clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Happening Today: Urban Outfitters is Using Interactive Social Chat Platform

New, 2 comments

Racked is no longer publishing. Thank you to everyone who read our work over the years. The archives will remain available here; for new stories, head over to Vox.com, where our staff is covering consumer culture for The Goods by Vox. You can also see what we’re up to by signing up here.

Starting now, Urban Outfitters is using tech company, Needle’s sales chat platform, which includes integration with Facebook and Twitter, for its agents to assist online shoppers in making purchase decisions.

If you've been on Urban Outfitters' site for more than 8 minutes(ish), or if you click the chat tab at the bottom of any product window, a pop up will appear where you can live chat with a Urban Outfitters rep who has the ability to interactively demonstrate product features, cross-sell and up-sell with the "outfit builder" and "cart builder", and create social coupons to share with friends via Facebook.

The cool part about this is that Needle scourers Facebook for for "rabid fans" or people who are online enthusiasts for a company’s products. They then become “Needlers” for that company by engaging in chats with potential customers, including answering and asking questions, making genuine recommendations. This includes drawing circles, arrows, lines in different colors and zooming in on products to better ask questions and effectively interact with consumers.
· Urban Outfitters [Official Site]
· Single Needle [Official Site]