The UK’s homeware industry is booming, with brands like Made.com, Ikea, H&M Home, Wayfair, and Dunelm finding success through strategic influencer collaborations and social media campaigns, driven by Wearisma’s data-driven insights.
Published On: August 12, 2020
The UK’s homeware industry is worth £13.5B and shows no signs of stopping with an estimated growth of an additional £0.5billion on the cards by 2021. With people spending more time than ever in their homes due to the pandemic, the industry is definitely one to watch. Wearisma’s analytics tool revealed that homeware content saw a whopping 120% increase in Engagements between January and April this year. Brands have been capitalising on the extra buzz with strategic collaborations and social media campaigns. Here are 5 homeware brands that have found success via this method.
Having been founded in the height of the digital era, social media plays an integral role in Made.com’s marketing strategy. With the help of Wearisma’s solutions, Made.com has achieved success by creating data-driven campaigns.
By utilising Wearisma’s discovery tool Made.com was able to broaden its scope, collaborating with a wide variety of influencers and not limiting itself to creators focused solely on interior design. For example, the brand’s collaboration with fashion and lifestyle influencer Maéwo (@maevvo) has been particularly successful with her posts generating over 5x the average Engagement rate of other Made.com sponsored content. Maéwo’s performance is evidence of the need to use data-driven insights when it comes to influencer selection to prevent you from overlooking influencers who will produce engaging content for your brand.
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Social media campaigns have been the brand’s key to building a solid community of brand advocates. Their latest campaign utilised the #madedesign hashtag inviting advocates to share shots of their homes featuring their favourite Made.com pieces. The campaign was effective in generating a wealth of creative content attracting online audiences keen to show off their interior design talents. Wearisma’s analytics tool revealed the campaign was well received with #madedesign content achieving sky-high Engagement Rates (ER). Livingston Living’s (@livingston.living) post featuring her new Made.com light fixture was particularly noteworthy, generating an ER over 4X higher than their average.
Informative and inspirational video content has been an effective content strategy for Swedish giant Ikea. YouTube is Ikea’s most successful social media platform generating the highest ERs for the brand. The most popular videos featuring Ikea content are “homeware hauls” and “room tour” videos which feature show and tells of different Ikea products as well as showing ways people have combined Ikea furniture to fit their homes.
Source: Wearisma Platform
YouTuber Lydia Elise Millen had one of the highest ERs for Ikea content with her home themed YouTube videos. Lydia has recently developed an audience of home decorating enthusiasts after purchasing her new home three years ago. Lately, we’ve noticed that Influencer’s are increasingly diversifying their content themes. These developments increase the need to utilise an Influencer Discovery tool that regularly updates when influencers enter new content categories.
Much like their clothing ranges, H&M Home features trendy pieces at reasonable prices. The accessible nature of the brand has meant that they have found success with a broad variety of micro-influencers, such as German home design bloggers Steph Hudson (@homehudsons) and Marcela (@interior_byma) who had the highest ER for H&M Home content. A strategic choice considering micro-influencers in Germany generate the highest ERs. These two influencers, in particular, generated ER’s between 2-4X the German average for their follower-group category. Factoring this knowledge into marketing decisions is important in ensuring a partnership will have the exposure and Engagement you’re aiming for.
Over the past year, Wayfair has found success working with mega-influencers. Back in February, the homeware brand announced that singer Kelly Clarkson (@kellyclarkson) would be their first-ever brand ambassador, featuring in social media campaigns as well as creating her own collection: ‘Kelly Clarkson Home.’
The #kellyclarksonxWayfair content received over double the Engagements for the singer’s regular content. Her content also had the highest Engagements and the highest media value for Wayfair by a longshot with her posts totalling £312K in media value. The fact that a portion of the proceeds from the collection will be going to COVID-19 relief efforts is arguably a strong factor in the effectiveness of this campaign as online audiences have grown increasingly attracted to socially conscious content.
Dunelm chose a similar marketing route as Wayfair by collaborating with TV personality Holly Willoughby (@hollywilloughby). Holly’s Instagram audience is largely based in the UK and Ireland, making her the perfect choice for the exclusively British furniture retailer. When collaborating with influencers, it’s important to check where their audience is based in order to ensure their content is catering to people who actually have access to the products. The collaboration went beyond sponsored posts on Instagram, the collection she promoted was designed exclusively by her catering to her broad fan base. Her posts had a combined media value of just under £176K, the second-highest for Dunelm while her Engagements were the highest for the brand between May – July this year.
YouTube is another platform where Dunelm has found success. Twins Lydia and Lucy Connell run a successful YouTube channel featuring beauty, home, and lifestyle content and achieved the highest Media Value for Dunelm in the same period. Having just finished decorating their shared London apartment, they uploaded a video giving viewers a tour showcasing their Dunelm pieces. Genuine and inviting video content such as this has consistently proved effective with homeware brands as evidenced by Lydia and Lucy’s home tour receiving 30x the average ER of other Dunelm content.
With COVID-19 reminding many of us that there’s no place like home, home improvement and decorating content has gained tremendous popularity. Organic and inviting content will be most effective but it’s important for brands to be strategic in their influencer selection and work with those that will help them achieve the highest ROI.
Keep informed with the latest trends, reports, and case studies from the world of influencer marketing.
Both influencer marketing and traditional advertising can achieve broad reach and foster trust—yet they do so with different strengths and challenges. Influencer marketing builds trust through personal, authentic endorsements that resonate with targeted audiences, often leading to higher engagement and a sense of community. Traditional advertising, on the other hand, leverages the credibility of established platforms and can quickly raise brand awareness across a wide audience.
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