Shoclef And Making Stylists The Star Of The Retail Show

There is no shortage of app and eCommerce platforms out there looking to match up consumers with personal shoppers. As a well-established part of high-end luxury retail experiences, the digital migration of personal shopping makes sense in the current retail context.

Consumers shop online more often, since they are shopping digitally more often – but more importantly, they’re spending more time thinking about shopping. According to Adweek, 81 percent of consumers conduct research online, and 36 percent report that they spend more than a half-hour doing it. Plus, 65 percent report they will spend at least 15 minutes researching before they buy.

When it comes to helping customers save that research time – or at least spend it more productively – is where personal shoppers and designers come in. There are a lot of variations on the offerings – Stitch Fix, Trunk Club and Farfetch all do it differently – but they all broadly seek to add the personal retail touch to the otherwise impersonal digital shopping experience, and creating a lasting relationship with the customer that is built as much around the service as it is the products.

Also Read: high quality boutique wholesale clothing

Up-and-coming eCommerce company Shoclef wants to the ride the trend of digital shopping gong digital – but also wants to change that opportunity.

The core of the site is built around the personal shoppers and performers who populate the space. What they do with that space is up to them – they can livestream shopping trips to various stores around the world, or they can do live demonstrations of goods and services for their audience, and they are rewarded directly for building that audience. Personal shoppers can communicate directly with their viewers via messaging, and those messages can also be used as a space to directly request and purchase goods. If that personal shopper or performer builds up a large enough audience, they can theoretically begin earning advertising revenue.

And while it might from the outside seem implausible that one could build a large enough audience of people watching them shop, it bears remembering that Tyler “Ninja” Blevins makes about $500,000 a month live-streaming himself playing a single game (Fortnite) on Twitch. His secret? He’s very good at the game – and he’s a very good performer while he’s playing the game.

“I’m very goofy; if you ever watched any of my streams or YouTube videos, I do impressions and stuff like that all the time and just crazy shenanigans.”

And shopping is like video games in that there are people in the world who are somehow better at spending money than anyone else – and that can be built around an online persona that’s fun and interactive. And, perhaps critically, given the site’s global reach, it can help consumers connect to rarer or more unusually flavored items.

For those who don’t’ want to watch, but do want to shop, Shoclef offers more standard marketplace offerings. Consumers can browse products and services offered by sellers and narrow down their search to a specific business, city, product or service category.

If buyers cannot find what they seek, they can make a request post to the newsfeed for their followers or the world to see.

“By incorporating social media trends into the app’s design, Shoclef unites personal shoppers, buyers and sellers to form a global social network. Shoclef has integrated essential social media features, which allow users to follow others, submit friend requests, live chat during livestreams, [use] full messenger features such as phone and video calls, make public or private posts, and browse current or past livestreams,” the emerging company noted.

It’s a big offering, and given the undeniable success of platforms like Twitch – not to mention the various stripes of Instagram celebrities selling everything from cosmetics to home goods successfully online – it’s not unbelievable that Shoclef is onto something. If the right influences are there, and they bring consumers along with them, this could be a very new and novel way to build personal shopper relationships and bring virtualization to real-world shopping experiences.

“If” being the operative word. The trick, as always, is bring the influencers along for the ride – no small feat in an area where there are already plenty of social commerce platforms looking to attract them and their avid fanbases. If Shoclef can crack them and bring them on, they’re in wholesale kids toys business. But, as with most chicken-and-egg problems for platforms, that first crack in the shell is always the toughest one.

In a recent column published at The Drum, Samuel Scott argued that the marketing industry has split into two distinct camps that have adopted and now advocate two very different approaches to the practice of marketing.

According to Samuel, the divide is between “online B2B marketers” who “want to gain and convert website traffic into leads” and “offline B2C marketers” who “want to build brands among mass audiences.” He wrote: “The result is a new Cold War in which the two sides have different practices, read different publications, attend different conferences, follow different thought leaders, and view the other as outdated or uneducated.”

Samuel contends that the big problem with this polarization of marketing is that people in both camps have an incomplete or distorted view of marketing. He wrote: “Both offline B2C and online B2B marketers can learn from the other’s news outlets, conferences, and thought leaders – if only they would choose to do so by openly integrating everything into simply ‘marcom.’ Today, there is no ‘offline marketing’ and ‘digital marketing.’ There is only marketing.”

