As an industry that’s built entirely upon the exchange of opinions, the fashion world may seem like a field where social media would naturally take flight. After all, aren’t terms like “word of mouth” and “viral buzz” the same keywords that signify success on both the catwalk and on Twitter?
But there’s a catch: the fashion world is actually built on a scarcity of opinions. It relies on the reputations and influence of a select few tastemakers to tell the rest of the rabid audience what they’re supposed to like (and not like), and when.
So how did an industry that benefits from the existence of gatekeepers learn to embrace a new technology that essentially renders gatekeepers obsolete?
By turning their own world upside-down and offering everyone access.
In 2010, the vaunted New York Fashion Week — an event once so exclusive that access to it has been proffered as the grand prize on every season of Project Runway — went social in a big, big way. Brands like American Express, Womens Wear Daily and Aveda helped sponsor a Twitterizing of Fashion Week, which spurred a wave of tech industry buzz.
Today, the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week fan page on Facebook currently boasts more than 85,000 fans. And while this year’s migration of fashion brands to Tumblr has had its share of ups and downs, the future implications of fashion’s affair with social media are clear: this once-insular industry is now actively seeking new ways to build buzz, generate awareness and connect with the general public.
As for fashion’s gatekeepers, they’re certainly not obsolete. In fact, their expertise is actually even more valuable now, as a filter to help the public make sense of the flood of available fashion information that was once so highly restricted.
Who knew the industry that generates so much of the world’s art, imagery and gossip could get even bigger simply by opening their doors, pulling back their curtains and pressing the “share” button?
Ouidad, backstage with the curly models of NYC Fashion Week 2011
When your brand is well-known in your field, you have a story worth telling. But how do you find new audiences to share that story with?
You find something everyone has in common.
For example, it’s no secret that the fashion world has invested heavily in the social media market. Tools like Twitter and Facebook, which are built to fuel conversations, are a perfect match for an industry that thrives on opinion. And while not every brand is necessarily fashion-forward, a forward-thinking brand can always find ways to bridge that gap.
During this year’s Fashion Week in New York City, two of our Creative Concepts clients learned just how exhilarating the fashion world can be.
Ouidad (the best friend a curly girl could ever have) was live-tweeting backstage from several Fashion Week shows and shoots, sharing photos and channeling buzz as the fashion magic was happening. Why? Because, as a hair care expert who’s focused on empowerment and education, Ouidad knows that surrounding yourself with beauty is a key building block in your lifelong quest to feel fabulous!
Another of our clients, the eco-cleaning innovators Ecover, were thrilled to support Study, a sustainable fashion brand from Tara St. James that proves the fashion world sees “green” as more than just a color. And since Ecover and Study are each using social media to communicate their passion for a cleaner, greener world, Ecover’s sponsorship provided the perfect opportunity to give each brand a common talking point which they could share with their own audiences.
So, how can your brand find new ways to share its expertise and passion with a new audience that might be a step or two removed from your existing fanbase?
First, find common ground — or a common enemy. Then, reach out. Be valuable. Be interesting. Be supportive. Be worth knowing.
(And if you can do it while looking amazing in Armani or Burberry, there’s nothing wrong with that either!)
When you’re the top specialty tea company in the United States, you reach a lot of tea lovers. Our client Bigelow Tea is using social media — from Bigelow Tea’s Facebook (and, yes, MySpace) pages to their YouTube channel, Bigelow loves to share their tea knowledge with the world. (After 65 years in busiess, they know a thing or two about tea.)
But how often do their customers have a chance to share what they know with each other? Normally, it’s not easy. Fortunately, we at Creative Concepts are helping Bigelow Tea bridge that gap.
Last month, the Bigelow Tea Twitter account asked its followers if they had any tea tips worth sharing. The results were instructive, and they formed the basis of a helpful blog post that allowed Bigelow’s fans to learn from one another.
This isn’t Bigelow’s first foray into customer connectivity. Earlier this year, they hosted their first Bigelow Tea Social in New York City, where bloggers and foodies alike came together to talk tea (and get their fill of free samples). How was that live event conceived of and managed? Why, on Bigelow’s blog and Twitter account, of course!
