5 New Rules for PR and Marketing Fashion and Luxury Brands in 2019 — Pressfarm

PR and Marketing for fashion and luxury is slightly different from what you find for conventional brands. After all, the product is high-end and the associated target market is inevitably more wealthy. What’s more, recent trends and the appropriate channels of communication have evolved significantly over the past few years and these changes often require a new perspective.

But how exactly does this translate to PR and marketing? More specifically, where should fashion or luxury brands be focusing their efforts in the year ahead?

Let’s take a look at five new rules for PR and marketing for fashion and luxury brands in 2019:

1. Focusing on the Most Lucrative Social Media Platform — Linkedin

Social media is still the quickest and most effective way to establish relationships online. For fashion and luxury brands, the search and filter process also makes social media the easiest way to reach the right target market. However, there’s good reason to believe that LinkedIn could be the most effective and relative social media channel for these brands in 2019.

That is to say, LinkedIn has the wealthiest demographic of any social media and fashion or luxury brands need to attract these individuals who have a particularly high level of disposable income. In fact, LinkedIn mostly consists of millennial’s and generation Z which account for one third of the world’s buying power.

What’s more, recent studies show that 41% of millionaires are currently registered on LinkedIn. As if that’s not enough, a LinkedIn spokesperson recently claimed that this fast growing social platform has the most educated and vastly experienced audience in the entire category.

Moral of the story: LinkedIn should be a strong focus for Fashion and Luxury brands in 2019.

2. Embracing Chatbots for Improved PR & Marketing

Let’s be honest, most people use chatbots a lot more than what they know about them. In other words, chatbots are extremely common on modern websites yet it would seem that most brands are still largely unaware of their importance.

You see, the chatbot industry is currently worth close to half a million and expected to more than double over the next five years. Amazon, Ebay, and Facebook are just a few of the big names which deploy this artificial intelligence and this trend is likely to continue into 2019.

But how can chatbots improve PR and marketing for fashion and luxury brands?

Well, chatbots increase engagement among users and are known to improve customer retention rates. In this sense, chatbots can be used as a proven means of communication and the cost is significantly lower in comparison with conventional customer service, sales etc.

On the other hand, at a time when the traditional call-to-action seems outdated, chatbots can be highly effective at compelling online users to signup, register or “click here now”.

3. Mastering Long Form Content and Recent Trends in Design

You may have noticed a significant drop or increase in terms of search rankings during the year. Simply put, this was down to the new “Medic Update” by Google which made a clear preference for websites with long form content. Needless to say, this illustrates how fashion and luxury brands should embrace long form content as part of their marketing strategy but that’s just part of the story…

You see, even web design trends are indicating some of the most crucial aspects that PR and marketing should be focused upon. For example, custom illustrations are hugely popular in the past two years and offer a unique ways for brands to convey a more accurate or colourful message. What’s more, there has been a clear transition from standard typography to bold and elegant letters which can do a much better job of infusing personality into the actual text.

With this in mind, recent trends suggest that PR and marketing for fashion and luxury brands should pay closer attention to design and utilize these trends to stay at the top of their game.

4. Driving PR & Marketing through Stories

As you know, Instagram Stories reached a new paradigm this year with more than 300 million monthly users publishing story after story. This rise was nothing short of spectacular but it was also largely expected, for more than 40% of professional are using these stories as part of their marketing efforts.

But why are these stories so important?

Simply put, story-driven content is the fastest way to communicate information and connect with online users at the same time. Now, that’s not to say Instagram of “Facebook Stories” are the only way forward but rather to explain how stories are proving to be the most effective trend in modern marketing.

With this in mind, PR and marketing for fashion and luxury brands should think about how they can use stories to promote their brand. For example, maybe the brand can talk fondly about their customers or publish stories about talented individuals behind the theme. Imagery, video and illustrations are all fantastic tools for this story-driven content and statistics suggest it’s the single-most powerful content.

5. Choosing Influencers over Ads and Measuring the Results

Facebook, Instagram, and Google Ads have really cleaned up over the past few years with every last businesses rushing to take advantage of “cheap” advertising. It’s true, the rates for promoting and marketing on these channels is still considered low and an excellent means of reaching out to customers. However, recent trends suggest this focus is taking a new direction with more and more marketers focusing on influencers instead of traditional adverts.

On the other hand, calculating the true value of influencer marketing was one of the major issues for marketers last year. That is to say, most marketers were admittedly unsure as to what they should or should not be paying for collaborations with certain influencers. In some cases, things worked out but the lack of measurable metrics meant that many marketing efforts came up short.

When you consider these recent trends and issues, it should be clear that influencer marketing is still highly important to PR and marketing for fashion and luxury brands. However, it will be just as important to measure these statistics in the coming year so that brands can ensure the best possible return on their investment.

As we edge slowly into the new year, it’s fully expected that the above trends will continue to play out and while things are likely to change by this time next year, these are certainly rules that fashion and luxury brands should be taking seriously in the present.

Originally published at press.farm on March 9, 2019.