Three key points we can learn from Daniel Wellington’s social media marketing

Wang Xin 1155080983

Nowadays in marketing, social media has become a vital platform by which brands can reach a larger number of customers, and some social media campaigns led to unexpectedly rewarding business outcomes. Daniel Wellington’ campaign on Instagram is an example of successful social media marketing. From 2014 to now, follower of Daniel Wellington on Instagram has grown from 850K to 3M, and its profits increased by 214% in 2015 largely due to its Instagram campaign. Choosing the most appropriate social networking site to conduct the campaign, leveraging influencers to promote its products, and engaging with customers on a daily basis are three key reasons of Daniel Wellington campaign’s success.

Social media platform selection

Different social networking sites are used by different customer groups whose traits are distinct from one another. It is necessary for a brand to select the most suitable platform according to their actual needs and target customers instead of blindly putting effort on all social media platforms available.

Users on Instagram have three characteristics. First, according to the Instagram 2015 Study published by Iconosquare (2015), users see Instagram as a shopping drive, on which they search for, view, comment on and like information of various products, while they regard Facebook more as a communication tool with families and friends. 

Second, it is more likely for Instagram users to get engaged with brands, as Socialbakers Analytics (2014) suggests, brands usually get higher post engagement and profile interaction rate on Instagram than Twitter.

A comparison of customer engagement on Instagram and Twitter

Third, most of Instagram users are youngsters. 44% of active users on Instagram are aged from 18-29, indicated by Cowen & Company (2014).

As a young, elegant Swedish watch brand, Daniel Wellington mainly target teenagers and young adults who enjoy a fashionable lifestyle.  So with the goal of increasing brand awareness and generating sales ultimately, it is wise for Daniel Wellington to reach its customers through image-based Instagram, where delicate pictures with the Daniel Wellington watch in the center were posted to arouse customers’ sympathetic responses.

Influencer marketing

Another important element of Daniel Wellington’s well-performed campaign is its influencer marketing. It sent free watches to Instagram influencers (accounts with a lot of followers) around the world, and in return asked them to post a photo of the watch, and include a discount code together with the photo, stimulating customers to buy. Most of these influencers are fashion bloggers, artists and designers whose followers are most likely to be interested in buying it.

A photo of a Instagramer displaying her watch

This cost-effective strategy soon paid off. Intriguing Photos in different styles were posted and went viral on Instagram. As a result, Daniel Wellington gained awareness and popularity among young people in a short period of time.

Customer engagement

To further engage customers, Daniel Wellington created several branded hashtags such as #danielwellington, #danielwellingtonwatches and #DWpickoftheDay, and encourage people to post their own photos of the Daniel Wellington watch, so far the first hashtag has received over 1.2 M posts. And its official account would choose one from user-generated photos to repost every day.  

Daniel Wellington's offical account reposts a user-generated image

To sum up, we can learn from Daniel Wellington’ successful social media campaign that the platform selection, influencer marketing strategy and engagement with customers are of great importance. Bearing these three key points in mind, a startup can grow into a famous brand, just like Daniel Wellington did in past 6 years.

References

1. Socialbakers Analytics (2014), Instagram Blows Away Twitter on Brand Engagement By Almost 50x, http://bit.ly/2c3PnfE

2. Emarketer (2015), Young Users Zoom In on Instagram, http://bit.ly/2njO5zZ

3. Iconosquare (2015), Instagram 2015 Study – Unleash the Power of Instagram, http://bit.ly/2ne2XOB

4. Mediakix(2016), Instagram marketing case study: how Daniel Wellington owns their Instagram game, http://bit.ly/2nv1uWs

5. SocialBeta (2015), 品牌主偏爱 Instagram 的3个原因：用户多为购物爱好者, http://bit.ly/2mXVbH1