Make This The Best November Sales Month Ever

Welcome November! For fabric retailers, and most retailers for that matter, November and early December should be the time to make or break their sales goals for the year and become profitable if they are not already profitable. In anticipation of what should be the most prosperous time of the year, I am at it again encouraging shop owners to use short 1-3 minute Facebook Live videos to promote their businesses.

I was going to make this a contest, but I don’t want to always have to offer prizes to entice retailers to do something that will help their own business thrive. I will however share select videos on my page if said retailer tags me by writing @jaftexpresident in the post description. This will certainly help to garner more exposure for the shop. I am better on Facebook than other platforms, so you should share with me there, but you should also consider using other social platforms to share your messages on your own. If you take the time to do the work, make sure to maximize its potential by sharing it as much as possible and getting the most mileage out of it.

Below are a bunch of video idea suggestions, but there are no rules so you should feel free to freestyle and work up your own ideas with your team or tweak my ideas. There are no bad ideas. You just need to make the videos and then you will be well on your way to realizing how video can help improve your sales and help you gain new exposure to new customers.

Idea #1

Introduce your shop and team to people that may not know anything about your business. Say friendly things about yourself so that when they visit you they already know something about you. Tell your new customers how you like green M&M’s or have a pet named Bosco or whatever. Tell them how you came up with the shop’s name. Tell them how the business started. Show people the outside of the shop and how to get there if it’s off the beaten path. Tell them what you sell and whatever you might have that people especially come to you for. Give them a reason to come to see you. Try and keep the message tight and focused. Plan your video around 3-5 points to keep you on track and don’t stray.

Idea #2

Sell an item. Get your face out there, show an item and sell it. Talk about the features, show the product, use the product, tell what another person who used this said about it, put your price on it and tell how many you have available. Try to make sure you have sufficient stock of said item because you never know when your video is going to hit home and gain lots of traction. Also, make sure you can get more in quickly if you sell out. Create urgency to get this sale made. Make it enticing. Then, add your phone number, address and how the consumer can close the deal with you. Make sure to keep it very simple. When things get complicated, people run for the hills and we don’t want that.

I know these types of videos work from my own experience. When I visited the Old Country Store and showed this quilting themed clock that they had, they ended up selling like 30-40 in a very short period of time. That video hit the spot. So you just never know when your video will take off. However, you do know that it won’t take off if you aren’t making a video.

Idea #3

Talk about Small Business Saturday on November 26 and how local businesses like your own put money back into the community. Talk about what your shop does personally to give back to the community whether in the form of charity or otherwise. Differentiate yourself from the big box retailers.

If you were one of the shops that took part in my Facebook live video challenge in August, you will have a Free Sewing Machine to give to someone in your community. If you didn’t partake in the challenge, you can give a sewing machine or something else away on your own and put a smile on someone’s face. You can use a poster like this one to promote what you are doing.

Idea #4

Talk about your promos. Don’t have a promotion currently? Make one up! Everyone likes a sale or a special offer. The trick is to get people into your shop for one reason and have them leave with stuff for lots of other reasons. Below are some ideas, but you don’t need me to help you with this. I will suggest that it’s a great time to try to move out your slower moving fabrics because those are like heavy weights on your neck and you want to start the new year with as few neck weights as possible.

• Buy 5 yards and the 6th one is half-off.
• End of the bolt savings on bolts with less than 3 yards, $2 off the per/yard price.
• Full collection pricing. Buy all the pieces in a collection (minimum 1/4 yard cut) and get 10% off all pieces in the collection. (minimum 8 pcs)
• Buy a sewing machine and get 4 classes free.
• Buy one class, get 25% off another class purchase when purchased at the same time.
• Buy 3 yards and get 10% off coordinating thread.
• Buy Jaftex fabrics! Have your picture taken with #ScottSentMe2019 and post on Instagram or Facebook as an entry to win a prize!
• Be creative and have fun.

Idea #5

Show your best stuff! Do a mini-tour and show off the fabrics that people come in and ask for by name. Show the Tula Pinks, the Kaffe Fassett Collections, the Kim Diehl fabrics, the Studioe Fabrics, the big names that you know are recognized and need to be shown off so people know you have them. Show off what you have, talk about how people want them and how you have a plentiful supply with new additions arriving frequently. Then make an offer on your best stuff. Come in and ask for the “BEST STUFF” promo by name as seen on Facebook LIVE and get a discount. That’s the way it’s done ladies and gentlemen.

Challenge Accepted?

Don’t have time for this challenge? Don’t know how to do all this? Don’t think this will work for you? Still afraid of diving into social media? Don’t worry, we have your back.

If you are a shop-owner, first you need join my private Jaftex Retailer Group. You can find this through my @JaftexPresident Facebook page under groups. You must thoroughly answer three questions to get in so I know you’re legit and not some kind of infiltrator. Our team posts lots of video tutorials on the Retailer Group page to help you get in to the video game. Second, if you are really unable to help yourself do this challenge or videos in general, find yourself a bright teenager or relative who can help you. Video is a must nowadays for small businesses trying to grow and build their reputation and it’s never too late to start.

I am confident that this will work for you. I just want you to see for yourself what LIVE video can do. I know that it has had a huge impact on my business and I have not noticed one reason why I should stop. Please take my word on this until the next big idea comes along.

Have a great week. Good luck! Can’t wait to see what you come up with.

Video Pusher Scott

P.S. If you order my blog book and anything else on Amazon from using the link below, I will get a commission from Amazon and that money too will go towards my sewing machine giveaway. Stated the proper way, “As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. ”