I had a super interesting chat with Emily Ferguson the eCommerce Director at Marie Claire. You might be familiar with her name as one of the two internships for Break into the fashion industry students was with her!
Her entry into the fashion industry is not the typical one of those who want to get into the glamourous industry. She studied international business, finance and economics and started her career in banking where she stayed for six years but with an exit strategy since the beginning. She went into banking in fact to save up some money to launch her own business and also pay for her student loan.
When she had enough money saved, she took the leap and started her own ecommerce fashon affiliate business. “I’m glad that I took that risk, left hat very secure job to launch my business” she says. She did a lot of networking and went to events to build many relationships.
She ran her business for three years until the website design company she was working with went bust and one of the freelancers took the copyright. He owed the source code of her website. The quote to relaunch her business was 3x times higher, so that was the moment when she knew in her heart that it was not the right time to run her own business again and made the brave decision to step back and went to work for a fashion startup.
Her own fashion business was her only experience in fashion, all her previous experience and what she studied were totally unrelated to fashion but she leveraged her own fashion company perfectly to land a job in other fashion companies. You could try this option too: entering fashion by leveraging your fashion business and then switch to the fashion corporate world.
“No one can take the experience of running your own business away from you. You learn more in working at your own business in 2 years than what you learn in 10 years at a corporate.”
She then went to work at the Telegraph and eventually landed at Marie Claire “They wanted someone to make the affiliate shopping site…I was super lucky because all the experiences I’ve gone through at my company have really paid off.
“Skills are always transferable even across industries…
you’ve got to be more relaxed with your career. Take advantage of the opportunities that come in front of you, they might not be exactly want you want right now, but it doesn’t mean the skills are not transferable.”
When we talked about how to get into fashion and what she looks for when hiring new people at Marie Claire she said:
“Don’t always chase the money….follow your passion, not your money. If you’re passionate about something you’re going to be 10x times more successful….
We want to hire people who really want to work here. Everyone who works at Marie Claire is super engaged and excited to be there… I think that it’s about a can-do attitude and resilience. People who are not passionate about Marie Claire don’t get the job or their job doesn’t last….
get out there and talk to people. The last person I hired was from LinkedIn, it was a girl who contacted me, she worked in a bank and wanted to work in fashion and it happened that I had a role that came up and she was perfect for it.”
Working at a fashion magazine is not just about writing or styling, there is so much behind a fashion publication as well as many different roles. As the eCommerce director, Emily’s job is about overseeing the growth and drive revenue of the business. Her latest project The Marie Claire Beauty Edit in association with Net-a-Porter is a shopping destination where you can find in one place all the products and brands, you can search from all the stores and shop what the editorial team is shopping.Â
The publishing industry has been challenged a lot over the past years with the rise of online platforms and social media, forcing many companies to shut down titles and struggling to find new ways to do business. But thanks to this revenue stream, the Marie Claire Edit, has grown when anyone else struggled during the pandemic.
About the future of the business of fashion publications:
“Fashion publications need to find ways to create their own ecosystem but also use SEO, client acquisition and retention, how do you find new revenue streams,…these are important questions”
Listen to the latest episode of The Glam Observer Podcast on Apple Podcast or Spotify for the full story and tips:
