Travis Scott, J Balvin, and McDonald’s: Why some social partnerships work and others are destined to fail

If you went to McDonald’s in September, chances are you encountered Travis Scott. The prolific rapper had the first celebrity meal partnership to be featured on the McDonald’s menu since Michael Jordan’s in 1992. The Cactus Jack meal, named after Scott’s record label, replicated his favorite childhood special-order. The partnership was wildly successful. In its first few weeks, McDonald’s saw many franchises completely run out of ingredients for the meal, forcing a logistical...

12 November 2020 | Influencer Marketing

How user-generated content can be more powerful than influencer marketing campaigns

User-generated content (UGC) is quickly becoming the most popular marketing tool ahead of online influencer campaigns. The public have become accustomed to reality stars and has-been celebrities flogging whichever never-used-gadget that they’ve been paid to promote.

Since the rise of the Insta-marketeer, the Advertising Standards Authority has prescribed new rules for promoting products and services through social media platforms and online blogs, where a paid promotion must be...

11 November 2020 | Content Marketing

Trends in influencer marketing: Instagram and TikTok key, brand collaboration promising

The influencer marketing industry continues to grow with Instagram and TikTok key channels - but as Covid-19 continues to rage, a new report has found promising areas of collaboration in uncertain times.

The report from Tribe Dynamics, which surveyed more than 60 brands and more than 250 influencers, found manpower and resources remain roadblocks to program success. 91% of influencer marketing teams were between one and five people in size. More than four in five (81%) said their...

12 October 2020 | Branding

Key practices for tech brands to drive brand love in today’s tumultuous climate

2020 has been a tumultuous ride that no one saw coming. Every industry out there has been affected by COVID-19, and businesses are unlikely to go back to the way things were anytime soon. Especially at a time where consumer spending has generally decreased, businesses need to rethink their marketing strategy and brand story, in order to earn a place in the hearts of consumers. 

For technology companies that may be tightening their budgets amidst the current times, it is still...

9 September 2020 | Branding

The state of influencer marketing amid Covid-19: Concern but micro-influencers show path forward

Influencer marketing campaigns, so often trying to achieve a balance between aspiration and authenticity, have seen a fault line rip through them as the coronavirus pandemic has progressed.

For all of the missteps which made the news last year - Philip Morris breaking its internal rules on a campaign, fashion influencer Marissa Casey Grossman's marriage which brought a new meaning to the term 'brand engagement' - the statistics around influencer marketing were solid. According to...

29 June 2020 | Campaigns

Instagram and social engagement rises in lockdown – but influencers having less impact

More people are engaging with Instagram, but posts from influencers are on the decline as marketing budgets are slashed, according to the latest report from Socialbakers.

The company's Social Media Trends report, for Q1, specifically highlighted the impact Covid-19 was having on marketing trends. While many organisations were undergoing a natural change in circumstances amid the pandemic - take the travel industry as an example highlighted by this publication earlier this week -...

6 May 2020 | Influencer Marketing

How micro-influencers can become integral to impactful marketing campaigns

The influencer marketing industry has been subject to great scrutiny in recent years with concerns about trust, transparency and authenticity looming over brands and influencers alike. As a result, consumers have become more skeptical, the Advertising Standards Authority has enforced much stricter rules on the discipline, and social media giants have introduced new measures to keep their platforms free from fraud. It’s no wonder then that micro and nano-influencers have become the...

16 April 2020 | Advertising

Why the obsession with an influencer’s reach is over – and where to target instead

With new opportunities, such as Instagram’s branded content ads and shoppable posts, the influencer space is changing rapidly. Vamp hosted a survey with 124 marketers to find out how they collaborated with influencers, what they prioritised and where they had found success. The results showed that the biggest changes in influencer marketing hasn’t been the hiding of likes or cracking down on fake followers, it’s the monumental shift in marketers’ priorities.

27 February 2020 | Campaigns

Will Eagle, Read This If You Want To Be YouTube Famous author: On authenticity, attitude and audience

“Video is an acquired skill,” explains Will Eagle, author of Read This If You Want To Be YouTube Famous. “It’s not the same as Instagram – anyone can take a picture and apply a filter.”

Eagle, who spent four years as a brand strategist at Google working primarily on the video platform, put together his new book based on a survey which found three quarters of young people interviewed wanted to become YouTubers. Yet long gone are the days when...

24 January 2020 | Best Practice

As influencers increasingly create video content, what does this mean for brands?

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video must equate to millions. At least, that’s what social media users are banking on. The number of videos being created and shared across social platforms has soared in recent years.

Photo sharing platform Instagram has shifted its focus to video recently, with the Instagram Stories feature - and over on YouTube, 400 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every single minute.

Platforms have been telling us for a while...

24 January 2020 | Branding