The Official Fluid Blog

Mariano Ferrario contributed to this post.

Fluid (@Fluid) collaborated with Lipman and Diane von Furstenberg to create a tweet-infused online catalog for DVF’s fall collection. You can experience the interactive catalog here.

Rich interactivity + iPad / iPhone compatibility.

The online catalog is richly interactive but coded so that it can be fully experienced on the iPad / iPhone. The video player, interactive carousels and screen transitions are all HTML5, delivering a great shopping experience and letting DVF reach its audience on the all the devices that matter.

Fully twitter-enabled catalog experience.

To put it mildly, Diane von Furstenberg is an avid twitterer (<@InsideDVF>) and her posts are addictive. The catalog is built around her most iconic statements – like “I always wanted to live a man’s life in a woman’s body” – and letting users retweet her latest posts directly from within the catalog.

Most interesting is that each product has it’s own hashtag – e.g. #jane bolero – encouraging users to tweet out what they like at a product level (they can tweet/share/like the catalog as a whole as well). The result is product-specific tweets with unique bit.ly links to each product detail page that help track the consumer’s path through the social shopping funnel and the traffic driven from their shares, likes & tweets.

Coach is the latest retailer to leverage Fluid products to launch a pop-up shop on their Fan Page within Facebook in just a matter of weeks. Take a look!:
Note: you’ll have to Like the brand first to access the exclusive, pre-sale content:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/Coach?v=app_130296760321957


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*Thank you* to the people behind the “people’s choice” Adweek Buzz Award! And special thanks to our great clients at Rachel Roy and the Jones Apparel Group. We’re thrilled to get this recognition for the facebook pop-up store for Rachel Roy!

(more on the facebook fan shop and why it worked here)

You’ve heard the news by now. “Fans” on Facebook are no longer. It’s all about “Likes.” We’ve moved from roaring crowds to the realm of school crushes and ice cream.

Prior to the change we did a survey. We wanted to know the degree to which people were getting involved with brands on Facebook. Are fans in it for the arm candy or are they locked in long-term? Is all of this brand fanning one big booty call?

The results: 35.3% described their relationship with brand pages as Love ‘em and Leave ‘em.

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As Kenmore’s social media agency of record we get a fair number of trips in to Chicago. Here are seven observations from our latest:

1. Fluid’s Rachel Roy fan-only Facebook shop resonates – with fans and with clients. Andrew, our CXO, explains why it works here. A 25% increase in fans in the first 24 hours is worth talking about.

2. Lucky magazine is integrating digital into publishing and fashion in great ways. In this month’s issue: Daily Deals for their At Your Service, QR code promos and ads using ShopText (think text-to-give becomes text-to-buy or sample).

3. Social media expertise is excelling in-house. As more brands hire community engagement or social media managers we’re finding big opportunities for strong partnerships. Client understanding will lead the shake out of social media vendors and offerings. Yay.

4. It’s time to upgrade my iPhone. Why? Video. What sparked this thought? I watched a guy clean and squeegee the windows near SFO security with more gusto, style and love than can ever be imagined. It was awesome. He needs to be seen.

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Fluid (@Fluid) launched a fan-only pop-up store on facebook for Rachel Roy last week. The insider shopping event gave the brand’s facebook fans early access to Rachel Roy’s new jewelry line collaboration with British r&b artist Estelle.

The pop-up store was live for 5 days only delivering fans a uniquely branded shopping experience around the limited edition jewelry collaboration plus one facebook-only exclusive item which sold out within the first 12 hours (all the items sold out completely before the 5 days were up). The insider event was a marketing success as well, increasing Rachel Roy’s fan base by 25% in the first day alone.

We had a fun time designing this: great brand + great clients + thoughtful use of social media = meaningful customer experience that delivers real value, makes them want to buy and love the brand more as a result.

Here are some thoughts from the strategy & design team on why it worked…

• Differentiated brand + shopping experience. There have been some research reports circulating lately that show consumers want to be able to shop on social channels. Importantly though, consumers do not want your ecommerce site pasted into facebook. They want a layered experience that blends a differentiated brand experience with awesome content (like the shareable photo & video gallery) with a great product experience.

