Some assumptions on the Shenshi Case Study
- my target audience is the aspiring career climber.
- the most representative industry for male career climbers in London is Finance. (that may have changed post-crash, but I would be surprised)
- the Gherkin is a well-recognized symbol of the Financial District aka “the City”. (Feels like an eternity since I sipped the rarefied nectar that is a London Pride…sadly).
- Savile Row is well beyond the reach of my target audience with their modest means.
- my target aspires to work in the Gherkin, but they’re some way off.
- to enter the UK market, I’m positioning Shenshi at a lower pricepoint than Next. We build a base, then move up and out as dictated by growth opportunities. However, I’m assuming Shenshi will provide designs that are easily the equal of Next (UK) or Banana Republic (US). The best analogy is the Korean automotive manufacturers who entered the UK market initially competing on price, but in fact offered excellent real quality. It took some time to change audience perceptions of quality. Now Korean cars have climbed the “quality perception ladder” and are positioned at #3 & #4 best selling family cars, and #5 & #6 bestselling large family cars.
- Shenshi is being positioned as a good fashion provider for my aspirational career climber. Nicely cut design can be supplied at a very competitive price point thanks to Shenshi’s manufacturing capabilities.
- for professionals who live and breathe content and all the stats and reports that go along with it, Pinerest data showing the majority users as female are legion. I agree with your findings. My US data suggests 68% female and 32% male. In terms of how many women compared to men enjoy shopping for fashion, from my experience, that ratio sounds like a good fit, i.e. about 70/30. So there really is nothing surprising there when we consider fashion is one of the biggest sources of content on Pinterest.
- In the U.K., they’re male more men use Pinterest than women. Source: agbeat.com
- (I am 100% open to being swayed by data and would love to see any data that contradicts those numbers or assumptions).
- Does the “average Joe” care about those numbers? I would argue no.
- What our target cares about is looking and feeling the part to “get ahead” in business, without breaking the bank :) — and they’re in luck with Pinterest. There’s enough men’s fashion ideas on Pinterest to keep the average male Fashionista browsing for weeks if not months.
- I’m also assuming that Fashion is mostly a visual experience. There is no more visually inspiring social site that Pinterest.
- Please try this link and see if you can keep scrolling to the end of the listing.
- Here’s some brand-specific Pinterest searches:
GAP
Banana Republic
Next Men
Abercrombie & Fitch
J Crew
- Here’s some generic category links for mens fashion:
Men’s suits
Men’s ties
British suits
Mens Style
- This speaks to your gender-specific comment about Pinterest: if you consider Hockey to be male-targeted, then check out how many pins and boards are dedicated to the sport all Canadian males love.
- Of interest to male and female alike is the wealth of pins related to “How to get ahead at work”. That will be another focal point in my plan.
- Pinterest is the fastest growing social network in history and has proven buying power to boot:
“Conversion rates for Pinterest traffic are 50% higher than conversion rates from other traffic and Pinterest is the top converting social media site for “Top of the Funnel” advertising.” ~SocialMediaToday.com
"Pinterest drives more revenue per click than Twitter or Facebook" ~ venturebeat.com
- 70 million users (Jul 2013) 32% male. Best social site for Fashion. INFOGRAPHIC
- Mindboggling Pinterest facts.
"According to social login provider Gigya’s latest numbers, Pinterest grabs 41% of e-commerce traffic. Compare that to Facebook at 37%. Since Pinterest is centered around the social discovery of objects (as opposed to friends and family), it makes sense that Pinterest would eventually have the upper hand, but it’s an accomplishment for any platform to sneak up on Facebook’s number-one-in-everything status.” ~Lauren Orsini, readwrite.com