Gliebers Dresses: The Cocktail Dress

It is time for another Executive Meeting.

Glenn Glieber (Owner): "... and I'm telling you, during my staycation, I enjoyed all sorts of programming. Have you checked out all the excitement in "Judge TV"? Probably not, you're busy working for me, right? Anyway, you can spend all day learning about the ways that landlords ripped off tenants, or how a girlfriend stole Craftsman tools from a deadbeat boyfriend as payment for 1984 Camaro he stole from her. There's Judge Judy, Judge Joe Brown, The People's Court, Judge Mathis, Judge Alex, Divorce Court, Christina's Court, Judge Karen, Judge David Young, Family Court with Judge Penny, Judge Hatchett, Judge Jeanine Pirro. Six straight hours of entertainment, all paid for by advertising. Heck, I even bought one of those things that rubs dead skin off of your feet, just $19.95 plus shipping and handling. Wow, what a week!"

Meredith Thompson (Chief Merchandising Officer): "Kevin, is that you?"

Kevin: "Yup, it's me."

Meredith Thompson: "We are so excited, Kevin, we're just bouncing off the walls today!"

Kevin: "Why?"

Pepper Morgan (Interim Chief Marketing Officer): "Haven't you heard?"

Kevin: "Heard what?"

Candi Layton (Chief Customer Officer and HR): "TMZ TOOK A PICTURE OF REESE WITHERSPOON WEARING ONE OF OUR STRAPLESS COCKTAIL DRESSES LAST NIGHT! OH MY GOD!"

Roger Morgan (Operations And IT): "And now the website is going absolutely crazy!

Candi Layton: "People are tweeting about this everywhere. Our cocktail dress is trending as one of the top ten terms on Twitter today!"

Meredith Thompson: "We're almost sold-out of the dress already!"

Roger Morgan: "The conversion rate of customers who look at the dress is more than thirty-two percent. 32%. Can you believe it?"

Candi Layton: "And people are tweeting about it everywhere!"

Lois Gladstone (Chief Financial Officer): "This is going to save our bacon in August. For the first time in my tenure, we're going to post a sales increase."

Roger Morgan: "We don't have enough people at the call center to handle the call volumes. Right now, the average wait time to speak with a customer service representative is thirteen minutes."

Meredith Thompson: "Normally, we'd let Roger have it for wait times more than a minute. But we just don't care, today. The building is alive!"

Lois Gladstone: "Pepper, can we get an e-mail out there, like immediately, featuring the fact that Reese Witherspoon wore our dress and that we've got a whole lot of other fantastic items that customers would love?"

Roger Morgan: "And can you put those social media buttons in the e-mail, so that our customers can spread the message for us?"

Meredith Thompson: "And can you stay away from directly promoting the cocktail dress, since we're almost sold out? No, wait, maybe you promote it and we'll take backorders and create all sorts of pent up demand."

Candi Layton: "The minute the e-mail is out there and Roger has the landing page ready, I'll put something out on Twitter."

Roger Morgan: "This is real multichannel advertising, folks!"

Meredith Thompson: "I can see it now. The cover of the Holiday Gliebers Dresses catalog, featuring the lovely Reese Witherspoon!"

Lois Gladstone: "Pepper, do you think you could get in touch with Reese Witherspoon? Do you think you could ask her to appear on the cover of the catalog? I mean, she's wearing the dress, so she loves us, right? But don't be like a creepy stalker, ok? Just express the benefits of being aligned with the Gliebers Dresses brand."

Candi Layton: "Reese Witherspoon on the cover of the catalog!"

Roger Morgan: "Reese Witherspoon on the homepage!"

Lois Gladstone: "Reese Witherspoon on Oprah, wearing one of our dresses. That would literally launch us into orbit! Just imagine Oprah introducing Glenn Glieber ... 'Here's Glenn Glieberrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr'!"

Meredith Thompson: "Reese Witherspoon being interviewed by Ryan Seacrest, wearing something elegant from Gliebers Dresses".

Kevin: "You could Skype in to the Oprah show, Glenn."

Meredith Thompson: "Reese Witherspoon telling America that all of the cast members of her new movie are planning on wearing Gliebers Dresses at the premiere."

Lois Gladstone: "And all of this is free, folks. We didn't do a darn thing to make this happen!"

Glenn Glieber: "I love free marketing!"

Kevin: "You'll want to create a new field in your database. Any customer who purchased this dress during the 'hype' period should be categorized appropriately. Our Multichannel Forensics work show that about 35% of first time buyers purchase again within twelve months, with half of the second purchases happening within just three months. In other words, if the new customer is going to purchase again, the customer is likely to purchase again soon. Our job is to see if the customers who are swept up in 'Reese Witherspoon Mania' ever purchase again, or if they are truly swept up in the event and have no interest in buying again. Pay close attention to e-mail click-through rates among customers who purchased this dress, as that will give you an 'early read' as to whether these customers are engaged with Gliebers Dresses, or whether these customers are trying to look like Reese Witherspoon. And we'll want to pay very close attention to the mix of new vs. existing customers buying this dress. We want to see if this energized our customer base, or if this was a great way to bring in new customers.".

Meredith Thompson: "I'm at the Academy Awards, listening to Reese Witherspoon tell E! Television on the red carpet that her new dress was designed by the famed designer, Scotty Jennings, of Gliebers Dresses. And then Reese calls Carson and I over, and the entire place gives us an ovation!"

Candi Layton: "And I'll 'live-tweet' the whole thing!"

Pepper Morgan: "Kevin, do customers who respond to mania like this ever purchase again?"

Kevin: "These customers act differently than a customer you rent from Anna Carter. They frequently spend less, long-term. We'll want to thoroughly simulate what the long-term impact of a phenomenon like this will have on the business. Again, we'll use e-mail to get an early read on how these customers perform. If the performance isn't there, we'll want to significantly limit the number of catalog mailings and e-mail campaigns these customers receive."

Glenn Glieber: "Outstanding. I'm so proud of all of you. Your hard work is finally bearing fruit. Always remember that we're a merchandising brand first --- without the merchandise, we have nothing. This is yet another of those 2% solutions that I'm looking for. Now on to the next topic. I watched a lot of 'One Life To Live' during my staycation. Do any of you think that maybe the actresses on 'One Life To Live' might want to wear our dresses, assuming we gave them to the staff for free? I'm just thinking that if I became hooked so easily, maybe the average person would buy from us if she knew that a cast member was wearing one of our dresses. Pepper, can you get on the horn with ABC and see if they want to support our merchandise assortment on-air?"