Fashion, Bow Down to Your Social Media Savior: 3 Ways to Pique Brand Interest with Pinterest

By Martha Dominique Sojka

Any designer worthy of an atelier on Avenue Montaigne will tell you that fashion is meant to be an experience. And ideally, it’s an experience that makes consumers feel so trendy, sophisticated, and confident that they’re compelled to come back, time and time again. It’s all about creating the experience; it’s all about delivering on that lifestyle.

Admittedly, it’s hard to replicate those experiences and lifestyles online, and so it’s no surprise that the fashion industry has been slow to adapt social media into its marketing strategies. Traditional social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook transform the vivid, visually-laden fashion landscape into little more than words and tiny, static banner ads. Where’s the imagery, where’s the color? Where’s the experience?

How can fashion reap the benefits of social media, when the existing platforms take the very heart and soul out of it?

Fashion, your social media savior has arrived. Say hello to Pinterest.

Tailored to the Industry
 What makes Pinterest so lucrative for fashion? Its very nature plays to two key strengths of the industry: it’s visual and it’s social. In fashion, a picture can tell the whole story. And Pinterest affords fashion brands the ability to propel their stories in a way that is engaging, personal, and far-reaching.

It boils down to one thing: Pinterest is a huge referrer of web traffic. So huge, in fact, that it has recently become the top traffic driver for retailers, beating out Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Because a link is always attached to a pinned image, users are clicking on these links and visiting company websites and blogs. And this translates into increased engagement, visibility, and sales.
                                                                                             
As Johanna Murphy, VP/Ecommerce for Kate Spade puts it, “Pinterest is kind of the fuel for the overall fire to the brand that will ultimately drive sales”.

The Wall Street Journal seems to agree. The publisher’s recent foray into Pinterest centered on creating a New York Fashion Week pin board as a means to increase engagement with existing customers as well as potential new ones, and "[reach] readers in a different environment and bring them back to [the] site”. Read: an increased and engaging web presence can go a long way. 

Time (and Presence) is of the Essence                                                                                Don’t delay with getting your brand on Pinterest. The fashion brands that will reap the greatest benefits are those that will establish their presence the quickest. As with any social media tool, if brands are not there when the site is first gaining traction then any future endeavor ends up feeling like a corporate intrusion into a personal space. To be authentic and influential, brands need to find a role for themselves on Pinterest early on in the game. 

Disclaimer: This does not mean setting up a brand pin board, slapping on your products, and waiting for the traffic to pour in. Sure, you’ll get some activity; however, getting that coveted customer engagement and influential WOM takes more than simply replicating your spring catalog and calling it a day.

Below are three ways to up the ante on your Pinterest presence and use the social media tool to skyrocket consumer engagement levels and website traffic:

1. Concentrate on the lifestyle, not the product: Says Murphy of her Pinterest philosophy, “[Pinterest communicates] our brand: who we are, what we believe in…if you go there and start just pinning your own stuff, without having the mood, the spirit of the community, you’ll turn people off”. Remember this—you’re not blatantly advertising products, you’re selling a lifestyle. Your Pinterest page should put your brand’s lifestyle on display in a way that’s beautiful, organized, and social. In addition to products, pin to music, moods, and thoughts that inspire you and your target audience. Check out ban.do, Lilly Pulitzer, and Barney’s New York—they’re doing it right. 

2. Get creative with contests: Contests are great ways to motivate and engage your customers and followers. Have customers curate boards featuring your products on their personal accounts, or launch a contest board on your own account and ask customers to pin specific types of items. Take inspiration from Ann Taylor’s Heart Fashion and Guess’ Color Me Inspired contests and get creative with themes. Offer prizes to the individual that creates the best board and/or the person whose pin receives the most action (this will encourage them to spread the word about their own pin, giving the contest greater reach).

3. Offer special ‘Members Only’ deals to spur loyalty: Have a "Pinterest Exclusive" board featuring hand picked products from your website that will be discounted at checkout using a special code (i.e. “PinterestDeal”). Put the price in the pin description box to generate the price ribbon. This will garner attention to that specific board and allow users to quickly recognize the products as featured and/or on sale.

So, is your brand ready to start pinning? It better be. Pinterest is the new trend on the block, and as we all know, in fashion it really doesn’t pay to ignore the next big thing.

