E-Commerce Shoe Fits

Fashion-forward American shoe designer, Steve Madden, prides itself on marketing and selling stylish footwear brands while creating personal one-to-one relationships with its customers. The company distributes products through its retail stores, its e-commerce Web site, and department and specialty stores.

Beefing Up E-commerce

In 2005, the popular brand was in search for other avenues to market its products and launched SteveMadden.com.

"Since the online store launched, we have seen 30 percent to 40 percent growth year-over-year," says Andrew Koven, president of e-commerce and customer experience, Steve Madden. "Today SteveMadden.com is the largest Steve Madden store in terms of product sales and number of products available in the world."

Last year, Steve Madden made a concerted effort to beef up its e-commerce solutions, participating heavily in social media, engaging in a full suite of analytical tools through Omniture Test&Target and setting a goal to merchandise the site uniquely for each and every customer.

The company is in the final implementation stages with e-commerce personalization provider MyBuys, which will execute targeted product recommendations and alerts to all Steve Madden.com customers.

"We are going to be implementing MyBuys for up-sell and cross-sell and alerts and we think that's meaningful in the customers' overall experience," says Koven. "We're looking daily to improve site search and to improve our presentation of products."

Fostering One-to-One Relationships

It has always been a mantra of Steve Madden to make things conform to each individual visitor -- on the Web site or in the store -- instead of operating on a mass approach.

"The theme of MyBuys, Omniture, live chat and customer service is that it all connects back to a very highly one-to-one customer experience where we are moving closer and closer to personalizing to that particular customer's needs and historical interests with their shopping experience," says Koven.

Shoppers visiting the Steve Madden Web site for the first time will have data quickly analyzed by MyBuys, as algorithms start dissecting and pattern matching for buyers within their first cloud of clicks.

"The expectation is that our conversion rates through the use of MyBuys will improve," says Koven. "We can identify when a customer buys a certain type of product and we can alert them on a more predictable basis on things they are highly likely to like and want to buy."

Koven continues, "As we engage more with MyBuys and look at analytical findings, it gives us a better read on what is getting bought, and what we need more of. We are continuing to make necessary investments both on the front-end of the site and the back-end of operations and technology to satisfy customers." 

This article is an excerpt from "Steve Madden Sets Designs on Improved E-Commerce," featured in the November 2009 issue of Apparel Magazine. For the complete article, visit www.apparelmag.com and select the "Magazine" tab.