Avid fashion blog followers may have noticed several high-calibre bloggers have simultaneously started wearing and drawing attention to Tod’s footwear of late. This is not down to coincidence – earlier this month the quintessential Italian brand launched a social influencer campaign to create buzz around its signature Gommino shoes.
On the campaign website, customers can check out the various style leaders who have been coveting the style, as well as submit their own photos.
Bloggers from all over the world have taken part in the so-called ‘Dots to Life’ campaign, including Italy’s Chiara Ferragni of The Blonde Salad, Switzerland’s Kristina Bazan of Kayture, and Shanghai-based Han Huohuo.
And it’s not just bloggers that have jumped on board – industry heavyweights such as Anna Dello Russo are also featured on site. The result: a showcase of the worldwide popularity of the Gommino, highlighting the shoe’s versatility and serving as outfit styling inspiration alongside.
The move for Tod’s to predominantly use bloggers over celebrities is a smart one in today’s online world. These stars – many of them now enjoying a level of celebrity status themselves – serve as influencers through their connection to existing customers and those highly engaged in fashion, but also yield influence over a much younger crowd who may not be as aware of the understated brand.
The endorsement should emphasise the brand’s heritage, reduce the ‘old person’s shoe’ stigma around the Gomminos, and boost its popularity among potential future customers. It’s helping the brand get it’s ‘cool’ back among the younger, digitally-savvy generation, effectively.
Tod’s is making the blogger campaign all the more social by inviting its Facebook fans to upload their own images to the campaign website. The post on its Facebook page has received over 22,800 likes so far. Participation through Instagram is also possible – with the tags #todsgommino and #dotsoflife.
This is a great example of an influencer campaign leveraging the power of social media as a means of inspiration and conversation. As with many campaigns, the site is curated and not all fan images are published. As with Burberry’s Art of the Trench, this creates a more exclusive feel and may inspire fans to put more creative thought into their snaps.
Tod’s is also pushing content over social related to the FIFA World Cup – recent posts have referenced the theme, I Cheer For My Colors. Working with bloggers seems to have yielded positive results for the brand in the past too. In February, for instance, it partnered with Ferragni of The Blonde Salad to promote its Touch handbag.
Trend forecaster WGSN might be best known for its design and product development work (seasonal colours, silhouettes, consumer insights and more), but it also analyses forward developments in retail strategy, digital marketing, merchandising and store design.
Sat under the umbrella of its market intelligence team, these are experts in their field on all things to do with the business side of the industry – note I’m shamelessly referring to myself in this category as WGSN is of course my employer. I’m a global senior editor on all things media and marketing related, by that I mean brand strategy, digital communications, in-store technology and more (of course in each instance always weighted towards how it pertains to the fashion and retail space).
But I also head up the social media content strategy for the company, overseeing our output across Twitter, Tumblr (award-winning!), Facebook, Instagram and Google+ (where you may have seen my mug hosting our business-focused monthly Hangouts).
To that end – I bring you the latest campaign, and urge you to get involved. On Tuesday, June 10 we will be hosting a live Twitter Q&A with Lorna Hall, head of the WGSN market intelligence team and resident retail expert. Hall brings with her a wealth of experience on exactly what is shifting the landscape and will be able to talk to absolutely anything to do with the future of shopping.
I’m talking legacy retailers and their moves to omnichannel; new focuses on innovation and integrating start-ups; big data, beacons and personalisation; search, shop and go, or the new paths to purchase re-engineering the ‘impulse buy’. Not to mention a bunch of other keywords and phrases like mobile, phy-gital, service, footfall drivers, experiential and more. You name it, Hall has the answer.
So please get stuck in, send us your thoughts using the hashtag #askwgsn – Hall will be online responding from 4pm GMT / 11am EST. The more you ask, the more we respond and the more content we regurgitate back out again. It’s a win win.
La Galerie d’Instagram will showcase a small collection of the best photos pulled from the Instagram community, for festival-goers to enjoy from June 15-21. Those who tag (up to three of) their shots by June 13 with #instagramcannes could be included in the exhibition. Winners will be selected based on the “originality, technical execution, and subject matter” of their submission.
“Both Instagram and Cannes Lions celebrate the world’s best visual imagery, so we’re planning to bring that connection to life at the festival,” it said Instagram in a blogpost.
Cannes Lions is an annual gathering honouring the best work in advertising and visual communications. As reported last year, it’s slowly becoming a space for the fashion industry to both be seen and recognised in too.
