Brief Overview [Brand Summary & Social Media Accounts]

            This report aims to provide a social media marketing plan for Samara Clothing Store. The report’s main aim is to create an efficient and realistic social media marketing plan for Samara Clothing Store, a company operating in the Saudi Arabia fashion e-commerce sector. According to Iftahy et al. (2019), annual sales in the Middle Eastern GCC fashion market account for around $50 billion, a manifestation of the region’s significant financial clout. The Gulf Cooperation Council countries such as Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, and Qatar represent spending that is highest on a per capita basis internationally. The fashion market in Saudi Arabia is facing major shifts, including a growing young population, a changing culture, and religious policies, especially regarding women, and increased spending power among the consumers (Plecher, 2020; McKinsey & Company, 2019). In Saudi Arabia, women are increasingly engaging in active roles in the country’s workforce and overall consumer culture due to the relaxation of religious rules touching on women’s dressing codes.

Samara Clothing Store is one of the e-commerce companies taking advantage of the changing business environment in Saudi Arabia and the greater GCC region to profit from the fashion industry. The main competitive advantage of the Samara Clothing Store is that the fashion company targets young people, including millennials and Generation Z, with the majority of the population in Saudi Arabia and the GCC region being under 30 years of age. A social media marketing plan will help the company reach and convince millennials and Generation Z, with the two demographic groups representing what is known as the “tech-savvy” and “digital” generation.

Audit Your Social Media Platforms Performance

MetricSentimentReachCompany PostsFeedbackAverage response time to feedbackPinterestThis is the best fashion brand ever!!!Medium20Positive2 daysFacebookSamara Clothing Store is a one-stop-shop for all fashion needs!!!!High250Positive24 hrsInstagramShiny, trendy, eye-catching fashion products for less!!!High300Positive15 hrs

Screenshots

The sentiment analysis process was conducted using Monkeylearn.com, a free online sentiment analyzer that evaluates a company’s social media presence. All three sentiments were rated positively, with all the percentages higher than 86%. In addition, Awrio.com has also used to analyze Samara Clothing Store’s sentiments against those of competitors such as Fad International Company and Anotah Fashion.

Social Media Benchmarking

As mentioned above, Samara Clothing Store will have two main competitors operating in the Saudi Arabian apparel and fashion industry; Fad International Company and Anotah Fashion.

Fad International Company

Fad International Company is a fashion designing and apparel company operating out of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Currently, Fad International Company has a total of 100,569 likes on its Facebook page while at the same time having 100,495 followers. The company also has 2,767 followers on LinkedIn and a large presence on Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest, among other social media platforms. Looking at the company’s Facebook page shows that much of the focus is placed on continuously posting new content, with little effort made on making follow-up contacts and responding to client queries. The highest engagement is currently seen on Facebook, as the company does not engage clients on Twitter using retweets. In most social media platforms, the company mainly posts weekly and sometimes after two weeks, showing a low rate of engagement. An overall evaluation of the company’s social media activity shows a lack of success on the company’s side.

Anotah Fashion

Anotah Fashion is an exceptionally unique and dynamic fashion brand operating in a number of countries in the GCC region, including Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Oman. The brand has 45,117 likes and followers on Facebook, 218 followers on Pinterest, and 303.4k followers on Instagram. Anotah Fashion posts mainly marketing and promotional content, meaning that the company does not focus on using engaging content to attract and engage the targeted client. However, the brand’s Instagram content is getting the highest engagement seen by the number of followers on its Instagram page. The lack of engagement in the other social media platforms can be blamed on irregular posting of content as well as failure to respond to client comments and queries.

SWOT Analysis

Strengths Strong supply chain management Unique designs Quality and affordable productsEffective engagement with millennials and Generation ZWeaknesses A new entrant into the marketLack of enough capital as compared to competitors Generalized collection  Opportunities Growing young population in Saudi ArabiaUsing technology to improve customer experience E-commerce opportunities in Saudi Arabia and the GCC regionThreats Increased competition from domestic and international rivalsReligious rules primarily affecting women dressing

Strengths

Samara Clothing Store has several strengths that can be leveraged to neutralize threats, including Strong supply chain management, unique designs, and quality and affordable products. In addition, the company also enjoys the benefits of an effective engagement with millennials and Generation Z, making it one of the most popular companies among the young generation in the country.

