Fashion brands on Instagram PDF

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Table of Contents
Introduction
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3

Literature Review
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5

Social media
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5

Social media marketing (SMM)
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5

Instagram
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6

Instagram for Business
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Fashion brands on Instagram
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Instagram based marketing
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Customer engagement on Instagram
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Generation Y
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Methodology
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Research Findings
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What are some ways Michael Kors achieves customer engagement on Instagram?
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What are some ways Nike achieves customer engagement on Instagram?
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How does Generation Y engage with fashion brands on Instagram?
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Conclusion
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Recommendation:
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Appendix
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Questionnaire Result:
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Figures:
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Personal reflection & Lessons learned:
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Activity Log:
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Sharing Evidence:
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Bibliography
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Introduction
One of the Internet activities that best contribute to this digital era are the
social media networks. Social media is used world- wide with the aim of
people engaging and connecting with each other. Social media has not only
become a trend, but a necessary part of many people’s lives, which makes it
a perfect place for businesses to find their target groups and tackle them with
marketing strategies. Nowadays, social media marketing is the most efficient
and effective way to engage with consumers and create brand awareness.
This paper focuses on one social media network called Instagram. Instagram
is where users are able to tell and share their memories, journey or life story
through a sequence of pictures or short videos. It’s known as one of the latest
social media tool to businesses. In this continuously technological evolving
world, businesses need to stay up to date and evolve with it. This era is all
about online connections and engagements, so businesses create content
that connect with the online community, consequently increases their brand
awareness and consumer engagement, leading to growth in sales. Forrester
Research did a recent study on social media platforms and the findings
showed that Instagrammers are 58 times more likely to engage by liking,
commenting and sharing brand’s posts than they do on Facebook and 120
times more than Twitter (Appendix: Figure 1) (Elliot, 2014). As Instagram is
evolving, it is clear to see that most social media users are moving away from
Facebook and Twitter and are now more active on Instagram. The visual
storytelling drives and inspires consumers which leads to action.
This paper looks specifically at how fashion brands succeed in using
Instagram to connect with their existent and potential customers. Studies have
shown that the brands that have had the greatest impact on Instagram come
from the Fashion industry. A previous study done in Europe has proven that
50 % of Instagrammers actually follow businesses’ accounts and 45% of
those business accounts they follow are fashion brands, companies or even
fashion bloggers, in order to get outfit inspirations (Feed Fashion, 2015).
Another study done by L2 Intelligence report, shows that the sportswear
brands and fashion brands have the largest community size on Instagram and
also rank as the top engagement rates (Appendix: Figure 2) (L2 Intelligence
Report, 2015, p. 5).
The purpose of combining research of Fashion brands on Instagram is to
observe and analyze the tactics used by 2 top selected fashion brands in
order to shows how these fashion brands maintain and create customer
engagement. Nike is known as the best brand in fashion and sportswear on
Instagram, and Michael Kors is known for one of the top that have come up
with the best strategies to get the most out of the engagement of their
customers on Instagram. The findings should create an understanding of the
best ways businesses can use Instagram to grow and interact with their
customers and how the most popular audience on Instagram actually interacts
back with brands.

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Research questions:
How do Fashion brands achieve Generation Y’s engagement through
Instagram-based marketing?
• What are some ways Michael Kors achieves customer engagement on
Instagram?
• What are some ways Nike achieves customer engagement on
Instagram?
• How does Generation Y engage with fashion brands on Instagram?
Aims of the research

The researcher hopes to analyze and find the similar or most interesting
tactics used by the 2 selected top fashion brands and how consumers engage
with the posts. Hopefully, the findings can be utilized as a learning guide for
other brands from other industries, like automotive, on how to boost their
presence on Instagram and engage with their customers.
Scope
The scope of this research is not only narrowed down to Instagram and the
Fashion brands. The research of the fashion brands is narrowed down to 2
brands that are listed in the most engaging and successful ones in Instagram-
based marketing, Michael Kors and Nike. The primary research on the usage
of Instagram customers is narrowed down to young adults between ages 18 –
35 years old, due to the research result of generation Y being the biggest
audience on Instagram.

