WhatsApp users could soon buy Prada, Versace and other luxury goods through the app
I hope I speak for everyone when I say that Net-a-Porter is the site we all secretly visit to lust after designer pieces we never really could afford. For us girls at least, guys head to Mr Porter instead.
The Yoox Net-a-porter group just upgraded their digital e-commerce platform with plans to develop a new technology. And that is allowing its highest paying consumers to buy directly through WhatsApp.
Keeping up with the Chinese
China’s WeChat is one step ahead – majority of their 700 million users are already linking their bank accounts to the messaging app. Bills, shopping and cab rides are all payable via WeChat, in a tap-and-go manner. 92% of global luxury brands are already marketing through the platform, but only a small proportion is selling directly through the app.
“We’ve made some of our biggest sales to EIPs by chatting to them through WhatsApp”.
So far, the fashion industry has been slow to capitalise on the opportunity of using messaging to sell to customers. Yoox Net-a-porter e-commerce platform already uses WhatsApp to communicate directly with its top clients but they are hoping that this new technology will allow even more direct and engaging relations with the customer.
Net-a-Porter says it’s still testing out the technology and no release date has been scheduled so far. Additionally, no details have been given on how the payment feature of the texting app would work either. Unlike the website, where one can openly access, the new platform will only exclusively be for those under their “Extremely Important People”, who helps generate about 40 percent of their revenue.
Net-a-porter mobile customers place more than double the orders of desktop users, making the WhatsApp opportunity potentially highly lucrative, particularly since those mobile purchases are also twice as valuable. With forecasts that the online luxury market will double to more than $39 billion by 2021, investors are already aiming for a slice of the business.
