ADDING DEPTH TO A PR/CELEBRITY ENSORSEMENT STRATEGY TO REINVIGORATE A BRAND

Transcription

1 ADDING DEPTH TO A PR/CELEBRITY ENSORSEMENT STRATEGY TO REINVIGORATE A BRAND A LIPSY CASE STUDY Colin Gray May 2015

2 INTRODUCTION Lipsy is an interesting brand sales are up, but all the signs suggests the brand is in decline There s been a 47% drop in unique visitor numbers to Lipsy.co.uk since August 2013 There has been a similar drop (46%) in Google search traffic between May 2011 (prompted by Mollie King) & March 2015 In fact, 2014 sales results were the best since Next acquired the brand. Further sales and profit growth are expected from Lipsy in the years ahead. The following slides explore how Lipsy might leverage Social Media and Cultural Trends to drive more engagement and reinvigorate the brand

3 BRAND CONTEXT Target audience: women aged 18-34yrs old, who are highly motivated to keep up with latest celebrity, beauty and fashion trends but don't necessarily have a huge disposable income Source: ComScore & YouGov

4 BRAND STRENGTHS Lipsy has a built strong connection with celebrity culture & the "Heat generation Targeting the right brand ambassadors and drawing them back to the brand After losing ground to the likes of ASOS, Lipsy has helped (parent company) Next appeal to younger (16-34) women Known for affordable glamour

5 A STRATEGY NOT WITHOUT RISK AFTER BUILDING THEIR FASHION CREDENTIALS, THOSE CELEBRITIES CAN LAUNCH THEIR OWN COMPETING RANGES

6 THERE S ALWAYS THE RISK OF THOSE CELEBRITIES PUBLICLY FALLING FROM GRACE

7 AND THE RISK OF BECOMING TOO CLOSELY ASSOCIATED WITH REALITY TV SPECIFICALLY (& ESSEX ) Just 20% of 18-34s 'love' or 'like' TOWIE, MIC or GS (compared to just 7% of over 35s) Surprisingly, they appeal just as much to men as they do women: 10% of men 'love' or 'like' them versus 12% of women

8 IT S A STRATEGY THAT IS ALSO EASY TO COPY

9 TRENDS WE COULD CAPITLISE ON TO MITIGATE THESE RISKS CONNECT 1 2 new digital platforms allow people to share information instantaneously. Real-time exchanges amongst billions of people is fast becoming a reality Privacy and security concerns will accelerate and novel forms of scrutiny will mean that companies are no longer able to hide from demands for transparency CRUNCH rising demand and limited supplies means that it s crunch time for key resources such as energy, food and water Sustainable business models are becoming a value-added imperative Source: Future Business: mega-trends that every company needs to prepare for, Corporate Citizenship, Feb 2013

10 1 CONNECT LEVERAGING A LARGE SOCIAL FOOTPRINT Community engagement Daily conversa3ons Down 2.3% (from 488k) on Oct 14 Up 6.7% (from 79.1k) on Oct 14

11 1 ALTHOUGH NOT AS LARGE AS COMPETITORS 3.5m 2m 3.9m 841.1k 35% of Google users also search for ASOS 35% of Google users also search for River Island 30% of Google users also search for Topshop

12 1 ADDING FURTHER DEPTH TO THE EXISTING SOCIAL STRATEGY Move beyond sharing photos of new range and retweeting PR coverage to a bigger conversation based On what s happening in our customers lives 13 Apr 23 Jun 6 Jul Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Feb 7-18 Apr May 21 Jul - 1 Sept Easter Apr World Cup 12 Jun - 13 Jul Key School holidays

13 1 AND ALSO ADDRESS SIGNIFICANT DECLINE IN WEB TRAFFIC? * *25% of web visitors are Male (& 17% of social men3ons)

14 1 FOR EXAMPLE Tulisa s X Factor return - an opportunity to remind our audience that you sell bikinis?

15 1 DEEPENING AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT VIA SOCIAL More competitions with the aim of generating content to share with Fans & Followers Find your perfect partner Lipsy loves Pixie and to commemorate her Strictly Come Dancing appearance, we re giving you the chance to win dancing lessons Objectives: more interactions, incremental reach), increased social sharing (which impacts on search engine visibility) & prospect data capture

16 1 HOW ELSE COULD WE DRIVE A CONNECTION VIA SOCIAL? Social can help us identify new brand ambassadors who do our Twitter followers also follow? who is influential in their Twitter-sphere? There is also significant scope to better leverage the social footprint of brand ambassadors using promoted tweets to further extend our reach Lipsy has 84.4k Twitter followers; Michelle Keegan has 2.9m. Currently there are only 86 followers in common Millie Mackintosh has 812k followers and there are only 97 people in common Pixie Lott has 1.7m followers and there are only 104 people in common Promoted Tweet

17 1 CONNECT: WHO S DOING THIS available 24hrs a day 7 days a wk. Dedicated YouTube playlists allows users to interact with all aspects of the Burberry universe (campaigns, shows, beauty, eyewear, childrenswear, events, etc.) American Apparel tapping into communities (& also appears to recognise that a significant proportion of their sales come from men) Black Milk Clothing is hard to define. It is as much a community as a business Frequent restock updates gives customers a sense of urgency in getting an order submitted

18 2 CRUNCH On 24 April 2014, 10 years after the first Ethical Fashion Show was held in Paris, tens of thousands of people around the world turned their clothing #insideout, calling on brands and retailers to answer the question Who Made Your Clothes? #Insideout became the no.1 global trend on Twitter Out of the thousands of requests to brands via phone, , Twitter and Facebook, only a handful of customers received replies. These mostly indicated the country where their clothes were made, adding in the fact that they adhered to the highest working conditions. Hardly any brands replied to the WHO made your clothes? and missed the opportunity to connect with their customers

19 2 CRUNCH: WHO S DOING THIS WELL? ASOS (with the largest social footprint) are one of the few brands to have embraced #Insideout with positive effect

20 2 CRUNCH: WHO S DOING THIS WELL? Ada + Nik brings together rebellious British dark matter menswear with Greco Roman Punk - Ancient ideals of masculinity fused with pre industrial revolution silhouettes and the spirit of 70's Punk The brand has a distinct commitment to sustainability with materials as ethically sourced and produced as possible with use of biproduct leather, innovative fabrics and sustainable production and manufacturing techniques.

21 2 CRUNCH: IS THERE REALLY AN OPPORTUNITY HERE? 89% of shoppers are concerned about the environmental impact of the products they purchase 78% are willing to pay about 5% more for a product that is green The green demographic crosses all age groups, all income levels and all education levels. However, Women are significantly more environmentally aware than Men

22 THANK