Online revenue grows 23%, Fabletics boosts online search

Athleisure apparel is growing in popularity, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic , as consumers ditch work pants for more comfortable options. Fabletics, which sells workout leggings , sports bras and other comfortable activewear , sensed the opportunity and stepped up its online search capabilities to improve consumers’ online shopping experience.

Ryan Darling, product director of Fabletics at Techable Fashion Group, said it would seize market opportunities around home sportswear to achieve better results in 2021.

Survey data shows that activewear accounted for 28% of total clothing consumption in the 12 months to May 2020, up 4 percentage points from 24% of the clothing market in the 12 months to May 2018.

In a 2020 survey of 950 online clothing shoppers, 64% of them purchased sportswear online. In addition, 22% of them have purchased sportswear online in the past few years, and only 13 % of consumers do not wear sportswear at all.

While Fabletics’ online sales have boosted its sales during the coronavirus pandemic , it still has 50 pages of products for consumers to sift through to find what they want. Its CEO said it doesn’t take into account shoppers who come to the site for a specific product , so it will work to narrow the search.

Initially, the retailer wanted to build some solution for in-house search, as it was often incompatible with third-party vendors. Fabletics decided to use Searchspring’s search technology because of the customizability it offered .

It took about two months to implement the search upgrade and roll it out to customers globally. Starting in fall 2020, shoppers can now type in searches like “blue sports bra” or “leggings with pockets” and see both textual and visual product suggestions as they type .

Darling said that Fabletics' search-related revenue increased 23% in February 2021 compared to February 2020, with transactions driven by search functions increasing 21%. In addition, the average order value of its customers who use search is $13 higher than that of non-search customers , which is equivalent to a five-fold conversion rate brought by search.

In fact, customers who use search tend to have a higher intent to buy products because they are searching for specific products . In addition to the main benefit of providing shoppers with the most relevant products based on their search query, Fabletics also has greater control over the items in search results through Searchspring's platform. Its marketing team can use the platform to create custom campaigns to increase or decrease the priority of specific products in the search results page.

He added that Searchspring ’s dashboard gives Fabletics insights into what customers are looking for, which helps the marketing and sales teams create new campaigns and products. In addition, Fabletics can adjust product category pages based on popular products, curate product pages to include limited-edition collections, and create landing pages for specific influencers to showcase products and promotions from their specific platforms.

For example, Madelaine Petsch, star of the CW TV show “Riverdale,” is an influencer that Fabletics has partnered with. So when she shares a photo or promo code on Instagram, Fabletics can create a landing page with the product she’s promoting and display any coupons.

Fabletics is planning to add trending searches and personalized recommendations to its search results , with the latter to be launched in 2021. Its platform will recommend products to shoppers based on past search history and recently viewed items. Fabletics said it will continue to enhance and expand the site in innovative new ways to meet the needs of modern online shoppers .

Fabletics

Online Search

Sportswear