Cole Haan’s modern classic styles have been a key part of American fashion since the company started in 1928. With its entrepreneurial spirit and lasting vision, Cole Haan helps customers look great for both work and leisure. Cole Haan makes products we love and is working on a strong online presence to go along with it.
Cole Haan has already taken the first step in using its self-proclaimed “good goods” to drive sales in the digital marketplace. Cole Haan based a creative visually-based marketing campaign around Tumblr and pushes its products to social consumers through awe-inspiring Pinterest and Instagram pages. The Cole Haan website is also easy to navigate, visually stunning and packed with reasons for people to open their wallets.
With its long history of making trendy designs, we believe the Cole Haan brand is on the precipice of ultimate fashion stardom in the digital space. With some important changes, we feel Cole Haan can increase its digital ROI by improving its visibility on search engines and raise sales figures by boosting its CTR on social media outlets and putting an emphasis on local SEO.
Shoes Made for Sharing
Cole Haan knows its products have the ability to sell themselves when put in front of a customer because they look and feel great. The company takes full advantage of visual-based social networking sites like Pinterest, Tumblr and Instagram. All three of Cole Haan’s pages are well organized, updated regularly and elicit thousands of responses and shares every single day.
Cole Haan also takes our advice by creating unique and specialized content for each platform. We feel that while the company is using social media, it can increase engagement and build a larger group of brand ambassadors by optimizing its social networking sites. We would recommend being more active on Twitter, which would include creating a daily tweeting schedule, and Google+, which has not been used since May 2012, because of its SEO benefits We also believe that while Cole Haan’s Pinterest page is active, it could drive even more traffic if the board and pin descriptions were optimized.
Born in 1928: Designed for 2014
Cole Haan’s website makes it easy to find the style shoppers are looking for and even motivates them to step outside their comfort area. Online shopping is made simple with an intuitive layout, easy to navigate directories and gorgeous aesthetic.
We especially love Cole Haan’s “Born in 1928” section, which includes quotes and videos from cultural and fashion icons that, just like the iconic Cole Haan brand, were born in 1928. It’s easy to get lost listening to Captain Jim Lovell and Maya Angelou talk about their inspiration and what has pushed them to become great. This section also directly ties in with the company’s newest advertising push, proving that Cole Haan understands the importance of synergy between its website and ads. 
Another feature we love is the Cole Haan blog, which is easy to find from the website’s homepage under the heading “be inspired.” The blog features advertisements for the company’s shoes, pulls old images from the archives to show where the brand has come from and includes fascinating insights from guest bloggers.
We would suggest optimizing the website for mobile and SEO. We would also suggest using paid advertising to help drive more people to the website, which could potentially drive sales.
Digital Foot Traffic in 2014
Cole Haan’s is known for making quality products, being ahead of the hottest trends and creating variety that fits everyone’s personal style. It’s also a brand that people seek out.
But we believe Cole Haan can do more when it comes to being found on search engines. A search for men’s shoes on Google turns up several of Cole Haan’s competitors including stores that don’t carry the Cole Haan brand. We believe that by utilizing a strategic link building campaign along with on-page SEO tactics, Cole Haan cold move up in the rankings and gain both visibility and engagement.
We also believe a local SEO strategy could is key for driving more customers to Cole Haan locations. The retailer’s “find a store” feature currently puts all of its locations into an iFrame. When a location finder is built this way, it is impossible for search engines to index local content. We would advise building a separate and unique page for each location, because by adding dedicated local pages — each with a unique URL — search results will be optimized to get customers in the door more often.
Seizing the Opportunity
Cole Haan tells its customers to seize every opportunity. We believe that’s the right attitude for Cole Haan’s digital strategy as well.
Cole Haan has everything it needs to become the biggest brand in the fashion industry, and that no change to its designs and style are needed to bring in more customers both in person and online. We believe that with the help of paid social media advertising, local SEO optimization and some easy website upgrades, Cole Haan can help even more people seize every opportunity.