Luxury brands have gone from relative inertia over digital strategies to a flurry of activity, including technology upgrades, partnerships, and even acquisitions. Back in the summer of 2017, we warned that luxury brands were out of time when it came to improving their digital customer experiences and internal operations.

Digitally mature and savvy luxury consumers will not tolerate a disconnect between digital and in-store experiences, and luxury brands risk losing control of their direct customer commerce relationships to online multibrand powerhouses such as Farfetch and YOOX NET-A-PORTER (YNAP).

Luxury Brands Are Waking Up To Digital But Still Have More To Do

Luxury brands are taking action but still have much ground to cover to create the exceptional omnichannel experiences that their customers expect. Key takeaways from the latest research include:

  • Luxury brands are out of time. Luxury multibrand pure players such as Farfetch and YNAP continue to grow in popularity and profitability. But luxury brands know they are out of time and are starting to improve their digital customer experiences and internal operations.
  • Luxury brands are chasing digitally mature consumers. Luxury consumers are digitally savvy early adopters with high brand expectations — even more so than mainstream consumers.
  • To succeed, luxury brand organizations must be unified and customer-led. Luxury retail brands must banish traditional online/offline channel silos and evolve their business models, operations, systems, processes, and people to truly become customer-obsessed.

The “Luxury Retail 2018: What A Difference A Year Makes” Forrester Report

This latest report shares insight into luxury consumers’ expectations and what luxury brands must do to evolve their business and succeed with their digital catch-up efforts. If you’d like to discuss any of the findings in further detail, please schedule an inquiry with me.