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Literature Review
Social media
In the 20th
century technology began to grow and change in a rapid pace.
Computers and networks were born which together gave birth to the Internet
and changed lives forever. As Internet evolved and many people owned
computers, social media became a sophisticated trend. In 1997, Six Degrees,
the first social media platform was built. This platform allowed its users to
create their personal profile and share it with other users. Facebook and
Twitter were launched in 2006 and remained some of the most popular social
media platforms in the world (Hendricks, 2013). Social media, “the online
means of communication, conveyance, collaboration, and cultivation among
interconnected and interdependent networks of people, communities, and
organizations enhanced by technological capabilities and mobility” (Tuten &
Solomon, 2013, p. 4). Social media is aimed to bring people from all over the
globe together through engaging, exchanging and sharing information with
each other.
Social media marketing (SMM)
Social media rapidly became the point of interest for marketers. Social media
allows companies to efficiently and effectively engage with their customers at
a low cost. It’s powerful in creating content that goes viral. Therefore
companies see social media as the tool to create augmented brand
awareness and customer engagement (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010, p. 60).
According to the Cambridge dictionary, Social Media Marketing (SMM), is a
form of method for advertisement of products, brands or services online, by
attracting the right target group that are willing to know more about it
(Cambridge Business English Dictionary, 2016). In other words, it’s a method
used by organization to create strong customer relations on the virtual
networks, which includes a strong brand recognition leading to sales growth.
For marketers, making connections with their target group is an easy, low cost
method via social media. With social media being a crucial everyday life
activity, a majority of potential and existent customers are available to the
marketers just a couple of clicks away.
Businesses that want to use social media marketing in their digital marketing
strategies should use the five dimensions of SMM in order to create customer
engagement and brand awareness. The dimensions are as follows:
Online communities: Businesses can create social communities online
where discussions and feedbacks can be collected from existent customers.
Interaction: Relevant news and updates can be shared and notify customers
all the time, creating greater interactions instantaneously. Sharing Content:
the content received can be shared by the customers to others, like online
word to mouth marketing. Accessibility: Social media is an easy to use
platform and social media marketing has low or no cost. Credibility:
Businesses need to take credibility for what they post, share and provide on
social media. The messages they want their target group to receive should be
clear in order to directly connect with them and create trust and loyalty
(Furgan Khan & Jan, 2015).

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Instagram
Instagram, a fun and unique social media application aimed at sharing visual
memories with others through a sequence of pictures and short videos. Kevin
Systrom and Mike Krieger launched Instagram officially in October 2010.
Kevin and Mike’s vision was to create ‘a world more connected through
photos by allowing users to experience moments in their friend’s lives through
pictures’ (Systrom & Krieger, 2016). Kevin and Mike created Instagram to
solve mainly 3 problems. The first was that plain mobile photos always
needed some editing, so they created filters to make pictures look better.
Second, they thought sharing a picture on multiple social medias takes time,
so they created a way to upload it once and sharable with other social media
platforms. Last but not least, uploading pictures on to other platforms always
took time, so they aimed to create Instagram easy to use in the most fast and
efficient way (Systrom & Krieger, 2016).
As soon as it was launched in 2010, its popularity rapidly grew. Within 1
month of existence Instagram already gained 1 million users. Today, 6 years
later, it has more than 500 million users; its usage has doubled over the last 2
years. On a daily bases, approximately 80 million pictures are posted and
approximately 3.5 billion likes are generated. According to Instagram
statistics, users have shared more than 40 billion photos until now. Instagram
might be an American app but 75% of its users are from outside of the US.
Instagram started with the ability to only post pictures, as it grew and
developed, it introduced the ability to post short videos too. When they first
introduced the video ability, more than 5 million videos were shared in the first
24 hours (Smith, 2016). In 2012, Facebook bought Instagram for 1 billion
dollars (BBC Technology, 2012).
Instagram is available to download for free on the App store and Google Play.
It also has a website where users can only view and engage with notifications,
posting pictures and videos can only be done via the app on smartphones and
tablets. To use the Instagram application, one needs to sign up and create an
account. After becoming a member, the user can follow friends or other
accounts. The following accounts’ updates will appear in their notifications or
home page. The user can engage with these accounts by liking and leaving
comments. On the explore page, the user can search for specific accounts,
hashtags, see top searches and locations. The latest edition also includes
stories of users, which is similar as Snapchat stories, a couple of seconds
pictures and videos that can be seen for 24 hours only. On the activities page,
the user can see new followers requests, likes and comments made by others
on the user’s posts. On the following tab within the activities page, the user
can see what the users they follow like. Last but not least on the sharing
page, the user can edit and post pictures and videos, adding tags, location
and a caption (Moreau, 2015).

