Urban truth
Star in Instagram marketing
Urban Truth, a local clothing brand and a venture of Pride Group, is the only brand that has successfully employed Instagram as a marketing medium through customer generated reviews and contents.
Ever since Facebook bought Instagram, an online mobile photo-sharing, video-sharing and social networking app, there has been a lot of talk about extending their advertisement platform to Instagram too and eventually they will.
Instagram has a growing number of users with 65 per cent of them residing outside of the USA. Marketers have been testing the limits of brand advertisements within the parameters of Instagram through posting ads as the pictures on their Instagram accounts and engaging customers through selfie, thus photography contests.
They asked their customers to wear their clothes, accessories and take pictures with Instagram, hashtag #utpeople #urbantruth and also tag Urban Truth on their photos in Instagram.
This created a sense of community among their customers and they fell in love with the brand Sumbal A Momen, marketing communication manager of Pride Group, was reached and was asked about the brand and its use of Instagram.
Why use Instagram as a medium of advertisement?
Primarily, our target market is a very social media savvy demographic. Beyond the usual social medium usage, kids in Dhaka mostly, have graduated to Snapchat, Vine, Vimeo, etc. which are still largely untapped potential here, but already been massively leveraged abroad. You can imagine my scepticism when we first began using Instagram, more than two years ago.
Companies only just realised the opportunities of paid advertising through Facebook, smart phone usage was still not as mainstream, and mobile internet was still shaky ground. I am still shocked to see our growing follower base (900+) and its level of engagement.
What are the main advantages of using Instagram for advertisements and engaging your customers?
The number one reason being it was free marketing! There is also nothing more compelling than a perfectly taken picture, demonstrating how to style your daily outfits, and which is the key for a fast fashion brand like ours.
Instagram helped us create a very direct relationship with our core customers. There were also no worries of our posts being lost in a crazy maze work of algorithms.
Lastly it was a very tangible measure of lead to sales conversions.
What do you think will be the future use of Instagram for businesses?
It is really difficult to say. The thing with most social media platforms is how trendy they are at the moment, and how fast that cool factor runs outs. It also depends on whether Instagram fits into a companys digital media strategy. It works for fashion brands, it has also worked for IKEA, but it seems farfetched for say, Goldman Sachs.
Globally, Instagram is a severely under-utilised medium, and in Bangladesh it is negligible. It is also a matter of time, before other brands notice Urban Truths success and follow us into the bandwagon. However, I believe that is still a little bit ahead.
Do you think Facebooks decision to extend its advertising platform to Instagram will be effective?
Facebook is still being a little evasive about their IG advertising plans, but if its anything like Facebook advertising or even Twitter, I think there is a chance it could ruin consumer experience, which is essentially the entire premise we as a company bank on. I cant even say to what extent that would fit into our social media budget, given that Instagram itself has been the most effective advertising tool for us, free of cost. In fact, it wouldnt even make sense.
How viable do you think Instagram is a medium of advertisement for emerging businesses and startups?
For emerging businesses, I cant think of a more effective advertising platform. For us, it was made easier through having an
established base on Facebook, to whom we could announce and divert to our IG page, which is critical I believe. Both are also very important if you have a website you need to direct traffic to.
The reason I prefer IG to Facebook is because it allows companies to share a more personalised and casual version of themselves. Facebook is like having a high tea in a hotel dressed in formals and paying an exorbitant amount for scones, while IG is sitting at home on a sofa with your friends, sharing a story and having a homemade cup of coffee.
Messages get lost in the clutter of TV, newspaper, billboard advertisements and consumers are now getting more attuned to tuning these mediums out rendering all the marketing efforts fruitless. Not only is this a huge roadblock for marketers but a potential cause of financial loss for the brands!
Urban Truth recognised all of these factors and brilliantly managed to revolutionize the way their customers uses Instagram in Bangladesh.
In the end, through one simple ingenious marketing effort, they emerged as a successful brand that people love and love to talk about!
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