How Goop is nailing Contextual Commerce
In his book The Content Trap, Harvard professor Bharat Anand states that every company should behave like a media company. No B2C company can afford to only be selling goods through their store (be that online or offline). I’d add to that by saying a brand nowadays can’t afford to only be a retailer or service provider anymore, they should be “slashing” — publisher/fashion brand/event organiser/home decor manufacturer/full-on media producer.
Those are only a few of the slashes I’d use to describe Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow’s lifestyle brand. Goop has been winning over the trust and wallets of its (mainly female) audience and has succeeded to build a wellness empire that people either seem to adore or despise. Whichever camp you belong to, the company has been pioneering the modern landscape of eCommerce and can be taken as a classroom example of brand building. What is the special formula that makes Goop the trailblazing success it is today? And which of their marketing moves would be best to leave behind?
From GP’s kitchen to 8 million inboxes
Let’s go back to 2008, to GP’s (Gwyneth’s nickname adopted by her Goop staff) kitchen table in the center of London. Little did she know then that the weekly newsletter she started sending out — containing recipes, interviews with industry experts, and travel recommendations — would grow into a company employing 250 people with a $250 million value. Today, the newsletter has 8 million subscribers, and as of June, goop.com welcomes 2.4 million unique visitors per month. They have 3 permanent stores and many pop-up initiatives that have been setup over the years. The bi-annual In Goop Health Summit caters to the customers’ desire to fully emerge into the Goop lifestyle, IRL. And that, I’m sure, is only the beginning of the Goop expansion.
It took GP almost six years to convert her newsletter into a brand that could actually make money by realizing the power of contextual commerce. This is a marketing term for allowing consumers to purchase in any context or setting — something B2C brands better embrace if they want to survive in the red ocean of eCommerce. And this goes further than placing ads in every free space on your website, placing Shop This buttons everywhere or allowing readers to directly purchase the organic parsnip chutney mentioned in a recipe. It requires a strong brand foundation and the right, high-quality content that can be consumed cross-platform for your audience to keep coming back.
Nailing contextual commerce
These are my takeaways to learn from Goop in achieving successful contextual commerce:
- Intimately know thy audience — a cliche, for sure, but nonetheless a must. Goop understands its target audience (high-income individuals, mostly women, with an interest in personal wellbeing) in a way that goes beyond a quick persona Powerpoint presentation. They know how this person shops, when she shops, her needs, and what she’s interested in before even she knows it. Goop has created their brand’s tone of voice to sound like a trusted friend and has coated all its content with it (from the intrusive website pop-up asking for your email to the recipe copy — they even write the brand’s name without a capital G in their content, for a friendlier feeling I’m sure).
The brand heavily invests in translating this tone of voice to its visuals as well, accompanying each content piece with beautifully produced images that make you instantly want to buy everything in order to achieve the same zen mode.
The merchandise is curated to a T, always relevant, like the online embodiment of the hip brick-and-mortar concept store. The customer knows it will be served the top of the crop when it comes to clean eating and beauty, New Age wellness products that are not too New Age-y, and the most beautiful garments with just the right je ne sais quoi-vibe. The buying process serves the demanding customer with a hassle-free shopping experience of:
- Seamless redirections from any platform
- Levels of registration allowing you to choose how much information you’re comfortable sharing
- A transparent payment page that shows you the steps still ahead
All wrapped in aesthetically pleasing UX, of course. Every Goop touch point with their customers has been carefully designed to make their hearts beat faster — and pull out their credit cards.
2. Different channel, different strategy — Contextual commerce sure, but monetize each media arm with its own approach. Goop does this through different business strategies, with both direct and indirect monetization. They use:
a. Sponsorships for their successful podcast (originally called The Goop Podcast, counting 100,000 to 650,000 listens per week)
b. Partnerships for their offline events and capsule fashion collections
c. Product endorsements for their ‘recommended’ content (there are different levels of this: from a full product review to a Shop The Story mention of a specific item)
d. Traditional ad placements for their newsletter and website
And let’s not forget social media and the art of creating the right eye-capturing posts:
- Facebook — ‘Recommended’ content pieces. They understand that no one will buy on Facebook and so they only post their newly published articles, acting as a news outlet/publisher.
