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If we’ve learned anything from the global pandemic, it’s that shoppers are relying more than ever on the digital world for their consumer needs.
This is a challenge for luxury goods and jewellery brands whose customers are more than likely used to an in-store experience. Meaning they can try on products before they invest in them, ask for advice on how to style them, and get a feel for your brand by experiencing it in person. All of this is what helps make luxury and jewellery brands what they are: elegant, exclusive, and simply irresistible.
But luckily there are ways for luxury goods and jewellery brands to recreate the in-store shopping experience through their digital footprint, providing the same level of connection and trust for customers that are shopping from home. And the number one strategy that is helping luxury goods and jewellery brands appeal to their online audiences in a more authentic way is User Generated Content from social media.
In this blog, we’d like to take a look at 7 brands who have adapted their digital marketing strategy to include UGC, helping to build trust, demonstrate their reliability, maintain customer loyalty, and increase their eCommerce conversions while selling online.
Initially, the risk as an eCommerce brand is that your relationship with your customers appears purely transactional. Without being able to offer the smile and personalized customer service which is such a key part of an in-store visit, you’ll need to think outside the box to build bonds with your customers.
By leveraging the power of UGC in your eCommerce, you can create a more human connection with your customers, winning their loyalty in the process. Minimalist watch brand CLUSE was able to successfully emulate this experience within their online store.
Since its creation in 2013, CLUSE has stood out as an innovative brand in the watch sector. But they recognized that they would need to do more in order to keep their competitive edge in a crowded digital market. That’s when they realized that the key was their customers.
Customers love to feel that they’re part of a cohesive and inclusive body of followers. Both old and new customers can feel united by their love of the brand, and the love the brand shows them back. Plus, they don’t want to feel like they’re being sold to, rather they want to believe in the experience of being a part of the brand community.
CLUSE recognised the best way to accomplish all of this was to make their loyal community the center of their marketing strategy through UGC.
In order to do this, they encouraged their followers to engage with them on social media by using the hashtags #CLUSE and #CLUSEwatches.
With the help of advanced UGC platform, Flowbox, they gathered over 19k customer generated images and videos, displaying them in a lookbook of customer content on their website. While customers browse images created by customers from social media, they’re directed to the products that appear within them, making the purchasing journey much more fluid.
This proved to be a successful strategy, as CLUSE increased their conversion rate by 19%.
Once your brand has created a community, it’s important that you demonstrate its accessibility to new customers that aren’t part of the community yet. This can be a challenge for luxury brands who often appear elite and unattainable.
But luxury jewellery brand Diamenti per tutti figured out how to bust this stereotype by using UGC to demonstrate the brand’s accessibility despite selling high-end luxury goods.
Diamenti per tutti is a jewellery company that sells timeless, classic pieces using natural and ethically sourced diamonds. Sounds fancy and unobtainable right? Well actually this couldn’t be further from the truth!
Diamenti per tutti is “the brand making diamond jewellery for all,” according to L’Officiel, and is perfect for “modern working women,” if you ask beauty magazine Her World.
So the question is, how can luxury goods and jewellery brands maintain their upscale status while still reaching potential customers at every level? There is one sure-fire way to showcase how popular and accessible their products are without having to say it themselves – that’s right with UGC.
Diamenti per tutti worked out that by gathering Instagram posts of their customers wearing their jewellery and integrating these images and videos onto their website, they could show that their products are worn and adored by real, authentic women.
There’s no doubt that customers want to see real people wearing your products because relatability sells. The days of professional models and staged photoshoots are behind us, which is exactly why luxury goods and jewellery brands should learn to create authenticity by featuring real customers in their marketing communication.
Rely on the authenticity of UGC to connect better with your customers. Request a demo of the Flowbox platform today and discover more about our advanced UGC platform.
But it’s not just about authenticity, it’s also about customer inspiration. This is something we can learn about from two luxury brands that are killing it with their UGC strategy.
Shopping for jewellery has typically been an in-person experience, as customers are used to seeing and trying on tangible products. But with the growth of eCommerce, it’s been a challenge to encapsulate that same experience online. This means that brands need to find new ways for customers to get a real sense of a product without trying it on.
This is something that leading jewellery brand Apart has solved with their UGC strategy.
Their shoppable UGC galleries give customers a sense of their products through the eyes of other customers. So by collecting genuine content from social media and integrating into product pages, customers get to shop the latest looks with an understanding of how they will fit in the context of an outfit. Meaning that new customers get a better sense of how to style the products and what they will actually look like when they wear them.
