In The Pink lets customers direct promotions
Falmouth, Mass. –In The Pink wants its customers to feel connected.
The 10-store specialty chain, exclusively selling Lily Pulitzer branded merchandise, offers a product assortment that makes customers feel a high degree of personal connection. Building on this personal relationship, In The Pink allows customers to direct promotions – in the form of 21-second online videos.
“Customers have an emotional bond with Lily Pulitzer,” said Gordon Russell, founder and CEO of In The Pink Stores Inc. “It reflects the social nature of customer and the visual nature of the product.”
Since June 2014, In The Pink has partnered with Cambridge, Massachusetts-based proprietary mobile marketing platform provider Vivoom Inc. to let customers create their own promotional videos they can share online. The summer campaign fits into the seasonal nature of In The Pnik’s business, as most of its stores are located on Cape Cod, Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard and do not operate year-round.
“It’s a social time of year people are spending with family and friends, so it’s a good match,” commented Russell.
Customers can download the Vivoom mobile app to create a 21-second video which is digitally encased in a branded In The Pink/Lily Pulitzer shell. In The Pink promotes the videos through means such as online, social media and email. Video creators can also share the video with their own networks, and some videos have gone viral in the greater online environment.
To boost the value of the videos as a tool to drive business and gather intelligence, video creators receive a unique coupon code they can use to make purchases at In The Pink. Video viewers also receive a coupon code uniquely tied to the video they watch. Coupon redemption data is collected in real time by the Springboard Retail (a sister company to In The Pink) POS system used at In The Pink stores.
“We create digital content that is knit together with the POS in real time,” said Russell. “With coupon data we can see who responds to videos and comes into our stores in a closed feedback loop.”
Russell first became aware of Vivoom when he met executives from the company while attending a technology innovation conference in Nantucket in June 2014, in his dual role as CEO of retail management solutions provider Springboard Retail. Liking the concept of using Vivoom’s app to launch a customer-driven video campaign, he quickly acted to get In The Pink, Springboard and Vivoom collaborating on the program.
“We had to act fast, it was early June and our season is short,” Russell said. “It kicks off after Fathers’ Day and runs until Labor Day.”
Results of the first summer In The Pink ran the video promotion included increased basket sizes from video creators and volume of sales from presenter and viewers of videos.
“Engaged customers came to the store not looking for off price items, but eager to buy the newest styles, and used coupons to do that,” said Russell. “Average margin was larger by a lot.”
In addition, dormant customers who hadn’t shopped at In The Pink in two years or more started coming back and using the coupons. The retailer also internally selected the top three promotional videos and then had customers vote on which was the best, with a $1,000 grand prize.
“We are doing the promotion again this year and will consider doing it again in 2016 – with a new twist,” concluded Russell.