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Instagram for Business
Instagram is a world wide used app that is also available to businesses. As it’s
still growing and becoming more popular, it’s being adapted by more and
more businesses as a communication and marketing tool. It’s one of the
newest online tools available to businesses (Lavoie, 2015). As it has a large
community of users, it is one of the most efficient and effective tools to
connect and communicate with current and potential customers. The main
idea of Instagram is to share moment’s on-the-go meaning it’s a fast and
efficient way for companies to share a post about an event happening at the
moment, but it’s also a way to show events of the past and advertise. It gives
the brand or companies a personal and honest connection with their followers.
Another opportunity for brands is that they can measure customer
engagement and satisfaction, by for example encouraging them to use
specific hashtags (Bergström & Bäckman , 2013).
According to the CEO and Co-Founder of Olapic, Pau Sabra said, “ As brands
engage on a deeper, more visual level with their customers, consumer photos
become an important part of the overall brand experience and how a
company tells its story” (L2 Intelligence Report, 2015, p. 5).
Instagram is the tool for businesses to visually share their stories with their
current and potential customers at a low cost and as a reward they achieve an
increase in customer engagement, stronger brand awareness and a growth in
sales. Businesses do need to realize whom their target group is and if the
majority of them are available on Instagram before using this tool. Studies
have shows that 90% of active Instagrammers are younger than 35 years old
(Smith, 2016).
Fashion brands on Instagram
Instagrammers interested and engaging with fashion brands are one of the
largest communities on Instagram (L2 Intelligence Report, 2015). They have
been from the beginning on the top of the list as the most enthusiastic
adopters of Instagram (Feed Fashion, 2015). The fashion lovers are fans of
visual posts, which made them Instagram lovers too. According to an article
on the 17 best brands on Instagram, the fashion loving Instagrammers have
helped Instagram build its engaging platform with fashion brands (Kolowich,
2016). This made following Fashion brands on Instagram one of the top
activities of many Instagrammers.
Instagram based marketing
According to the study done by Forbes magazine on the social media’s
dominating marketing trends, investing in SMM is a necessary and crucial
marketing strategy for companies (J, 2013). For Instagram based marketing,
on the other hand, not all companies can use this tool effectively and
efficiently. Since, studies have shows that 90% of active Instagrammers are
younger than 35 years old, this means that Instagram marketing is most
useful for companies that target the generation Y (Smith, 2016). Instagram is
a visual, easy and affordable strategy for digital marketing departments to
take when engaging and collecting data from their target audience at no cost.

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Customer engagement on Instagram
According to the principles of marketing book by Kotler, communication
between businesses and their customers is very important, in fact it might as
well be as important as price and product are to the business’s success.
Looking at the marketing mix, after product and price comes promotion, and
that is the part of the mix used for communication between the business and
its customers (Kotler, Armstrong, Wong, & Saunders, 2008). According to
Gurau, author of “Integrated online marketing communication: implementation
and management”, there are three main differences between online
communication and other types of communication within marketing. First,
online communications is interactive because there are many different ways
for the company to influence their target group and also many ways the target
group influences the company’s posts. The second characteristic is the
transparency of companies and followers can have access to information
about one another fast and easy. Last but not least, what also makes online
communication different from other types of communication is memory. Social
networks save everything that is posted, so if a follower wants to get back to
information or a post they can (Gurau, 2008).
Online customers are also different from offline customers. Studies have
shown that online customers tend to be more involved in communicating with
companies than offline ones. According to Gurau, online customers are able
to avoid the information they don’t need and pick out the ones they are
interested in, rather than having to engage with all the offline information they
come across (Gurau, 2008). According to ‘The social media bible’, nowadays
customers are exposed with advertisement every minute of the day, making
them all irrelevant and annoying, but social media is a way for companies to
build their own account and let the customers come to them instead of the
company tackling them (Safko, 2012).
Generation Y
Generation Y is the generation that was born between 1980s and year 2000.
They are also known as the Millennial whom grew up in the digital era. For
them a life without their Internet is abnormal. According to Aquino, mobile
phones and social media is a crucial part of their social life (Aquino, 2012).
Generation Y is always available via their phones, according to a study by
Bergh and Behrer, 80% of generation Y sleeps with their phones lying next to
them (Bergh & Behrer, 2013). Since Generation Y takes up of 90% of
Instagrammers, companies that target to communicate with this generation
have to be on Instagram (Smith, 2016). Generation Y are known to be
emotional and want to differentiate from others. They make decisions based
on what their heart tells them instead of their head. They value others
opinions on a brand or product (Bergh & Behrer, 2013). Therefore it is
important for Marketers to take into consideration that targeting this
generation means that their communication has to be honest, create feelings,
fun, creative and it should create a form of worth-of-mouth marketing within
the generation in order to succeed in engagement (Aquino, 2012).

