Woolmark launches ecommerce site for fashion

The Woolmark Company has unveiled a new ecommerce market place aimed at extending the reach of Merino wool fashion products worldwide.

The Merino Shop was developed in partnership with online fashion site, ShopStyle, and global digital marketing agency, Lowe Profero, and sits on the wool promotional body’s consumer-facing website, Merino.com.

Consumers can search for clothing and accessories made from wool in the shop from a host of retailers and brands. Once they’ve decided on an item to buy, then are linked through to the retailer’s site via ShopStyle to complete their purchase.

The content-driven Merino.com website provides information on the heritage and story behind Merino wool, and has recently been relaunched. The website is aimed at increasing consumer engagement and provides a central marketing channel for the fibre, its products and its brand image, Woolmark said.

Woolmark Company chief strategy and marketing officer, Rob Langtry, said introducing ecommerce into the site connects the story of the products consumers are buying through to purchase. It will also allow tens of thousands of Australian woolgrowers to explore the diverse range of products created from the fibre they cultivate, he said.

“Merino.com is our primary channel for educating consumers on the benefits of Merino wool through highly engaging content,” Langtry said. The site launched 12 months ago and has been steadily growing in terms of content and language capabilities since then.

“The past two years has seen our digital presence significantly grow and our key campaigns are increasingly moving to a digital basis. While we are currently about 60:40 digital: traditional, within the next three years we are likely to shift towards 90:10.”

Over the past four years, AWI has Langtry toldCMOthe AWI has put the majority of emphasis first on connecting with trade. The group has 80 brand partners globally, most of which are fashion brands.

More recently, AWI has been ramping up its content marketing skillset and launched the Merino.com consumer site 12 months ago as a way of talking to the customers of its partners, Langtry said.

The site has been populated with a range of internally produced content and gained multiple language options two months ago.

“As we’ve built out the publishing platform, rather than just generate leads, the ecommerce capability allows these consumers to follow through with a purchase opportunity,” Langtry said.

The ShopStyle agreement is not exclusive, however, and Langtry said it will look at extending its ecommerce capabilities as demand increases.

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