In today’s online
driven world many consumers are spending more time shopping online then in
brick and mortar stores. With online shopping sales expected to increase to
over $370 billion by 2017(Abramovich, 2014). This increase in online sales has
made the online market extremely competitive and increases the importance of
proper SEO implementation for all sites. The site that I chose to study is
Fabletics.com.
Fabletics.com
is an online retail store when customers can sign up for a monthly program to
receive new affordable workout clothes. Fabletics was founded in 2013 by three
partners because, “there were plenty of luxury brands, but none that offered
stylish and high quality gear at an accessible price point”(Fabletics, 2016).
Fabletics has created a website that allows customers to create outfits and
order each month. Customers enjoy this service because it provides them the
ability to purchase a quality work out outfit every month at an extremely
affordable price compared to other major competitors.
Fabletics has used
many different marketing tactics to increase its market share in the industry.
The use of Kate Hudson, who is a co-founder, as a spokesperson has helped
increase the reach of Fabletics, helping it increase traffic to its site. Their
webpage has many pictures of examples of outfits with pricing and includes very
few words to avoid too much clutter on the page. Fabletics uses three main tabs
and one drop down to keep the entire process simple for the user. The dropdown
menu that is available for the users on the home page is for shopping and
finding certain categories within the site.
Fabletics
clearly focuses on having a simple straightforward approach to their site that
concentrates on letting the visitor see the products instead of providing
unnecessary information that distracts them from the product. The homepage for
Fabletics has a total of 386 words on it, with the majority of them being the
menu options at the bottom of the page (Internet Marketing Ninjas, 2016). In
comparison, a competitor such as Under Armour, has over 1,800 words on its
homepage (Internet Marketing Ninjas, 2016). The differences of something that
seems as simple as word count can show the disparities in philosophy between
the marketing teams of both companies. Fabletics is clearly focusing on the
ability to show more of their product and keep minimal clutter on their page.
Under Armour has the focus on providing more information and options to their
visitors and looks to show its expansive options through more information.
Another major metric that stood out in my
analysis was the number of links on Fabletics page. Currently there are 23
external links on their home page (Internet Marketing Ninjas, 2016). While many
times in life and marketing, people tend to believe that more is better, that
is not always the case. The use of only 23 links that are effective can be far
more impactful for a company then thousands of links. Continuing the comparison
of the competition, there is another large difference between Fabletics and
Under Armour. With Fabletics having 23 external links they are nowhere close to
the nearly 1,200 links on Under Armour’s page (Internet Marketing Ninjas, 2016).
While external links are important in building a great site, having too many
can take away from it as well. “Some experts believe that indexing of more than
a hundred links in a page may set off the alarms of spam filters and result to
the downgrading of the quality of the subject web page”(WordPress Design Shop,
2016). Fabletics having only slightly over one hundred links is reducing the
risk that they are downgraded in search rankings. While a company like Under
Armour is not as worried about this causing a major downgrade due to their
brand image and recognition, a relatively new company in the industry that is
fighting for market share, like Fabletics, this can be crucial in the success
of their company.
The external links available on the page are
not the only links that are affecting the SEO and search rankings of these
site’s pages. The internal links are also a big factor in this process as well.
Currently, Fabletics has 149 internal links on its homepage. This is a great
number that stays consistent with the recommendation to stay around one hundred
links on the page. While the recommendation is one hundred it is also stated
that the best number for each company depends on what the customer needs in
order to make a decision. So while a competitor may have more or less links it
all depends on they are trying to achieve.
After analyzing the webpage of Fabletics and
the metrics of its SEO, it seems clear to me what their goals and objectives
are for their site. While their competitors have a longer history in the market
and have built brands that have larger product lines and contain more
complexity, Fabletics is young and focusing on reaching their customers with
their products. Fabletics is focusing on ease of use and letting their products
and prices sell for themselves. The marketing team of Fabletics has worked on
creating a site that feature enough information but never so much that it
becomes complex and hard for the visitor to accomplish their goal. When it
comes to online retail stores, the visitor of the site and the company tend to
have similar goals. The visitor has hopes of finding a great product that fits
their budget and appearance goals. The company has a goal of selling their
product to the customer and leaving them satisfied. Through the analysis of the
Fabletics site, I believe that they have been able to achieve this goal. As a
younger company they have been more focused on customer satisfaction then the
flashiness and over the top marketing that some competitors use.
Fabletics
may never be able to contend with the well-established competitors in the
market but overall they are creating a great niche within that industry that
can help them have long term success. The creation of a great site that is
simple and customer focused has been the first step in this process. It will be
interesting to see if they continue this philosophy in the future with their
site or if they fall into the trap of “show time” marketing that their
competitors are using.
References
About Fabletics. (n.d.). Retrieved November 19, 2016, from
http://www.fabletics.com/about#press
Abramovich, G. (2014, May 7). 15 Mind- Blowing Stats about
Online Shopping. Retrieved November 19, 2016, from
http://www.cmo.com/features/articles/2014/5/6/Mind_Blowing_Stats_Online_Shopping.html#gs.UGOs2SY
Disadvantages Of Having Too Much Content And Too Many Links
On A Website. (n.d.). Retrieved November 19, 2016, from http://wordpressdesignshop.com/disadvantages-of-having-too-much-content-and-too-many-links-on-a-website/
On-Page Optimization Tool. (n.d.). Retrieved November 19,
2016, from http://www.internetmarketingninjas.com/seo-tools/free-optimization/
Side-by-Side SEO Comparison Tool. (n.d.). Retrieved November
19, 2016, from http://www.internetmarketingninjas.com/seo-tools/seo-compare/
Appendix
Figure 1- Fabletics Home Page
Figure
2- Under Armour
Figure
3- Page Analysis
Figure
4- Analytics for Fabletics