And while tea is obviously a communal drink to begin with, Bigelow Tea isn’t the only company finding new ways to bring their customers together. Our client Ecover celebrated their 30th anniversary of creating ecological cleaning products with a live event that united green bloggers, media-makers and innovators, all of whom swapped stories and tips until the party ended. How did we at Creative Concepts help Ecover organize this event? With a Facebook contest hosted on Ecover’s blog!
Social media: bringing companies and customers together — with the emphasis on together.
Ecover’s 30th Anniversary party in NYC. Photo by Kate Eisemann
Despite the impressive track record that comes with being a 30 year-old international brand, our client Ecover is still facing one big hurdle when it comes to increasing audience awareness in the United States:
They weren’t here first.
While Ecover was establishing their brand of ecological cleaning products in Europe before they ever crossed the pond, competitors like Method and Seventh Generation were becoming the common names that people in the US tend to think of as “clean and green.” And although Ecover has effective partnerships with retailers like Whole Foods, they’re still seeking new ways to connect with potential customers who might not even know that they exist (yet).
So, yes, Ecover is on Twitter. And yes, Ecover is on Facebook. And yes, Ecover has a blog.
But when Ecover celebrated their 30th Anniversary in November, they saw an opportunity to connect with those bloggers, tweeters and Facebook fans in a whole new way: in person.
We at Creative Concepts helped Ecover create a “30 Under 30″ contest to celebrate the contributions of America’s young eco-innovators. The contest’s winner, Ryan Arnold, was announced live in New York City on November 10th at Ecover’s 30th Anniversary party, held live in the Environment showroom in Manhattan. Ecover also partnered with EcoStilletto, who organized a green blogger panel during the event which focused on the future of sustainability.
The result?
Increased brand awareness, compelling conversation and positive post-event coverage on blogs and Twitter alike. Plus, Ecover CEO Mick Bremans got to meet dozens of young eco-minded entrepreneurs and media makers who are passionate about the future of sustainability which was a great opportunity for him and the finalists!
This kind of personal connection can be started online, and we certainly expect it to continue online long after the event is over. But no matter how electrified your Facebook community is, nothing replaces the power of face-to-face communications to build tangible relationships.
Are you building relationships that bridge the gap between the online and offline worlds?
Need help building those bridges? Join us on Twitter or Facebook!
Our client, Ouidad, has been helping women take control of their curls for over 25 years. After one mind-blowing appointment, when they finally see how great their hair can look, many of these women say “I wish I’d known all about this when I was younger!”
So, naturally, we helped Ouidad find a way to scale their hair care tips down for kids! (Or, in this case, for moms, who sometimes feel like a straightening iron or a ponytail is their only recourse for getting the kids to school on time.)
Wondering whether your content might scale to kids and parents? Ask yourself these questions:
What are your brand’s core beliefs / offerings / products?
Do the problems your brand solves also occur for kids?
How would your products’ implementation change in the hands of kids (or parents)?
How could your packaging or marketing change to appeal to kids (or parents)?
Are kids (or parents) reachable via your current messaging channels? If not, where are they reachable — and how would your message need to be adapted?
In Ouidad’s case, their core products solve a universal problem: “How do I look good without taking forever?” Their products improve their customers’ self-esteem and self-awareness. And these same needs and impacts are just as valuable (and maybe moreso) to kids and parents.
It helps that Ouidad has a line of KRLY Kids products specifically designed for kids’ hair. But even if that weren’t the case, the same basic principles of content scaling apply. Once you’ve identified your brand’s core values, adapting them for kids and parents is a great way to expand your customer base while simultaneously endearing your brand to a whole new generation.
And if your content (and your products) could be useful to children and parents, who else should you be reaching?
Back in February, we at Creative Concepts were scheduled to film a video for our client, Ouidad, better known to curly-haired fashionistas around the world as “the queen of curl.”
The video was supposed to be simple: a before-and-after interview with the winner of Ouidad’s “If These Curls Could Talk” contest, including a glimpse of her fabulous post-makeover ‘do, live from Ouidad’s New York City salon.
But we had one problem: the East Coast had just been buried by a blizzard.
In fact, the winner herself lived in Baltimore, which had just set a snowfall record. Amtrak wasn’t running, the highways were shut down, and there was a very good chance the shoot would have to be canceled.
And then, miraculously, everything came together.
