The Viral Power of Facebook

Fashions change faster than a New York minute in trend-right, mid-priced apparel. Not only do hot designers change at lightning speed -- one minute you are in and the next you are out -- but styles, brands, marketing methods and business models change at an accelerating pace.

A veteran of this high-stakes game is Jones Apparel Group, a $3-billion vertically integrated global leader that operates such popular women's brands as Anne Klein, Jones New York and Nine West. It is primarily a wholesaler, but it also has 940 stores and a fast-growing direct sales division with a host of e-commerce sites.

Jones' core mission is to launch new brands, find new partners and sign new licensing agreements, a business model it has been successfully executing since 1970.

But established methods are no longer guarantees of success in a marketplace undergoing residual effects from the recession and dynamic shifts in consumer behavior fueled by the boom in social media and smartphones.

While not giving up on former methods, Jones recognizes the importance of leveraging new opportunities as they open up, even if it means moving beyond familiar boundaries and onto the leading edge.

One good example of this approach was the launch of a Rachel Roy Fusion product line in February where Jones used the social media platform Facebook as the cornerstone of its marketing campaign.

This is a significant achievement, because so many retailers today are still confused by social retailing and struggling to develop a realistic roadmap to tap into its vast potential.

The Jones launch, then, can be viewed as a proof of concept to many in the industry, a successful business initiative that validates the power of Facebook and social retailing as an essential go-to-market strategy.

FILL THE FUNNEL

"There are tremendous opportunities for us today in the current marketplace," says Ron Offir, president of e-commerce at Jones Apparel Group. “Some of our brands are targeting the younger segment of the population, and these women live their lives through technology like PCs, laptops and mobile phones. They love to stay connected to the people they love. Older consumers enjoyed e-mail, but emerging populations don't engage through e-mail. They stay in touch through Facebook and mobile phones. Our need is to fill the funnel with people and it is important to serve them in the way they want to be served, which includes Facebook."

Offir put this philosophy into action last year for the launch of a new Rachel Roy Fusion line. Rachel Roy is a high-end designer not to be confused with popular TV chef Rachel Ray. She is signed by Jones to create affordable fashion apparel and shoes exclusively sold through Macy's and RachelRoy.com.

"A cornerstone of the launch was the use of Facebook, which at the time for us was a non-traditional approach," says Offir.

While other marketing methods were deployed as well, a key tactic was sending an announcement about the new line to 100,000 fans on the Nine West fan page on Facebook and inviting them to sign up for future newsletters, sales and coupons.

Around the same time a large number of fashion bloggers were invited to see and review the product line prior to its formal debut.

“We knew there was some risk in letting bloggers see the line prior to release, because they could blog about it good or bad," says Offir. "But it created a significant amount of online buzz, and the number of social media mentions was enormous. From a public relations perspective the pick up was very strong, and it resulted in a significant number of people signing up for e-mail and friending the fan page we created on Facebook."

Pop-Up Fan Shop

The centerpiece of the launch campaign was a social retailing Facebook page where new fans could not only get more information about the products, but also purchase special offers with a few clicks.

Jones already had some experience with creating fan pages on Facebook, and was an early adopter of the concept with Nine West. But, according to Offir, there is a lot to learn about creating successful Facebook pages, and it's not as easy as slapping up a version of your Web site.

"You want to make it a dynamic and interesting experience," says Offir. “It has to be engaging and have texture and depth. Otherwise you are not giving consumers enough reason to visit on a day-in, day-out basis. But when you get it right, what better way to
engage your shopper than when she is involved in the intimate experience of being with friends on Facebook?"

Facebook has a unique set of APIs (application programming interfaces) and strict user guidelines, so an important first step is choosing a good technology partner to make it work. Few retailers have the necessary personnel and skill in-house and therefore must look to external sources for help.

Jones chose San Francisco-based Fluid to build what it calls a Pop-up Fan Shop for the Rachel Roy launch. A pop-up fan shop is a page on Facebook designed to accomplish specific goals during a limited timeframe, which in this case was just five days. Fluid is a pioneer in creating digital shopping experiences, and the Fan Shop is one of its hottest products.

"Creating a Facebook fan shop with Fluid helped us build a lot of buzz and go viral," says Offir. "When it is done right it encourages dialogue and also encourages more people to fan us. It isn't going to displace e-mail marketing, traditional advertising or standard Web sites. It's just another tool in the toolbox, but it adds a viral component, and if you hit on something that creates a stir it will then show up on everyone else's Facebook pages. The power of its viral nature is exponential.

Social Retailing Success

The fan shop developed by Fluid for the Rachel Roy launch featured a fans-only "lookbook" to attract new fans and deepen the relationship with existing ones by offering exclusive content and a private brand-appropriate shopping experience. Fans were also able to get a Facebook-exclusive 15 percent discount.

The fan shop allowed shoppers to explore featured products from within a shopping environment designed to feel like a fashion magazine with popular Facebook features, such as the ability to allow fans to “Like and "Share" products and looks.

Purchasing and shipping were arranged without leaving Facebook, although payment is executed on the retailer's own site because fans are not comfortable making credit card transactions within Facebook.

Results from the Rachel Roy Fusion pop-up fan shop were impressive during its short life. An exclusive offer was made as part of the launch and it sold out in the first six hours the store was up. In the first 24 hours the brand got 1.5 new Facebook fans each minute, and the event resulted in a total fan base gain of 35 percent.

As a result of the success of the Rachel Roy launch Nine West recently added a fan shop to its Facebook fan page, which is accessible to fans by clicking on a tab.

As Offir points out, social retailing isn't going to replace traditional methods, it's just another tool in the cross-channel toolbox. "We are doing everything here in a strategic and coordinated fashion," he says. "At times we give a sneak peek to one channel over others, but everything is coordinated so we are all singing from the same songbook and everything will feel very consistent with branded messaging."

This tight coordination also means that brand stewards and marketers need to get fully on board with new concepts like the pop-up fan shop on Facebook and embrace new forms of media.

The Rachel Roy launch proved that using Facebook as a cornerstone of a major campaign can be an effective sales driver and bodes well for it use in future campaigns. As Offir points out, "you cannot afford to ignore social media, and if you do you may not be able to reach the younger demographic."

Or any demographic for that matter as Facebook, which just recently passed 500 million users, gradually takes its place as one of the major pillars of retailing