Social Listening, GOAT

 

The Brand that I have selected for this post is an online shoes store called Goat. Goat allows people to sell and buy shoes on their app. When selling a shoe on this app it gets goat certified which means that the shoe customers are buying is 100% authentic and not a fake. 

For a while in the freelance shoe industry, Goat made a name for themselves by becoming one of the largest marketplaces for buying used shoes. Goat began to get a bad rap for having poor authentication checks on their shoes. The 1 Star reviews began to stack up for this company when it came to their authentication process. And with the rise of other sites like Stock X, Goat began to get sidelined by other reselling companies. 

Goats Value proposition was their unique authentication process but as the years went by it became more and more unreliable for customers to ensure the quality of the product they were buying. Currently Goat is still having issues with their authentication process which makes them an unreliable marketplace compared to its competitors.

One thing that gets brought up a lot is the authentication process, even though I've talked about it a lot I wanted to talk about what people are saying online about Goat. Most people that leave reviews are mostly there to complain about a bad experience they've had, I get that. After reading reviews left on this site most of them are their to complain about this authentication process and how they have received "100% authenticated" shoes that have marks and glue on them. 

although there are multiple comments about their verification process and their customer service, one thing I have noticed Is that although some marks or glue might go through, they do a very good job on cracking down people selling fakes on their site. In my opinion that is more important then cracking down on marks left on the shoes because If you receive a fake in the mail that's hundreds or even thousands of dollars down the drain. 

So fair I have discussed poor authentication, poor customer service and being good at cracking down on fakes. How does the company respond to these comments? 

Goat prides themselves on their authentication process and customer service, even though these comments bash on their quality of service, there is always gonna be horror stories of these shoe selling companies. I looked through Stock X comments and they were about the same as Goat. Its hard to help every customer and authenticate every shoe. 

One thing that Goat has recently done for brand awareness is the People of Paris collaboration which explores the styles of the Paris champions in soccer and the Parisians everyday style. They have become sleeve partners with PSG which is the biggest soccer club in France. In an exhibition match PSG showcased their 4th jersey which had their Goat sleeve stamp on it. 

Its hard to see but on his left arm there is a Goat stamp on the jersey, it was hard finding a clear photo. This is a big accomplishment for Goat, they started out as just a site for people to resell shoes and now they are doing a massive collaboration with PSG and becoming a sleeve sponsor. Don't get me wrong the NFL and NBA have sponsors that make lots of money off of those teams, but to gain a sponsorship with an international soccer team as big as PSG, is insane to me. 

This People of Paris collaboration goes beyond shoes, it is exploring the styles of that culture which I believe is a wonderful marketing strategy. Goat built their fame through shoes, but times have changed and you have to change with it to stay relevant. Companies like apple have a monopoly built to the point that they can release the same phones for decades and still make a profit. But companies like Goat make their fortune and fame during their golden years then tend to fall off. Instead of just sticking with shoes Goat has began to expand past shoes and with this collaboration, they have become a multi national company. 

Overall, Goat has had its ups and downs with its customers but every company deals with angry people and bad reviews. I liked how Goat expanded past shoes and actually became a brand sponsor with PSG. This is an even better move for Goat because PSG has Lionel Messi on their team who is considered the G.O.A.T of soccer by many people especially after his recent World Cup win. Now Messi has a Goat stamp on his shoulder when he plays which will draw lots of attention to this company. This is a prime example of a very smart marketing decision.