Trains and buses began running mere hours before the shoot was scheduled, and the winner arrived just in time…
… and with straight hair.
For those of you who don’t spend your lives in a hair salon, this is the equivalent of winning free tickets to a hockey camp and then showing up with a broken leg. Whatever the camp intended to teach you, they suddenly realize they’ll have to heal you first.*
So Ouidad and her stylists set to work, not only to give their contest winner the curls of her dreams, but to help her understand why straightening her hair wasn’t the best idea in the first place. We’re pretty sure their advice worked, because the contest winner was awestruck by her new look and her newfound understanding of how to best care for her curls.
So remember: in social media, there’s no such thing as a true negative. Every stumbling block is really an opportunity for improvement, and another positive just waiting to happen — and when it does, you end up with an even better story to tell!
(Speaking of improvement, for more helpful haircare Q&As, visit Ouidad’s info-packed website. If you’re not curly by nature, you’ll wish you were!)
* And speaking of hockey, enter this Facebook contest from Bigelow Tea — who is also our client — and you could win tickets to Wayne Gretzky’s hockey camp in 2011! (But be careful about that broken leg. Seriously.)
Want to turn your troubles into treasures? Join us on Twitter or Facebook!
You may know actor Ed Norton from films like Rounders, Red Dragon and American History X. What you may not know is that Ed Norton is also one of many celebrities who’ve embraced the power of social media to create real, tangible change among real people, from America to Africa.
And it just so happens that one of Norton’s ventures is directly benefiting one of our clients, the Children’s Aid Society, all because one person decided to make a difference.
For example, one Crowdrise member is currently raising money for the Children’s Aid Society. Her goal is to raise $1000 and, at the time of this writing, she’s more than halfway there. And while the Children’s Aid Society certainly stands to benefit from any funds raised on their behalf, the knowledge and experience that the donors and organizers glean from taking part in the effort can’t be overstated, either.
In other words, if your supporters are using their own crowdfunding initiatives to raise awareness of all the wonderful things your organization does, aren’t those the kinds of supporters you want to empower?
And if helping your favorite charity raise money becomes an experience that helps you understand the true value of a cause, doesn’t everybody win?
The web is crowded and filled with distractions. A successful business finds ways to break through the clutter and deliver compelling messages to the people most likely to act upon them.
But how well can you articulate who your target audience is?
“Whole Foods is actually a psychographic, not a demographic,” said Paul Rossi, The Economist’s managing director and executive vice president for the Americas. “One of the things people say is, ‘You go after an affluent audience.’ But we don’t define our audience by their demographic. We define our audience based on what they think.”
That’s a bold move — and, at least for now, one that’s paying off on The Economist’s bottom line. But, to do this, a company must understand what its core audience thinks, wants and needs, and be able to deliver those solutions in a manner that resonates.
If you can do that… why stop there?
How Creative Concepts Helps Its Clients Expand Their Core Audience
When a client asks us to help them deliver a message, they often already know what they want to say and to whom they’d like to say it. What they initially expect us to do is help them find that audience online. And we do.
But we also help them tailor their original message to the tastes of multiple audiences, each of which combines to form different aspects of their extended customer base.
For example, Ecover is a multinational company that manufactures sustainable cleaning products. Their obvious core audience is “green” moms in search of healthier alternatives to chemical cleaners.
But the list of customers who are, could, or should be motivated by Ecover’s solutions is much broader, including:
Journalists
Scientists
Teachers
Fathers
Kids
Grandparents
Gardeners
Cleaning staffs
Corporate buyers
… and so on.
Likewise, tea might not seem like an obvious conversational topic for sports fans, traveling salesmen or history buffs, but our work with Bigelow Tea has helped expand brand awareness among these unlikely audiences.
And while Ouidad may be the “Queen of Curl,” the interested audience for her products extends far beyond the walls of her New York City salon. As we helped Ouidad track inbound web traffic and blog comments, we found passionate customers from around the world — many of whom speak Spanish or Portuguese. This prompted us to begin translating Ouidad’s content, in order to better serve her growing multilingual audience.
Understanding your core audience is a key to driving your business forward. But finding different ways to deliver one message to multiple audiences is one way Creative Concepts helps our clients expand beyond their core customers.
