Since the outbreak of Covid-19, a lot of things have changed for the majority of the luxury, fashion, and beauty industries. Some businesses had to temporarily close stores and product warehouses as well as their staff having to isolate and work from home. As a result of this, the majority of the industry has slowed down. The challenge for some brands will be to maintain customer communication and attention to survive through this uncertain period, locally and globally. Now that a large majority of people are at home, the online activities define our daily routine now more than ever. This results in a rise of online content demand and therefore, the supply being generated or consumed via shared pictures and videos.
From our latest State of Influencer Marketing 2020 report, we discovered that "94% of brands found influencer marketing effective in driving sales". This highlights the value and impact of influencer marketing for brands - and the mass market industry is taking a strong approach in this strategy.
In this article, we are going to take a look at how influencer marketing via the use of keywords and hashtags has contributed to activating customer attention, maintaining an online community, and keeping the likes of Pretty Little Thing, Boohoo, Missguided, and Nasty Gal front of mind. Popular trends like loungewear have helped mass fashion brands in terms of the value they have generated in recent months. In March alone there were 62 content placements for influencers using the keywords ‘loungewear’ and ‘working from home’ - resulting in £571.4K in MIV®.
Pretty Little Thing
In the first quarter of 2020, fashion e-tailer Pretty Little Thing maintained a high performing Media Impact Value™, generating £90.2M in MIV®. They officially coined the hashtag #stayathomewithPLT creating a community of influencers to share their stay at home outfits via organic social content across Instagram and YouTube channels. This shows that not all brands have been heavily affected during this on-going crisis. Due to the major push in the celebrity and influencer content space as well as leveraging Influencer Voices, Pretty Little Thing maintained relevance.
Influencer Emily Philpott, created a ‘new in’ try-on haul specifically for her followers, focussing on fashion purchases for working from home. In her try on haul, she included Pretty Little Thing joggers - this content alone generated £29.2K in MIV® and was the top-performing placement for the brand in the month of March.
Nasty Gal
Nasty Gal is another mass-market brand using one of the popular trends in mass market fashion, using the loungewear keyword and hashtag to drive content. Fashion creator, Lydia Rose (@fashionflux) posted a loungewear short set on Instagram generating £143.9k in MIV®. This placement was one of the top posts globally in March for the brand.
Missguided
YouTube haul videos have dominated influencer marketing in the world of fashion, especially during the first quarter of 2020, as audiences look to longer-form content for entertainment whilst at home. Missguided is another brand that has implemented a successful influencer marketing strategy to reach a wide audience during Covid-19. With the release of their collaboration with Playboy during a peak time in isolation, influencer content was a key element in the brand launch to spread awareness of the range of products. @Roxxsaurus shared a YouTube haul of the collection which included the brand’s new loungewear and jogger pieces. The use of this Influencer Voice generated £65.3K in MIV®. Another example of how high performing content via an online presence creates a high return was via style blogger, @x_carms displaying her misguided loungewear set, accumulating £39.5K in MIV®.
Boohoo
Last but certainly not least is UK mass-market brand Boohoo, also using the keyword Loungewear across March, with just 21 placements driving £90k in Media Impact Value™ for the brand. This is a positive insight to consider when using hashtags for online marketing strategies. Not only are brands able to check in on their community and how they post using a hashtag on Instagram, but it is a great way to measure how your brand is performing through a certain season. Boohoo have also created their own branded hashtag ‘#boohointhehouse’ which is a great example of how mass-market brands can use their ongoing partnerships with influencers to be creative and optimize content with a changing environment and consumer demand.
As mentioned in our latest State Of Influencer Marketing 2020 Report, building a customer-centric strategy is more important than ever before. And the fact that almost 95% of the fashion industry work with influencers, or that the main objectives covered through these types of campaigns are awareness or sales is not surprising. As the world is now depending on online resources, it is important to consider optimizing keywords and hashtags within your strategy to maintain engagement with your brand audience and increase your online brand awareness. We hope you enjoyed this article highlighting popular trends in mass market fashion.
By Launchmetrics Content Team
The Launchmetrics content team is always on the lookout for new trends in the fashion and technology sector. We are geeks with style and lovers of good stories!
