Silk Orchid chief Marketing officer dictate: How did I start digitizing a traditional makeup brand from 0?

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I dark Horse: Cosmetics retailer Silk Orchid is recognized as a model of digital marketing, it successfully integrated digital marketing into the company's overall strategy. One of the hallmarks of this strategy, the CMO and CDO (Chief Digital Officer), is one person concurrently. Zhu Li Bernstein is the chief marketing officer and chief digital officer of Silk Orchid. In an interview with Harvard Business Review, Zhu Li Bernstein will share how he leads the development under the line of the Silk orchid.

Q: What attracted you to the silk orchid? What was its digital organizational structure?

Bernstein: The fact that Silk Orchid has been an innovative global enterprise has been a maverick, which attracts me to join. Silk Orchid is the first to sell high-end cosmetics while allowing consumers to experience different brands in a physical store. The company launched its website in 1998, making it an early E-commerce company. In 2007, when I joined Silk Orchid, it was clear that it had the element of becoming a world-class brand, willing to take risks, make promises to customers, and have the passion to educate customers.

Q: When you join silk orchid, what advantages does the company have to improve digital innovation? which tasks have the highest priority?

Bernstein: When I joined the Silk orchid, it was unthinkable today that mobile phone shopping was unheard of. E-commerce companies are still trying to sort things out, and the entity stores haven't started experimenting with new technologies. However, based on my personal experience, I believe that technology can make shopping more efficient. Sephora.com the initial creation of this site was largely outsourced, and when I joined, we didn't have an in-house technology development team. So the first thing I did when I joined Cecil was to build a team of in-house web developers. This is also my advice to those who create the initial digital brand.

I realize that we need a stronger, more flexible platform to drive digital development in the future. We find the right people and make unremitting efforts on this road. Then we launched the site, which is far more than just a platform for product specs or a shopping cart. Our newly established website enables my customers to obtain better product images, understand more comprehensive products and provide a way for customers to communicate with each other. We continually improve our mobile and web experience to maintain our competitive edge and adjust our strategy based on data analysis. So it's important to have an in-house technical team.

Q: Digitalization is often one of the bottlenecks in the company, how do you solve the problem after you join the silk orchid?

About 10 years ago, companies like Nordstrom had their website nordstrom.com as a completely independent business, which had a huge impact on the company's operations and culture. At the time, the website played an important role in a newly established company. Companies that have done this now have more online business. But ultimately this structure is not consumer-centric. Now the digital bottleneck is the result of the traditional brand additional digitization. But I believe that if you want to be a successful retailer-or a businessman in a broad sense-digitization must be a top priority.

It's not easy, but Silk Orchid has already started to act, depending on the digital product and the physical product in the store as important. This requires a major shift in our thinking, organizational structure and hiring. So we are ready for success. At the same time, we try to think like consumers-what is my idea of a shopping experience? What would make me feel better? Can we perceive the future through the interaction between children and technology? Then we engage in brainstorming, marketing and in-house IT staff. What one group thinks is possible, another group may think it is impossible. Unfortunately, in many large enterprises, because of lack of it expertise, some good ideas do not have the opportunity to bear fruit. We are fortunate to have such an excellent technical director who is familiar with E-commerce and is keen to combine it with business. He also has strong team support behind him.

When industry experts claim that the best function of mobile phones is the content engine, and that it takes a few years for the take-off of mobile shopping to take off, Silk Orchid is the first to invest in the cause of mobile shopping. We are the first company to set up mobile website. Over the past three years, sales have increased by more than 100% per cent a year over mobile phones. You need the right people and the right investment to make a business premonition come true. For us, our investment is clearly rewarded.

Q: You also served as a CMO and CDO for the Silk Orchid. Is this dual identity reflected in your team architecture?

Bernstein: Of course. The growth and development of consumer experience is interrelated. More than a year ago, we redeployed the structure between the traditional marketing team and the digital marketing team, which is easy to see, but anyone running a big company understands that this is not a small task, it takes months of planning and execution. Frankly speaking, we are still in the rebuilding phase, but the team has been restructured based on incentives and partnerships. By merging our teams, we get the return on investment through various channels, improve efficiency, and the team becomes stronger. In addition we become more agile--in this era, agility is particularly important. I firmly believe that marketing and digitization will work together, this is the road to the future.

Q: Recently, the chief digital officer has become a fashionable noun, and your dual identity is unique. What qualities do people need to succeed in these positions? How do you deal with this particular identity?

Bernstein: Chief digital officer is a new word, but it's not a new concept. The chief digital officer has elevated digitization to the "Chief" level, giving the digital cause more support in the executive layer, encouraging management to try harder and build infrastructure. I spent a lot of time thinking about how to balance my two roles to make sure that both the store and the e-commerce channels were improved, and I had to consider the overall image and marketing strategy of the brand. An enterprise with creative and analytical capabilities should support E-commerce and physical stores equally. Most of the time, the two are related, but I want to manage the team with different identities. I make a suggestion to all those who open the company: If the chief digital officer and the chief marketing officer are not the same person, try to keep the relationship closer. This is not only conducive to the operation of the company, the final benefit will have a great impact.

Q: What other problems remain to be solved? What challenges are you facing right now?

Bernstein: There are always some unresolved things and the business to be built, and that's why my job is so compelling. Maybe there will be another Pinterest or Instagram to satisfy the customer's desire to interconnect. As the next generation of shoppers grows up, they will have new needs. We have been evaluating new technologies and platforms. My children are my target clients. The headquarters of Silk Orchid is in San Francisco, where people's daily necessities are digitized. We can test the product and improve the design as early as possible. Only those who claim that "mobile shopping is impossible" will stop looking for the next user point of contact.