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e-tailing Posts
Web fashionistas just a click away from mainstream acceptance
October 19th, 2009
I was really interested to see an article in the Times (www.timesonline.com) on the increased importance of blogs within the fashion industry.
This is a sector I have been strongly associated with for many years, so my interest was tweaked.
It wasn’t that long ago that Sir Philip Green, CEO and supremo of Arcadia, owners of Top Shop, Miss Selfridge and other leading retail fashion chains, dismissed offhand a new social networking website called Mint, setup by fashion students. If he couldn’t see an immediate financial opportunity, forget it.
So it was interesting to see Sir Philip invite fashion bloggers to its HQ for a preview of its Autumn / Winter lines. This is part of a broader trend in which retailers have been forced to find new ways of influencing key opinion-formers on the internet, which is the sector’s fastest growing sales channel.
According to Leon Bailey-Green, founder of the Online Fashion Agency ‘right now, bloggers are ruling the online fashion space. Arcadia are thought to be punching below their weight online – for example, ASOS, the fashion retailer that operates entirely online receives more visitors than any of Sir Philip’s brands.
As frivolous as a bloggers preview seems, fashion experts are unanimous in their increased importance, which began at the top end of the market. Two years ago Chanel invited bloggers to Paris for a VIP tour of Coco Chanel’s apartments. Its now, common for bedroom bloggers to have their own section at fashion shows, elbow to elbow with conventional fashion media.
More importantly, it is estimated that 40% of all fashion sales are influenced by the internet (15% of actual fashion sales are online), so retailers increasingly see the need to win hearts and minds online.
This is a problem because consumers are notoriously fickle and disloyal on the internet. Over 60% of consumers have increased their use of price comparison sites, and 45% said that they would leave the website immediately if it failed to show them what they wanted on the first page, according to Avail Intelligence Trust Index (http://avail.net/en).
So it seems that retailers really do need to take fashion bloggers seriously now and will find it difficult to get their attention when they become mainstream. It will certainly affect sales.
Do the Oldies matter?
May 16th, 2009
‘The fastest-growing group using the Internet are the over fifty-fives’.
That’s fact apparently. Although I don’t come under this category (!) we need to look seriously at an ageing population and the online marketing implications going forward. My 81 year old father-in-law is online at least 2 hours a day and is far more adept than some I have seen at half his age!
Take for example Figleaves, an online underwear site, which is now launching an underwear range specifically aimed at the 30 and 40-something women who buy its bras. No longer is online for youth. The average age at the video library site VideoJug is 40, and higher still for the cooking section of the site.
Some of the most successful sites relish in their mature customer base. Take Glassesdirect, for example, where Jamie Murray, it’s founder and CEO says ‘we’re concrete proof of the rise of the silver surfer – they have been integral to our growth’. And then what about the highly successful and profitable John Lewis site, which wouldn’t get my 20 year old anywhere near it!
Buying wine online also appeals to an older age group, as has been seen by Laithwaites Wines. They are selling online to people well into their 60’s and 70’s. But the marketing channels will be very different from those of a much younger age group.
Whereas there is little point in emailing under 30’s this has to be the route for an older customer. This younger group communicate almost exlusively through social networking sites – Facebook, MySpace and now Twitter, although it seems inevitable that this way of communicating will become the norm across the age spectrum. SAGA is apparently looking at setting up their own social networking site, so this is only around the corner.
But one word of warning – Spam is just as irritating whether 18 or 80.
Is ecommerce the way out of recession?
April 1st, 2009
In the UK, we are digital addicts.
Whilst we have ony 20% of the US’s population – our ecommerce market is 60% of the size of theirs. It’s the largest online market in Europe. 70% of Brits are now online – a very high percentage internationally – and online sales account for 17p in every Pound spent in the UK.
‘Ecommerce is the Noah’s Ark of retail in the recession. People naturally turn online when they want value, and those etailers that provide it will secure a place on the Ark to better times. Those that don’t will not be able to get on’, commented Jamie Muray, founder and CEO of Glassesdirect.com.
This wave of success is being driven by some smart individuals, mainly London based, and often women (able to excel outside of corporate stereotypes) who are focussing almost exclusively on innovation and creativity. From these, significant profits are now being made, and there is little or no discussion about recession. In fact the attitude amongst these entrepreneurs is to find new market opportunties in the chaos.
Take for example moo.com, which at first glance would look like a small London based printing business. They have skillfully expoited the web to sell abroad to increase profits and economies of scale. They now export to over 30 markets globally and the website is translated into 6 languages.
Or what would be seen as a traditional online ‘off-licence’, Laithwaites.co.uk is now shipping wine across the globe and is doing strong business in viticultural markets such as France, Australia, the US and Germany.
Peter Fitzgerald, from Google UK recently commented ‘Ecommerce will not be the only road out of recession for the UK but it will be one of the main ones’
Napoleon said we were a nation of shop-keepers. Well now we are now fast becoming a nation of e-tailers.