But while experimenting online, they sometimes value buzz potential to the detriment of the message. Are luxury brands ready for the giant digital leap forward? And must they all inevitably add technology to their core values in order to exist in the digital age?

Luxury brands have never been too keen on revolutions. After all, when your roots so firmly attach you to a time (Asprey since 1781, Aston Martin since 1913) and place (Chanel’s rue Cambon or Tiffany’s Fifth Avenue), rubbing shoulders with Amazon.com and Nike.com can feel uncomfortable. Now customers can connect to brands 24 hours a day, seven days a week, disseminate negative buzz at the speed of broadband, and visit virtual flagships without suffering the “threshold resistance” that keeps the non-initiated at the doorstep in the real world.

However, luxury has managed to embrace digital as the perfect test for one of its highly marketed values: creativity. There is a real creative challenge when communicating on a medium still in the making, a media which actually embodies innovation.

Of course, interaction can baffle some luxury brands obsessed with one-way communication, iconic products and glamorous ambassadors. But a few have come to realise that the internet is not just another advertising space, and participative marketing is not the only big revolution. They have discovered that interaction holds the key to one of luxury’s most distinctive promises: dedicated service to customers, anytime and anywhere.

Digital media can help luxury brands renew their service message and their service offer. And that means learning to deliver a truly seamless experience that remains focused on the brand. For maximum impact, technology has to be transparent to users and that means mastering the media.

After turning TV spots into Hollywood-esque shorts and sales routines into powerful in-store experiences (as in Chanel’s stupendous Ginza building), the luxury industry is now learning to tread that thin line between media innovation and brand creativity.

Such bold experiments can lead luxury houses to break new ground. Ralph Lauren’s technology fuelled innovations constitute a real tour de force for the industry. This summer, the brand was the first luxury retailer to launch a mobile commerce site in the US market. From cell phones, customers can now shop for classic polos, the Pink Pony collection, the latest fragrance Notorious, and also browse the Ralph Lauren couture collection. It is an initiative turned multi-channel, since traffic to the mobile site is driven through 2D barcodes located on print ads, mailings, and store windows.

Similarly, Chanel’s pioneering iPhone application positioned the brand among the very first to design an iPhone application, and one that made sense within the brand story. The app featured a news feed including backstage exclusives, a complete wrap-up of the fall/winter ’08/’09 Haute Couture looks with zoomable video, and a zippy store locator that provides users with a dynamic, interactive itinerary to the closest Chanel store. Bringing together form and content, providing information with an entertaining touch, the Chanel app is the perfect lookbook and reference point for journalists and fashionistas on-the-go.

In view of delivering service anytime and anywhere, mobile devices have become one of luxury’s favourite tactics. An immersive and modern interpretation of long-known Louis Vuitton City Guides, Soundwalk is a collection of audio guides that accompanies travellers through the streets of Beijing, Hong Kong and Shanghai. Revisiting Vuitton’s roots as a brand for explorers and travel junkies, Soundwalk delivers its aspirational experience through celebrity narrators such as Gong Li and Joan Chen. And of course, places explored are sure to receive the LV seal of approval as fashionable hotspot. Each downloadable Soundwalk mp3 retails for £8 (12€) – half the price of a Lonely Planet guidebook.

In times of economic turmoil, a little extra service might be just what it takes to create lasting preference in customers’ minds. On its first foray into e-commerce, Cartier targeted the picky Japanese market with an original, service-driven concept that challenges e-commerce conventions. From the homepage, online shoppers can surf the catalogue three ways: “Guide Me” (a user path enhanced with decision-making tools), “Tell Me” (a journey through the history, heritage and values of Cartier) and “Show Me” (directory of the online store). With content and functionalities cherry-picked for each navigation mode, e-commerce itself becomes a service experience.

Reaching maturity in interactive communication, luxury brands are beginning to see that mastering technology is a means to impose their most vivid ambitions in terms of service and branding. But in a difficult financial context, new digital creativity must take into account return on investment imperatives. Consequently, the convergence between service at the point of need and CRM strategies could well be one of the most fruitful battlegrounds for luxury brands in the near future.

Taline Mouradian is the strategic planning director for Nurun in Europe. Nurun works on strategy, execution and measurement of interactive programs that use technologies.