Many of the observations in this column are absolutely on point, but I also think that some of the differences Samuel describes exist for valid cell phone parts wholesale business reasons. Recently, it’s become popular to downplay the differences between B2B and B2C marketing. Some commentators even argue that all marketing should be viewed as “business-to-human” or “human-to-human.”

It’s certainly accurate to say that virtually all forms of marketing involve the communication of a message to a human being. It’s equally true that business decision makers are also consumers, and that the attitudes and preferences they have as consumers don’t disappear when they’re acting in a professional capacity. This doesn’t mean, however, that there are no important or meaningful differences between B2B and B2C marketing.

Samuel argued in his column that the current divide between B2C and B2B marketing is largely the result of longstanding assumptions, the main one being that “B2C is emotional and has short sales cycles while B2B is logical with long sales cycles.” He then correctly points out that this assumption is, at best, an oversimplification of reality.

A more practical and meaningful difference between B2C and B2B marketing is that most B2C marketing involves the communication of a relatively simple message to a large or very large audience, while most B2B marketing requires the communication of more complex messages to a relatively small audience. This difference alone dictates the use of different marketing strategies, channels, and tactics.

The combination of simple message-large audience explains why many B2C marketers still emphasize advertising via offline mass media channels. Short ads (think 30 or 60 seconds) can be effective at communicating simple messages, and mass media channels are still an efficient way to reach large audiences.

And despite assertions to the contrary, several recent research studies have shown that advertising still has a significant impact on consumers. For example, in a 2017 survey of 1,030 U.S. consumers by Clutch, 90% of respondents said that advertisements influence their purchase decisions. The Clutch survey also found that TV is still the most influential medium for advertising. Sixty percent of the respondents said they are likely to make a purchase after seeing or hearing a TV ad.

Since many B2B marketers must communicate more complex messages to a relatively small audience of dropship malaysia business decision makers, it shouldn’t be surprising that they tend to emphasize the use of marketing channels (such as email) that can be more precisely targeted and marketing techniques (such as content marketing) that can accommodate longer communication formats.

So, is there a “Cold War” in marketing as Samuel Scott suggests? I agree that marketers who work in the various marketing disciplines tend to read many of the same publications, attend many of the same conferences, and follow many of the same thought leaders. To some extent, this kind of “tribalism” is inevitable. But it can also create echo chambers in which the particular and narrow perspectives of each marketing discipline are reinforced and amplified.

To combat the pernicious effects of these echo chambers, marketing leaders need to ensure that the members of their marketing teams are regularly exposed to information about the broader aspects of marketing. Such regular exposure helps reduce the impact of echo chambers and avoid the development of marketing silos.

Allen Edmonds Ditches the Stodgy Boys’ Club Image With a New Identity

At a time when “artisan” and “craft made” are some of the hottest buzzwords among millennial consumers, Allen Edmonds is banking on attracting more followers with its storied craftsmanship.

This month, the 98-year-old, made-in-America men’s shoe label (which was acquired by Caleres Inc. in December 2016), debuted a new identity aimed at a broader, youthful demographic.

According to Caleres CEO, president and chairman Diane Sullivan, the modern Allen Edmonds is more focused on inclusivity than exclusivity. “Allen Edmonds shoes have been something men aspire to — shoes they buy when they’ve achieved a certain station in life,” she said. “[Now we want to] make Allen Edmonds part of the journey, part of his lifestyle along the way.”

The refresh encompasses all aspects of the brand, from a new logo and maker’s mark to energized promotional imagery and packaging. In addition, Allen Edmonds has begun rolling out a modern look for its 79 brick-and mortar locations. And its e-commerce site relaunched this month, featuring the new identity as well as rich content and video elements.

The initiative is being steered by brand president Malcolm Robinson, who joined in July 2017 and previously worked with Sullivan at PVH Corp., where he oversaw the sportswear division, including labels such as Izod, Bass and Van Heusen.

The executive noted that it took little convincing to bring him to Allen Edmonds. “I knew it had intrinsic value,” said Robinson. “It was really a matter of designing products using their expertise that were going to engage consumers and tell a story that’s engaging.”

