I found Vogue's site slightly addictive. Even though I am no upscale shopper, I clicked on an Adrienne Vittadini leopard skirt, a diamond-lace Bebe camisole and pair of Sergio Rossi lizard pumps, then sat mesmerized by the descriptions and prices that appeared. The $1,030 Rossi shoes were not available in Washington, the site informed me, but the $49 Bebe camisole could be found at 11 area malls. As for the $200 Vittadini skirt, a "buy now" button invited me to purchase directly from Vittadini's Web site -- an option offered by some but not all advertisers.
All told, Vogue's shopping site contains details on 1,240 products and 780,000 retail outlets where they might be purchased. Prices range from $1.69 for a bottle of Evian water to $45,000 for a J. Mendel chinchilla coat.
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Powering the site is software from a small Atlanta firm called Active8media. It uses patented technology for making digital replicas of print pages clickable online and giving advertisers a self-service system for editing the Web versions.
"We take consumers from the point of inspiration to the point of purchase," proclaimed Lee Davis, chief executive of Active8media.
Vogue's site is the latest in a series of attempts -- mostly ill-fated -- to allow advertisers to link their messages in print with Web sites. Two expensive flops that launched four years ago required consumers to hook up small scanners to their computers to read special codes or watermarks imprinted in magazines and newspapers.
If Vogue's simpler experiment succeeds, Active8media's technology likely will be welcomed by publishers eager to find ways to give advertisers more information about how print ads perform. That, after all, is part of the appeal of Internet advertising; it typically tells advertisers which part of their ads draws the most response from viewers when they click to get information. Active8media's software collects detailed click-through data, allowing Alberta Ferretti, for example, to learn whether more people seemed interested in its green satin mini-skirt, lapin fur jacket or pink silk chiffon blouse worn by the model in its Vogue ad. For its part, Vogue has hired an outside firm to analyze all the data.
"This is designed as a research product for the industry," Florio said. "We will learn from it and hopefully roll it out again with the March issue."
Some people might also like to have links online to the clothes featured in the articles, but Florio said it was too difficult to secure all the rights from the photographers and models required to make that happen. Because it was experimental, Vogue charged advertisers nothing extra to appear in Shopseptembervogue.com. But if Vogue decides to make shop-the-ads a regular feature, Florio said the magazine would eventually collect fees from advertisers to participate.
Leslie Walker's e-mail address is walkerl@washpost.com.
