Gigantic™

Friday. Love.

This week we love some of the great moments from New York Fashion Week #nyfw (via @fashionstreamz)

• Models off the catwalk.
• Modelinia's look back on NYFW of season's past.
• The return of The Boyfriend Jacket.

Friday. Love.

This week, we love fashion and Fashion Night Out, Thursday Sept 10. Get out there and shop! (via @fashionstreamz)

Retail: Time to Track the Trends in Real-Time.

A recent article in The New York Times suggests that the need for tracking shopping trends in real-time is upon us.

An initiative known as “My Macy’s” requires the retailer’s merchandisers and other planners to go into stores each week to learn from the sales staff — who keep logs at the cash registers — what shoppers are requesting, snapping up or complaining about.

For instance, when strapless and bare-shouldered dresses were selling well everywhere except Salt Lake City and Pittsburgh, Macy’s employees in those stores knew the problem was that their customers wanted more modest dresses. So they passed that information on to the merchandisers. Out went the strapless dresses; in came dresses with cap sleeves. And sales went from lackluster to robust.

The article begins with the statement: "Shopping as we know it is on the brink of major change." and we couldn't agree more.

Life Streamz at You in Real-Time.

We just launched 3 sites that aggregate Twitter feeds into a stand alone web page. The sites cover Twitter users who are holding conversations around: Travel, Food and Fashion. Each site aggregates tweets, pictures linked to the tweets and allows for favoring of the tweets. Additionally, each site has a interactive Real-Time Trend Cloud that allows users to see who talking about a particular subject or trend.

These sites are built around our data pyramid of: Aggregation, Contextualization and Editing. Obviously each site is an aggregation and begins to add context by tracking trends and allowing for favoring. We plan to further enhance how context can be added and will be adding an editor for each site as well. Making each site a valuable real-time resource around each subject.

Why did we build these? We think these sites serve as Proof Points around the following beliefs:

• We believe there are users who can benefit from Twitter content but don't want to be actively involved in Tweeting. These sites will become a new kind of media helping users get a real-time view around each subject.     

• We believe that brands have to think about how to actually become media (as opposed to consume media) as the world becomes more social and connected—and Twitter feeds of brands are an example (in some cases) of the right kind of steps in that direction. Aggregating them allows for a great way to monitor them.

• We believe that the future of Twitter and other real-time media lies within the ability to build off of the API, adding value (context + editing) and users to already existing communities.  

Looking forward to your feedback on these (here or on Twitter) and thanks to everyone on Twitter who helped QC these. And a big shout out to the guys 14Four for an amazing job of programming.

 

Let's call it Social Retail: Shopping Together, Alone.

Social retail is the latest technological twist on shopping. Harnessing the power of the collective to create better deals and make sharing part of the user experience, it's a mashup of social media and shopping.

First up, Charlotte Russe rolls out Shop Together app allowing friends to shop online together through synchronized shopping sessions. GNC and Lillian Vernon are also said to be using this technology.

Next up is eswarm which turns the idea of crowdsourcing around to amass a collective that bargains for better deals. Seemingly the place for for savvy deal seekers to gather, the real opportunity is for a supplier to move lots inventory fast. Not a bad thing in a down economy.