Robinson pointed out that Allen Edmonds is principally a direct-to-consumer business, with about 90 percent of sales coming through its stores, website and catalog.

“We want to do things well at a few significant points of distribution and not be splattered all over, where you can no longer control pricing and presentation,” he said. The brand’s topwholesale iphone cases partners include Nordstrom and The Forum Group of upscale independents.

Even before the reboot, Allen Edmonds had a strong start to the year. It saw a 10 percent rise in sell-though in the first quarter, and Caleres predicts more upward trajectory in the coming months. “It typically takes a little time for any rebranding to gain full traction,” said Sullivan, “but we anticipate solid year-over-year [sales] increases in Q4 both in stores and in the e-commerce business.”

Steven Marotta, an analyst with CL King & Associates, said the label has performed relatively well in the years leading up to and since its acquisition. “Based on the evolution of their offering, they appeal to a very wide swath of the demographic,” he said, “but by rebranding and emphasizing marketing to a younger audience, it might unlock a whole new set of customers.”

Aside from its visual identity, Allen Edmonds has also revamped its product strategy: It is exiting the private-label business in all non-shoe categories in favor of long-term collaborations with other U.S.-made accessories brands.

The curated program, called Artisans of Freedom, launches this month with partners including L.A. denim brand Civilianaire, Alan J Eyewear of Vernon Hills, Ill., and New York outerwear label Cockpit USA.

Allen Edmonds will serve as a distributor for the co-branded products, selling them through its own stores, website and catalog. “We are using our marketplace to help build up other American businesses that need support,” said Robinson, who sees untapped opportunity in the small leather goods and bag categories.

Another area ripe for expansion is the brick-and-mortar fleet. In Q1, the brand opened one store location but closed three. However, Robinson said he aims to add four or five doors per year, both domestically and internationally. “It’s a brand that does well in high-income neighborhoods, so we have to go global soon,” he said.

Also read: how to start dropshipping

Internationally, Canada is a top target for store openings, as well as the Middle East, Asia and South America. In Europe, the brand is looking at wholesale opportunities such as shop-in-shops.

Additionally, e-commerce continues to gain importance. Robinson estimated that his average customer buys about four Allen Edmonds shoes online and one in-store — a complete reversal from four years ago. He noted that its e-commerce business could soon eclipse brick-and-mortar, even with the addition of locations.

But the rise of digital does place greater importance on storytelling for the brand. “Our biggest challenge is staying on top of the task of engaging the enthusiasts who care about quality product and being a part of this,” said Robinson. “If we do a good job of that, the rest will be easy.”

It is believed that dropshipping and affiliate marketing are the most popular e-commerce methods in the world now. Drop shipping is an online retailing method which allows retailers to purchase merchandises individually from suppliers, and these suppliers should take the responsibility of delivering merchandises directly to end-customers. Moreover, affiliate marketing is an online practices that helping merchants to gain much more visitors or customers to their websites whatever visiting or purchasing. Furthermore, the ‘products’ in the affiliate marketing include merchandises, services or even campaign. In this posts, I’m gonna list some of the pros and cons in drop shipping model and affiliate marketing method, and then make suggestions for you by taking a comparison between them.

Pros and cons

Pros of drop shipping:

a. Lower capital requirement. It is believed that drop shipping model requires lower capitals, which means retailers should not spending too much money in the early stages of drop shipping process. For example, basically, retailers do not need to built up a online store before doing drop shipping business. Retailers should only need to find some more customers as quick as possible, and they can make profits from it easily. However, in my opinion, it should be better to build up your own store or brands because you need to strengthen the brand awareness among customers, which should be helpful for your long-term strategies. Therefore, it can understand that it is up to you if you want to spend much more money in the early stages of drop shipping, if not, it should be fine to start your drop shipping business with lower capitals.

a. Get escaped from the inventory. As we know that drop shipping allows retailers do not need to carry inventories during the trading process. That means retailers can saving lots of costs on inventory and warehouses renting. Moreover, they can also change selling strategies easily like switching niches.

b. Jobs from home. As the features of drop shipping model, it is possible to understand that retailers can totally carry out the complete drop shipping process at home by using smart devices like PCs and tablets. For example, some of the drop shipping platforms should built up its software systems, that allows retailers to deal with supplying issues, inventory management, and logistics. It is believe that retailers should saving time on deal with drop shipping business, and they can also make profits from it.

