Dote was shown to me by Apple Music’s newest and first released TV series Planet of the Apps. Essentially what this app does is allow you as the customer to shop mall brands, but do it all from your smartphone.
In my experience with this app, the shopping experience is pretty great. The app has many stores and brands including Vans, Nike, Express, Hot Topic, and many others. Dote has over 100 stores and mall brands right within the app, including online only shops such as Gary Vaynerchuk’s online store.
The experience itself is pretty great. Not only can you find what you want based on the brand or store you are looking for, but that it has a lot to offer. Where it does go wrong is its organization. It feels like you’re in this one store and it is cluttered with great deals. However, there are options and settings in the app that allow the user to customize it and narrow down what they are looking for in particular.
Another featured that I loved about the app is the favorites tool. This is similar to Tumblr. When you “heart” something, it gets saved under all of your other favorites so that you can easily find it the next time you need to.
When I was looking for a pair of Vans shoes, what I loved most about it was that the sizes showed both the men’s and women’s sizes in the same bubble. this makes it easier to compare the two if needed and creates less clutter on the screen.
The most important part of the app was the fact that it does accept Apple Pay. This was something that I had to have in order to place my order. Personally, I am all for debit and credit card security, and this app did just that. Needless to say, it was the easiest shoe online transaction I have ever had. With that said, it was my first shoe shopping online experience, therefore it does not have much to compare to.
A minor issue that I saw with Dote is that even though I like that it has tracking information for your order, I really wish that it would also give you notifications on your orders, such as whether or not it has shipped or perhaps how many more days it has until it reaches you. This would make it feel more personalized and give you something to look forward while you were waiting for your package to arrive.
Overall, Dote is an amazing app for online shoppers and could be the future of mall-brand shopping. I’m giving Dote 3.5/4 stars. It’s a good app with a bright future ahead if executed properly. With “ghost malls” becoming more and more common, Dote might be one of the best ways out there to keep those mall brands alive.
Dote is currently a free app on the iOS App Store.
Rating: 3.5/4 stars
