Splashlight - Splashlight Offers the Highest Standards in E-commerce Photography and Video

Optimizing Online Merchandise With An Editorial Mindset

Today, we are challenged by COVID-19 on all fronts; our day-to-day lives, our relationships, and most prominently in our businesses. How we meet this challenge is what will eventually define us and shape the future of retail.

New York - July 27, 2020

To take the bad just as gracefully as the good, and seek opportunity in the changes we all face is how we at Splashlight focus our lens on the future. We are continuously experimenting, innovating, and changing how marketing and eCommerce content is created for our retail partners. This forced change from COVID-19 is the opportunity we should all embrace, as this is the time where great ideas are formed; where lean teams work together on solutions outside the box to elevate one’s business. It only takes one great idea to revolutionize how you work.

Over the past several months, we have made many changes to how we create content for our retail partners and here are a few examples:

Remote shooting

  • We built a network that allows client creatives to direct a shoot team remotely. 
  • This system allows the client full communication and visual access to the set, the shooting team, and all assets shot.
  • The opportunity created by this new way of shooting is that it is no longer required for clients to travel, meaning we can service any client worldwide.

Robotic Imaging Systems

  • We made investments in robotic technology development for both photo and video imagery. 
  • The opportunity created is a reduced on-set COVID-19 safe team that can produce editorial and e-commerce imagery for both on-figure and product. 
  • Another advantage created was a significant increase in SKU throughput, meaning a lower cost for image content creation.

CGI Imaging Systems

  • Allowing retailers to produce high-quality on-figure imagery at a low cost with a small COVID-19 safe shoot team with limited oversight and resources needed from the client.
  • The opportunity created is not just in the overall cost reduction to produce CGI content, but in the reduction of resources needed from the client resulting in a lower internal spend for content creation.

What’s the right solution for your retail brand/business?

If your need is marketing or eCommerce content or a combination of both, there is a solution out there for you. To determine what solution is best for your business, a deep dive into one’s creative (branding) is the 1st step. Understanding and developing a common creative goal that a team can work towards will unify your team and reveal the best path of how to get there.

Once you have a solid creative/branding foundation, now is the time for the next step: Where will this content live? Some retailers have fully branded editorial imagery on all their platforms i.e. website, social media, advertising, etc. and others have limited creative branded content where the focus is utilizing outside sources (advertising, social media) to drive customers to their site where branded imagery is solely comprised as part of the landing page.

What determines this split between fully branded content versus partial branded content is directly related to cost. Higher levels of creative content with many platforms will always come at a greater cost than a limited creative and marketing goal.

As all retailers are feeling the pinch from COVID-19, cost today is paramount, and many retailers are now moving towards a hybrid solution of utilizing new advanced imaging technologies with traditional forms of content creation. This is the opportunity available now for all retailers; as with a hybrid solution, a retailer can create highly branded marketing content for specific platforms i.e advertising, social media, landing pages, with e-commerce content produced by low-cost advanced imagery solutions. Thus revealing one path on how to achieve your goals as set by one’s creative and remain on budget.

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