DIGITAL
The Digital Agenda
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A State-of-the-Industry Briefing on E-Commerce and Online Marketing Gone are the days when luxury brands regarded the digital world with that heady combination of scepticism, incomprehension and occasionally even contempt.…
Over the last decade, collaborations between luxury brands and contemporary artists have gone beyond mere artistic partnerships towards a new kind of luxury branding.
PARIS – Art and fashion have always developed side by side, for fashion, like art, often gives visual expression to the cultural zeitgeist. During the 1920s, Salvador Dalí created dresses for Coco Chanel and Elsa Schiapparelli. In the 1930s, Ferragamo’s shoes commissioned designs for advertisements from Futurist painter Lucio Venna, while Gianni Versace commissioned works from artists such as Alighiero Boetti and Roy Lichtenstein for the launch of his collections. Yves Saint Laurent’s vast art collection, recently auctioned at Christie’s in Paris, testified to his great love of art and revealed the influence of a variety of artists on his own designs.
In the 1980s, relationships between luxury brands and artists were advanced when Alain Dominique Perrin created the Fondation Cartier. In the Fondation Cartier pour l’Art Contemporain, a book marking the foundation’s 20th anniversary, Perrin says he makes “a connection between all the different sorts of arts, and luxury goods are a kind of art. Luxury goods are handicrafts of art, applied art.”
The Fondation Cartier pour l’Art Contemparain building in Paris
A State-of-the-Industry Briefing on E-Commerce and Online Marketing
Gone are the days when luxury brands regarded the digital world with that heady combination of scepticism, incomprehension and occasionally even contempt. In just a few short years, a new era has dawned, one marked by the acknowledgement that the ever-evolving innovations and potentially lucrative opportunities presented by digital channels could prove to be a decisive factor in a luxury brand’s success.
It has been the rise of the digital consumer – those who spend more and more time on their computers and mobile devices and who are also clearly willing to buy luxury goods and services online and who even discuss their favourite brands through social media – which has finally convinced most luxury marketers. In the meantime, brands have gained a deeper understanding and appreciation for the opportunities and risks offered by digital media, thanks to experts they integrated in their teams or specialists with whom they collaborated.
In fact, 2010 has almost been a tipping point for the luxury industry. It seems more determined than ever before to take advantage of these exciting technologies which are changing the way almost all products and services are marketed and sold. Virtual fashion shows, digital flagship stores, 3D advertising campaigns, augmented reality applications, iPad magazines, Facebook live-streams and Twitter-based customer service are just a few examples of the long list of digital innovations that luxury brands have pioneered this year.
However, putting the enthusiasm of many of these firms to one side, have all luxury purveyors come on board? Are they indeed adopting the right digital marketing tools and techniques? How is digital media impacting business? Where should companies invest? And what can we expect next? In order to understand how the luxury industry is facing up to the digital revolution and what luxury executives have to say, we surveyed our members, talked to digital experts and interviewed CEOs.
This report presents the answers and insightful comments of more than 500 respondents – working in both small companies and multinational conglomerates. It also reveals the views of expert practitioners and strategists and, finally, offers a directory of service providers specialised in digital marketing and e-commerce for luxury brands.
I invite you to join the conversation on luxurysociety.com as we continue to debate and discuss these critical topics online.
Philippe Barnet
President
