Are you passionate about fashion and/or beauty? Do you love to create beautiful but distinctive looks and express yourself through your appearance? Do you dream of sharing your looks and insights with the world and gaining the adulation of a loyal audience from all over the world? If so, there’s a good chance that you’ve already thought about becoming an influencer. But while many have their sights set on this elusive career path, many also find themselves throwing in the towel in frustration. Make no mistake, the world of a fashion influencer is not one that is entered into lightly. Building your profile involves investing hours and hours of your time in creating content with no guarantee that this investment will see a return. But fortune favors those who have the courage of their convictions and are prepared to put in the time and effort to gain the attention of big brands and maximize your exposure.
In order to do this, you need to take steps to build your own personal brand. In this extremely competitive field, you’ll find success if you’re able to find your niche and post a lot of content on a very regular basis to cater to them. It’s important to keep your expectations realistic, engage with every comment your content receives (yup, even if it looks like it comes from a bot) and use the tools available to you to grow your personal brand…
A website… no, seriously!
No, you haven’t fallen in a time warp and woken up in 2001. In order to be a successful influencer, even though your support may come from platforms like YouTube and Instagram, it’s still a good idea to have a website. Success as an influencer comes when you’re able to create a version of yourself that’s attractive yet accessible to people with the same interests. While They will follow you on social media and subscribe to your YouTube channel, they will still relish an opportunity to peek behind the curtain. Long form content like blog posts can help your fans get to know you a little better but more importantly, having your own website enables you to own your own content. You don’t own your own Instagram account and it can be deleted in but a moment. It can inadvertently fall afoul of Instagram’s terms of use or even be hacked by a malignant party. Keeping all of your content stored on a website offers you a little more exposure and that extra bit of protection.
A Pitching guide
The aim of starting a blog today is yes passion, but all the girls would love to make money from their Instagram, blog or Youtube channel. With lots of bloggers out there is always more and more complicated that brand will find you. That’s why now bloggers who collaborate with brands are those who pitch them! Reach out to the brands you love, send them an effective email and get the collaborations. We wrote a Pitching guide, perfect for this where you’ll also find email examples that you can copy and paste and send to brands today. You can shop out guide here
Fashion and Beauty Monitor
Sometimes all it takes for your account to blow up is the right pair of eyes falling on your content. If another, more established influencer or an industry professional shows an interest in your work, your exposure could be launched to atmospheric heights. Thus, it’s important to know who to tag in your posts, and whose products will help you to gain traction with your target audience. The Fashion And Beauty Monitor is a great resource for finding out who’s hot in the industry at any given time.
A Media Kit
You really want to grow your blog and turn it into a full-time business? You need a Media Kit. A media kit is a document to send out to brands that shows all your Instagram/blog stats, previous collaborations, content, collaboration options and everything a brand needs to know to work with you. A media kit is like your Instagram or blog’s CV.
Lookbooks
Lookbooks began life in print for fashion brands that wanted to showcase their looks, but in the digital era they’ve become a much more versatile and immersive tool. Check out this article on how to create a lookbook. Lookbooks are uniquely useful for influencers as it enables you to make a strong emotional connection with your audience. You can use it to showcase images, video or audio and the experience of flicking through a lookbook is more personal and immersive than scrolling through an Instagram feed. It combines gorgeous images with a sense of storytelling which will keep your fans coming back for more.
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