Bazaarvoice made public that Zale Corporation will be working with Bazaarvoice Stories in an effort to gain customer loyalty by incorporating the social network application on Zale Corp.'s website. The recent announcement was made by Bazaarvoice, a leader in marketing technology which provides social commerce applications that drive sales programs. This is big news since Zales is a major specialty retailer for fine jewelry in North America.
The new application will allow customers to share their personal stories involving Zales’ and Gordon's jewelry. For more than a year, Zales has been successfully using Bazaarvoice Ratings & Reviews and now adds (lovestories.zales.com). The Stories application offers an online diary for customers to tell their special stories about events and celebrations and how Zales' products played a role in them.
Steve Larkin, Executive VP and Chief Marketing and Ecommerce Officer of Zale Corporation, describes the ideas behind the Bazaarvoice Stories venture. "The jewelry business is one that's built on people's personal stories, since fine jewelry is often given to celebrate joyous occasions like weddings, birthdays, the birth of a child and special holidays. Bazaarvoice Stories gives Zales customers a place to share their own love stories-whether humorous or heartfelt. This user-generated content is a great resource to connect shoppers with each other-and to build brand involvement and loyalty in an authentic and organic manner."
The Bazaarvoice message goes on to explain why Zales will benefit from the newest ecommerce sales application. "Zales has been a pioneer in listening to their customers via ratings and reviews, and their launch of our Stories product is just another milestone on their path to complete customer engagement." Brett Hurt, founder and CEO of Bazaarvoice says, "Studies prove that when customers engage with one another by sharing their real-life stories about certain brands or products, they become more loyal to the brand, purchase more products and become brand evangelists to their friends and community".
Bazzarvoice Stories help companies increase brand involvement and feed-back creating new opportunities to apply user-generated content (UGC). Companies can offer online destinations where customers and visitors can tell their personal stories about products and services and for additional use in campaigns, contests and promotions.
