In general women are more social than men; they feel more
comfortable if accompanied by friends or partners. It also applies when they
are going for shopping, especially when shopping for clothes. Women love to go
with friends, they can share opinions about the latest fashion trends while
choosing the new clothes on the stores.
In the online stores era today, the situation has changed.
You can easily shop using your gadget, but you are difficult to get the
togetherness just like when you are shopping with friends in boutique or
fashion stores.
Responding to these changes, the famous online fashion
store, Net-a-Porter, introduces a new application for iOS devices, namely The Net Set. This application is intended to create togetherness atmosphere for
buyers even though they are shopping in the digital store.
The Net Set looks quite similar to Pinterest. Users can
upload photos of clothing they like, and then look at pictures uploaded by
other users. Or they can also access the catalogs that have been prepared by
Net-a-Porter.
Interestingly, The Net Set is also equipped with image
recognition technology. For example: You're drinking a glass of guava juice in
a cafe. Take a photo of that guava juice, and then upload it to The Net Set.
You will get recommendations of various pink clothes just like the color of
guava juice you drink.
Similarly when you upload a dress picture from the magazine
or a store, the image recognition technology will seek similar outfit from a
catalog available. When you feel comfortable with certain clothes, you can buy
it directly.
To revive the togetherness atmosphere, the social media
element has been embedded into The Net Set. Users can become a follower of
various designers and brands, as well as search for other users who have
similar tastes. From here, they can make a community called 'Style Tribe', where
the members have similar tastes about fashion.
Style Tribe can also build relation with various designers
or brands. Before designing the latest work, a designer can first ask for input
from the Style Tribe to understand what's being desired by the customers at
that time.
Unfortunately, the clothes that can be purchased from The Net Set mostly come from the Net-a-Porter catalogs which displaying clothes
from renowned designers, so the prices offered are relatively high. Furthermore,
at this time The Net Set is still 'limited', or in other words, you can
register and start shopping after receiving an invitation.