It’s relatively easy for fashion brands to connect with consumers through social media, marketing, and brand appeal both pre-purchase and during purchase. But how can fashion brands stay connected with consumers post-sale?

The post-purchase sector is an under-tapped area for fashion companies to extend engagement and build brand loyalty.

Rather than appealing to new consumers time and time again, it’s more effective for fashion brands to build strong relationships with consumers and build brand loyalty:

• Repeat customers spend 67% more than new customers.
• It costs five times more to recruit new customers than to keep current ones.
• If a company increases their retention rate by 5%, they can boost profits by 25% to 95%.
• 80% of brand sales come from 20% of the consumer base.

To boost brand loyalty, companies need to focus on post-purchase engagement. Here’s what fashion companies need to know about extending engagement and creating consumer loyalty by using Connected Products with Digital Product IDs.

Going Beyond a Label

With traditional tags, fashion brands are limited to small, often hidden labels and tags on clothing items and accessories.

Connected labels however, empower you to go above and beyond brand and garment information with:

Instructions: Rather than limiting care instructions and materials to a tag hidden somewhere on the garment — that may become hard to read over time with washing and wearing — a consumer can easily scan a QR code or NFC tag to learn how to care for their clothing.

Brand and Product Story: Connected products empower you to go beyond the label to share your unique brand story. Or share the special story behind that specific garment or collection. Especially for fashion brands with changing garment offerings depending on the season, this empowers you to take the extra step and really connect with consumers to tell stories.

Product Certification: If your products or company is certified fair trade, made with organic cotton, or has other special registrations, you can easily share them with consumers.

Direct Connections with Consumers

Fashion brands that depend largely on social media can face challenges in fostering direct connections with consumers.

With the average social media user spending nearly 2.5 hours on social media daily, according to Statista, it’s easy to see how brands have to fight for consumers’ attention. Experts estimate that consumers see an average of 6,000 to 10,000 ads every single day. This doesn’t even include the tens of thousands of posts on a user’s social media feed on the various platforms they use.

Connected products empower brands to bypass all other traditional channels — and directly connect with consumers.

Each product becomes a direct communication channel for brands to build connections.

In this direct communication channel, fashion brands are empowered to:

• Sell directly to consumers
• Promote additional purchases and upsell with product recommendations
• Foster continued connections with loyalty programs
• And more

Share Sustainability Initiatives

As consumers increasingly push for brands to become more sustainable — and be transparent about their practices — connected products empower companies to show consumers how everyone can play a role in the circular economy.

Sustainable Materials: If your 100% organic cotton t-shirts can be composted when they’re no longer wearable, or if your company dyes fabric with turmeric and other natural materials instead of wasteful, harsh chemicals, share that with consumers.

Item-level Tracking: Unique digital IDs from Blue Bite empower brands to be transparent and show consumers item-level tracking. Show consumers the life journey of each individual garment, from farming to dyeing, to transportation, to landing in their hands.

Encourage Consumers to Recycle, Reuse, Repurpose and Resell: Show them how to recycle worn-out textiles properly, encourage them to cut up old t-shirts to use as dusting cloths at home, teach them how to replace a zipper if one breaks, and encourage them to resell garments they no longer wear to help reduce over-consumption and keep textiles out of landfills.

Show Your Brand’s Circularity Efforts: Give consumers the transparency they value by showing supply chain impacts and the steps your company takes to offset any negative environmental impacts.

Encourage Best Sustainable Practices: Share other sustainability initiatives from your brand, encourage consumers to pledge to reduce overconsumption, and encourage them to make mindful shopping and other changes that support sustainability efforts from your brands.

Disposing Packaging Instructions: Whether your packaging is cardboard or plastic, or garments come in a reusable organic, fair-trade cotton bag, show consumers how they can properly dispose of it — or reuse it.

Connect Consumers in Secondhand Markets

Buyers and sellers alike often turn to secondhand markets to get discounted garments, help the planet and make some extra cash.

