Case Study - Colman Jewelry & Watches
How do you sell luxury watches and jewellery in a lockdown?
Colman Rolex Center - Photo by Jente Willems
“Now suppose a pandemic shuts your boutiques down. What will you do?”
Suppose you sell true luxury items and you have heavily invested in boutiques on prime locations. You have built a strong reputation and your hard work pays off: you have acquired exclusive dealership for some of the most demanding brands in the world. And you have built a clientèle that loves to be immersed in the experience you offer in your boutiques. Because they rely on your expertise to help them choose, and they definitely want to try it on before they buy.
Now suppose a pandemic shuts your boutiques down. What will you do?
That is what happened to Colman during Covid. If you have a sweet spot for luxury watches or fine jewelry, the name Colman probably rings a bell. As an authorized dealer for brands such as Rolex, IWC, Vacheron Constantin, Messika, Dinh Van Paris and many others they have an unparalleled range of exclusive brands in stock. With boutiques on prime locations in Antwerp, Brussels and Knokke, Colman indulges its clients in an atmosphere of luxury and service. The kind of luxury that needs to be experienced In Real Life.
Colman Instagram Shop
Instagram Product Tagging
Taking the boutique experience online
Our strategy was simple: if the people can’t visit the boutique, we bring the boutique to the people.
Colman had already invested in an online presence that was on par with their boutiques. Webwave built a website with an integrated webshop that links to a PIM (Product Information Management) and a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system.
But we took it one step further: if you really want to go where the people are, you need to take the shopping experience to Social Media as well. So we integrated the entire catalogue of Colman in a Facebook Shop and an Instagram Store. This also allowed us to tag products in our posts.
So Colman was armed & ready to virtualise its business: the technology was up for the job.
But were the customers ready? Would people be prepared to buy a dress watch or necklace without trying it on first? Our job was to find out.
Always-on: inspire to desire
By definition, you don’t need luxury. You desire it. Successful luxury brands excel in creating desire and maintaining it. On Facebook and Instagram, we maintain the desire by posting attractive visuals and videos from the different watch and jewellery brands on a daily basis. Brandtag set up an approval flow where the client can see all the posts and stories one month beforehand in Facebook Creator Studio. Of course posting on your own channels is much like preaching to the choir, but in this case it makes good business sense: we estimated that most of our online income would come from existing clients rather than new prospects where we have to build up trust first.
Advertise for Action
Of course, we weren’t going to limit our efforts to our existing clients. In fact, we defined 3 target groups with different potential:
High-rollers: people who tend to live a life filled with luxury
Aficionado’s: people who have shown an interest in one of the specific brands Colman has in stock
Impulsive buyers: a target that is within walking distance of one of the boutiques with specific socio-demographic properties
We rolled out different ad-sets:
On special occasions, we target the High-rollers with awareness campaigns on Instagram and Facebook. Think Valentine, Christmas, Back Friday.
We continuously (re)target Aficionado’s with Facebook and Instagram Shopping ads.
Impulsive buyers are shown directions to the physical boutiques when they are in the neighbourhood. Of course, these are only activated when the Covid measures allowed for it.
Results
Colman now has a consistent and qualitative online presence that is on par with its boutiques, both on its website and on its social channels
An ever growing and interactive fanbase on Facebook and Instagram
A systematic increase in qualitative visitors to the website, with planned seasonal peaks
And even: a first Glashütte Original online sale