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Methodology
Research is the most fundamental part of writing a paper. In this chapter the
methods of the research conducted for this paper is explained per question
that will be answered in the findings.
Sub question 1 & Sub question 2:
What are some ways Michael Kors achieves customer engagement on
Instagram?
What are some ways Nike achieves customer engagement on Instagram?
Method: The research method to be used here is secondary research.
Desktop research will be conducted with case studies; academic articles and
online articles based on the fashion brands’ marketing communication
methods. Also research will be done by observation and analyzing the brand’s
Instagram accounts, like their current amount of followers and posts.
Sub question 3: How generation Y engages with fashion brands on
Instagram?
Method: The research method used on the answer to this question is
both primary research and quantitative research. A questionnaire will be
conducted and filled by young adults between ages 18-35 who are
Instagrammers. (see Appendix: questionnaires) The results will show how
active this generation is on Instagram and how many of them follow fashion
brands and actually engages with them.
Conclusion: How do Fashion brands achieve Generation Y’s engagement
through Instagram-based marketing?
Method: A combination of the findings of sub questions 1, 2 and 3,
should conclude in an answer to the main research question.
Validation
In order to make sure all research come from valid information sources,
research tools like Google Scholar and the school’s library Database was
used during desktop research. Other desktop research came from online
journals and free downloaded e-books conducted by reliable organizations.
The Primary research conducted through a questionnaire was filled out by
students of the Digital Marketing Minor 2016 and by personal Facebook
friends. The questionnaire was posted in Facebook groups of people ages 18-
35, making the questionnaire results valid for the findings.
Limitation
Due to the time limit of conducting this research, the brand/ company’s tactics
of Instagram posts can only be measured through analysis of case studies,
online sources and own analysis of their accounts rather than primary
research by contacting the brands/ companies’ themselves. Also due to the
time limit, the questionnaire was shared only on social media, Facebook,
student email and LinkedIn, which had an effect on the amount of
respondents and sample group.

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Research Findings
What are some ways Michael Kors achieves customer engagement
on Instagram?
“I’ve said it before, but we really do live in a selfie world,” says the famous
American fashion designer, Michael Kors himself (CPP LUXURY, 2014). In
November 2014, the American fashion brand, Michael Kors announced that
they are launching an exclusive Instagram shopping feature called
#InstaKors. With the unique feature of #InstaKors, Michael Kors reaches his
highly engaged 8.9 million Instagram followers by allowing them to directly
take action to shop the
product posted on Instagram
in just a few clicks. Michael
Kors’ goal was to create an
experience for their
consumer that is ease of
use, engaging,
communicated personally
and digitally offering their
products at the most
efficient and effective way
possible. Today the hashtag
#InstaKors has over 13
thousand posts.
“Everyone is on Instagram. It’s inspirational, aspirational, and now, with
#InstaKors, it’s attainable. If fashion is a reflection of the world we live in,
Instagram is the three-way mirror,” says Michael Kors (CPP LUXURY, 2014).
Instagram doesn’t allow
retailers like fashion brands
to use active links in their captions to directly lead followers to their online web
shops. This is where fashion brands get creative on creating new ways to get
the most out of the advantages and opportunities when using social media
marketing. Michael Kors succeeded in hacking Instagram’s structure by
introducing their algorithm-based feed, but it still hasn’t given Instagram the
hint to change its structure. Michael Kors either way is still engaging with his
Instagram followers more than ever (MICHAEL KORS, 2016).

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By signing up on the official website, www.michaelkors.com, filling in an email
address and Instagram account, Instagram instantly becomes a social shop or
e-commerce app to all users following Michael Kors. The steps to purchase
are slightly different than web shops but it’s as easy as 1,2,3. The followers
have to like the post of the product that contains the #InstaKors hashtag and
an email will immediately be sent to the follower’s email address with the
direct link to the purchasing page of that specific product featured in the post.
Michael Kors’ brilliant idea gave Instagram a whole other meaning to brands,
making those customer engagements lead to so much more (Fisher, 2014).
Michael Kors currently has 8.92m followers. Looking at only their 20 recent
posts, they obtained a total of 826,463 likes and 2,670 total comments. Their
engagement rate is 9.3%. It’s calculated by taking the sum of the 20 recent
post’s likes and comments divided by the number of total followers (A-FIS).
With 8.92 million followers, it’s clear they are one of the top fashion brands to

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follow and engage with on Instagram. Michael Kors stimulates interactions
with their customers through hashtag campaigns and they strive to have the
most sophisticated and unique campaigns that drive Generation Y (Colwyn,
2015).
Michael Kors engages with their followers with one of their biggest and most
interesting campaigns called Watch Hunger Stop.
In honor of World Food Day on October 16th
, Michael Kors started the
campaign #WatchHungerStop to raise awareness and funds for the World
Food Program’s School Meals Program in 2013 and because of its success it
has become an annual campaign. Throughout the month of October, Michael
Kors engages with their customers by allowing them to create a picture with
their digital t-shirts that say, “Today I want to…” and the customer can
customize it with their own message for the campaign. With every digital shirt
made, Michael Kors donates 50 meals to children in need. Customers may
post these pictures on their Instagram and hashtag #WatchHungerStop to
take part in raising awareness.
#WatchHungerStop currently has about 21
thousand posts. Next to the donation of the digital
shirts, customers can donate directly to World Food
Program at Michael Kors stores during the month of
October. Also when purchasing the Watch Hunger Stop
limited edition watch worth 295 dollars feeds 100
children in need. In the back of the watch, Michael Kors’
signature is engraved including the campaign message:
1 Watch = 100 Meals. The fact that Michael Kors
encourages his loyal Instagrammers to share this
campaign gives the customers the ability to be proud of

