Working in lifestyle or fashion PR can be a dream job — but it can also be far more challenging than meets the eye. Keeping your clients happy (and loyal) takes dedication, creativity, and the willingness to always keep a finger on the pulse.
In our latest eBook, 10 Ways to Streamline your PR services, we outline 10 things you should do in order save time and make the most of your services to get your agency ahead in the digital era. But what about the things you shouldn’t do? Whether you’re a freelancer, have a full time job at a fashion brand, or work for fashion, luxury and cosmetics PR agencies, avoiding these five mistakes can make all the difference.
5 mistakes lifestyle & fashion PR professionals should avoid:
- Working with the wrong influencers.
There’s no denying that influencers have become the golden ticket to reaching consumers. But that doesn’t mean you should go throwing pitches around every corner of Instagram hoping to get on someone’s radar. What really counts is identifying the right influencers — not only based on the client, but on specific campaign goals they have at the time.For example, if your client wants to boost sales of a particular product, reaching out to niche micro-influencers might work best. On the other hand, you might try and land a big-name macro-influencer if the goal is widespread brand awareness. Choosing influencers who don’t fit the brand message or goal is not only a poor investment, it can even be damaging to the brand. - Lack of digital assets.
Having easily-accessible digital assets makes life easier — for you, for editors, for bloggers,… for everybody. Maximizing your digital assets means implementing a system that lets media easily find and download images and information from a centralized place. For trend reports in editorials or other types of articles for which editors or stylists don't necessarily need samples, product photos are ideal and making them easily accessible increases chances of getting featured.However, it's not just about having digital assets, it's also about how you distribute them, and sending large files of photos is not optimal. Uploading these pictures to a cloud-based platform will make it easier for others to browse your images without overwhelming their inbox, keep you organized, and, in some cases, can even offer you insights. To go a little deeper into how to make the most of product images, take a look at our digital showroom guide. - Bad email communication.
Gone are the days when mass emailing your press list a chunky PDF was an acceptable fashion public relations strategy (if ever they existed). Email is still an important medium for reaching press contacts, but with everyone’s inboxes overflowing daily, you need to use it wisely.For one thing, a catchy subject line matters. Without one, your email might not even get opened. A good way to learn what works and what doesn’t is to think up a couple of options and then A/B test to see which one gets the most opens and responses.Sending large attachments with pitches is another PR faux pas. Remember what we said about digital assets? Rather than clog up people’s inboxes, link out to your digital showroom so they can access the files they want.
- Not personalizing your pitches.
PR reps who have been working at lifestyle or fashion brands know a generic pitch when they see one. While they can sometimes yield results, they’ll never be as successful as carefully crafted and directed pitches that are personalized based on the potential client's needs.For one thing, you want to understand where they stand and what their needs are before putting together your pitch. This is why a pre-pitch analysis is absolutely essential. Where are they most mentioned? Are the investing in the right type of collaborations? What's their social media strategy like?Once you have all of this information, then you're ready to personalize accordingly. And, make sure to present your ideas and a highly visual format to fully transmit your campaign ideas or vision of the brand.
- Failing to show your worth.
Day to day you might be working hard behind the scenes, doing everything you can to keep up with the fast paced fashion, luxury and cosmetics industry and net your clients stellar coverage. But here’s the thing: your clients don’t see all of that. So for them, what really counts are the results.Here’s where regular and comprehensive reporting is paramount. Weekly coverage briefs should give your clients an overview of things like print and online media mentions, social media mentions, reach, and engagement. More extensive campaign reports might include things like competitor analysis, geographic segments, and performance across different channels.If you’re not sure how to make your reports the very best they can be, download our free PR services guide. It not only includes more in-depth information on how to supercharge your PR services, it also includes a free template you can use to generate clear and concise reports for your clients.
Image credit: Juliette Leufke/Unsplash
By Launchmetrics Content Team
The Launchmetrics content team is always on the lookout for new trends in the fashion and technology sector. We are geeks with style and lovers of good stories!
