IDENTITY OF THE RECEIVER IN FASHION COMMUNICATION

The receiver acquires his identity in relation to the identity of the sender, to his cultural background and protective grid of perception, in other words, a sort of virtual psychic network of defence against the daily barrage of messages that facilitates the assimilation of only those that are consistent with one’s past experiences.

The sender, through a certain theme and using his particular style, aims to send messages to a specific type of receiver, a “model receiver”, with the characteristics he has envisioned.

A fashion house that wishes to propose sophisticated luxury fashion knows the type of people potentially interested in this kind of product: affluent, worshippers of elegance, taste, style and opulence. With such people in mind, it will design its garments by combining luxury, elegance and originality, matching fine fabrics with refined accessories.

The fashion house has only envisioned the existence of these receivers, without even actually knowing them. Yet these people exist, the designer’s vision has done nothing but to evoke them.

Once the receiver has been identified, the next step is offering him what he needs.

A designer, for instance, who caters to middle-aged women who wish to look sober and refined, would never propose eccentric wear with flashy colours, whereas a line created for the younger generations would look cheeky, colourful, with clothes sporting a particular and original image, perhaps not refined and elegant, but appreciated by its target.

This is the protection grid/relationship with the sender identity combination that unveils: a sender with an identity associated with elegance relates with a receiver who adores sober elegance.

A transgressive sender relates with a rebel receiver.

Receiver, model and target often mismatch.

“Target” is, in fact, a term specific to marketing and implies a capacity and a propensity towards purchasing proposed products.

The term “model receiver” refers, instead, to the communicational, aesthetic and stylistic interests of a group of people who lack the spending power to purchase designer clothes and are, therefore, considered nontargets and cannot (for the time being) convert into clients.

However, we must always remember to nurture our model receiver, as he may well lack the spending power today, but he may not tomorrow, and if we have succeeded in winning his loyalty, he may turn into a client and help our business grow.

Our target of tomorrow grows inside the “model receiver”, which is an incubator in a way.