• Not an “e-commerce” template. Fluid’s launch for Rachel Roy is built on a productized software-as-a-service solution (Fluid Social) but consumers would never know it. The technology is designed from the ground up to be easily customized and uniquely branded (proof coming in 2 weeks when we launch another one – stay tuned . Consumers and retailers hate templates and for good reason: nobody wants to shop someone who is indistinguishable from their competition. When you look at some of the templated “facebook lookbooks” out there that deliver an identical experience for athletic footwear as they do for womens fashion, it’s an easy prediction that consumers will devalue those brands that embrace generic sameness, especially in social media.

• Authentically social. We were surprised to see so many self-described “social shopping” implementations out there that completely lacked basic social functionality. Fluid integrated standard facebook “like” and “share” functionality throughout the entire experience, delivering users the social elements they expect. It makes for a great shopping experience to see that 90 other people “liked” the Petal Ring – far more meaningful in this context than product reviews.

• Limited to fans only. It’s impossible to overestimate how much consumers value insider status and benefits. As long as you are serving up real value – and avoiding exclusivity for exclusivity’s sake – your consumers will appreciate it, share more and have a stronger urge to buy.

Last year Alicia Keys asked American Idol watchers to text-to-give. It yielded $450K – the largest portion of the $4M total donated via mobile texts in 2009.

That record has been broken. As of last week, the Red Cross alone has received over $25M in text-to-give donations for Haiti. $3M in the first 24 hours. 25% of the overall Red Cross funds donated.

A devastating event + human generosity + mobile technology equals:

- A broad base of in-the-moment givers
- A momentous moment for mobile

The money raised to positively impact Haiti relief efforts is the biggest win. The implications for e/mCommerce though are incredibly exciting.

Here are the top five things I see text-to-give teaching us:

1. The power of “virtual” currency
Disney has Disney Dollars. Facebook and online games have their own currency. Chuck E. Cheese has tokens. Casinos transact in chips. Credit cards aren’t the same as cold hard cash. Whether we like it or not, these all leverage the fact that people are likely to spend more money when they’re not transacting in actual dollars. Text-to-buy via mobile creates this same sense of distance.

[Haiti donations efforts were focused on $5 and $10 donations. My colleague smartly asked, what if they’d allowed text codes with varying cash amounts (HAITI25, HAITI50, etc.)? Would donations be that much bigger?]

2. Mobile providers as payment systems
Text-to-give means that providers become the payment method. The $10 donation goes on our mobile bills and the providers reconcile with the non-profits to ensure that the donations reach their end destination. This puts providers in a powerful position.

It’s not a big leap to think about facilitating mCommerce purchases via text messaging. Mobile providers could become the next PayPal – taking a percentage on the pass-through before the order is delivered to a retailer.

3. Social sharing after an action
Companies are consumed with how to make their commerce and brands more social. Much of it is focused on sparking purchases through the power of social networks. What about making them social post-purchase?
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We, as brands, are no longer guaranteed to scroll across the walls of our fans. High school prom dates, former colleagues, people who came out of the woodwork from 4th grade and my mom aren’t guaranteed that placement either.

Facebook’s decision to split the wall into Live Feed and News Feed is having an impact. Vitrue determined that on average there are 57% less interactions and 30% less clicks on wall posts.

According to Inside Facebook, the algorithm takes into account:

- How many people comment on and like content from Pages you fan
- Which Pages you visit frequently
- Which Pages you interact with frequently

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We’ve just returned from Shop.org’s Annual Summit in Las Vegas. Most of what happened in Vegas shouldn’t stay in Vegas. It’s well worth sharing. Ten highlights in 140 characters or less…

1. If you’re getting bad reviews on a product you probably shouldn’t be selling it. [Session: Terry Lundgren, CEO, Macy's]

2. Starbucks is the McDonald’s of the middle class. And McDonald’s is owning this by competing up. Their take? 4 bucks for coffee is dumb. [Session: Sucharita Mulpuru, Forrester]

3. Everyone else is in = why 50% of retailers are in social media. 34% see a + biz impact. Note: This is social bc it’s worth talking about. [Session: Sucharita Mulpuru, Forrester]

4. Walking through the Expo Hall wearing a non-retailer pass is like walking into a singles bar wearing a denim vest and waving a red flag.

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