Subscribe to Optaros RSS feedIt is nice when two trends can be mashed together to create a third. For example when you combine the trend in ecommerce to allow customers to create highly configurable products with the trend towards social shopping, together they create a third trend, the Long Tail. The in-store shopping experience is superior to ecommerce in its ability to be tactile. Ecommerce solutions however are superior when allowing customers to customize and configure products on-line. Take for example this nice t-shirt configurator (http://www.spreadshirt.net/en/GB/Create-t-shirt/Designer-59/) or this sports apparel configurator (http://www.teamworkathletic.com/taa/design-uniform/) or this sneaker configurator (http://www.rbkcustom.com/content.html ). There are many such examples of these configurators, and I suspect we will see more of them as retailers get better at lightweight manufacturing to produce these highly customized products and as suppliers continue to move into the direct to consumer market.
The basic ecommerce engine is not good at this type of lightweight manufacturing, as these features are usually evaluated by the retailer as a combination of allowing customization options, such as monogramming, or kitting/bundling. Ecommerce engines will fail here because lightweight manufacturing is not a customization or kitting capability, it is a lightweight manufacturing capability. However once a retailer does successfully add a lightweight manufacturing capability to their ecommerce expertise, it can be a distinct competitive advantage. Suppliers are also getting into the act via their direct-to-consumer capability, which is another ecommerce trend. (So retailers are getting better at lightweight manufacturing, and manufacturers are getting better at fulfilling directly to individual consumers, and affiliates and shopping comparison engines sell across both of them - convergence perhaps? But this is a topic for another time.)
Once retailers allow customers to customize products, we then introduce social shopping into the experience. After a customer customizes, and hopefully buys a product, then the customized product is made available for new customers to discover, rate and review and buy. As more highly customized products are added, they will naturally become increasingly nichie. When niche products are made available for other shoppers to discover and buy, viola - the long tail emerges!
One of the issues with the long tail is although it does a good job describing buying behavior, it is not easy for a retailer to tap into. Most retailers do not have the merchandizing resources that Amazon, iTunes or Netflix have, so how is a retailer supposed to offer all the merchandise required to tap the long tail? Combining lightweight manufacturing, customer product customization and social shopping, your customers will act as your merchants, and will create the long tail for you - and the retailer makes money the entire way, sweet.
A good example of this technique in practice is DK travel guides http://traveldk.com/), picture below. They are a leader in the crowded travel guide industry. To differentiate they started allowing customers to customize travel guides, so the customer can print out the travel guide or have a guide professionally printed and sent to them (check this). DK travel guide had figured out the lightweight manufacturing issue. Then they allowed other potential travelers to look at all the custom travel guides that other travels had previously created, and naturally the travel guides are increasingly niche as each new one is created. DK's long tail is being built out with customer guides such as:
- Bernini in Roma
- Best mojito in London
- Chicago Easter Break on a Budget
- Chocolatiers in Paris
- Christmas Shopping in New York Coffee
- Cake in Vienna
- Dad's 50th Birthday - New York
- Eccentric's Guide to the Amalfi Coast
- Family fun in Naples & the Amalfi Coast
- George's London eating favorites
- Outdoor London guide
- I am so going to the big apple before I die
- Shopping in Bruges
- Slow Travel's Tuscany
- Harry Potter in London
- Three Days in Las Vegas
- Madrid with Girls
So customers are creating and buying highly customized guides, and are filling out the long tail at the same time for other customers to discover, customize even further if they wish, and then purchase. Simple, too simple. And DK makes money the whole time and does not have to spend anything to populate the long tail. So lightweight manufatcoring of highly customized products plus social shopping equals the long tail, brilliant.
And another great example is mydeco out of the UK where customers can create a furnished room. Mydeco has a very nice room configurator where you can set up your room and then add furnishings and decorations to your room. Mydeco is an affiliate for furniture retailers, so ultimately you can buy the furniture and decorations for the room you created through them. Then once your room is configured, you can publish it for other customers to discover and review. (And the rooms other customers have created are quite impressive.)
This would work great in apparel if you let your customers create their own look with a configurator like this (http://www.martinandosa.com/web/layerit/index.jsp?catId=womens) and then put the completed looks into a location that other customers can discover and comment on. Certainly Threadless (http://www.threadless.com/) has made a good business from this model.
One final thought - I would encourage you to view emerging ecommerce trends as merging into your strategy rather than diverging trends vying for your attention. This way these trends can be combined by you to make a more successful offering and more importantly, when viewed as converging, the trends are much easier to digest. They can help to deliver unified and powerful capabilities rather than making you continually evaluate which single one would be the best bandwagon to hop on while you watch the other bandwagons speeding off all in random directions.