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contributing to making a difference in the world and feel special by not only
contributing to the cause but also sharing the project of the brand itself, which
also raises their brand awareness.
Another strategy Michael Kors uses to get more customers engaged is
celebrity endorsement. For example, they use famous models and the well-
known artist Kate Hudson as the face of the campaign, attracting more
followers. Also celebrities and pageant queens around the world whom have
thousands of followers on their Instagram, contribute to this cause by posting
a picture with the shirt, hashtagging #WatchHungerStop and tagging Michael
Kors’ Instagram account. This is not only raising awareness of the cause but
it’s also bringing the globe together through Instagram, creating emotion
within the audience.
Michael Kors leverages Instagram to take part
of its campaign. They boosts up the Instagram-
based marketing not only by using celebrity
endorsements and hashtag campaigns but also
by allowing its followers, including the
celebrities themselves to engage with
something way bigger than just his brand on
Instagram. They engage with the followers by
allowing them to be part of a big project they
are highly passionate about. It’s a challenge to
have customers actually engage, so to achieve
this, Michael Kors makes his campaign unique
and far bigger than only Instagram.

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On October 16th
, Michael Kors lighted up New York city’s hot spot, Times
Square with all the posts of Instagrammers around the world supporting the
cause with hashtag #WatchHungerStop. The posts were streamed on to 12
billboards all day and Time Square gets a daily amount of 350,000 visitors.
Instagrammers not only got to have the chance to have their picture on the big
screens in Time Square but they got to take part in raising hunger awareness,
making an impact on thousands of people that day, and they also educated
their own personal followers with their post on Instagram (Instagram, 2013).
Another Michael Kors’ Instagram- based marketing strategy that boost
customer engagement was a two-week Instagram contest held in 2012.
Michael Kors encouraged followers to engage with their contest by asking
them to share pictures of the follower’s favorite Michael Kors brand watch and
hashtag #MKTimeless. By the end of the two-week campaign, Michael Kors
picked a winner and they received a new limited edition Michael Kors watch.
The sharing pictures posted by over 6,800 engaging Instagrammers turned
out to be an accessory style inspiration and free publicity for Michael Kors.
This campaign had one of the most satisfying results. The Instagram account
experienced a 50% growth after the #MKTimeless campaign contest. 3,000
posts were submitted on Instagram in the first 24 hours of the two-week start.

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According to the chairman’s CEO, Michael Kors have grown throughout the
years because of their high integration in Social Media Marketing, especially
Instagram (Colwyn, 2015).
To answer the question ‘What are some ways Michael Kors achieves
customer engagement on Instagram?’ Michael Kors achieves customer
engagement on Instagram, through their unique way of making Instagram
shoppable / e-commerce with #InstaKors, through sophisticated and one of a
kind Instagram hashtag campaigns including contests and last but not least,
through celebrity endorsement.

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What are some ways Nike achieves customer engagement on
Instagram?
Nike is known as one of the most popular brands on Instagram. Currently
Nike’s official Instagram page has 65.5 million followers. On their recent 20
posts Nike achieved a total of 7,094,877 likes and 55,904 comments. Their
engagement rate is therefore 10.91%. It’s calculated by taking the sum of the
20 recent post’s likes and comments divided by the number of total followers
(A-FIS). This is just on their official account, aside from this account they have
other accounts that are categorized for different segments like Nike Running
and Nike Woman.
The hashtag #Nike has 49,087,031 posts and increases daily. Instagrammers
use many more hashtags that relate to Nike too, like #NikeWoman #JustDoIt
and #NikeAir. Their trademark #JustDoIt currently has 9,398,242 posts.
Nike is definitely listed as one of the top fashion and sport brands on
Instagram because according to Davoult, the Parisian analytic firm’s content
manager, “Nike understands the psychology of Instagram”. The pictures and
videos posted by Nike fit Instagram because of the “kind of real-life-and-in-
the-moment feeling” it brings to its followers (O'Connor, 2014). Nike
emphasizes on the real life style content in order to engage with their
customers rather than just promoting their brand and its products. They
embrace the feeling by adding motivational quotes including their hashtags
with the inspiring content posts. This inspires the Instagrammers to do the
same or to repost their posts in order to spread the motivating message
(Gotter, 2015).

