For businesses that do sell their own products at retail, product compatibility with their own customer base is of utmost importance to marketers. Marketing includes promotional activities like print and other media advertising at both the wholesale and retail levels with the goal of building brand recognition and reputation for various traits like quality, affordability, or trendiness.
Merchandising, which aims to increase sales and profitability by persuading customers to buy a company’s products, is closely related to marketing. Selling the right product, at the right price, at the right time and place, to the right customers is the standard definition of the term “merchandising.”
In order to make decisions about things like stocking appropriate merchandise in adequate but not excessive quantities, offering items for sale at enticing but still profitable prices, and discounting overstocked goods, fashion merchandisers must rely on marketers’ information about customer preferences. Additionally, merchandising entails presenting products in an appealing and approachable way through the use of shop windows, in-store displays, and special promotional activities. Merchandising experts must be able to quickly order new supplies of the popular product in response to spikes in demand. An automatic order for a certain quantity of clothes of a specific type and size to be delivered in a matter of days can be sent to a production facility in Shanghai by an inventory-tracking computer programme in a department store in London, for instance.
