Apparel November 2019 Apparel November 2019 issue | Page 71

NEW AVENUES
enable individuals to directly connect with
hundreds, thousands, and millions of people
easily. As compared to the olden days, when
‘celebrities’ were a one-sided attraction, only
seen via movies and television, stars of the
21st century are everyday, accessible people,
thanks to social media. A key audience of these
platforms is the younger demographic of 17- to
35-year-olds, which also happens to be the most
important consumer demographic. It is only
natural then, that the stars of these networks,
also known as ‘social media influencers’, should
wield significant power. And it is because of this
fact that social media influencers have become
a rising component of the marketing and
advertising spend for retail brands.
In India, social media has been no different in
this regard, despite its relatively under-connected
population. Today, the nationwide internet
penetration is only 41 per cent but the majority of
its users are young people with an average age of
27 years; and over 52 per cent of them belong to
the millennial generation. In total, this means that
there are over 566 million online users, of whom
326 million are on social media. This is about
the same as the population of the United States.
With such a massive potential audience at their
disposal, it is quite easy to understand why retail
businesses are investing in social media influencer
marketing to promote their goods and win over
more customers.
SOCIAL MEDIA
INFLUENCERS HAVE
BECOME A RISING
COMPONENT OF
THE MARKETING AND
ADVERTISING SPEND FOR
RETAIL BRANDS.
THE VALUE OF SOCIAL
MEDIA INFLUENCERS
As social media has evolved, it has discovered
various niches and frameworks for its operations.
So while Facebook is a feature-rich platform
for chatting, sharing images and videos, and
posting stories, etc., there is also Twitter, which
is a relatively minimal service that allows limited
character-tweets and image posts. This is where
Instagram has emerged as the leading channel
for apparel retail and brands. Among all the social
media platforms, Instagram is the fastest growing,
with nearly 2 billion active monthly users, over 95
million photos and videos posted per day, and
over 400 million Instagram ‘stories’ posted in a
day. In fact, the platform boasts over 4.2 billion
interactions per day, thanks to the variety and
scale of its content, and most importantly, its
content-creators.
APPAREL
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November 2019
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