COPENHAGEN: Online fashion retailer MatchesFashion.com believes there is a huge untapped opportunity to sell luxury goods online that can be exploited through the regular delivery of relevant content.
Ulric Jerome, CEO MatchesFashion.com, addressed this topic at the recent ShopTalk Europe conference in Copenhagen where he suggested that “the timing of really increasing the opportunity for luxury products through technology is just amazing”.
His own business stands testament to that view, having undergone a digital transformation five years ago: from a dozen shops in the UK with a turnover of £35m, it now has a turnover of £204m, with 95% of sales online and 85% outside the UK.
“It’s not just about selling a product, it’s about selling an experience,” he said. (For more details, read WARC’s report: Content and experience: how MatchesFashion taps the luxury fashion market.)
“When people buy at MatchesFashion.com, they really buy the experience,” he stated. “We really try to be everything to that specific someone. It takes some time but this is how you create a one-to-one conversation with your customers.”
That means there is a huge focus on content, not just presenting things to sell; Jerome described the combination of content and commerce as a blend of logic and magic.
The business takes “a unique approach to storytelling”, he said, adding that when a visitor interacts with a piece of content, they are likely to stay on the site for 12 minutes, thus increasing the chances of conversion and of building loyalty.
More than one third (35%) of revenue could be directly linked to content, he added.
And content has to be regularly updated. “People don’t want to wait a month to have a printed magazine,” Jerome observed. “They want to see something now.
“The customer wants freshness every day, and that’s the big game-changer in the industry.”
Crucially, all content is directly shoppable, without users having to navigate away from it.
If they had to move away to shop, there would be a risk of losing them, Jerome said.
Ulric Jerome, CEO MatchesFashion.com, addressed this topic at the recent ShopTalk Europe conference in Copenhagen where he suggested that “the timing of really increasing the opportunity for luxury products through technology is just amazing”.
His own business stands testament to that view, having undergone a digital transformation five years ago: from a dozen shops in the UK with a turnover of £35m, it now has a turnover of £204m, with 95% of sales online and 85% outside the UK.
“It’s not just about selling a product, it’s about selling an experience,” he said. (For more details, read WARC’s report: Content and experience: how MatchesFashion taps the luxury fashion market.)
“When people buy at MatchesFashion.com, they really buy the experience,” he stated. “We really try to be everything to that specific someone. It takes some time but this is how you create a one-to-one conversation with your customers.”
That means there is a huge focus on content, not just presenting things to sell; Jerome described the combination of content and commerce as a blend of logic and magic.
The business takes “a unique approach to storytelling”, he said, adding that when a visitor interacts with a piece of content, they are likely to stay on the site for 12 minutes, thus increasing the chances of conversion and of building loyalty.
More than one third (35%) of revenue could be directly linked to content, he added.
And content has to be regularly updated. “People don’t want to wait a month to have a printed magazine,” Jerome observed. “They want to see something now.
“The customer wants freshness every day, and that’s the big game-changer in the industry.”
Crucially, all content is directly shoppable, without users having to navigate away from it.
If they had to move away to shop, there would be a risk of losing them, Jerome said.
Sourced from WARC
