How to build customer trust on secondhand fashion platforms with immersive technologies
The secondhand clothing trend has taken a solid place in the market as an affordable and sustainable alternative to fast fashion. According to the 2022 Fashion Resale Report, the secondhand market is expected to double within five years to a whopping $77 billion. However, the secondhand fashion market still needs to overcome some negative images associated with pre-owned clothes. Let’s explore how the industry is evolving, why customer trust is crucial in the secondhand fashion market, and how to inspire consumers’ confidence on secondhand fashion platforms.
Reasons for the rise of secondhand fashion
One of the key drivers behind the rapid growth of the secondhand fashion market is modern consumers’ awareness about the environmental impact of clothes production, transportation and waste. Consumers in general are becoming more conscious of their individual impact on the environment and prefer to make more sustainable fashion choices. Additionally, some consumers cut back spending on apparel and turn to used clothing because it’s much cheaper. Others simply look for hard-to-find, vintage and unique items on the secondhand market.
The state of secondhand fashion market
The 2022 Fashion Resale Report revealed that as a result of consumers’ keen interest in pre-owned clothing, the market is expected to grow 3X faster than the global apparel market overall. North America leads global secondhand apparel market growth, at a rate 8x faster than other countries. The fastest-growing sector of secondhand is online resale. The most popular product categories in online resale include Casual Wear, Outerwear, Accessories, Footwear, and Loungewear.
The rise of recommerce: big retailers join the party
With resale appealing to a growing number of shoppers, more and more retailers are jumping on the recommerce bandwagon. According to the 2022 Fashion Resale Report, nearly 3 in 4 retail executives say they have or are open to offering secondhand to their customers, up 14 pts from 2020. For example, Nike launched a new service called “Nike Refurbished” that allows you to refurbish or resell shoes. Levi’s introduced its shoppers to “SecondHand”, a recommerce site that buys back unwanted Levi’s items and resells quality secondhand denim. Likewise, French sporting goods retailer Decathlon launched its resale website “Seconde Vie”. Today, shoppers are willing to spend their money with brands that align with their values, so apparel brands are jumping into the resale market to answer the new demand for a more sustainable offer.
Building customer trust on secondhand fashion platforms
Although secondhand fashion is getting more and more popular, fashion resale marketplaces still need to overcome the negative images associated with pre-owned clothes, in particular, consumers’ concern regarding the quality of desired items and sellers’ reliability. Online shoppers often doubt if the used item is still in good condition and reasonably priced, especially when it comes to buying pre-owned luxury fashion. That’s why it’s crucial to provide consumers with as much product information as possible to make it easier for the seller to sell and the buyer to buy.
A perfect way to inspire consumers’ confidence on secondhand fashion marketplaces is to provide buyers with interactive 3D product visuals that allow them to examine items in detail. This is where the 3DShot app comes into play. The mobile app allows sellers to capture products in a 3D View format (data format developed and patented by Cappasity) and add interactive 3D product visuals to their ads on marketplaces and classifieds. A 3D View of a product allows online buyers to interact with it like they would in real life: zoom in to see all tiny details and change the angle of perception to examine its condition.
As a result, the buyer gets the opportunity to check whether the item is heavily damaged by the previous owner or not and to make an informed purchase decision. By offering such an opportunity, a secondhand fashion marketplace will reduce the friction points between buyers and sellers and improve customer trust. What’s more, after integrating with Cappasity, our clients see higher conversion from search results (6%+), longer time on product page (15–45+ sec), and higher conversion rates of contacting sellers (12%+).
The application is extremely easy to use — all you need to create a high-quality 3D View of an item is a smartphone camera and good lighting. The seller simply opens the app, circles around the object, and the app automatically creates a 3D View. The resulting content is then saved in the Cappasity account and the seller will be able to display it on a marketplace or classified. Please watch the video to see how easily you can digitize items in 3D:
If you’re interested in integrating immersive technologies into your marketplace or classified site, contact our team at https://3dshot.io/contact
Download the 3DShot app to create interactive 3D product visuals of your items and increase customer trust: https://3dshot.io/