Cons of drop shipping:

a. Lower profit margin. As the statistics shows from the Guardian, it illustrate that the average profit margins of drop shipping is approx 15-30% globally. That means retailers should making lower profits from it, and it definitely need much more sales for supporting the drop shipping business. As its lower capital and costs requirement, the profit margin in drop shipping business is also lower than other business models.

b. Less control. Drop shipping allows retailers to set their hands free, that means retailers should not need to do so much business operation and they can make profits from it. However, retailers may get less control on their business. As the inventory management and order fulfillment carry by suppliers and other partners, retailers cannot directly manage its supplying and logistic issues, that should leads them to a passive way to do their dropship electronics business.

Pros of affiliate marketing:

a. No order fulfillment. Actually, affiliate marketing is not selling a physical product, which means it should not have any logistics or order fulfillment. All affiliate marketing can do is help sellers to gain much more website traffic and customers to entering online store whatever visiting or purchasing. Therefore, people do not need to worry about the order fulfillment when they are doing affiliate marketing.

b. Providing spaces for advertising. Doing affiliate marketing only requires for blank spaces on the web pages for advertisement. The advertisers should save a lot costs on delivering products.

c. Understanding demands and market trend. It is believe that the basic affiliate marketing process is shows as following:

Sellers give its basic requirement to advertisers include advertising campaign, key words and targeted customers=>advertisers put finished advertisement on available websites=>visitors click the links and entering to the websites=>sellers pay for the clicks once it happened.

It can clearly understand that sellers need to give the information about market trends or even market reports to advertisers to doing the advertising campaign, which means advertisers can easily collecting these information and statistics that should be helpful for understanding the current market whatever in any categories.

Cons of affiliate marketing:

a. Less control on profitability. As we know that the profits of affiliate marketing can only gained from CPC (Cost-Per-Click), CPL (Cost-Per-Lead) and CPS (Cost-Per-Sales), which means the profits if is higher or not are depend on the quality of advertisements and kind of luck. The profits that can be made is uncontrollable especially in the early period of affiliate marketing. Therefore, advertisers should stay focus on how to improve the quality of advertisement that should make more profits for affiliate marketing.

b. Risky when doing affiliate marketing. According to the case studies for affiliate marketing, it can find that some of the advertisers have been owed money by sellers, which means some of the sellers are not paying for the advertisements even it already increased the website traffic. For example, sellers may exit from the existing transaction without paying any money for advertisers, even advertisers are spend so much money and time costs on its advertisement. There are so many cases happened just like it shows above, advertisers cannot make sure they can get paid by sellers every single time.

Make your return policy easy to view

One of the best ways to increase your conversion rate is to use a fair return policy in your online store.

A psychologist wrote an article that gave an in-depth look at the return policy and what they can do for the retailer.

In that article, she wrote: “A simple return policy promotes sales because shoppers are more willing to buy and know that returning to them will not be a problem.”

Providing a guarantee helps build trust between you and your customers, which is critical for small retailers who want to build a brand. Proposing a guarantee does not take up your web space, so your real estate price cuts are usually very high.

Always include comments and ratings

One of the great advantages of online shopping is that a lot of customer reviews are at your fingertips. Do you want to know if the latest Jack Ma book is worth buying? Have detailed comments. Are you still not sure which new sunglasses are right for you? A large number of commentators describe their face and other features to help shoppers like themselves.

Comments have incredible power because they are value. According to entrepreneurs, 61% of customers read online reviews before buying wholesale baking supplies products online.

But what if you don't comment on all the products on your site?

Most importantly, don't write fake comments.

A popular strategy is to send an email to all buyers who currently have no reviews. In that email, if they want to quickly review the products they just purchased, they can offer them a 10% discount on the next purchase, or free shipping.

As the reviews and ratings on the wholesale kids toys product page increase, you’ll see a significant increase in conversion rates.

Domestic to overseas

The first question everyone needs to consider is whether you want your supplier to be domestic or overseas. Of course, both have their strengths and weaknesses. It comes down to factors such as your personal preferences, the products you sell, or the pricing of your products.

