May 2015

ADDING DEPTH TO A PR/CELEBRITY ENSORSEMENT STRATEGY TO REINVIGORATE A BRAND A LIPSY CASE STUDY

Colin Gray

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

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

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

A STRATEGY NOT WITHOUT RISK

AFTER BUILDING THEIR FASHION CREDENTIALS, THOSE CELEBRITIES CAN LAUNCH THEIR OWN COMPETING RANGES

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

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

IT’S A STRATEGY THAT IS ALSO EASY TO COPY

“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

“CONNECT” 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

TRENDS WE COULD CAPITLISE ON TO MITIGATE THESE RISKS

Source: “Future Business: mega-trends that every company needs to prepare for”, Corporate Citizenship, Feb 2013

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“CONNECT”

Down 2.3% (from 488k) on Oct 14 Up 6.7% (from 79.1k) on Oct 14

Community  engagement   Daily  conversa3ons  

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LEVERAGING A LARGE SOCIAL FOOTPRINT

ALTHOUGH NOT AS LARGE AS COMPETITORS 1

30% of Google users also search

for Topshop

35% of Google users also search for River Island

35% of Google users also search

for ASOS

3.5m

841.1k

2m 3.9m

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

Easter 18 - 21 Apr

World Cup 12 Jun - 13 Jul

23 Jun – 6 Jul

17 -21 Feb

7 -18 Apr

26 - 30 May

21 Jul - 1 Sept

13 Apr

School holidays

Key

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

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AND ALSO ADDRESS SIGNIFICANT DECLINE IN WEB TRAFFIC?

*25%  of  web  visitors  are  Male  (&  17%  of  social  men3ons)  

*  

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Tulisa’s X Factor return - an opportunity to remind our audience that you sell bikinis?

FOR EXAMPLE 1

•  More competitions with the aim of generating content to share with Fans & Followers

•  Find your perfect partner

DEEPENING AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT VIA SOCIAL

•  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

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•  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

HOW ELSE COULD WE DRIVE A CONNECTION VIA SOCIAL?

Promoted Tweet

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CONNECT: WHO’S DOING THIS WELL?

•  “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

@BurberryService 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)

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•  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, email, 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

“CRUNCH” 2

ASOS (with the largest social footprint) are one

of the few brands to have embraced

#Insideout with positive effect

CRUNCH: WHO’S DOING THIS WELL?

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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 bi-product leather, innovative fabrics and sustainable production and manufacturing techniques.

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CRUNCH: IS THERE REALLY AN OPPORTUNITY HERE?

78% are willing to pay

about 5% more for a product that is green

89% of shoppers are

concerned about the environmental impact of the products they

purchase

The green demographic crosses all age groups, all income levels and all education levels. However,

Women are significantly more environmentally aware than Men

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THANK YOU

@ColinInTheBath http://psychemarketing.com