Social Matter — brands making an impact – VOL 01

1. Back to the tangible, even for digital

Jaquemus’ “Le Paysan” evokes its origins in a new collection and campaign
 
French fashion brand Jaquemus has announced its latest collection without a maximalist show, a common occurrence in the luxury and fashion industry. Instead, it simply features photographs of village life. The village life of the family of Simon Porte Jacquemus, French designer and founder of the brand.

The “le paysan” collection evokes a return to roots, to the tangible, showing the reconnection of the designer and founder of the brand, Simon Porte Jacquemus, with his rural origins.

And he’s not the only one returning, so to speak, to basics. Italian accessories brand Miu Miu has launched a book club: a physical space for conversation and collective reflection. In contrast to the digital noise, it is committed to the face-to-face, the intimate and the intellectual as a way of reconnecting with critical thinking. At the same time, it generates real stories that are then transferred to the digital ecosystem.

These are two examples of brands that continue to build on emotion. And in both cases, their actions evoke non-digital stories that will live on digitally. Because what is communicated digitally does not have to be (only) digital.
 

2. Google and Meta: friends forever?

Or why Google would want to index your Instagram photos
 
Who would have thought 10 years ago that Meta and Google would now be joining forces? Mark Zuckerberg’s company recently announced that content from company and creator profiles on Meta will begin to be indexed on Google. But why would Instagram, which has always been a closed platform, decide to open up in this way?

We may find a possible answer in Silicon Valley itself: ChatGPT. AI is gaining ground in the search market, and this directly threatens the core of Google’s business (with apologies to its AI Gemini, which, despite being on par with ChatGPT, does not seem to attract as many users as its competitor).

But changing contexts also give rise to opportunities: SEO on social media is taking another step forward. If optimizing texts on social media was already considered a necessity given that more and more users use them as search engines, this practice is now also becoming a new opportunity, as everything points to the fact that this same content will also appear in Google results in image format.
 

3. Influencers, a serious issue

The two three Patricias and the Royal Household
 
At a recent Royal Household event to mark the anniversary of Spain’s accession to the EU, a lifestyle influencer was mistakenly invited instead of the journalist specializing in EU and human rights issues who was actually supposed to attend. The source of the confusion? They are both named Patricia Fernández.

The influencer, far from clarifying the situation, attended, posed with the King, and justified her presence with generic arguments about sustainability and respect, to the astonishment of the journalist Patricia, who had to explain on her social media that she did not understand how no one had checked that the guest was not her.

As if that weren’t enough, it is worth noting that there is a third Patricia Fernández, a lawyer and activist who has been awarded for her work in human rights, who would also have been a good fit, but was never invited. This situation, which is somewhat peculiar to say the least, should reinforce the importance of thoroughly verifying our strategy and activation of collaborators.

What happened is a wake-up call: working with influencers requires looking beyond indicators such as followers and carefully analyzing their relevance, credibility, and consistency to avoid potential reputational risks.
 

4. Timing, cultural context, and agility: the essentials in social media

Desigual responds quickly and avoids a major crisis on social media
 
Desigual recently had the agility and ability to turn a potential crisis into a viral activation in its favor. Its “Not a Doll” campaign, in which the fashion brand advocated freedom in dress, failed to take into account the cultural context at the time, clashing with a slogan in defense of transgender women’s rights. Faced with this situation, the brand reacted strategically by collaborating with trans activist and performer Manuelacore to launch a new version of the campaign with the word “not” removed, reframing the message and joining a trend.

The controversy arose because “doll” is a common identity term in the LGBTQ+ community, especially in the US, and Desigual’s slogan coincided with the social campaign “Protect the Dolls,” created to raise awareness and protect trans women in the face of rising hate speech. Although the original message called for female empowerment, the crossover of meanings created a clash of narratives.

Understanding the social context and taking the cultural framework into account is essential. And if misunderstandings still arise, acknowledging a mistake even when there is good intent is an opportunity to demonstrate real commitment. Because on social media, context, agility, and authenticity are not optional.