Last Friday we hosted one of our Digit Breakfasts, this time posing the question, ‘can interactive content change the way luxury brands do business?’ We were joined by a small but perfectly formed group of luxury experts, including a Savile Row tailor, a luxury fragrance queen, a couple of innovative fashion start-ups, and a consultant for luxury brands in Asia, to name a few. Our Strategy Director, Laura Tan writes:
We kicked off the morning by sharing our point of view on the potential great digital content has to truly transform the luxury world. While many luxury brands have now embraced the idea of creating content for online (big tick), they could go a lot further by making it an integral part of their business rather than a nice-to-have, fluffy add-on.
We provoked a debate around the table by introducing a series of ‘what ifs’ around how luxury brands could do more with interactive content. The first suggested that if brands can create quality, interactive content that is connected to the actual business it promotes, then it will transform the way brands promote and sell products.
We showed examples of brands that are already starting to do this, via transforming brand films into ecommerce platforms. The ASOS Urban Tour was one case study we discussed – a great concept, but one we think could have been executed better to really drive sales.
We also talked about how brands could transform physical locations into extensions of the online shopping environment and mentioned recent innovations from Net-a-Porter and Glamour magazine. Both brands have created interactive ‘shopping walls’ in public spaces which allow passers-by to shop from their mobiles and tablets. We also shared some of the more innovative apps that are cropping up in this area. One of the ones our breakfast experts were most interested in was Kaleidoscope, an app that allows users to shop via street-style images (like shopping directly from The Sartorialist).
Our second ‘what if’ asked if business could think about content as a way to embed themselves within the daily lives of their customers, could they then create new products, services, or revenue streams?
Examples we explored included Nike + and Nike Fuelband, ingenious innovations that have seen Nike embed itself into the everyday lives of runners. We also showed some clever inventions from Nokia that allow snowboarders to track their skills via their phones.
Our breakfast guests agreed that they could learn a lot from these technological innovations. If you can create services that your biggest fans will love, you can get more people spending time with your content and therefore your brand.
Our last ‘what if’ suggested that luxury businesses needed to think more like media owners, acting as though content was just another product they produce, and taking inspiration from the most prolific producers. We looked at Burberry as an example of a brand that is behaving like a media owner in terms of quantity of content. However, there was a heated debated around the table as to whether or not what they create is any good!
One thing everyone did agree on though, was our summary illustration below – that content needs to be considered an important part of every collection.
Thanks to everyone who came along on Friday, and watch this space for a proper write-up soon!
