in the web… For those people who search for you at myspace it’s cool to find you, to “add you as a friend”, all this interactive stuff to give the customers a cool and personal feeling, cause often that’s the only way the can have a “personal” contact with you!! But never represent you whole web ci over myspace!! that’s not professional!!
January 31st, 2008 at 4:51 pm
I agree that myspace or any other social network is good for them to find your business and just having a page should not be bad for business especially if your clothing line caters to young adults and teens…but yes to also have a real web page that everyone can go to also…
February 4th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
reason being i use myspace and facebook and blackplanet,and paypal on myspace but i also have clothing and few stores in the city and i post a few blogs and bulentins for customers to see where to get my gear like retailer location ect, like this http://www.myspace.com/nycspot witch customers are really buying from the page and rappers uses myspace to sell albums especially when u have over 100k friends….
but i still rather to have a website witch we working on now,
like some rappers and clothing comapanies uses myspace when they have over 100k friends would they sell atleast 1 cd?
February 4th, 2008 at 5:59 pm
hey midstate agian
here also a way to get many friends,some made this program to help on myspace friends i got like 400 friends in 1 day took me like 15 mins
http://www.ohyayadds.com
for some reason it works
February 4th, 2008 at 6:15 pm
ok i fount proof that myspace is selling tee’s clothing ect
i talk with the peoples at nyspot and they show proof myspace is really selling thru the comment customers left them ect
go look!!!
http://www.myspace.com/thespotny
February 27th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
Myspace is a good additional presence on the web, however it shouldn’t be the only presence. I’ve actually made good contacts thru myspace. Hopefully, it will lead to more awareness for my brand http://www.ekgenes.com
April 20th, 2008 at 8:52 am
I use MySpace as something of a fansite. It’s a means for disseminating information to a pretty sizeable group of folk at one time (about my REAL website). All of the efforts I put forth online are all with an eye towards driving traffic to my REAL website. Some of my offline promo materials have the myspace address in addition to my actual website, however I won’t include it in magazine ads or mention during any interviews.