That’s looking set to also be the case this year, with speakers on the agenda including Melisa Goldie, CCO of Calvin Klein; Raphael Elicha founder of The Kooples; actress Sarah Jessica Parker with Cosmopolitan editor Joanna Coles ; and supermodel Gisele Bündchen.
Highlight names otherwise include Ralph Fiennes, Sheryl Sandberg, Aaron Sorkin, Sir Patrick Stewart, Spike Jonze, Sir John Hegarty and more.
Alexander Wang has been spreading summer cheer in Hong Kong with a black ice cream truck stationed outside its Harbour City store for the past two weekends. The branded van has been handing out free ice cream to customers and passers-by.
The ‘Eat Me’ campaign, developed in collaboration with HK boutique, Joyce, was launched to celebrate the two year anniversary of Alexander Wang Harbour City. Those who commemorated their ‘Eat Me’ moment on Instagram using the hashtags #joycehk and #alexanderwanghk had the chance to win an Alexander Wang gift.
Sure enough, the initiative drew quite a crowd – people of all ages were captured queuing up for the chance to enjoy ice cream out of the branded ice cream cones. The result was Instagram buzz from young and old alike, with winners of the competition receiving prizes such as a yoga matt and a domino set.
Will.i.am, Kate Bosworth and Jamie Oliver are among some of the first celebrity names to be using a new music discovery app called Tunepics, while brands including Paul Smith, Chloé and asos are also on board.
Ever wanted to share a song with your photograph to help sum up the mood of the scene more than a filter alone can do? Now you can. Tunepics – launched in the app store for the iPhone and iPad today – enables users to pair images with relevant songs thanks to the iTunes API.
“Over 500 million pictures are uploaded to the internet every day, and over 100 million songs are downloaded each week. Together, that’s dynamite,” says the brains behind the new social network, Justin Cooke, former CMO of Topshop, now founder and CEO of innovate7. His aim is to help create the “soundtrack to your life”.
The experience is an intuitive one: you upload an image, place a filter over the top, then search the 35 million songs in the iTunes library by keyword to add them to your shot. The result appears in a feed alongside those from the friends you opt to follow; each one auto-playing a 30-second preview of the track as you scroll over it, as well as offering a ‘download’ button to buy the full version.
Posts can also be ‘re-tuned’ to your own followers, and shared via Facebook and Twitter where they will appear as a ‘tunecard’. For the likes of Will.i.am, that of course makes the app an appealing proposition for its potential to help drive record sales. It also provides a revenue stream for innovate7 through affiliate sales from iTunes (there’s no advertising model planned on the platform for now otherwise).
Cooke is particularly excited for the opportunity that lies in music discovery, both for consumers using the app and for young, emerging talent to start gaining recognition in a new way. On that basis, it launches with a specially commissioned soundtrack from British band, Ellerby, called Colour Me In.
But the premise of the app, which was built by agency AKQA, otherwise goes further than just being about music sharing and discovery. The aim is to provide multisensory experiences that evoke an emotional response.
“When you hear a picture, it changes everything; it awakens your senses. We want [Tunepics] to be like a cinematic celebration of your life,” said Cooke. “Music is the most powerful way to express the things we see and feel; nothing else comes close.”
To that end, the emotional response that posts receive from followers is also fully visible. Each is accompanied by an ‘emotion wheel’ (the design of which also makes up the app’s logo). This features a spectrum of 16 colours users can choose from, representing different feelings such as happy, moved, jealous and heartbroken.
Said Cooke: “A like doesn’t tell a story on its own anymore. When [Nelson] Mandela passed away, we didn’t want to say that we liked it, but that it moved us. This is all about enabling an emotional experience.”
Which is why this app also makes sense, from the off, for brands. Beyond the initial celebrity appeal, there are also the likes of Paul Smith, All Saints, asos, Dazed and Airbnb already on board.
The expectation is that embedding music into their social content will help heighten the moments they want to talk about. An example post from Paul Smith featured a collection of paint pots and the Rolling Stones track Paint it Black. “His response was that he couldn’t imagine life without music. That’s so powerful, and so true,” Cooke explained. In fact, a similar quote from philosopher Nietzsche features on the Tunepics introductory video from the innovate7 team: “Without music, life would be a mistake.”
Clare Waight Keller, creative director of Chloé, said the choice to join Tunepics from day one was an instant decision after a two minute pitch. “I just loved the added layers of emotion, simply adding music to an image really brings it to life. It’s like a way to capture what was going through your head in that moment.”
