London Fashion Week: Topshop Partners with Facebook for an Interactive, Social Shopping Experience

Pictured: Topshop’s new Social Shopping Interface will Debut at London Fashion Week.

Isn’t part of the fun of shopping interacting with other shoppers, or going shopping with your girlfriends? I think that’s the main lesson we all recently learned from Fashion’s Night Out.  Shopping is fun and for women, it’s an inherently social experience. The team at Topshop seems to really get that shopping is a team sport for most of us.  That’s why they have developed an  advanced social shopping experience with Facebook for the upcoming Topshop Unique Spring Summer 2013 London Fashion Week show on Sept 16th.

“This show is all about the customer and creating what we call ‘social entertainment’ around our product. We want to take the energy and the excitement of our iconic Oxford street store to millions of people all over the world through Topshop.com,” says Justin Cooke, the new Chief Marketing Officer for Topshop  “It’s social, it’s commerce and it’s entertainment all rolled into one.’’

So what exactly does this mean?  For the first time ever viewers will be able to ‘customize the catwalk’  experience.  This means  viewers watching the Topshop SS2013 show will have the ability to change the color of selected key looks and accessories and share them the moment they hit the runway or order them instantly with delivery 3 months ahead of industry lead times. That’s power, when fashion is literally at your fingertips and you can customize it to suit your tastes and match your figure. Personally, I can’t wait to test drive this.

The idea behind the Topshop social shopping experience is to engage viewers by allowing them to to personalize the show and share those moments with their friends. Everything from the music, to the clothes, to the beauty products can be purchased and shared across every platform, channel and device. I’m planning to watch in Los Angeles and share with my friends in London, since I may not make it across the pond in time for this. Of course, ifs there a way I can get to London next week, I will. Update, This just in, I will be there for the show, live blogging & Tweeting with the hashtag #TopshopUnique. I’ll also be pinning my favorite show looks on my Topshop Unique SS2013 Pinterest board.

To create this social, interactive fashion show, Topshop partnered with Facebook’s in house engineers. The smarties at Facebook developed ‘shoot the show.’ This is a camera button placed on the corner of the livestream and on demand versions of the Topshop Internet show from London Fashion Week. The camera button will allow users to click and capture their favourite looks from the show as if they were sitting in the front row,  easily enabling the content to reach hundreds of millions of people.

“Fashion enthusiasts are sharing the things they love on Facebook now more than ever. This is where the conversation happens, its among friends and its where great brands need to engage. Topshop clearly understand this, they are a cool young brand with a deep understanding of their customers, and by developing the innovative ‘shoot the show’ functionality with Facebook, they are enabling millions of people globally to share their favorite moments instantly with their friends,” says Joanna Shields, VP & MD,  Facebook

But wait there’s more.  What would interactive shopping be without a little “buy it now” action? All the beauty products used on the Topshop Unique girl  in the online show will be available to buy immediately with delivery in 48 hours alongside styling tips and tutorials. The online tips will be designed to replicate the in-store  Topshp nail bar by offering a digital version of it.  Too bad they can’t stream over the candy from the Oxford Circus store. Sweets and the cafe have always been part of the Topshop London shopping experience.

As with Burberry shows, and their Facebook page, music will be a crucial part of this experience. Visitors to the Topshop social experience be able to download  music from the social site on Topshop.com from iTunes both during and after the show.

How can you participate? Elementary my dear Social Media Maven! Follow @Topshop on Twitter and join the upcoming “Fashion Tweet Off” with the brand.  Topshop will be challenging fans to review the SS13 collection in 140 characters on launch day , in what it has branded the ‘Tweet off’. The best tweet will be chosen with the winner given vip tickets to the next show. All tweets will be broadcast live on Topshop.com.  You know I’ll be getting in the mix on that Tweet up!  Follow me @Recessionista to learn more and hear my thoughts.

To learn more, check out the Topshop Facebook page.  Leave me a comment and let me know your thoughts! I think it’s going to be amazing!