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Neiman Marcus drives social shopping with holiday wish lists

November 3, 2010

Neiman Marcus' Presents Perfect social shopping initiative

Department store chain Neiman Marcus is promoting its gift options and encouraging consumers to share their holiday wish lists through a social media initiative on its Web site.

The Presents Perfect Challenge lets participants choose ten or more items from a selection of Neiman Marcus holiday gifts and submit their visual wish lists for a chance to win a $2,500 Neiman Marcus gift card. The challenge is available online at http://www.neimanmarcus.com/presentsperfect.

“[The contest] is a fun way to engage our customer and show they the large assortment of product we have at varied price points,” said Gabrielle DePapp, vice president of corporate public relations at Neiman Marcus, Dallas.

“It’s a great way to allow not only the Neiman Marcus customer to share their submissions with all their friends via various social networks, but it also allows us to engage new customers and expose them to our variety of gift ideas while viewing other entries,” she said.

Neiman Marcus developed the contest in partnership with social media marketing firm Brickfish.

Visual wish list
The Present Perfect Challenge Web page generates an interactive platform where visitors can participate in the contest.

The interface features four main sections: a contest overview, a section where visitors can view other entries, contest details and a place for participants to submit their own entries.

Neiman Marcus Presents Perfect Challenge platform

Visitors can chose from 14 different product categories such as accessories, beauty, gadgets, gifts, jewelry, men’s shoes and women’s shoes.

The category listings appear at the top of the screen, above a blank frame where participants will place their wish-list items.

When consumers click on a category, a selection of thumbnail images representing different gifts offered by Neiman Marcus will appear. Users can click on images to select them for the wish list and place it on the program’s canvas.

Once participants have placed a gift’s image in the frame, they can adjust the size, rotate its orientation and move it to the front or the back of the tableau.

Entrants are instructed to select at least ten items, then give their entry a name and description and designate the identity of the wish list’s recipient from a list of eight possible choices: Mom, Dad, The Kids, Host/Hostess, For Him, For Her, Other, The Person Who Has Everything.

Users can log-in to their Facebook and Twitter accounts to share details of the list with their friends.

Neiman Marcus is promoting the competition trhough blast messages to its email database as well as via its Facebook and Twitter accounts.

A Presents Perfect promotion on Neiman Marcus’ Facebook page

Contest stakes
Each week the program generates a top-ten list based on the most popular items selected.

Neiman Marcus will pick 40 finalists from the first round, which ends on Nov. 30. Five finalists will be selected from each of the eight gift recipient categories.

The second round will shorten the list to three prize winners.

One winner receives a $2,500 Neiman Marcus gift card, while a first runner-up earns a $1,000 dollar card and the second runner-up nets a $500 card.

This is Neiman’s third social shopping contest, following in the footsteps of its Rock-The-Prom challenge this spring and Passion for Fashion challenge in September.

“With both contests, customers also had to add a commentary explaining their selections and their inspiration,” Ms. DePapp said. “We generated over 900,000 views with 70 percent of the viewers coming from viral sources.

“These challenges allow not only our customers, but also a wider audience, to create content which we can then analyze and monitor and gain insight into their likes and dislikes,” she said. “From a branding perspective it allows us to broaden our reach.”

Holiday push
Neiman has already had an active holiday sales season, having released a mobile application to enable consumer to shop its catalogs from their iPads (see story).

The department store chain also launched an interactive and commerce-enabled iPhone application (see story).

“We hope this [contest] gives consumers more gifting ideas for the holidays and takes some of the stress out of the shopping experience,” Ms. DePapp said. “The gifts cover all price points and we think it will be something people will want to share with all their friends via their social networks.

“Let’s face it, no one likes tears on Christmas morning, so its better to give a list than to receive a request for a gift receipt,” she said.

Final Take
Peter Finocchiaro, editorial assistant at Luxury Daily, New York