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Next to making their content focus on motivation and positivity to create
emotion and feeling for their followers, Nike also uses celebrity endorsement
to increase the engagement rate. They even post pictures of celebrities or
athletes and teams using Nike and tag them in their post. Strategies like these
have built upon Nike’s successful use of Instagram-based marketing (Gotter,
2015). Likewise celebrities post pictures with their Nike shoes or Nike outfits
and engage by either hashtagging Nike or tagging them in their post.
Customers want to feel like they can be part of this engagement too. When
they have Nike outfits on they do the same as celebrities do, they engage
using hashtags and
brand tagging.
In order to achieve the
maximum of customer
engagement on
Instagram, Nike of course also has ongoing campaigns that make their
followers either interact by liking, commenting and sharing or by posting their
own image and hashtagging one of the numerous unique campaign hashtags
they have created including their trademark hashtag #JustDoIt.
One of Nike’s campaigns was so successful it is known as one of the most
successful Instagram-based brand campaigns. This campaign was called
Nike’s #PHOTOiD campaign and the hashtag #NikeiD on Instagram
(O'Connor, 2014). With this campaign Nike engaged with their customers by
allowing them to create their own post by designing their custom Nike shoe
online by selecting one of their Instagram’s photos. Customers shared their
creative designs with friends, Nike and the rest of Instagram or even shared it
to further social media accounts like Facebook.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2014/02/13/starbucks-and-
nike-are-winning-instagram-and-your-photos-are-helping/#31bf24631b08
Nike’s PHOTOiD campaign’s purpose was to allow its millions of followers
whom are active on the famous Instagram ta grab posts of moments in their
life and bring them right to their feet. It’s all about easily turning digital into
physical. Nike takes the colors of the selected Instagram picture and applies
them the customer’s favorite Nike Air Max shoe, making it a custom made
shoe based on a moment in life captured through a picture. The end result of
the design can be uploaded on all social media including Instagram, using the
hashtag #NIKEiD and the shoe itself can be purchased immediately. Nike
used Instagram not only to engage with their customers but also to increase
sales. Customers want to feel unique, especially Instagrammers are all about
telling their own story, and with Nike they could combine it and tell their story
through their shoes. Making their product personal, expressive and inspiring
their customers to engage by being creative (Nike, 2013).
Nike’s Instagram strategy is the strategy all brands should be learning from in
order to succeed on this platform. Nike succeeds in customer engagement on
Instagram by focusing on five points: Running one of a kind campaigns,
focusing on the audience, not selling or promoting but inspiring and

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motivating, sharing beautiful attracting content that capture emotion and
adapting their content to the needs of their big audience (Ditty, 2015).
From the five mentioned above, focusing on their audience is the most
important thing when it comes to their Instagram Strategy. Nike’s core
demographic includes the modern young Instagrammers, so Instagram is one
of the most important digital platforms to communicate and engage with their
customers. Customer engagement is their commitment. That’s why
encouraging them to share their posts, engage with them by participating in
their various unique campaigns and last but not least use the various
hashtags the brand has created, contributes to the brand’s most important
focus. Nike adapts to their Instagrammers needs by triggering them with
inspiration, motivation, energy and emotion. They bring the community
together by giving shout-outs to those engaging and sharing their posts.. They
don’t focus on promoting, in fact not one price or discount offer content is
posted on their account, only inspiration, moments of action in life and
motivating quotes, because after all that’s what both the app, Instagram, and
their audience is all about. Nike went the extra mile on Instagram by creating
an entertaining inspirational and memorable account and managed to still stay
relevant to their product, brand and the needs of their audience (Moon, 2016).

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How does Generation Y engage with fashion brands on Instagram?
According to the Pew Research Center Demographics of Key
Social Networking Platforms study, Instagram’s Key demographics (See
appendix: figure 3) shows that 53% of Instagrammers are between ages 18-
29 and 25% are between ages 30-49. Also according to the 2016 Instagram
statistics, 90% of Instagrammers are from Generation Y (Smith, 2016). To
analyze how Instagrammers from Generation Y engage with fashion brands
on Instagram, a survey was created (see appendix: questionnaire). The
survey results had a total of 104 respondents of 35% male and 65% females
between ages 18 and 35. According to the survey findings, 76% of the 104
respondents use Instagram daily, 17% couple of times a week, 5% not
frequent and 1% once a week and 1% never. This proves that it’s a fact that
people between ages 18-35 or Generation Y are found on Instagram. 46% log
on to Instagram
whenever they are bored,
13% have no preference
or logs on first thing in the
morning. 99% use their
smartphone. As seen
from the previous
findings, both Michael
Kors and Nike make
good use of hashtag
marketing with their
Instagram campaigns, so for this it’s important to know if Instagrammers
actually browse for hashtags rather than accounts. From the survey results
49% of the respondents said yes, they do browse for specific hashtags and
51% responded with no. From the 49% whom responded yes, 34% search for
Fashion and Fitness related hashtags, which is interesting to see that two of
the top most engaging Instagram brands are fashion and fitness brands,
these include Michael Kors and Nike.
From the 104 respondents, 85% actually follow brands on Instagram. 29%
chose Nike as their favorite fashion brand, 15% chose Michael Kors and 11%
chose Victoria’s Secret. The
remaining 45% respondents
answered with different
fashion brands, mostly
smaller, local companies. The
results of the questionnaire
prove that the research done
on the top fashion brands are
valid since Nike and Michael Kors are also the two top favorite brands from
this sample group. Asking whether these fashion brands actually influence
them in purchasing the brand’s product, resulted in 71% yes, it influences
purchase and 29% answered no.

