Luxury Brands and Retailers Still Cautious about Social Media

In the history of marketing, luxury retailers have usually been the last to adapt to technology including radio ads, television commercials, digital marketing, and social media.  While tons of retailers have embraced Facebook and Twitter as the holy grail of social marketing to reach the masses, luxury brands have preferred to not share the spotlight, deciding to remain niche and elite.  However, as social is become a key platform for marketing, some luxury brands are now accepting the inevitable.  Luxury brands Chanel, Burberry, and Louis Vuitton have started to see the value and ROI of social media.  Chanel recently began posting photos on its official Instagram account – and gained more than 2 million followers.  Burberry is now dedicating 60% of its budget to digital, while Louis Vuitton used Instagram to plant clues for followers in order to create buzz for Paris Fashion Week.

However, other high-end brands continue to be reluctant in using social, including Apple, Rolex, and even online publisher Monocle.  It sounds counter-intuitive that a culture/design publication would not try and push its articles via social media.  Andrew Tuck, editor at Monocle, explains “[Social media] feels like a little too much exposure.  For our brand, it seems just a little bit uncomfortable.” Rolex has a Facebook page that is over a year old, but only posts a few times a month.  The brand’s Twitter and Instagram pages are protected.  As the most valuable technology company in the world, Apple is also one of the least engaged in terms of social marketing.  Samsung, one of Apple’s biggest competitors, had the most number of retweets on Twitter with Ellen DeGeneres’s Oscar selfie with multiple celebrities, beating President Obama’s record.

While it may take months or years before luxury brands fully accept digital and social media, the brands will inevitably embrace this change in culture. 

Source: http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/luxury-brands-are-still-casting-leery-eye-toward-social-media-161155 

Fashion Bloggers Are Making Millions

The glamorous New York Fashion week has just ended last week, it is intriguing to see who is making money in this affluent industry. 

Some estimate the economic impact of this event to bring in on average $850 million to New York in less than a week. However, the models walking the run way may not be skinny just because of anorexia, but because the fact that they are way underpaid. While a designer dress could cost you thousands of dollar, a model walking on a New York Fashion Week runway could earn as little as $150. Often the models in this event just do it to be able to say they've walked on NY Fashion week. The rest of the people in the scene such as the security guards, public relations liaisons, and buyers, have annual salary below $100,000.

Surprisingly, there is a profession in the scene whose income is on the rise, actually hitting the millions, those are the bloggers. Unlike those celebrities who get paid showing up in the front roll of a designer's show, the elite fashion bloggers earn their income in a different way. They do not focus on being a journalist, they focus on branding themselves. These tastemakers and style influencers do not really report anything, they may just give comments on what they like. 

It does not matter how old or how experience you are to be a great fashion blogger. Pink Peonies' Rachel Parcell, a 23 years old blogger is making around $960k this year. Bag Snob's Tina Craig and Kelly Cook are expected to have income of over $1 million. Many upcoming bloggers are also making their way up to the six figure earnings.

Blogging is certainly not a just a hobby or a class assignment, if you find what you are passionate for, it is probably a good idea to start blogging about it!

Source: CNBC, WhoWhatWear

How Social Media is Transforming Fashion Week Coverage

An article cropped up on Mashable.com a couple of days ago about how social media transformed the coverage of Fashion Week, which recently invaded New York City. What was once considered a niche event of interest only to those directly involved in the fashion industry has suddenly become newsworthy to the general public. Even publications like the Wall Street Journal are in on the act.

Several different explanations are cited as the reasons for the increased coverage via social media platforms: growing demand from readers for play-by-play updates, sneak peeks backstage, and firsthand raw footage and/or images that give followers all over the world the sense of really being there.

What I really find most striking about this article is how obvious it all seems. It’s almost unbelievable that it has taken this long for the fashion industry and the journalists that cover it to catch up to the growing dominance of social media, especially given the proliferation of fashion bloggers and photographers, many of whom have managed to cultivate international fan bases (Ex: The Sartorialist).