- Instagram — Product placement and endorsements. You can’t embed redirection links so it is key to feature the most trendy and beautiful visuals accompanied by capturing copy in order for the prospect to make the effort to search for the link in bio.
- Twitter — this is not a place for inspiration or where purchase decisions are being made. Therefore Goop doesn’t heavily invest in this channel and only posts the minimal amount of tweets to exist on the medium.
- YouTube — Product placement and endorsement. Short videos (they keep it around 1:30 minutes) are the perfect vehicle for Goop to show the merchandise in action, using (mostly) their employees to achieve that relatable, trustworthy tone of voice.
- Spotify — Advertisements. Home to their podcast, where they monetize by selling audio ad space, familiarizing the listener with the product by wrapping it in a personal story and repeating it throughout each episode, every episode.
3. Influencer marketing 2019 — Tying into point #1 of knowing your audience, Goop saw through the trend of using influencers to sell products. Instead, they went for Influencer Marketing anno 2019: using ‘real’ people that are relatable enough to inspire. The stories often feature an intimate glimpse into the morning routine, bathroom or kitchen of successful business women (whom all, conveniently, seem to be using the entire product stack available through goop.com). And they don’t shy away from using Goop employees to promote a product in one of their specially made YouTube videos or product review articles. Here they meet the customer at the crossroads of relatability and inspiration which is where the sales message hits home hardest.
4. Be a storyteller — This is the component that ties all the channels together, the true foundation of the brand. Goop would not have been the success it is today without a compelling story that deeply resonates with its consumers. They not only managed to find their USP and mold it into an attractive story, they’ve also mastered implementing this story into every element of their business. All the topics and content of their articles/newsletter, the way they speak to their audience, every image, partnership and all their merchandise neatly fits into their vision and tells that story. Even the commercials during the podcast are cute personal stories, told by their Chief Content Officer, delivered in the pleasant, relatable way that is Goop.
Better leave the jade eggs in the Goop store
Goop’s road to becoming a successful brand hasn’t been paved solely with great examples. There are definitely some marketing moves, or lack thereof, I’d say NOT to learn from:
- The lack of proper fact checking has been giving them the most backlash, especially when it comes to their wellness pieces. Goop.com/wellness seems to be a town square of physicians and self-proclaimed practitioners that advocate whatever potion or treatment they believe in, resulting in some straight up ridiculous claims (think: jade eggs to insert in the vagina to allegedly fix hormone levels), followed by a whole lot of controversy. Not great for a brand that is so largely built on the trust of the customer.
- In today’s day and age of machine learning and big data,no brand should be without some system of automatic personalization in order to tailor the user’s experience. It seems that Goop doesn’t alter their content even if they know who they have in front of them. Smart marketing tricks, like an abandonment email after halfway leaving a purchase process, are not in place. Being data-driven is a must for survival, if you ask me.
- For a company that leans so heavily on their leading position in the world of high-end personal wellness and lifestyle, pushing the envelope can backfire. How far is their clientele willing to go when it comes to accepting weird New Age-y beauty routines into their bathrooms? Goop is walking a fine line of keeping their audience interested. So far it seems that GP is saving the day as its ultimate cover girl, but what happens once she completely steps out of the Goop limelight and will only be pulling the reins from behind the scenes?
- And lastly, besides Goop’s rapid vertical expansion, it is questionable how much their business can scale. After all, they’re targeting an audience that chases a lifestyle that swims opposite the mass-market mainstream.
All that being said, I find it admirable how Goop has become the go-to place for anything that interests the modern-day woman while staying highly focused on monetizing every element of their business. Each article is filled with product placement, every social media post has been cleverly constructed to direct the reader to where Goop wants them to go (pulling out their credit cards) but it’s all being done in style. Every employee at all times represents the brand and will be marveling at the latest products in the Goop staple. It is brand building to the last detail. But they still couldn’t make me buy those jade eggs.