Connected products empower brands to connect buyers and sellers in secondhand markets. Some brands, like Levi’s, have independent resale markets where buyers can get discounted, preloved denim, and sellers can get a credit to use toward a new product. Other brands prefer to connect consumers through third-party partners.

Whether you have a highly sought-after, limited-edition collection or just want to help consumers shop and clean out their closets more sustainably, connect consumers with secondhand markets where they can sell and make purchases.

This also gives brands a new value opportunity: connect with secondary owners of your products.

Provide Peace of Mind With Product Authentication

Luxury brands can also leverage product authentication — empowering buyers and sellers with the peace of mind that the product they purchased is the real deal.

Unique digital IDs empower consumers with item-level tracking to see where their garment was made and the other hands that have touched it throughout its life. When a consumer buys a garment from your brand in a secondhand market, they can see how many owners the product has had and be proud to show off that what they’re wearing is the real deal.

Gain Powerful First- and Zero-Party Data

Third-party data can tell brands about general target market demographics and interests. However, third-party data typically comes from social media and other websites, so there’s no way to tell how or even if it applies to your brand.

Instead, fashion brands can leverage connected products to gather powerful first- and zero-party data from consumers themselves.

Brands gather first-party data by learning directly how consumers interact with their Experience, site, and app.

Zero-party data tells brands directly what consumers want and what they’re shopping for.

This can include:

• Preference centers
• Customer shopping intentions
• Surveys and polls
• How consumers interact with digital experiences
• And more

Brands that gather this data directly from consumers using connected products have the most accurate, effective data to tailor their approach to connect with customers and build stronger relationships.

Encourage Purchases With Recommendations and Reminders

With connected products, each individual item becomes a point of sale. For fashion brands, this means that connectivity doesn’t stop after a consumer goes home with the garment.

• Encourage Product Upsells: Whether it’s an accessory add-on or a different color or material of a garment they already have in their cart, upsell product purchases. Make suggestions to complete their look.
• Recommend Products: Show consumers product recommendations based on the item they scan and past purchases.
• Encourage More Orders: Send consumers reminders to order new products and encourage additional purchases when a new garment or collection drops. Update consumers when your brand offers deals.

More Effective Loyalty Programs

Gone are the days of lackluster, hard-to-access, difficult-to-follow loyalty programs. With connected products, integrated, engaging loyalty programs are here.

• Coupons and Direct Offers: Brands are empowered to encourage repeat and larger purchases with coupons and other offers offered through a scan.
• Gamification Experiences: Incentivize consumers to purchase limited edition garments or encourage them to make multiple purchases with the possibility of prizes and larger rewards.
• Exclusive Content: Encourage sales with exclusive content unlocked only after making a purchase — like lookbooks, personal styling software, and product authentication.
• Points for Purchases: Offer milestones with redeemable rewards and coupons after earning points on each purchase.
• And More: Whether it’s a behind-the-scenes on your brand, personalized recommendations based on a consumer’s past purchases, or another way you appeal to them, connected products empower brands with the most effective and engaging loyalty programs.

And best of all, with connected products, you don’t have to limit yourself and consumers to one form of loyalty program. Integrate different methods to appeal to consumers and incentivize repeat purchases.

Quality Guarantee and Customer Contact

An essential component of building brand loyalty is ensuring customer happiness. Traditional brand labels leave little room for quality guarantees and ways consumers can get in touch with your brand if they have concerns.

• What happens if a consumer finds a stain or tear on their garment?
• What if they have a quality issue where the garment does not hold up as expected?
• What if their garment develops a hole from wear and tear, and they want to take advantage of your company’s repair service?

Connected products mean with a simple scan, consumers have an easy way to reach out to your company. Direct them to specific forms, emails, or other forms of contact to get in touch with your brand. With Digital Product IDs, consumers have an easy way to do this for individual garments — no hunting for the receipt or proof of purchase required. Then, you can take steps to ensure their happiness.