If you’re just beginning to use social media, Twitter and Facebook may seem very similar.
And while it’s true that both services…
Are built around publicly shared “status updates”
Enable users to “follow” or “friend” each other
Can be simultaneously updated through third party services like HootSuite
… you’ll soon realize that the audience for each service has very different goals and expectations.
Broadly speaking, Twitter is good for…
Connecting with peers and industry professionals
“Water cooler” discussions of breaking news & pop culture
Real-time information-sharing, research, Q&As, etc.
Technology-focused and business-driven discussions
One-way broadcasts, with occasional commentary
… while Facebook is good for…
Connecting with people you already know “in real life”
Threaded discusssions (where all comments are collected)
Personal opinions
Photo albums
Videos
Twitter, while offering less robust features than Facebook, is also (paradoxically) considered to be the more professional and business-oriented platform. Meanwhile, Facebook (like MySpace before it) is the more visually-driven sharing platform among friends, family and acquaintances.
This means that the users of each service have different expectations for their experience on each platform. And if you’re piloting a brand across both channels, you need to be aware of those differences. (Dan Zarella writes frequently, and well, about how to do this.)
For example, in December of 2009, we at Creative Concepts were helping The Children’s Aid Society promote their annual Miracle on Madison fundraiser. Most of the news about that particular event — celebrity sightings, fashion updates and high-end sales — differed from the vast majority of The Children’s Aid Society’s traditional topics (children’s health, education, foster care and family services).
We quickly learned that the charity’s followers on Twitter remained open to the Miracle on Madison messaging, but their fans on Facebook chilled to the idea. While they may be interested in the actual work being done by The Children’s Aid Society, that must seem at odds with more “commercial” updates about a high society Manhattan fundraising event.
So they made their voices heard – some abandoned The Children’s Aid Society Facebook page.
When we noticed a drop in Facebook numbers that coincided with an increase in Miracle messaging, we followed our instincts and dialed down the Miracle mentions on Facebook. And when their fans’ behavior subsequently returned to normal, we chalked that up as a lesson learned — and one we believe is worth sharing:
Facebook is not Twitter is not MySpace is not a blog. You may have one message, but you have multiple audiences.
Listen, and then adjust your pitch.
Want to hear our various voices? Follow us on Twitter and Facebook!
On the web, video works wonders. It’s fast-paced, personable, entertaining and informative. And since production time is always a factor, it helps to have a solid plan in place to make sure you stay on track and under budget.
But if there’s one thing we’ve learned here at Creative Concepts, it’s that our best-laid video production plans often need to be scrapped once the camera starts rolling.
Here are three examples of the ways we’ve adapted our original video ideas to suit a client’s newfound needs — or to accommodate the limits of reality.
“What Do YOU Know About the Children’s Aid Society?”
That was the question we expected to ask people on the streets of New York. And their answer?
Well… as it turned out, not much.
Although nearly everyone we spoke with had heard ofThe Children’s Aid Society, most of them weren’t quite sure what the charity actually does. Despite operating in NYC for over 150 years, we quickly realized the organization was still “under the radar” for most New Yorkers.
When we recognized this disconnect between public impact and public image, we adapted our video’s premise and used our “man-on-the-street” style Q&As to educate the the viewers about the charity’s multitude of programs.
The First Rule of Live Event Planning: Something ALWAYS Goes Wrong
Ruth Ridgeway is a veteran event planner in the New York City market. As such, she’s unflappable in the face of any challenge — including having her entire event crew videotaped during one of their signature two-day location transformations.
But when the wrong furniture gets delivered and there’s no time to revise her designs, Ruth switches from “management mode” to “problem-solving dynamo” in seconds — and our video capitalizes on her shrewdly-solved conundrum.
Have A Cup of Tea with (Windblown) Wally at Fenway Park
Even when everything goes right, there’s still no way to control the weather.
As proud sponsors of the Boston Red Sox, Bigelow Tea was thrilled to have a chance to shoot a quirky video with Wally the Green Monster. The idea was to have Cindi Bigelow herself teach Wally how to make a cup of tea. But the weather refused to cooperate, forcing Cindi and Wally to race through the process before their props blew clear across the field.
The lesson?
No matter what happens, find a way to make the most of every unexpected, inconvenient and downright blustery situation.
