In the past, the reason why the brand's official website seemed to be slightly "old" in form, in addition to the impact of the mobile Internet era, was more because too many brands only used it as a traditional channel to accurately present product information and brand information, provide official sources of goods, and grasp online retail pricing power.
But at present, more and more official websites that are more like "digital history books" are bringing more existential value to this traditional channel.
Last week, on Earth Day, Giorgio Armani launched its new Armani/Values website. Unlike the brand's official website, which has been presented as an official channel for product purchases or event information in the past, the Armani/Values website is used to show the Group's three major brands and high-end lifestyle business segments as a whole, but also focuses on corporate responsibility commitments including business strategy, corporate structure, personnel, management and production aspects, and tells the story of the Group through important projects in the Group's history, as well as current and planned projects that are making important progress The complete history of the company since its inception in 1975, as well as all projects and commitments involving sustainability, ethical decisions and agreements.
Giorgio Armani launches a new Armani/Values website
Through observation and brand official information, it can be understood that the current Armani/Values website mainly includes the "Humanities" section, the "Earth" section, and the "Achievements" section.
The "Humanities" section showcases a diverse and inclusive work environment that focuses on personal well-being and quality of life through the number of employees, group locations, offices and production plants, as well as training, growth and a focus on diversity, with links to job positions.
The Earth section summarizes activities and initiatives supported by the Armani Group to create a more sustainable and safer world, including afforestation and biodiversity conservation. The Achievements section brings together Giorgio Armani's range of local and international projects to sustain community, social and cultural heritage and value creation, such as the Acqua for Life Project, which includes opera di San Francesco, the Community of Sant'Egidio, Save the Children, and Support from a number of organizations, including the Veronesi Foundation, Humanitas and the Teatro alla Scala Foundation.
Commenting on the launch of the new Armani/Values website, Giorgio Armani said: "I think I have a lot of responsibility as a designer and entrepreneur. While setting an example, you should also support others. In practice, I have always adhered to traditional and firm values. To this end, I follow the concept of 'less is more', designing pure and simple eternal objects that have endured the baptism of time and are still enduring. I always care about the humanities and the community, and firmly believe that enterprises must not only accept, but also return. In the same way, we must love the planet. I think fashion can contribute to the transformation that is happening right now in many ways, and that's exactly what I'm committed to. Values are important, and I see them as foundations. Through this website, I hope to share the necessary and urgent responsibility: to invite people to work together to build a more responsible system. ”
In addition, not only Giorgio Armani, including Hugo Boss, Blancpain and many other brands, has also been developing and operating through official websites with different levels of investment, reflecting their different dimensions of social responsibility or brand cultural value.
Hugo Boss Group website
For example, Hugo Boss's official website, which focuses on the construction of value in environmental protection, employee welfare, animal welfare and other aspects, has also jumped out of the sales profit model of only a commercial brand, which not only records the progress of a series of sustainable projects in the global area over the past long time, as a lesson for greater breakthroughs in the future, but also makes the sustainable action of the fashion industry further through the value consensus accumulated on a larger scale.
It also includes the official website developed by British cosmetics brand Lush for the Lush "Fight Against Animal Testing Awards" launched in 2012, and the official website of the Blancpain Ideal Republic Literary Award, which has been held for five consecutive years.
For the current fashion industry, behind the seemingly antagonistic relationship between their own platforms and third-party channels, what luxury brands need to grasp most through their own platforms such as official websites is not only around the control of product information, pricing power of online retail channels, etc., but also as a "digital history book" that records brand history, public welfare and sustainable development projects, reflecting the brand cultural value and social responsibility, and can also launch a calling role on a larger scale.
This is the most difficult to replace for social media or e-commerce platforms where information is becoming more and more iterative. Therefore, even in the mobile Internet era when users' reading and consumption habits are different from those of the past, luxury brands are still obsessed with investing in their own platforms such as official websites - compared with the waterfall-like fleeting communication model, they need to firmly grasp the core content and value advantages of the brand through the logical combing of the layout and the more autonomous primary and secondary relationship.
In addition, for luxury brands that have been active in the international vision and have been taking the expansion of all categories as the core business idea in recent years, the official website and the official App and other self-owned platforms have the differentiated advantages of clear layout, larger content volume and richer interactive forms, and can more effectively highlight the brand's increasingly diversified product matrix and personalized services.
Official Gucci website
Although in online and offline brand stores, luxury brands often adopt a relatively independent retail model based on beauty, clothing, jewelry watches, but through observation, it can be found that the official websites of luxury brands including Louis Vuitton, Dior, Chanel, Gucci and other luxury brands have chosen to focus on presenting the brand's full range of products and services.
It is worth mentioning that in the official website of Gucci China, in addition to many main categories, there is also a living art section including home series and lifestyle series, which emphasizes the Gucci Décor series and the core aesthetics of the brand behind it, which has attracted much attention in recent years. On the Louis Vuitton China official website, in addition to covering clothing and leather goods, jewelry and watches, lifestyle series, it also records and presents the brand's progress and achievements in culture, art and sustainable development through the "Louis Vuitton's World" section.
Shot by Viviane Sassen
Louis Vuitton brand blockbuster
Previously, WWD China had reported on the "official app of luxury brands", which is also a medium form of the brand's own platform, in which the "Louis Vuitton Connect" application independently developed by Louis Vuitton and the smart interconnection page in "Louis Vuitton" can control Louis Vuitton connected devices including Horizon Light Up speakers. This further strengthens the brand's emphasis on the intelligent product system. and bottega Veneta, which is described as the "door to creativity", the official app that emphasizes the brand's core aesthetic and content, and through digital interaction, centralized maintenance of community and customer sources, or a series of campaigns and sports trends featured content on the official app or website of Nike and Adidas.
It is not difficult to see that luxury brands develop and operate their own platforms such as official websites, either as "digital history books", public welfare and cultural special network media, or as the helmsman to guide brand upgrading and transformation, rather than adhering to the "traditional model". However, at the same time, although the objective rationality of the development and operation of its own platforms such as official websites and the advantages of operating discourse rights have been clearly visible, there are also challenges that vary from brand to brand.
Louis Vuitton launches a number of official apps
For international luxury brands, the scale of product lines, channel operation experience, and economic strength all allow brands to play with different emphases while taking into account third-party dividends and building official platforms to build solid cultural value reserves. However, at the current crossroads of "Internet +", for young brands that have just been established or face a new market, the platform construction from 0 to 1, and the subsequent multi-investment that requires long-term optimization, update, visual design, operation, etc., there is a huge test for the comprehensive strength of the brand's human and financial resources.
Therefore, how to scientifically measure the input-output ratio and rationally allocate the resource input between the own platform and the third-party platform is still a debatable choice. The development of more self-owned platforms such as official websites, and the consequent grasp of more business discourse, should be regarded as a long-term development idea of enhancing brand value and sustainable upward development after having a certain market awareness and customer base scale, rather than a single option that is partial and comprehensive. WWD
Written by yalta
Image source brand official and online