Beardsourcing?

As you know, we are close watchers of crowdsourcing, and the interest in emerging companies like Crowdbands continues to build.

However, our friend Dan Sieger took crowdsourcing to a strange place yesterday when he asked his Facebook friends to vote on his vacation beard.  As you’ll see from the picture below, it was kind of a scraggly beard, but we’ve certainly seen worse.  He paraphrased the Clash when he asked people about the beard: “Should it stay or should it go?”

Dan posted the picture at 5:38, on the train home, and by 5:41, the responses were rolling in.  Early returns pointed to the beard’s survival, but the tide turned quickly, and by 10:32, there were 16 responses, most of which recommended giving the beard the Gillette treatment.  The vote was 12 for “Go!”, six for “Stay!” and one guy who just couldn’t make up his mind.

According to Dan: “The final straw was when my friend Eric from Vermont voted to get rid of the beard.  Eric is a passionate Deadhead and wonderful free spirit.  If a Vermont Deadhead wants you to get rid of your beard, that’s a bad sign.”

Dan is clean-shaven now.  It has yet to be determined whether he will use Facebook to vote on whether he should get the steak or the Chilean Sea Bass at his brother’s wedding on Saturday night.

Filed under: Crowdsourcing , Beard, Crowdsourcing, Fashion, Psychology, Twitter

Launch of fashion site

We launched Papillon Bleu’s new site on Friday. The good people at newpixel designed and build it with us. The litte research firm that could is now doing more and more web projects.

Filed under: Marketing , Clothes, Design, Fashion

Importance of video for style related online retailers

In a recent survey nearly half of respondents say manufacturer Web sites have some or significant influence on their jewelry or watch purchase, and 43.4 percent say the same about jeweler or retailer Web sites.

Consumers also cited online video as an influence in their recent purchases, the majority of which are younger male watch buyers.

Online video is fast becoming an increasingly popular advertising vehicle, especially for marketers of style products. Many videos found online for watches resemble mini-movies more than commercials. The study finds that for one in five male jewelry/watch buyers 18 to 24, online video does more than entertain; it impacts what they buy or where they buy it.

Other key findings from the survey:

• 50.9 percent of U.S. adults 25-34 say they bought jewelry or a watch recently.
• Nearly 84 percent of consumers prefer to buy jewelry/watches in a store as opposed to online.
• The store experience is important: 63.5 percent rate store reputation and 65.9 percent rate the sales staff as important factors in their purchases.
• 47.9 percent of recent jewelry/watch purchasers were influenced by information or advertising from newspapers. Magazines, television, and direct mail were also among the most influential traditional media.
• More than 20 percent of respondents consider cause and/or charity support by a manufacturer or store to be somewhat or very important. That number goes up to 25 percent for African-American consumers.

The results highlight the need for local jewelry and watch retailers to have a strong Web site that showcases their products visually, provides product availability information and reviews or comments from previous customers. Pre-roll video advertising on other Web sites may also be an effective option for jewelry/watch marketers.

Filed under: Market Research, Marketing , Fashion, Online, Retail, Video