Pros and cons of domestic wholesale clothing suppliers

Try out the advantages of domestic apparel suppliers: because they are located in the country, the transportation time will be significantly shortened. Communication will be easier. Because there is no language barrier between you and the vendor, this can reduce errors and errors. In addition, the quality of manufacturing should be higher. The two biggest drawbacks include the limited number of products available and the high cost. In China or India, the number of products made in the United States is less than that of overseas products. Moreover, due to higher product quality and higher legal requirements, commodity prices will be higher.

Pros and cons of overseas wholesale clothing suppliers

Another option you can choose is to manufacture overseas. This also has its own advantages, such as lower manufacturing costs. This is especially true if you compare it to a US manufacturer. Unfortunately, this is due to lower labor standards and lower quality products. On the positive side, there are many buy wholesale clothing suppliers to choose from, especially clothing suppliers. With services like Aliexpress, it's easy to start working with overseas suppliers.

Some other drawbacks include longer transit times. Most of these manufacturers are in China. Delivering the product to your customers in North America takes longer. You may occasionally encounter customs issues. You will not be able to visit the manufacturer in person, at least not cheap. If it is not a big problem, verifying the product can be a big problem. Cultural differences and language barriers can bring you more errors, mistakes and troubles.

Where can I search for a supplier?

The best way to start searching for a supplier is through the free online catalog. This is true for both domestic and foreign suppliers. As for the domestic catalog, I recommend starting with Maker's Row, ThomasNet, let's be here, or Sqetch. If you are interested in overseas suppliers, you can start with Alibaba and IndiaMart. However, I highly recommend using AliExpress for fast shipping operations. They have a good list of wholesale clothing suppliers. You can read more about how to find the best supplier for you. They have more than 700,000 suppliers from Asia and millions of products to choose from.

Another thing you can try is to use Google. Most vendors' websites are old and outdated. Google rewards constantly updated websites so that manufacturers are buried. That's why they don't rank high in search. You will have to dig deeper into the 5th or 6th page of the search to find something useful. I don't recommend doing this unless you have enough time and patience.

If you are still not sure where to find a supplier, try relying on recommendations. If you know that the business staff asks them to provide advice. Contact people who may be able to help you, even if you don't understand them. If you know how to ask them, people are always willing to help. If you feel uncomfortable when reaching out, try the online form. In addition, there is some research on social media. There is a lot of information for you to read.

If you have time and money, you can consider attending trade fairs. This is just another option you can choose. 10 times and Trade Show News Network will help you find trade shows in your area. You can go and see individual baby products wholesale in person. You can talk to their representatives. This will be an opportunity to network and sample some products. Who knows who you will meet in these activities?

The UK high street has posted its worst August performance for three years, in further evidence of the pressure on traditional retailers.

Underlying sales at physical stores slid 2.7% last month, compared with August 2017, with homewares and fashion taking the biggest hit, according to the latest data from the advisory firm BDO, which monitors mid-sized, non-food chains.

“With inflation continuing to bite on the weekly shop and the heatwave driving discretionary spending to bars and entertaining, there is even less disposable income heading to the high street,” said Sophie Michael, BDO’s head of retail and wholesale.

She said rising interest rates and subdued wage growth meant there was little spare money to spend on fashion or expensive homewares, contributing to declines in underlying sales of 3.6% and 6.1% for those sectors respectively.

BDO said August was the seventh month in a row during which high-street sales had fallen, with no boost from an apparent trend towards staycations.

While the difficulties on the high street were offset by a 13.7% rise in online sales in August, according to BDO, the latest data will fuel gloom about the future for town centres, which have been hit by a wave of retail closures this year.

The difficult August for non-food retailers also pours cold water on hopes raised by an unexpected lift in retail sales in July, when consumers spent heavily on supermarket food and drink as they enjoyed good weather and England’s extended World Cup run.

Heavy discounting by clothing stores also brought shoppers back to the high street in July, reversing a decline in sales in June.

Michael said there were signs that retailers had protected their profit margins by keeping stocks tight. However, the troubles of major chains, including House of Fraser and Debenhams, have spawned discounting across the market.