Self-reflecting essay

Dressing properly is a task that is not taken for granted. The way you get dressed speaks volumes about you. Most of the people spend a lot of time staring into the wardrobe, spend a lot of nerves and finally just pick out the first thing that springs to hand. If you are lucky then it will end up looking great, but it is the exception rather than the rule. What, how, and when you will wear can affect the way you feel during the day.

The idea to create a smart wardrobe is not spontaneous. The creation of an everyday outfit is a special ritual that makes me feel confident when I go outside. From my observations, I understand that a lot of people have huge problems with outfit preparations even if they have tones of clothes in their wardrobe. As President Barack Obama said: 

“You’ll see I wear only grey or blue suits. I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make. You need to focus your decision-making energy. You need to routinize yourself. You can’t be going through the day distracted by trivia”. 

And it is the problem the average person meets every day. 

Nowadays there is no universal formula that can help you to create the ideal look just in a few minutes. Everything will depend on your mood, the weather outside and, of course, the place you will go. People who want to be stylish need to read a hundred tips, articles, or YouTube videos that will explain to you how to look stylish or combine the things between themselves. Our goal is to make life easier than ever. Our start-up will help people and our planet. 

The eternal problem “I have nothing to wear!” will be solved even without purchasing a new piece of clothes. You will remain about your “old” ones from the new perspective. Everyone has at least some pieces of the clothes that are forgotten to wear and then fashion-trends has changed, and you just throw them away. 

Our project will also support go green movements to protect our planet from unused clothes and in this way save money, resources, and our nature. 

According to statistics (Harmony, 2020): “The average US citizen throws away 70 pounds of clothing and other textiles annually. The U.S. EPA estimates that textile waste occupies nearly 5% of all landfill space”.  

You would be surprised by how our approach can improve your look. The virtual assistant creates a completely new outfit using the same pieces that you had earlier. You will save money and forget about fashion stylist and discover a new way that will help you to stay and look awesome. 

The smart wardrobe is the start-up that will improve our daily lifestyle, helps to get rid of stresses during morning preparations, and save our time. It is not an app; it is a complex system that will become a necessary part of every future flat/house and fit on different scales. It is possible to place the construction together with a build-in wardrobe or it will become a separate smart dressing room. The “brain” of the wardrobe will be based on artificial intelligence and all the system can be voice commanded. In addition to all these functions, you can add all your family members, and the special mechanism can recognize them and create the outfits according to their preferences and clothes.

All in all, a smart wardrobe is a start-up about the present problem with an innovative future solution. To be stylish and fashionable without waste is one of the perspectives that can be fulfilled properly. 

       Use it every day, make your life easier and enjoy the way you are getting ready.

Marketing strategy

The smart-wardrobe is a start-up about innovations and future trends. That is why, we choose collaborations, influencers, social media, and viral marketing as the main marketing strategies.

Step.1 (Influencer marketing)

The secret weapon of influencer marketing is that it doesn't look like an advertisement. People tend to believe their favorite bloggers more than TV ads or YouTube ads. According to statistics, 92% of shoppers believe recommendations to other people, even if they don't know them personally.  We choose tech and fashion influencers to reach our target audience, spread the information, and, of course, successfully sell our product. 

For this part of our strategy, we create the list of the influencers/communities that can fit our product:

Marques Brownlee

Jon Rettinger

SuperSaf

Lewis Hilsenteger

MIT Technology Review

Karina Nigay 

Chiara Ferragni

Kylie Jenner

Camila Coelho

Leonie Hanne

Yana Leventseva 

Step 2. (Social media marketing)

Another way to promote our product is social media marketing. First of all, it is free to join, we can create a profile on different media platforms and create entertaining and educational content that will be closely connected with our product. It helps to catch the eye on our project and then reach the audience. 

One of the biggest advantages of social media is that all the information that is published will be immediately visible to the public. Moreover, social media helps businesses to interact with the customers, so the existing and potential clients will use our social media to ask questions, give feedback and suggestions about the product, build a strong relationship with the company and become loyal to it. 

Step 3. (Viral marketing)

Viral marketing is also an effective way to promote the start-up.  Its main feature is that the message is spread by people, not a company. The company creates - a video, article, book, or uses another viral marketing tool. Then it spreads the virus, and if the content gets to the point, people start to share it. One person sends a message to two, two to four, four to eight, and so on. You can tell whether the message went viral by the first week. 

Viral ads are not perceived as ads, so they have a better chance of breaking through the information noise. People receive viral messages from friends and acquaintances. And friends are trusted more than companies. Successful viral advertising can be much cheaper than traditional advertising, since the company invests only in the production of materials, and it is distributed free of charge.

In our case collaborations will also play a vital role, as it helps to build a strong business and boost awareness. The smart-wardrobe can be offered as a part of smart-houses, so the collaboration partners can be smart-houses designers or studios and the places where you can buy something for smart-houses. As a result, such collaborations help the company to grow and save money as marketing and development expenses are divided between companies or at least double the budget for additional expenses. All in all, in partnership companies, build new values and exchange with the customers.

RECOURCES:

1. What is influencer marketing: How to develop your strategy. (2020, December 02). Retrieved January 31, 2021, from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/influencer-marketing/

2. Harmony. (2020, January 13). The Facts about Textile Waste (Infographic). Retrieved January 31, 2021, from https://harmony1.com/textile-waste-infographic/

3. Diaries, G. (2018, April 20). "You'll see I wear only grey or blue suits. I'm trying to pare down decisions. I don't want to make decisions about what I'm eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make." - Barack Obama #AvoidDecisionFatigue #HighlySuccessfulPeople pic.twitter.com/shKpnrJDbh. Retrieved January 31, 2021, from https://twitter.com/GoodHairDiaries/status/987215908140666881

4. Social Media Marketing Made Simple: A Step-by-Step Guide. (2020, October 28). Retrieved January 31, 2021, from https://neilpatel.com/what-is-social-media-marketing/

5. What is viral marketing (and does it actually work in 2020)? (2020, August 21). Retrieved January 31, 2021, from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/viral-marketing/