Pacts with inSing.com and Zalora signal Clozette’s intent to become Asia’s premier fashion network

For a social network about fashion, Clozette isn’t exactly a looker, especially when compared to the sprightlier and hipper #OOTDX, an upstart that appears to be drawing the Instagrammer crowd.

But while my first impression may be less than positive, Clozette actually turns out to be more interesting than it lets on.

It certainly has enough cache to seal a partnership with SingTel’s lifestyle portal inSing.com, an arrangement that has given Clozette front page placement — on the portal’s dropdown menu. Clicking on that link will bring you to insing.clozette.com, an e-commerce site that sells goods from Clozette’s partners.

While I’m not sure how many percent of inSing’s purported 2 million monthly active users will actually land on Clozette, it’s a positive start. The partnership between these Singapore companies appears to be the right one too: Clozette, after all, has ambitions to be a one-stop shop for women’s fashion and beauty needs.

Sure, you might have heard it all before. It would seem that every online fashion and beauty retailer, your Zaloras, Luxolas, and Asoses, wants to be that first-stop for fashionable women.

But here’s the difference between Clozette and the rest: It isn’t a traditional e-commerce site at all. In fact, it fulfills an entirely different role in the online fashion ecosystem, that of discovery.

You see, Clozette is really trying to become an online public closet for women, a place where they can show off their large collection of clothes, shoes, and accessories and discover collections by other women.

That’s the first part of the equation. The other component of their business model is their fashion directory, split into a ‘Bazaar’ and ‘Shoppe’. As the names suggest, the Marketplace contains hundreds of blogshops from Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, and Indonesia, while the Shoppe displays goods from larger online stores like Bebe and yes, Rocket Internet’s Zalora.

Altogether, Clozette claims to direct women to over 3,500 international brands and 180,000 female fashion selections.

Combining all components, the platform becomes a means for women to more easily discover and purchase fashion items, while at the same time giving merchants an online marketing channel.

If a comparison must be made, we can say that Clozette is attempting to become a Pinterest for female fashion. That analogy, while apt, doesn’t quite capture it — I would guess that Clozette is ahead of Pinterest in terms of having a revenue model (site traffic is another story).

While the visual pinboard has been coy about its future revenue model, it could eventually end up looking like what Clozette is probably doing: Drive sales to businesses, and earn from a combination of advertising, referral, and marketing fees.

In comparing both sites, a huge question remains: How much traffic and sales has Clozette been able to drive to its merchant partners? I tried asking the startup for some figures, but I’ve yet to receive a response (I’ll update this article when I do).