Discover the latest and most relevant industry news and insights for fashion professionals in marketing to help you get an edge in job interviews and promotion discussions, or improve your performance at work by increasing your market awareness and emulating market leaders.
BoF Careers distills business intelligence from our wide range of content – editorial briefings, newsletters, case studies, podcasts and events, as well as exclusive daily interviews and conversations with experts and market leaders – to bring you key takeaways and learnings for your role.
Important articles and need-to-know insights for today’s marketing professionals:
1. Fashion brands that overachieve on social media and how
According to the BoF Brand Magic Index, brands like Diesel attract more engaged audiences on social media than their much larger competitors. (Getty Images)
Today, having a large social media following doesn’t necessarily mean a brand is able to drive cultural conversations online. While many of the fashion industry’s biggest brands have relatively low engagement rates on social media, smaller brands are able to consistently capture and lead online discussions. For example, Jacquemus, with 6.4 million followers, regularly receives hundreds of thousands of likes on his Instagram posts, while Dolce & Gabbana, a brand with over 30 million followers on Instagram, typically receives fewer than 10,000 likes per post.
Jacquemus topped the charts on Instagram, with an average of 2.6% of its followers engaging with each post during the evaluation period. For reference, Jacquemus’ 2.6% Instagram engagement rate was nearly double that of the next-place brand. Jacquemus cuts through sleek Instagram imagery by leaning into the humorous and surreal content that flourishes on social media today, with its fanciful store designs and whimsical videos being among Jacquemus’ most-liked posts during the period.
Related jobs:
Marketing and Social Media Manager, Debut — London, UK
PR and Marketing Manager, Stine Goya — Copenhagen, Denmark
Marketing and Communications Director, Alexander McQueen — Shanghai, China
2. Why influencers want to invite you into their group chats
Instagram’s Broadcast Channel feature is becoming popular among online creators and brand founders. (BoF Team)
Anyone with 10,000 or more followers can create one [a broadcast channel] Other features include image and text sharing, polls and question boxes, etc. Members can’t reply like in a real group chat, but they can react with emojis. […] Influencers like Courtney Grow, Mallory Goldman, Megan Loop and Sarah Walker have launched channels in recent months, as have founders like Chelsea Kramer of Gen Z’s popular fashion company Park, Nell Diamond of fashion lifestyle brand Hill House Home and Megan Strachan of lab-grown jewelry brand Dorsey.
Just as influencers are using their channels to offer more candid views of their daily lives, brand founders are using them to spurn the “girl boss” era of the 2010s and paint a more down-to-earth picture of what it means to be an entrepreneur. […] But transparency isn’t the only benefit.
Related jobs:
Influencer Marketing, Hugo Boss — Metzingen, Germany Influencer Marketing
Senior Manager, Retention Marketing, Stuart Weitzman — New York, USA
Brand Engagement Intern, Gucci — Seoul, South Korea
3. What is the value of buzz?
Brands are becoming smarter about how they create and leverage buzz. (Getty Images)
“Buzziness means that brands aren’t forcing their story on people; people are responding and evangelizing on your behalf,” said Tony Wang, founder of luxury consultancy Office of Applied Strategy. “If you can unlock that, it’s much more scalable than paid media.”
In the immediate aftermath, a viral moment can boost sales of handbags, shoes or other products, attracting new customers or, for emerging brands, deep-pocketed collaborators or sponsors for their next show, said Jia Quan, founder of New York-based PR firm Lua. For example, she said, her client saw a surge in sales in a new geography after Beyoncé sat front row at her client Lua’s fall/winter 2024 show in Brooklyn.
Related jobs:
Head of Digital Marketing, UGG — London, UK
Professor of Fashion Marketing and Management, Savannah College of Art and Design (Savannah, USA)
Moncler Senior Marketing & Communications Manager — Seoul, South Korea
4. How the WNBA Tunnel Walk became a fashion marketing goldmine
With unprecedented attention on the league and its tunnel walk this season, WNBA players such as Angel Reese, Cameron Brink and Kisle Gondrejcic have emerged as bona fide trendsetters. (BoF Studio)
Tunnel walk attire has long been an obsession for NBA fans and has provided valuable marketing opportunities for brands, but with the WNBA experiencing unprecedented popularity this season, thanks in part to rookies like Angel Reese, Caitlin Clark and Cameron Brink, attention has been focused on how the women dress for the game. Veteran WNBA players like Skylar Diggins-Smith, A’ja Wilson and Kelsey Plum, as well as young trendsetters Kisle Gondrezick and Olivia Nelson-Ododa, have been sporting stylish pre-game attire for years, but the players are all taking it to the next level.
Brands that were hesitant to dress WNBA players are now seizing the opportunity: Clark, the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer (male or female), wore Prada to the WNBA draft in April, becoming the first player (male or female) to be outfitted by the brand at the draft. […] Reese recently showed off a pre-game Alexander Wang bodysuit and Chanel sneakers from the account she tagged, “Revolve,” which garnered half a million likes.
