Digital's Evolving Role in Retail & Fashion
Distributed ecommerce is leading to more opportunities, as the requirement to purchase, handle, and ship products is being eliminated. This is opening enormous opportunities for both individuals and the retailers, and there is a huge opportunity to take this concept and apply it to the fashion world.
Different people have different levels of desire to look great. Some fashion forward individuals spend a great deal of time piecing together their outfit, while others put on what they have in their closet. The former feed and drive the retail economy.
In some cases, these fashion leaders have become bloggers and spread their knowledge to their friends and followers. Occasionally, they gain notoriety but don't derive an immediate economic benefit from their fashion tips.
This is changing. As companies become more and more digital, and start to offer distributed ecommerce opportunities, users will have the ability to sell products without ever buying, shipping or touching the products.
The Digital Fashion Director
Instead of brands and retailers telling the customers what looks they should buy, the looks - and endorsement - comes from other users. The users have become the Fashion Directors, but they need a easier, low barrier of entry, way to profit off their knowledge.
They need a site that lets the users with a knack of style become the Fashion Directors. These Digital Fashion Directors (DFD) have the ability to go on this new site, create an account, merchandise various looks that can be purchased by other customers, and open an online Boutique. The items can be purchased either piece-by-piece, or their customers can purchase entire look.
With a distributed ecommerce model, the DFDs don't handle the merchandise. They handle transactions, but nothing else. Their customers never realize the items don't touch the DFDs hands; to them, it is a seamless purchase.
The Boutiques are a site that can be incorporated in a personal blog, or as a stand alone site. DFDs market and promote their sites.
How Retailers Incorporate the Boutiques
Along with the stand alone site that sits outside the retailers environment, retailers would have two new shopping sections within their site. One is a list of individual Looks created by the DFD and a second is a list of Boutiques run by the DFD. This becomes the retailers new marketplace within their site.
In the Looks section, a DFD has the ability to piece together a look by merchandising products from the retailers entire collection of products. For example, a pair of shoes, is combined with a dress, merchandised with a red scarf and then a gold necklace is added. This look is saved, credit is given to the creator as the DFD, and then uploaded into the New Look section. Other users will have the ability to shop this look - either by the individual products or the entire look. They also have the ability to rate looks.
A Top Rated Looks section will be created that ranks the looks based on a combination of user ratings (star system), Likes, Tweets, Pluses and purchases. This takes into account the gamut of social interaction, and also the bottom line questions - do people actually purchase The Look.
But fashion is collaborative, where one idea builds on another, and so will this site. Under this system, a pre-existing look can be edited. Additional products can be added or current products can be swapped out for new products. A user can add a hat to the above outfit or replace the red scarf with a black scarf.
The original DFD will always receive credit for the original idea, and secondary credit will go to any subsequent edits by the new DFD. Looks can evolve over time, with slight changes, or even drastic changes.
Once DFDs start to gather a number of great Looks - either through collaboration or original looks, their collection of Looks can be found in their personal Boutique. Each Boutique will have sections that include the DFDs Top Rated Looks, Most Recent Looks, and they can be organized around lifestyle (modern, contemporary, classic, etc.).
The DFD will build their Boutique brand, which is always associated with the Retailer, and start to receive a following. Customers who what to stay connected with the Fashion Directors, can follow their Boutique and receive alerts - email, SMS, Facebook, Twitter, etc. - whenever a new Look is created, or even if a look goes on sale.
Customers will receive the latest fashion information, and they will be directed back to the retailer's site.
Business Model for the Digital Fashion Director
Aside from getting credit for their talent, the Fashion Director is putting together a look that is being sold and they should be compensated for their work. Like an affiliate, the Fashion Directors will receive a percentage of the sales for their Look. 5% to 10% depending on the retailer's business model, with potential increases or bonuses as their sales increase.
In any collaboration the DFDs split the sales, based on the value of the products they included in the Look. For example, if the original DFD created a look that has a value of $1,000, and the second DFD replaced a $300 pair of black shoes for a $300 pair of white shoes, the original Fashion Director receives 70% ($700) and the second Fashion Director receives 30% ($300).
Some DFDs will want to collaborate on the majority of their Looks to build on an already great look, and others will want to create a Look from scratch. Either way, the number of looks increases which leads to more options for the customers.
::What This Means For Marketers::
It's an opportunity to increase awareness and sales. An opportunity to create numerous stand alone Boutiques that sell products, but it also creates new content for the retailer's main site.
Marketers give the DFDs a collection of free marketing tools to market Boutique and Looks. The DFD will have the ability to market and promote their Looks and Boutiques on any of the social sites, their personal blog, and other third party sites. The retailer will receive increased traffic back to their site and the DFD will receive a new stream of revenue.
Also, this is additional content on the site that can be used by the Marketer in various marketing campaigns. Campaigns can revolve around the Top Looks of the Season, Top Boutiques, Fresh New Fashion Designers, and Fashion Design contests.
By giving the DFDs the ability to market their own products, the marketer will generate increased traffic to the site. Traffic that should be highly qualified, and relevant to the recipient.
Also, marketers can track the type of Looks each DFD puts together, and infer that their followers have an interest in those looks. For example, if a DFD has a young, contemporary look, it can be inferred her 1,000 followers are interested in young, contemporary products. This information can be used in personal site recommendations and other personal marketing. This information builds on the Marketers knowledge about their customer base, which will lead to further personal and customized marketing.