21

In order to purchase a brand’s product on Instagram, the user mostly has to
visit the brand’s website. The survey therefore asked if fashion brands
Instagram posts attract them to visit their website. 70% answered yes,
sometimes, 14% answered yes, often and 17% answered no, never. This is
interesting to see how Instagram doesn’t only act as an advertising and
inspiring platform to increase company’s brand awareness and customer
engagements, but it also indirectly leads the customers to increase their
website traffic and sales growth for e-commerce.
The sample group was asked for what reason they would follow a fashion
brand on Instagram and the most 3 responses where for inspiration (34%),
new arrivals (26%) and
trends (18%).
One interesting ‘other’ that
was answered was
“I follow Fashion brands in
order to share their posts
with my friends by tagging
them in the comments
section.” This reason is
basically free publicity.
Seeing that Inspiration was selected the most, identifies generation Y’s
attraction to inspiring content.
The ways
generation Y can
engage with the
posts and
campaigns of
fashion brands are
through hashtags,
commenting,
reposting and liking.
From this sample
group 85% said they
engage mostly
through likes and 19 % through commenting. Only 10% actually use hashtags
relating to the brand in their own posts and only 4% repost a brand’s post to
share it with their followers. 14% just follow the brands enjoy their posts but
do not show any type of engagement. Fashion brands can most effectively tell
if their post was engaging by looking at the total amounts of likes before
anything else. The amount of comments shows how engaged the customers
were to take the next step of brand advocacy of sharing it with others or
leaving feedback.

22

Therefore, respondents were asked whether or not they leave comments on
fashion brand’s posts. 62% answered no and 38% answered yes.
Those who do leave a comment behind were asked what type of comment
they would leave behind and 67% said that they leave a comment when they
want to tag another Instagrammers in order to share the post with them. The
likes and sharing of the post through tags in comments shows to be the most
engaging act of Generation Y towards Fashion brands on Instagram.
The form of engagement through hashtag marketing for
this sample group is not one used a lot. Only 29% of the
104 respondents have used a fashion brand’s hashtag in
their own personal posts before. 8% never use hashtags
in their posts and 63% never used a fashion
brand’s hashtag. Although hashtag marketing is
one strategy used by the top brands on Instagram,
it’s interesting to find out through this questionnaire
that most of the generation Y do not respond by engaging through using their
hashtags. A larger sample group would have given a more valid outcome.
However this sample group has proven that
most of generation Y does find fashion
brand’s presence on Instagram useful. 51%
said they find it useful, 28% said yes, very
useful, 14% said sometimes useful and only
7% said that fashion brand’s Instagram
account is not useful to them.
72% of the respondents admitted that they prefer following
their favorite fashion brands on Instagram, rather than other
social media accounts or websites and 12% responded with,
they rather browse the websites. The results show that
online presence is a very important for fashion brands in
order to get generation Y’s engagement, since only 1% said
that they preferred offline..

23

Conclusion
How do Fashion brands achieve generation Y’s engagement through
Instagram-based marketing?
By observing and analyzing two of the top fashion brands utilizing Instagram-
based marketing at the most efficient and effective way to interact with the
main audience on Instagram, generation Y, the research question ‘How do
Fashion brands achieve generation Y’s engagement through Instagram-based
marketing’ was answered.
Michael Kors achieves customer engagement on Instagram, through their
unique way of making Instagram shoppable / e-commerce with #InstaKors,
through sophisticated and one of a kind Instagram hashtag campaigns
including contests that utilize hashtag marketing and last but not least,
through celebrity endorsement. Nike went the extra mile on Instagram by
creating focus on the emotional, inspirational, motivational and personal
aspects to engage with their followers and managed to still stay relevant to
their product and brand. With the various hashtags they have created for their
products and the brand’s slogan, they have achieved the contribution of
millions of followers. They use multi channel strategies where they get their
followers to engage using their Instagram to participate in a campaign on their
website. Their focus is not selling their product, but the needs of their
audience including their feeling towards the brand. Best and similar practices
by Michael Kors and Nike that have resulted in high engagement are unique
campaigns that allow their audience to feel part of something bigger.
Generation Y based on the survey results, engage with fashion brands the
most by liking and leaving a comment where they tag others to share the
brand’s post. This makes it easier for them to measure their engagement rate
by taking the sum of likes and comments divided by the number of total
followers. These way goals can be set specifically for increasing engagement.
Generation Y is known to response more to emotional, inspirational and
personal posts that somehow connects to their lives. Therefore Fashion
brands like Michael Kors and Nike have succeeded in having the highest
engagement rates on Instagram with their unique campaigns and their
inspiring content.
So, how do fashion brands engage with generation Y on Instagram? Through
investing in the creation of content that drives this specific group. As shown in
findings, inspiration, emotional and authentic feeling drives generation Y’s
engagement.