Weaknesses

Samara Clothing Store also has some weaknesses affecting its growth and expansion plans, including limitations because of its position as a New entrant into the market, lack of enough capital as compared to competitors, and offering a generalized collection of products.

Opportunities

There is a growing young population in Saudi Arabia and other GCC countries as well, such as UAE, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait. Even though the company is doing well when it comes to customer service, it can consider investing more in technological advancements such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and virtual reality to improve its customer service. In addition, Samara Clothing Store can also take advantage of e-commerce opportunities in Saudi Arabia and the GCC region by setting up a customer-friendly e-commerce platform targeting millennials and Generation Z consumers.

Threats

One of the company’s key threats involves strong domestic and international competitors eyeing the GCC apparel and clothing industry. Increased competition affects the company’s operations by creating pressure on sales and marketing, thus reducing its overall market share. Besides, Samara Clothing Store operates in one of the most restrictive countries globally when dressing, especially for women.

Define Your Social Media Marketing Goals

To create a detailed and specific action plan, Samara Clothing Store’s social media marketing plan will be founded on three main objectives as outlined below;

a)      Samara Clothing Store will focus on getting visibility and having a strong presence in different social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and blogs.

b)      The company’s second objective is to improve its overall brand awareness and increase overall follower engagement in the chosen social media platforms. This objective will be achieved by creating attractive, compelling, attractive, and youth-centered content that focuses on increasing brand awareness.

c)      The engagement between the company and the customers will be achieved by liking, reacting, commenting, and sharing the different social media stories and posts shared on different platforms.

Research Your Target Audience

Market segmentation is important for the company as it helps develop specific and ideal customer profiles before commencing social media marketing planning. A segmentation of the Saudi Arabian market shows that the company should target the younger generation, especially aged between 20-40 years of age, living in urban areas, and active on the internet and social media platforms (Hassan, 2019). Samara Clothing Store mainly targets millennials and Generation Z, the two main generations that confer brand loyalty to companies that have a strong brand story and values to connect with. In addition, Samara Clothing Store will also focus on positioning itself as the best brand for the younger generation to express their sense of millennial and Generation Z style. The main understanding is that to achieve success in the competitive market, the company must carve out a niche between fast fashion and luxury, representing a place where young people can go and find unique fashion products that balance quality and affordable pricing.

Marketing persona means grouping the potential customers according to similar interests, priorities, and concerns. The three marketing personas that represent the company’s target audience include competitive, spontaneous and methodical. The competitive persona looks at a company’s competitive advantages in determining whether they can solve their problem quickly or not. The spontaneous persona only focuses on enjoying movement and simplicity while determining whether the company can get them what they want or not without much focus on details. Lastly, the methodical persona enjoys the details and fine print while at the same time paying more attention to determining whether a company is correct in its claims of what the product or service can do. Understanding the different personas can help Samara Clothing Store better target them in the market and cater to their different needs and desires. The company will use different social media platforms to target the audience, including Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, and TikTok.

Reference List

Davis, J. D. (2012, April 30). 5 easy steps to measure social media campaigns. Entrepreneur. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/223437

Delin, J. (2007). Brand tone of voice. Journal of Applied Linguistics, 2(1). https://doi.org/10.1558/jal.v2i1.1

Hassan, N. E. (2019, May 23). Saudi millennials are more optimistic about the future compared to global average of peers | Deloitte Iraq | Press release. Deloitte. https://www2.deloitte.com/iq/en/pages/about-deloitte/articles/saudi-millennials-optimistic-about-future-compared-average-peers.html

Iftahy, A., Mellens, M., Walia, N., & Youssef, A. (2019, December 6). A Closer Look at the Fashion Industry in Gulf Cooperation Council Markets. McKinsey & Company. Retrieved February 22, 2021, from https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/retail/our-insights/a-closer-look-at-the-fashion-industry-in-gulf-cooperation-council-markets

McKinsey & Company. (2019, December 6). A closer look at the fashion industry in Gulf Cooperation Council markets. https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/retail/our-insights/a-closer-look-at-the-fashion-industry-in-gulf-cooperation-council-markets

Plecher, H. (2020, October 12). Saudi Arabia – total population from 2015 to 2025 | Statista. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/262467/total-population-of-saudi-arabia/

The most important social media metrics to track. (2020, August 4). Sprout Social. https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-metrics/