Following mysterious tweets from @TargetStyle in early October, Target announced a partnership with fashion designer Jason Wu who became well-known after designing the 2009 Inaugural Ball gown for First Lady Michelle Obama. The official look book for was released online on January 10th in anticipation of the in-store and online launch which took place on Sunday, February 5th. Weekly searches for variations of “Jason Wu” shows consumers seeking out information related to the designer corresponding with these key dates.
Daily search data for February 5th shows that four of the five top searches around the term “Jason Wu” also included mentions of “Target”. An analysis of the individual keywords used in searches for “Jason Wu” on the day of the product launch indicates that “cat”, “poplin” “scarf” and “dress” were the top items that consumers were looking for related to the product line.
Total visits to Target.com were up 8% on February 5th when compared with the previous day, but down 77% when compared with Thanksgiving, which was the most highly trafficked date for Target in the past 6 months. However, total visits to Target were up 22% on the day the Jason Wu product launched when compared with September 13, 2011 – the date the Missoni line launched and the site had trouble keeping up with online consumer demand. However, average visit time to the site was slightly higher on the date of the Missoni launch when compared with the date of the Jason Wu launch (7:51 minutes versus 6:31 minutes).
Thanks to Lauren Rice, Analyst with the Strategic Services team for today’s analysis who wishes she lived closer to a Target.