The double-edged sword of brands going viral
To go viral is what every brand on every platform is after, is it not? Sometimes, however, or most of the times, going viral has proved not to be ideal. What brands should be after is not the short-lived hysteria over their products, as much as long-lasting brand loyalty.
After the two-year pandemic hiatus, the long-awaited return of Coachella finally happened, and anyone with minimal social media activity could confirm that the music played is not the most talked about topic of the festival.
Taking first place, is fashion. The festival has indeed become a launchpad for major fashion trends and brands are going into the event with big marketing moves and extensive collections. This is because the audience they’re adhering to is far away from the influencers that flood the event: they’re watching from the comfort of their own screen.
Coachella is an example, if not the best one, of how major music festivals produce a torrent of social media content, and the influence of what people are pictured wearing on sales worldwide cannot go underestimated. “You won’t be able to miss this on TikTok.” Says Miah Sullivan, HUGO’s senior vice president for global marketing and brand communications, when talking about the brand sponsoring the event: “It’s a part of creating the party vibe and getting the HUGO tribe all together and welcoming people into the brand,”. Brands, indeed, take their time choosing which event to sponsor as it’s key to ensuring their clothes and logo appear in as much of that content as possible. So, the more entertaining it is for the viewers, the better.
Revolve, the next-generation fashion retailer for Millennial and Gen-Z consumers, has done the most to associate itself as much as possible with the festival. Indeed, the retailer sees Coachella as the kick-off to a lucrative season, where consumers are getting inspired from festival trends for both spring and summer seasons. “It is essential, it’s massive … it’s this kind of Super Bowl,” said Raissa Gerona, Revolve’s chief brand officer.
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Even luxury brands are now interested to the influence Coachella holds, and it would be unwise not to, as what “kids consider experimental” might become “a trend.”, as stated by Tiffany Reid, senior vice president of fashion at Bustle Digital Group. Lifestyle brand Cult Gaia’s founder and CEO Larian Hekmat said brands should focus on special designs that will make customers stand out on Instagram or TikTok. ‘Easy for brands to stand out if they’re doing massive VIP parties and sponsored events with tons of influencers’, is what one may think. However, marketers have stated that even small brands can reach numerous consumers, a point supported by Vic Drabicky, founder of digital marketing agency January Digital: “You don’t need Drake at your house, you just need to do something cool and fun”.
These insights show how the phenomenon of catching Gen Z’s attention with social media content is not completely unknown to the fashion industry. However, keeping it for more than a few days – or hours- has proved to be a much bigger challenge. Many times, the content posted by brands is treated by consumers as every other type of content they see online: they see it, they like it, they forget about it. It’s great to have brand enthusiasm, but the issue is when it does not go hand in hand with brand loyalty, which is what happens most times on social media platforms today.
“The TikTok trend cycle is a double-edged sword for brands,” said Biz Sherbet, culture specialist at London-based next-gen creative agency and consultancy The Digital Fairy. “It can catapult brands to fame, but it can also contract a brand’s period of relevance”. When a brand or a singular creator goes viral, very quickly they get associated with one specific type of product or content. This can easily trap them in a cycle in which they feel like they need to keep selling what got them the views and the attention in the first place, with unsatisfying returns.
To have a Gen-Zer genuinely interested in you content for longer than the seconds, or milliseconds, that it takes to swipe to the next video, brands first need to know what Gen-Z values. This means having a distinctive voice on social media, as well as a certain stance on socio-environmental issues, rather than trying to jump on the newest trend as soon as possible. There needs to be a genuine dialogue between the brand and the consumers, without fakeness, superficiality, and without the content constantly feeling like an ad.
“More than anything, I prioritize a brand’s consistency first and foremost in determining their authenticity,” said creator Tyler Mazaheri. “It’s easy to tell when a brand is just trying to cash in on trendy buzzwords through a pocket-grab campaign. Consistency and continuity throughout a brand’s practices goes miles in winning over consumers’ trust and loyalty. What you claim to be of value to you today, better be of value to you tomorrow.”
The app on which this dialogue with the consumers can be most direct is, indeed, TikTok. It’s much more frequent on there to have the founder or stylist post videos with no particular editing, or aesthetic they are trying to appeal to, as it happens with Instagram feeds, but simply talking to the viewers, familiarizing them more and more with their brand and possible production processes. Sustainable womenswear brand Miror Palais’ founder, Marcelo Gaia, posted a video of this kind while showing the difference in quality and materials of his own dresses and much cheaper knockoffs, highlighting the importance and passion that goes behind a designer’s work, not limiting himself to showing a pretty picture of the final product. Alice Delahunt, chief digital officer of Ralph Lauren, stated that “Instagram is for beautiful, stylized photos while TikTok is fun, viral content."
However, TikTok is not the ideal platform for everyone, as its, if you will, lightheartedness, might dilute the image of luxury brands. Luxury brands, indeed, seem to have been interested in something quite different from going viral: disappearing.
Such strategy has proved to work for brands like Bottega Veneta, which was the first to adapt such a drastic marketing move disabling last year its Instagram, Twitter and Facebook accounts. The brand’s fan base is obsessed with the how and the when of the brand’s return to social media, and their creation of unofficial accounts like @newbottega in the meantime. Especially before a rebrand, going dark on social media can draw significant consumer and industry attention, but not for every brand. Smaller brands often depend on social media engagement for e-commerce sales, and they absolutely cannot afford to jeopardize that and sacrifice their platforms for a period when they are not sure there would be long-term benefits.
Does this mean that platforms such as TikTok and Instagram will face a clear distinction between their users being either small or luxury brands? Could there be a noticeable shift in which app attracts more social media presence once a certain level of stability and brand loyalty is reached?
