# Free advertising for your brand



## StartYourBrand (Jul 8, 2013)

*How To Advertise Your Brand For FREE!*

Promoting your brand may be a difficult task. There are many different options you have as to how you can promote your clothing. Some options involve money, and some do not. Although paying for advertising may be beneficial to you and your business, you *do not* need to pay for advertising in order to be successful. Trust me, you have many other options. Below I will provide a very small, basic list of how you can promote your clothing for FREE and still become successful. But before you start promoting your brand, you must first have pictures and/ or products that are available for your targeted customers to see. If you are promoting something that is not there, you may have a hard time building an audience. You should not promote your brand until you have either released SEVERAL products, or are planning to release SEVERAL products. A lineup release featuring only 1-3 T-Shirt(s) is not a lineup at all. You need to learn how to use the tools around you as _leverage_ for you and your business. These tools are:

• *You:* Use yourself as a personal billboard for your clothing. By that I mean to showcase your apparel everywhere you go. If you own a clothing line, wear your own clothing! Attend events that would appeal to your target market and pass out free promotional products such as business cards and stickers. Be prepared to explain your brand in full detail to those you're handing cards and stickers out to. Many people will ask you what your brand is about, and if you can't answer that question right away then you are not likely to receive them as a customer.

• *Friends/ Family:* Use friends and family the same way you would use yourself. Most clothing companies starting out usually give away several free products to their friends and/ or family in order for them to help promote the brand. This doesn't mean you will have to, but chances are if someone receives and FREE T-Shirt, they are likely to help promote it.

• *Social Networking Websites (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, etc.):* Build a strong audience on your social media websites/ apps in order to attract customers. Do not follow/ friend a whole bunch of people because you are liable to lose your account. Instead, follow/ friend a small amount of people you would believe to be considered a part of your target market, and view the response. If the majority of them follow/ friend back and/ or ask about your apparel, they are clearly interested in your brand. Start off with a small group of people, and keep repeating the process. Make sure you have something you can present to them such as pictures/ products/ website or else they will not be interested at all. Have all of your friends/ family share each of your posts in order to start a chain. This could lead to a great amount of traffic to your profile and/ or website. If you post something and a friend shares it, chances are there is somebody in his or her friend list that is likely to share the same post. If this happens, it will start a chain that could generate even more traffic back to your site and/ or profile. Also, whatever sites/ apps you decide to use to help promote your brand, you must remain active on those sites. If you are un-active and only upload 1 post per month, you are likely to lose your audience.

• *Website:* A website is a key tool to use when promoting your brand. EVERY clothing company should have a website in order to sell products out of state. You want to be sure you have enough products to start a website BEFORE you do so. Like I stated before, a lineup release featuring only 1-3 T-Shirt(s) is not a lineup. If you have a website with only 1-3 products, it will look very unprofessional. You can also attempt to swap links with sites that generate a lot of traffic. You can do this by contacting a company and offering their website link on your site in exchange for you link on theirs. There is also blogging websites, and even this website (T-Shirt Forums) can be a great tool to get your name out there. Just be sure to follow the rules of another party's website before attempting to advertise your brand all over it. There may even be websites that offer free advertising such as:

*ClothingCompanyStartup.com - Brand Exposure*

• *Newspapers/ Magazines:* Although most newspapers/ magazines charge for advertising, there are some that do not. Check around, you may get lucky!

• *Celebrities:* This option is by far the most difficult, unless you have direct connections. Having a celebrity promote your brand can return huge amounts of traffic to your site, along with thousands of dollars in profits. Obviously there are many more people that keep up to date with certain celebs via social media and etc. But if there was a way to contact a celebrity and offer them free apparel for a simple picture wearing it, you never know what they may say. However, this is NOT as easy as it seems. Contacting a major celebrity is highly unlikely, and chances are they won't respond to you unless you make them a desirable offer. Personally, I would start with local celebrities, artists because they are easier to reach.

Keep in mind, this is a very small list of the many options you have for free advertising. If you come up with more options, feel free to leave a comment. There are still many more options out there, but it is up to you to do your research. Good luck!


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## strike3sports (Jun 24, 2013)

Nice Informative Article. I had another great idea to put along with your article. 

*Press Release:* Put out a Press Release for an upcoming event or promotion you may be running for your brand. Press Releases are a great tool to get some Free Advertising. Make sure to write a professional Press Release do some research or have a professional write one for you. Also make sure that your Press Release has relevant info that a newspaper or other media outlet may want to use. Make it Newsworthy!


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## Sebbean (Jul 6, 2013)

strike3sports said:


> Nice Informative Article. I had another great idea to put along with your article.
> 
> *Press Release:* Put out a Press Release for an upcoming event or promotion you may be running for your brand. Press Releases are a great tool to get some Free Advertising. Make sure to write a professional Press Release do some research or have a professional write one for you. Also make sure that your Press Release has relevant info that a newspaper or other media outlet may want to use. Make it Newsworthy!


Thank you both for your ideas on free advertising. It's really good information. 

strike3sports, do you have a resource you think is best for putting together a professional press release and getting it to the right people? Or just Google will be fine?


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## strike3sports (Jun 24, 2013)

Sebbean said:


> Thank you both for your ideas on free advertising. It's really good information.
> 
> strike3sports, do you have a resource you think is best for putting together a professional press release and getting it to the right people? Or just Google will be fine?


Glad to help.  Here is a link to Google Docs which has templates for Press Releases.


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## Gambit (Apr 8, 2011)

I couldn't get the google doc link to open ? Did it work for anyone else


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