She also appreciates the emotion wheel. “[It] will be really interesting. ‘Likes’ have almost become empty gestures now, it takes no real thought to ‘like’ a picture. But to take the time to select the feeling the image inspired in you, shows real engagement. It’s a great way for Chloé to connect with our audience,” she explained.
Brands will also begin to benefit from the data said emotion wheel collates. Mood charts are displayed beneath each tunepic showcasing people’s responses, which suggests valuable consumer insights could be gleaned should the numbers creep high enough. Unlike Instagram, it is also possible to add hyperlinks to every post, which will prove quite the draw for the likes of Paul Smith again, and all those others with e-commerce capabilities.
It may come as no surprise to learn that prior to his role at Topshop, Cooke spent six years helping to lead the charge at Burberry – a brand not only with a longstanding music initiative in Burberry Acoustic, but with an unquestionable focus on emotive content tied to measurable business results.
Topping it all off is the fact those aforementioned filters are based on the weather – another theme familiar to Burberry fans. Every photograph uploaded can be enhanced with true-to-life overlays of the snow, raindrops, sunshine or even a rainbow.
“I’ve always had a fascination with music, colour, images and the weather, and how they influence our mood and emotions. I want people to be able to share the depth behind the moments they experience and to articulate all the ones that they dream of having,” Cooke explained.
Banana Republic brought happiness to New Yorkers today – literally – with a social-media-meets-real-world campaign that saw surprise deliveries sent all around Manhattan.
Tied to the promotion of its new Marimekko collaboration collection (launching online and in stores on Thursday, May 22), the US retailer invited its following to tweet with the hashtag #sharehappy to be in with the chance of sending a special treat to a friend. Users were directed to Sharehappyny.com to fill out a short form with their own name, email address (nice data collection there) and the address of their buddy.
All over Manhattan deliveries of cupcakes from Baked by Melissa and balloons were then made, accompanied by a little notecard saying: “Here’s a little something to make you smile.” Recipients were also encouraged to tweet and share the love with a “pay it forward to someone you love” call to action.
The likes of Olivia Palermo and Eva Chen also got involved, sending back snaps of themselves with their goodies. Check out some of the content below, including a Wear Happy video for the Marimekko line at the bottom…
British contemporary brand, Whistles, has launched a short video directed by Garance Doré to celebrate its further expansion into the US and France.
Called #bellesandwhistles, the spot features a cast of “modern, sharp and stylish” women living in the US, UK and France. Among them are Yasmin Sewell, a London-based fashion consultant; Elle Strauss, fashion director of Shopbop and Brit living in New York; Vashtie Kola, an American artist and DJ; Jeanann Williams, an American stylist; French actress Rebecca Dayan; and French DJ and creative consultant Cecile Togni.
They are each seen clapping, dancing and whistling along to the tune, as overlaid copy reads: “The Whistles woman is independent, quietly brilliant, relaxed, discerning, elegant, intelligent, sharp, stylish.”
Jane Shepherdson, chief executive of Whistles, referred to the campaign as a digital first for the brand. “We see a great synergy between the aesthetic of both Whistles and Garance, which has been brought to life in the #bellesandwhistles film. To have such inspiring women working on and in the film is representative of the brand’s DNA, it’s like working with friends who understand you.”
The video launched on the Garance Doré website today, May 19, while shorter versions are also being posted to Instagram with the #bellesandwhistles hashtag. Consumer are simultaneously being invited to submit their own ‘whistling’ clips on the platform for a chance to win a shopping spree in the store.
Whistles is opening its first brick-and-mortar presence in the US, with a concession at Bloomingdale’s in New York. It is also supplementing its already established concession at Le Printemps, with Le BHV Marais this month and will roll out a French language website this summer.
Marc Jacobs is celebrating its 30-year anniversary with an online gallery of never-before seen imagery.
The content dates back to 1984 when the partnership between Marc Jacobs and Robert Duffy began, and so far features everyone from Sarah Jessica Parker and Winona Ryder, to Christy Turlington.
Reads one of the posts on the site: “Robert Duffy created 10 original company guidelines to help ensure the success of Marc Jacobs Intl. He reminds us that we must always foster an environment that encourages risk taking, maintain irreverance, and most of all, always have fun!”
The content can also be found collated across social sites under the hashtag #MJ30. The designer has released two exclusive items alongside the campaign – the Timeline Tee and 1984 Tee.
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