With 81% of users using Instagram to research products, it’s more important than ever for brands to integrate UGC into their eCommerce store to compete in our increasingly digital-savvy world.
This is something that we can also see from Dutch brand MyJewellery.
Have you ever been shopping online and felt like you needed a second opinion? Well, MyJewellery has you covered. The ‘styled by you’ section of their online store is like having your best friends advising you on how to style each item.
This is a great way to showcase your products, especially because 83% of people said they use social media to research new products and 80% say social media helps them make decisions about what to buy. So by integrating this content directly into your site, you’re giving customers a more comprehensive and compelling shopping experience where their needs are put first.
Another important point that brands need to keep in mind is longevity. A successful marketing strategy not only attracts new customers today, but it helps you give your current customers tomorrow. Let’s take a look at how Aria Lattner uses UGC to do just that.
When it comes to jewellery and fashion, there is such an immense range of brands to choose from online. This means that keeping your customers interested has never been more important. Bear in mind that 50% of U.S. consumers have left a brand they were loyal to for a competitor that better met their needs.
So what’s the best way to maintain customer loyalty? By giving customers the opportunity to become their own brand ambassador by celebrating them with UGC.
Sustainable fashion and jewellery brand, Aria Lattner, realized that a brand community was the key to retaining customers. And what better way to create a community than by allowing customers to play a role in presenting the established brand image.
With the help of Flowbox, Aria Lattner gathered their customers’ Instagram posts and displayed them on their website with the result that customers felt acknowledged, appreciated, and an allegiance to the brand’s image. By letting them be a part of creating the essence of the brand, they feel a sense of loyalty and pride every time they wear Aria Lattner products.
Ultimately, everyone wants to be an influencer. When you feature your customers’ posts on your website, you allow your customers to feel like one. And this is powerful! The best thing is, in order to keep being featured on your website, customers will want to keep buying your products and posting pictures of themselves wearing them. It’s truly a win-win.
Speaking of influencers, here’s another key benefit to UGC that plays off of influence in a similar way – and that’s social proof.
Social proof is a highly effective selling tool, especially given the prevalence of social media marketing today.
Customers love feeling that other people are making the same buying choices as them, and that the brand they’re buying from is popular with other people too. We all want to feel like part of the clan, right?
UGC is the perfect form of social proof because it actually shows real people authentically living their lives with your products. So when people browse your site and see all your existing customers, they feel like they’ll be part of the ‘in-crowd’ if they buy your brand’s products too.
KARL LAGERFELD has made the most of social proof by including a gallery of stylish and satisfied customers wearing their products on their website. This is the ultimate proof that their products are popular and worth buying – and the results speak for themselves.
Since employing Flowbox’s UGC platform, LAGERFELD has experienced a 7.02% conversion rate and an average order value increase of 20.84%. And best of all the brand didn’t have to work hard to convince people; all the work was done for them by their loyal customers!
If there’s one thing you take from this, let it be not to underestimate the power of social proof!
If you plan on being in the business for a long time, and we certainly hope that you do, it’s also important to keep up with the latest trends. Heritage brand LIP is able to connect with both old and new customers with their UGC strategy.
French heritage brand, LIP, has a long history of community building, and they were looking for a way to celebrate this rich heritage through their marketing practices. Not wanting to be stuck in the past, they turned to the future of digital marketing, aka UGC.
“We chose to include UGC in the LIP strategy to give our visitors the feeling that – more than a brand – LIP is a community or family that they can relate to. Because it’s French, because it’s close to them, and because it’s human.”
Pascal de Aguiar – Online Communication Director at LIP
LIP has used UGC to show how much they value their customers – both old and new – positioning themselves as an innovative brand in the eCommerce space in the process. Through their UGC integration, they’ve memorialized their long-standing relationship with their loyal customers, while positioning themselves as a relevant brand in the space.
LIP’s decision to pursue a UGC strategy proves that even long-established brands need to adapt to the changing landscape of luxury goods in order to stand out from the crowd and continue to flourish in such a competitive marketplace. Read for yourself how this strategy is working for them here.
Now that you’ve learned how these seven luxury goods and jewellery brands have integrated UGC into their digital marketing strategy, it’s time to try it for yourself. And we’d love to help you!
With Flowbox’s User Generated Content platform, you can easily collect, manage, publish and analyze your customer content for a truly stellar strategy. Learn more about our solution here
With all of these key benefits, it’s really a no-brainer for luxury and jewellery brands.