24

Recommendation:
The best practices found from these two top fashion brands on Instagram
serve as helpful resources for other brands to learn from and improve their
Instagram-based marketing. As shown Michael Kors and Nike consistently
post content that have great customer engagement and overall performance
compared to Instagram’s average engagement rates. Strategies used by
these top-engaging brands are valuable guides and lessons that can be
copied by all types of businesses that target generation Y.
TIPS to take from top Fashion brands on Instagram:
-‐ Create campaigns that bring Generation Y as the center of attention by
incorporation what this generation is most passionate about including
the trends.
-‐ Create creative, unique campaigns that give a sense of an emotional
vibe, for example charities or short emotional videos that indirectly
promote the product or the brand’s trademark and vision.
-‐ Emphasize on the engagement of the audience rather than promotion
of product. Get them to create free publicity by sharing and building
relationship with the brand with for example contests.
-‐ Emphasize on lifestyle branding in order to make content realistic and
personal for the audience.
-‐ Share exquisite, one of a kind and authentic images of lifestyle that
catches Generation Y’s eyes for example focus deeper on the location,
colors, mood, sound, vibe and environment.
-‐ Last but not least, stay up to date with trends and what goes on in
Generation Y’s daily lives. Research is an important investment for an
increase in engagement and performance for a brand on Instagram.

25

Appendix
Questionnaire Result:

35

Figures:
Figure 1:
(Elliot, 2014)
Figure 2:
(L2 Intelligence Report, 2015, p. 5)

37

Personal reflection & Lessons learned:
Writing an individual assignment on a chosen topic was the best option /
opportunity for me to take this block. I haven’t written a paper in over a year
and to be able to start my thesis next semester, this was the perfect practice
needed to get me back on track. Taking the steps of in depth research,
creating research questions with its purpose, writing literature reviews and
methodology are important segments for when writing a thesis too. Even
when doing research on academic articles including other former student’s
thesis papers, thought me so much on how the structure of my thesis is going
to be. Writing this ‘mini-thesis’ on a topic that I find interesting made it even
more fun to write about and learn more about. During the creation of my
primary research, I also learned new free online tools that I will be able to use
again for my thesis. I have no regrets whatsoever in choosing this minor nor
this assignment.
If I were able to extend this paper and have further research and findings, I
will focus on not only customer engagement but also branding and sales
growth. I will still want to use Nike and Michael Kors’ social media success as
an example for other businesses and could even use their strategies to create
a guide for brands wanting to use Instagram in their marketing strategy. Due
to time and the limitations of writing this paper, I had to narrow down my
research questions and research depth. This was a challenge for me
throughout the writing; I realized I was exceeding the word expectation and
the depth of the research. I had to constantly make changes to my research
questions and methodology in order to narrow this broad subject down. As a
result I was able to narrow it down to two top fashion brands making good use
of Instagram and one group of generation Y using Instagram. If I were able to
extend this research I would also have a larger group take my survey, and
share it on multiple channels or even have them taken on a hard copy, this
way I could tackle more man to take the survey. I’ve definitely learned that it’s
hard to get people to actually engage by taking the survey. I had to share it a
multiple times and I’m grateful for the people who have helped me by sharing
it with their network and of course the total of 102 respondents who have
helped me conclude my findings. Furthermore I have no regrets, I have
learned a lot, gained experience again in writing research papers and learned
on how I could improve in the future.

38

Activity Log:
Activity Hours
Topic research 20
Literature Review 20
Methodology 10
Michael Kors case studies 25
Nike case studies 25
Survey making 15
Survey data gathering 10
Findings 20
Conclusion 6
Total 151
Sharing Evidence:
Survey sharing: Facebook, Email & LinkedIn

40

Some people who shared my survey on Facebook:
Research Paper share: LinkedIn
http://www.slideshare.net/JacintaMariedaSilvaC/fashion-brands-on-instagram-
research-paper-block-1

41

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