However, what I did find interesting was the mention of the new challenges and opportunities that the addition of social media presents for reporters. One of the reporters from the Wall Street Journal commented on how difficult it was to find a balance between capturing those play-by-play moments that readers are most interested in, while also not missing or being distracted from the actual event. Although nowhere near the level of these reporters, as a freelance dance critic myself, I can definitely relate to how challenging it can be to be taking notes and analyzing parts of the performance, while simultaneously trying to get a sense of the show as a whole and also have the opportunity to enjoy what I’m watching. Throw in having to take photos and video while uploading the content to Facebook and Twitter while also keeping an eye out for the next look coming down the runway and you have yourself one incredibly overwhelming job.

Despite these new challenges, as there are virtually no constraints on the amount of content that can be uploaded through social media, reporters now have another outlet for all of the information they gather that didn’t make the cut for the physical newspaper or magazine. Although the information shared through social media doesn’t translate directly into dollars, the reporters in this article agreed that their involvement with social media sites has changed the way the general public views their publications. The popularity of Facebook and Twitter allows them to reach a wider audience and establish stronger ties to their readership.

Is Digital Media breeding a generation of narcissists?

You might be wondering how this has any real relevance to the topics being discussed in digital marketing but hear me out. When Facebook became a worldwide pandemic, I use the word pandemic purposefully; I stopped to think what it really was it that made it so successful.

Was it the ‘oh so eloquent’ mission statement of ‘helping you connect and share with people in your life’? No that’s BS. As much Mark Zuckerberg had the noble cause of helping people understand the world around them, let’s be honest, Facebook is a paradise for stalkers and narcissists and taps into a primitive instinct of general curiosity. How many of you suddenly get excited by your friend count going up, or think about what status update to put up or how many people respond to what you say? Recent websites such as Klout.com and the Sunday Times Social media rich list are serving to breed a relentless self promotion that give rise to some wholly unhealthy behaviors.

Sites like LinkedIn I can see real professional merits to but the number of people who constantly seek some form of self validation and attention on social networking sites is alarming. Now I actually did some research on this. In an article entitled ‘Narcissism and social networking websites’ (Laura E Buffadi & W Keith Campbell) those with narcissism are predicted to have higher levels of social activity online with more self promoting content. Of course I have posed the reverse question but through my own observational evidence – I can attest to the fact social media sites can make even the most normal people become a little on the self obsessive side.
One might wonder that this level cycnism completely contradicts the fact that I love all things digital. I am excited by how it is changing the world as I have written in many blogs for this class but I am equally cautious and aware of its malaise.

I look forward to any comments you might have.

Monetizing Microblogging - Glam Media & the Oscars

Glam Media figured out a way to make money off of tweets by hosting a twitter widget on its own web site during Sunday night's Oscars. The widget streamed tweets that were filtered by freelance curators hired by Glam, and then further edited by Glam entertainment editors. Glam was able to sell sponsorship of the widget to women's beauty brand Aveeno. The service, called gWire, is being expanded to include streams from FriendFeed and Facebook. We can expect Glam and other ad networks to offer similar status update/commentary streaming during other events watched by mass audiences in the future. Touting editing and curating tools will surely help to secure sponsorship from brand conscious advertisers.

More information can be found on VentureBeat: http://venturebeat.com/2009/02/22/glam-edits-oscars-twitter-feed-and-makes-money/

The Race to Critical Mass in the Fashion World...

You know you've reached the tipping point when something tech related becomes big news in the slow to move fashion world! So the fact that Womens Wear Daily had a large article yesterday entitled "What's Next for Fashion Networks?" made me think it was time to jump on the bandwagon! This whole internet thing might really be catching on ;) In all seriousness, it raised a couple of interesting questions: what can fashion sites offer beyond online shopping? Is there room for a niche, fashion-based social networking site (like the one MySpace has created, which in my opinion will never succeed because fashionistas would never be caught dead on MySpace - only A Small World for those ladies)? In our voyeuristic society, where every day people are willing to take the time to post and critique outfits in front of thousands of strangers, is there a way to reach critical mass and can it be monetized? As we've discussed in class, perhaps the most promising aspect of this model, if someone can do it right, is the targeted database of information that could be created on users, which would be incredibly valuable to retailers and fashion companies looking to make that incremental dollar...