Back in April I read this article about the over-saturation of outlet malls in the U.S. Historically, outlet malls were cheap real estate space compared to the traditional mall retail space. As this graph below shows though this is no longer the case.
Now at this point, you are probably asking yourself how does this relate to internet marketing? The answer is simple. With the rising retail space cost and growing popularity of online shopping major department stores are now planting their outlet stores on the World Wide Web in addition to their traditional physical outlet store fronts. In the near future, I would have to imagine the popularity (and profitability) of the online storefront will take center stage for major department stores such as Nordstrom's and Neiman Marcus.
To me this is a very interesting trend. The outlet malls have existed for decades but the major department stores never participated in this arena. I would assume because they wanted to maintain their 'exclusivity' feel. It has become apparent though that with the growing outlet rental space cost, this WWW retail space has become a revenue area that is too large for the department stores to ignore. They are no longer above selling their products in this area and as a-matter-of-fact they have decided to jump into the pool head first by creating physical outlet store fronts as well as online outlet store fronts.
Nordstrom's Rack and Neiman Marcus Last Call are the stores major outlets now.
From what I can tell both companies are selling exactly the products that are sold in their flagship stores. It will be interesting to listen to future quarterly conference calls to hear what percentage of revenues these store fronts are generating for these two companies. If these are the exact products I think these stores are going to a major advantage over a number of retail clothing companies such as J.Crew. The reason is because while J.Crew also has physical and online outlet store fronts they are offering lesser grade products made specifically for the outlet environment. To me this is alright if you are willing to sacrifice quality but I personally believe that lessens quality of the product in the flagship stores and hurts the brands perception from it's customers.
This latest trend seen in the online marketing world is just another example of the power of the online shopping experience and online marketing!
For years I have been a big online shopper and would probably consider myself an earlier adopter. I always have taken pride in finding name brand name merchanise for prices that most would think isn't possible.
Because of this online shopping obsession I got some 'spam' mail for a online shopping website called MyPoints.com probably five years ago now. For whatever reason the email got my attention and I looked into what it was all about. At first glance, it seemed to simple and to easy to earn the reward points they were touting. The thought of saving additional money though, the professional looking website and the fact that I did not have to provide credit card information led me to sign up.
The premise is simple:
Five years later I still use MyPoints.com and I have received about $300-$400 in various gift cards with the points I have earned! What a concept!
What's in it for MyPoints.com and the various retailers that they work with? In my opinion, it's pretty simple from the retailer standpoint. By having the incentive for the MyPoints.com members to earn more points they will go through their website to reach the retailer they want to buy from. With the same products being offered for the same price on so many websites the online retailers need that one extra catalyst that steers the customer to pick their website over another retailer's.
Before I buy anything now online I will check MyPoints.com to see if they are partnered up with the retailer. If they are not, I will actually spend the time to look for a retailer who carries the product at the same price or better and is paired up with MyPoints.com.
This website and business model is not unique. I have found other websites over the year offering similar services but my loyalities have been cemented. It's just another great example of the creativity companies are coming up with to grow revenues and their brand awareness.
The stigma of Pinterest when the site first gained popularity was that is was only for females. I followed the crowd for a while on that theory before I finally when to check it out for myself. What I found out is that, in my opinion, it is an online shoppers dream come true.
The real beauty of Pinterest is not the obvious aspect where you store a beavy of ideas you come across while searching the web. The real beauty lies in the ability for your pins that are linked to an online store to become real-time coupons. For example, I have a pair of shorts from Macy's pinned and when the item when on sale Pinterest notified me with this email:
From an e-commerce perspective Pinterest is brilliant. I can't remember how many times I have either completely forgotten where I found an item online I liked or did not want to buy the item at the current price. It's clear that the savvy online stores understand this as they make pinning an item/image from their page very user friendly. An example of this can be tied to my blog post from last week about Bonobos. On there website you can simply click the Pinterest logo and move it onto one of your boards.
