Matthew Williamson in Net-a-Porter Instagram takeover for #matthewmapped campaign

Matthew Williamson is guest posting on Net-a-Porter’s Instagram this week in a campaign that teases his own arrival on the social platform.

The London-based designer is sharing images of his favourite places from around the world on Net-a-Porter’s account twice daily for seven days. Each is tagged with #matthewmapped and the relevant location, therefore curating a geographic story of his travels that will result in a ‘Matthew Map’; an image that showcases all the shots together in one place.

“All week we will be sharing photos of [Matthew’s] inspirational travel destinations on our Instagram. Get inspired!” reads the intro post from Net-a-Porter.

“Follow me around the world in 7 days! MW x,” quotes the copy in the first shot from Matthew – one of him in Mauritius. Others so far have also come from Goa, Lake Tahoe, Venice and the Nevada Desert.

The initiative is being pushed across Net-a-Porter’s social platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest and its blog, Fashion Fix. There are also posts showing relevant product from Matthew Williamson, such as an ombré sweater inspired by the sunset hues from the Nevada desert snap (as below).

It all leads to Matthew launching his own Instagram account from April 1. This will be run by the designer himself and include everything from shots of his creative inspiration to insight into his daily life (the profile picture for his account is shown at the bottom).

Rosanna Falconer, head of digital at Matthew Williamson, said: “We both felt it was crucial Matthew was posting his own visual story and personal photo diary. His aim is to encapsulate our core brand DNA, be it about colour or travel, art, nature, or interiors. He’ll share his sketching and his styling when he’s in the studio, as well as shots when he’s out and about with friends.”

The new feed will also see images shared from the brand’s #MatthewMagnified and #OhMW campaigns – the former stitching together different shots that zoom in to the details of collection pieces, and the latter featuring fans themselves wearing Matthew Williamson. “They have both proved so popular on Facebook and Twitter, and I always find fans taking the images from those platforms to Instagram on their own accounts, so it’s an obvious fit.” Falconer added.

Matthew can be followed via @matthewwilliamson on Instagram from April 1.

ThingLink’s interactive Twitter images could be a natural fit for fashion brands

Interactive images on Twitter? That sounds like something that would translate well to the fashion industry…

In which case, it’s worth knowing about ThingLink. A tool that let’s you “tag any image, with any content”, it was referred to by Mashable this week as having huge potential for brands and marketers following news of its link up with Twitter.

“Icons pop up when users hover over the image then, with a click, open up YouTube channels, audio clips, Facebook or Pinterest profiles, home pages, contact forms or anything else you would normally be able to link to the old-fashioned way,” reads their story. Click here to see an example of it in action.

They use an NBA team to illustrate an instance where images enhanced with links would work particularly well. But let’s translate it to fashion. Imagine a catwalk shot from (for argument’s sake, the easy option) Burberry. Now imagine if you could have a box that linked to play the full show on YouTube, or how about a click-through to the make-up looks up close.

Then we could also add in the Facebook page of the brand, not to mention one to Pinterest or to their all-new Instagram profile where all the backstage shots are housed. We might even consider adding the social profile of the model, thanks to a couple of nice integrated quotes from her. Now how about a link on one side that plays the soundtrack of the event via SoundCloud, or better yet sends fans to iTunes to buy it.

We could also think about an info box that lists detail about the product. And of course, a direct line into Burberry.com to enable everyone to pre-order it too.

The great thing is, ThingLink is ridiculously easy to use – so I did roughly the above with a Burberry SS13 show pic, and here immediately is the result (non-interactive version embedded below too).

As Mashable nicely sums up: “That single photo, in essence, just became a platform of its own.”

Check out more about what ThingLink is up to in the real-world with NFC, via this story from The Next Web, too.

Cinemagram’s crowdsourced GIF content could prove viral win for fashion brands

Rodarte

There’s no denying the unfathomable appetite online for GIFs at present, or Graphics Interchange Format images to use their full name. Although the simple animated pictures (made up of multiple frames on loop) are about to celebrate their 25th anniversary, they’re being feted across the web now more than ever.

Within the fashion industry, what’s followed of course is bundles of beautifully creative work – pioneered by blogger Jamie Beck and Kevin Burg with their “Cinemagraphs”, as reported here, and since carried on by all manner of Tumblr stars, including the likes of Mr Gif and FashGif.

In fact, on Tumblr, GIFs are hands-down the most successful posts. As Rick Webb, Tumblr’s revenue consultant explained at an event in New York recently it’s these that result in the most engagement actions – likes, reblogs and follows.

Needless to say therefore, fashion brands have cashed in on them too; Burberry, Oscar de la Renta and Calvin Klein as just a couple of examples. Below meanwhile is a recent tribute to the late Lee (Alexander) McQueen created by Nick Knight, and above another created by Rodarte, both of whom are part of the selection committee for a forthcoming GIF exhibition at Art Basel Miami created by Tumblr and Paddle8 called Moving the Still.

Over the past few months, Cinemagram is a name that keeps popping up in relation to all this. One of a number of apps dedicated to the GIF, it essentially simplifies the whole process for individuals to do themselves by using film, while simultaneously tapping into a sense of community once more (think Instagram for GIFs – grainy filters and all). It launched on the iPhone in March 2012, and reportedly has over two million users already.

Referred to as “a fun and beautiful way to animate your photos”, it has caught the eye of a number in the fashion industry especially. It’s interesting to see who is, or has been, on there already – the usual (largely New York-based) digital crowd when it comes to individuals, as well as the industry’s most tech-savvy brands, including Nicola Formichetti, Bergdorf’s and Rebecca Minkoff.

What seems to be the most interesting part of it, however, is nothing to do with corporations having to manage yet another social media outlet, but being able to use it to crowdsource content from their followers.

Brands such as Red Bull and music stars like Pink and Linkin Park have partnered with the platform to offer users the ability to remix official videos and create their own interpretations of the work. The sharing features built into the app then help spread it.

An original post introducing the “Remix” feature, reads: “For the first time, users can engage, interact, and be creative with official video content in a way that has never existed before. Companies want more exposure for their video content… We view cines as tweets for videos and therefore potentially a unique opportunity for Cinemagram to achieve their goals.” Users were doing it already, now they can do so legitimately, and directly from the source.

While a number of fashion brands told me they don’t see uploading their own content on Cinemagram to have too much of a future for them, one e-commerce site in particular said they’re excited to look at how to make use of this new crowdsourcing opportunity. Sending snippets of content out to fans and using it is as a teaser for a then full campaign video is enormously appealing, they explained.

Watch this space…

Nick Knight’s GIF tribute to Alexander McQueen