With the advent of social media, some are inclined to think that we entered a new era in which clients do all the work: talk about the brand, create fantastic content, promote products and even buy more of them because they are so passionate about it.

Editorial content and its advertising focused declinations, such as advertorials for example, remain a very effective way to promote or build buzz around products and the brand.

Most luxury brands understand service better than anyone else. In-store sales, event management, or bespoke design are some of the areas where they push boundaries. Why then is it still so rare to see the same level of attention with online services?

A recent article published by WWD Men’s states that men’s luxury fashion is showing a global growth. Some aspects of life are more immune to economics. When it comes to identity, fashion and its statements sometimes appears to go beyond buying power.

Online virtual worlds and all of their related applications (e.g. virtual shopping) can be as useless as they are beautiful. More often can they actually end up wasting a client’s precious time – defying its purpose.

Mini has been extremely aggressive with community marketing lately. Their online world is deep and wide with tens of micro-sites.

This Next is a social shopping network, along the lines of Kaboodle. The site centered a lot of attention onto their “Mavens” (trend-setters) who are featured on the homepage.