  
Martha Sojka is a graduate student in the Northwestern Medill IMC marketing program specializing in branding, analytics, and digital marketing. Her focus is on the fashion, beauty, and lifestyle industries. She is set to graduate in December 2012. Martha can be reached on twitter using the handle @MarthaDomiSojka

Three Ways Fashion Magazines can Recapture the Spotlight

With these digital strategies fashion magazine can stop the (fashion) bloggers from strutting all over them

by Kathryn Rubin Goodman

“Video killed the radio star” but has the Internet, particularly bloggers, slain the fashion magazine? Vogue, Elle, Glamour and Cosmopolitan are iconic brands– but how many of us actually purchase these magazines anymore? Falling sales figures and tumbling advertising revenue, beckons the question: are fashion magazines outmoded?

Magazine publishers blame Internet, arguing that the disintermediation of content online allows consumers to choose from an overabundance of free sources. While it’s true that people always prefer ‘free stuff’, there may be another reason that consumer’s are abandoning their allegiance to the fashion magazines in lieu of fashion blogs.

A whole new set of ‘fashion’ dictators in town
Once upon a time, what Vogue said was ‘IT’. Considered the ‘bible of fashion’ its decision of what colors and what silhouettes to feature trickled all the way down from Yves Saint Lauren to Target’s clearance bin; but now fashion bloggers have seized the reigns. So what do fashion bloggers have?

Trustworthy-ness: To younger consumers, fashion blogs seem more honest than established mainstream titles such as Glamour and Elle, after all they display the day-to-day looks of real women without the elaborate photo shoots equipped with an army of stylists, hairdressers and makeup artists. Designers and retailers have taken note of this trend, and have begun to usher these fashion bloggers out from behind their computer screens and into the spotlight. Just look at TJMaxx’s latest set of commercials, featuring fashion blogger Lindsey Calla (aka Saucy Glossie) walking viewers through her favorite looks. The birth of this latest partnership has allowed bloggers to lure even more readers away from the mainstream fashion magazines.

Real-time delivery: In a world where ‘on-demand’ rules, fashion brands see bloggers as a way to deliver instant news about the latest trends. Just scan the front row at a fashion show and you'll see that coveted spots typically reserved for magazine editors and celebrities are now also being filled by fashion bloggers, whose avid followers await their minute-by-minute updates. The rapid pace of social media allows consumers to engage with fashion brands in real-time, so fashion houses are no longer constrained by Vogue’s schedule. They can now swiftly distribute their own content directly to the consumer, bypassing the magazines entirely.

Three ways to rule once more
So what’s a fashion magazine to do? Option 1:fold up its pages or option 2: FIGHT. Fashion bloggers have created a unique experience for consumers, one that is timely and personal; fashion magazines should combined digital capabilities of tablets and smartphones with their formidable resources to create a truly engaging experience that will out shine the bloggers.

Below are three ways to create a strategy that will boost engagement, translate into increased profitability and help fashion magazines win this 'cat fight':

1. ATTACK on multiple fronts: Today, you can access fashion magazines' content online, on your tablet and on your smartphone; but it’s basically all the same! However, these different mediums need to compliment rather than substitute each other. Fashion magazines should channel their energy into developing killer tablet apps for the monthly issues, turning the websites into real-time updates for a quick fix and creating smartphone apps that deliver much-needed ‘service-oriented content’. By using these different mediums to satisfy distinctive needs, fashion magazines can create a full range of experiences that fashion bloggers cannot even come close to realizing.

2. ENGAGE the consumer: Fashion magazines have neglected the technological capabilities of the tablets, smartphones and even our PCs, placing the quality of the content above all else; and while content is definitely key, everybody likes a bit of ‘glitz and glam’. From the editorial content to the advertisements, fashion magazine publishers need to start combining video, slideshows and audio to create a more interactive experience for their readers – one that free bloggers cannot afford to produce.

3. TRANSFORM the reader into a customer: While fashion magazines' main role is to promote the latest designs, they need to step in up a notch and sell what they preach. Online shopping is all the rage, with Amazon 1-click ordering leading the way. Magazines must seize this opportunity, and integrate the reading and buying experience to create the option for consumers to easily purchase products directly through the magazine’s tablet and smartphone apps – a move that would transform the leading fashion magazines from style makers to virtual retailers, recapturing the attention of the leading fashion houses.

To prevent fashion magazines from going 'out of fashion', they need to embrace the latest technological trends to out-style the bloggers.

Kathryn is currently a graduate student at Northwestern's Medill Integrated Marketing Communications, concentrating in Direct & Interactive Marketing and Media Management at the Kellogg School of Management. Upon completion of the program she is extremely interested in pursuing a career in the media industry, particularly in the digital strategy department of a major fashion magazine. Follow her @KatRubinGoodman and connect with her on LinkedIn: Kathryn Rubin Goodman.