One of the Year’s Biggest Fashion Media Stories: Revamping Style.com

Continuing with our look at year-end countdowns, it’s time to take a look at 2016’s biggest fashion media stories. First up is the relaunch of Style.com by Condé Nast, remaking the site into a luxury e-commercial space.

Does Style.com Have an Edge in the Luxury e-Commerce Space?

Back in October, BoF asked if the revamped Style.com can be considered a success, and if so, why. Style.com president Franck Zayan gave insight into the three pillars of Style.com’s brand positioning.

BoF: The luxury e-commerce space is highly competitive. What gives Style.com an edge?

FZ: First of all, it’s a space that is still growing and will grow significantly over the next six to seven years. So the size of the overall cake is getting bigger. Now, that being said, going out there with exactly the same platform as everyone else is not enough. We are building a position that stands on three pillars.

Number one is the incredible content we can leverage from brands like Vogue and GQ, which is very different from just saying we have content. Those brands carry incredible weight in the market. The product assortment is also part of it. We decided to position ourselves with big emblematic fashion brands as well as rising stars, new designers, new names. And, thirdly, there’s the technology piece. We’re not here to build a basic catalogue of products. We are here to build a sustainable proposition for customers that relies on recommendations and personalisation.

We have an entire artificial intelligence team here, because the product assortment we show people needs to be relevant to them and what they are reading. We are just starting. Some might see that as a disadvantage, but I see it as an incredible advantage, because we are not stuck with any kind of legacy system.

Read more at BoF.

From Business of Fashion:

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The Best of BoF 2016 | Top 10 Media Stories

1. Is the New Style.com Working? It’s been just over a month since the launch of Condé Nast’s new e-commerce venture. Is it working? BoF’s Vikram Alexei Kansara sits down with Franck Zayan, president of Style.com, to investigate.
2. What’s Going on at Condé Nast The publisher is streamlining its operations and reorganising its US portfolio to capitalise on its most valuable brands: Vogue, Vanity Fair, GQ, Wired and The New Yorker. BoF breaks down the changes.
3. How Instagram’s New Feed Will Impact Brands and Influencers What does Instagram’s new algorithmic feed mean for the platform’s lucrative influence economy?
4. Can Cost-Cutting Save Magazines In the face of falling print ad sales and circulation figures, publishers are experimenting with new ways to cut cost, including pooling staff and sharing content.
5. Condé Nast to Launch Vogue Arabia BoF can reveal that Condé Nast will launch a Vogue Arabia edition online in the autumn, followed by a print magazine next spring, appointing Saudi Princess Deena Aljuhani Abdulaziz as its editor-in-chief.
6. How Snapchat Killed the Homepage In an attempt to woo Generation Z, publishers are launching social media-only concepts.
7. The Art of Disclosure: FTC and the Influence Economy As the importance of native advertising continues to grow, are brands and digital influencers coming clean with consumers about the deals that power fashion’s influence economy?
8. How Newspaper Supplements Took on Fashion Magazines While commercial success among fashion magazines is uneven, supplements are a steady oasis of profitability. How are they doing it?
9. Publishers Bet Big on Special Editions Bookazines and special interest publications offer struggling print magazines high-margin revenue opportunities and the promise of new readers. But are they cannibalising the already-dwindling audience for monthly editions?
10. Is Branded Content Buoying Fashion Publishers? Fashion publishers are pushing sponsored content to make up for declining traditional print advertising revenues. Is it working?