chapter 6 207digital luxury- Live online chat with a customer services representative.
- Direct telephone link facilities from the website.
- E-notes facilities for message posting.
- Online bulletin boards.
- Online personal shopper.
- E-news subscription.
- Instant online fashion coordination.
- Extensive product view and description.
- Exclusive subscription offers to fashion shows and product previews.
- High security transactions.
- Viral marketing tools.
- Permission marketing tools.
Online customer services programmes also provide an excellent medium of
developing a customer database and gathering feedback from consumers. The
majority of the existing luxury brands are far from implementing effective
e-CRM strategies. A few exceptions are Gucci.com and Eluxury.com (Figure
6.13) which have implemented efficient means of interaction between their
online customers and an available customer services staff.
Community
The online consumer society consists of several communities of consumers
with shared interests. The internet has equipped consumers with the tool to
develop platforms where they can share stories of positive and negative expe-
riences with different brands. These are called user-to-user communities.
These communities have sprung up in the luxury fashion arena, although they
have been prevalent in other sectors such as the airline industry. A notable
Figure 6.13
Eluxury.com’s live
chat facility provides
instant shopping
assistance in an
efficient manner
(June 2006)