I intentionally chose this image from Jordan Brand. Grumpy Westbrook symbolizes how I feel after touting the growth of Jordan Brand’s CMS.
As Jordan Brand launched the air.jordan.com site, I lauded the strategy. In the post above, I talked about the considerable growth that had taken place with the site from 2016 to 2020. Running a CMS is difficult, no matter the brand or company. The amount of time needed to build enough content to shift search takes years. I’ve dealt with this myself on this site. Jordan Brand had increased the amount of content on the CMS, but at the same time, their Direct strategy has accelerated considerably. Much of their action happens within their digital apps and on their primary Nike site.
Why is the folding of air.jordan.com into the Jordan section of the larger website important, when many people probably haven’t noticed this shift? I’m a huge proponent of long-form content and media sites, but I also discuss fractured search in great detail. Fractured search is when a company has too many locations where they are delivering content and information on their products. The multiple locations when searched online can contribute to a lower click through on the actual product being pushed. As a deviation, think about companies that don’t have the ability to sell on Instagram. The customer having to Jordan Jordan Jumpman Flight T-shirt to buy, contributes to that consumer possibly doing something different before clicking on that buy jordan 13 low brave blue. air.jordan.com worked, but it was possibly best utilized as an information and entertainment site for branding vs selling. I think Jordan Brand only cares about selling and with the sneaker media sites covering Jordan Brand extensively, air.jordan.com became redundant… especially since sneaker media hasn’t been able to convert their visitors into customers for their own e-commerce ventures. Sneaker media was constantly trying to integrate e-commerce when Jordan launched. Media sites have been somewhat unsuccessful in launching e-commerce, and I assume this led to Jordan Brand recognizing they no longer had to regain their search via the CMS.
The goal of a retail outlet is to sell product. air.jordan.com required an additional click through from that site to the products being discussed. In order to diminish transaction friction, it doesn’t matter how much I liked the site, or how much the site grew, Jordan Brand can integrate those stories being told into the app, and into the website and it looks like that’s just what they did. Nike News is still a standalone site, but that is an educational component vs a branding arm.