Related jobs:
Head of Brand, On — Zurich, Switzerland
Creative Director at White House Black Market — Fort Myers, USA
Public Relations and Marketing Manager, Alexander McQueen — Shanghai, China
5. Vogue World takes on Paris and sports
Vogue World: Paris – Show Sabrina Carpenter walks the runway at Vogue World: Paris at Place Vendôme. (Getty Images)
Vogue and French fashion sought to position itself at the heart of pop culture and sports, kicking off Paris Haute Couture Week with a star-studded gala on Sunday that combined fashion history, music and sporting excellence.
Nakamura Aya and Bad Bunny performed, while athletes and models walked around the square’s central column in designs that evoked Paris’ long-standing love affair with fashion and athletics. Olympians opened the show in all-white Lacoste ensembles, while models Gigi Hadid and Kendall Jenner rode down the runway on horseback in equestrian-inspired outfits by Hermès. Sisters Venus and Serena Williams wore Marine Serre and off-white ensembles, and “Espresso” singer Sabrina Carpenter strutted in a bespoke Jacquemus outfit inspired by glamorous midcentury swimsuits. A breakdancing team closed the show as Pharrell Williams wore a Louis Vuitton jumpsuit, sitting next to editor-in-chief Anna Wintour (opposite John Galliano). Champion swimmers, footballers and fencing players were also in attendance.
Vogue’s focus on sports comes as fashion giant Paris prepares to host the 2024 Summer Olympics, and at a time of a broader surge in sponsorship activity. Brands are increasingly attracted to the high profile and aspirational images of famous athletes, and a report by consultancy PwC says the sports sponsorship market is expected to grow from $63.1 billion in 2021 to $109.1 billion by 2030.
Related jobs:
Marketing Assistant, The Bicester Collection — Paris, France
Tiffany Special Events Manager — New York, USA
Marketing Special Events Coordinator, Bloomingdale’s — New York, USA
6. Beauty brands are treading carefully with “trad wives”
Cooking, cleaning, and more – with gusto. (BoF Team)
The term, a portmanteau of “traditional” and “wife,” refers to women whose primary duties are traditionally gendered roles like cooking, cleaning and childcare. Some beauty and lifestyle brands have been quick to jump on the bandwagon. Nara Smith, a TikTok sensation with her model-like good looks and domestic skills, has endorsed Korean beauty brand Laneige and shot beauty tutorials for Vogue.
But the tradwife trend has a darker side: Creators like Milkmaid Gwen mix far-right views and conspiracy theories with more innocuous videos about making pasta or tending to the garden. Brands are still figuring out how to navigate this tricky landscape. Milkmaid Gwen has a small TikTok following of about 65,000 compared with Smith’s 7.6 million, but some viewers believe they’re all part of the same content stream, or at least on the way to becoming radicalized.
Related jobs:
Digital Marketing Specialist, JOOR — London, UK
CRM & Email Marketing Manager, DeMellier — London, UK
Bloomingdale’s, Home and Beauty Product Marketing Director — New York, USA
7. Are signature sneakers still popular?
A new generation of young talent, fresh designs and bold marketing have rekindled interest in athletic lines. Adidas athlete Anthony Edwards’ AE 1 sneaker, released in December, has been hailed by many industry experts as the basketball shoe of the year. (Getty Images)
Signature shoes have long been a key component of sneaker marketing strategies, especially in basketball. There’s no better example than Nike’s partnership with Michael Jordan, which would later become the $6 billion Air Jordan business and help make Nike the global powerhouse it is today. These shoes help brands show off athletic credentials and convert superstar fans into buyers of their products. To do this, brands shell out huge amounts of money for the top athletes in the sport, as well as big-budget marketing campaigns.
But where once only a handful of athletes had their own shoes, the market is now flooded with so many different styles that critics say they’re all too similar. If you don’t play basketball often or are not a fan of the athlete in question, you’re unlikely to spend $150 on a pair of shoes. And as sneakers have become a staple of everyday wardrobes, consumers have gravitated toward lifestyle products inspired by sports, even if they’re not necessarily made for playing the sport.
Related jobs:
Senior Manager, Global Brand Marketing, Coach — New York, USA
Director of Internal Communications, Banana Republic — San Francisco, USA
Marketing Lead, On — Shanghai, China
8. Why the fashion industry was silent about Pride this year
People marching in the Pride Parade holding the Pride flag aloft (Getty)
For the first time since 1999, Nike will not release a Pride-themed collection or targeted advertising campaign, and has not recently posted any LGBTQ-themed content to its Instagram grid. The sportswear giant said in a statement that it would instead focus on corporate giving and “offer employee-only programs.” Nike isn’t the only brand distancing itself from Pride: Retailers are stocking 7 percent less Pride-themed T-shirts than they did last year, and are promoting 36 percent fewer beauty products in campaigns tied to the month-long celebration, according to Trendlytics.
Marketing experts and advocates say the sharp decline in Pride ads and collections is a direct result of unexpected backlash against last year’s campaign by anti-LGBTQ consumers and activists, none more intense than the boycott of Bud Light after the company partnered with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney in June. The beer lost its No. 1 spot in the U.S. market and sales have yet to fully recover.
