For those of you Kardashian skeptics, I’ve got a story for you.  I must confess, I’ve been a fan of the Kardashian clan for a long time now, probably began watching Keeping Up With the Kardashians and the multitude of spin offs about 4 or 5 years ago and have not been able to stop since.  Besides the unbelievable drama that goes on within that family on their reality shows, I have began to individually follow each member on their social media, primarily following their Instagrams.  Now, when you follow 7 members of the family on Instagram (Kim, Khloe, Kourtney, Rob, Kendall, Kylie and Kris), if becomes apparent that the family that everyone pins as superficial really have a marketing strategy going on.

Take this week for example.  Second youngest sister in the family and supermodel, miss Kendall Jenner, signed with cosmetics company Estee Lauder to be the face of their new campaigns.  While it’s obvious that she would promote this on her personal Instagram, it was impressive how supportive and tactical the rest of the family were.  Each member of the family, one by one, reposted her Instavid throughout the day, being careful not to overlap with each other.  That way, a super fan of the show like me who follows everyone, would not have any chance of missing the news.

Kendall Jenner instantly boosted Estee Lauder’s Instagram followers by 50k shortly after the news was announced.

The family uses the same tactic each Sunday when a new episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashian airs – ensuring none of their loyal fans forget to tune in.

For a reputation of dumber-than-average individuals, I think they’ve got their well-oiled social media machine down pat.

The infamous LinkedIn….the one social media platform that we all dreaded setting up at one point or another.  Let me convince you why it’s worth the leap in my Top 5 reasons you need LinkedIn:

1) It’s the new place to find a job.  Based on your skills and keywords that you include in your LinkedIn profile, recruiters can search for attributes of their ideal candidate and find them on LinkedIn rather than recruiting the old fashioned way.

2) You can tell your story.  Unlike an ordinary paper resume which must be short and sweet, your LinkedIn profile has no word limit.  It gives you the chance to show your personality and story, and to constantly update little milestones that have added up to your success!  You can also upload your personal blog posts or projects that you’ve done to prove to recruiters that what you say you can do is true and you’re not another “perfect interviewee gone wrong”.

3) You can find and stalk your favourite companies.  Have a dream company that you’ve always wanted to work for, but never know when they’re hiring?  Connect with the company on LinkedIn and you’ll be that much more likely to know when a job posting appears.  Connect with recruiters from these companies to show your eager interest.

4) You can start building your professional network.  Are you the type of person that groans every time someone mentions the word “networking”.  I know I am.  LinkedIn allows you to start building your professional network the easy way: simply by pressing the connect button.  Now you’re able to build your professional circle without the stress of coming off as awkward or saying the wrong thing.

5) Have your peers endorse your skills for you.  Once again, the proof is in the pudding, my friends!  Having others vouch for your skills rather than you simply stating that you are a “social media expert” or “excellent baker” seems more trustworthy.

So, there you go!  I hope I have you convinced that your next personal project is setting up your LinkedIn profile.  Go forth, young professionals!

(for your reference below, I have attached a guide to build your perfect LinkedIn profile)

It’s the most wonderful time of the year…almost.  Well, it’s the beginning of November and the #psl (pumpkin spice lattes) are gone from Starbucks, replaced by the infamous red cups.

With the Christmas joy comes the spirit of giving and…a Christmas email marketing campaign?

Yes, people.  Time to take advantage of the shift in weather and happy spirit of your customers and carefully craft your Christmas campaign to get your fans even more in the spirit.  Here are my tips for crafting your perfect Christmas email marketing campaign.

1) Make it feel personal and special.  Nothing feels better than knowing or feeling like someone truly cares about you.  That’s what your customers want, to feel as if they’re not just another number.  Give them something special, a gift of some sorts, to encourage them to do what you want (maybe buy a gift for xmas at their store with an exclusive discount – only available to email subscribers!).  You have their name on file, so use it.  Look at their previous purchase history and tailor the email to the correct group of people.  This is where you may have 3 slightly different campaigns sent out to different types of customers. 

2) Pump up the festivity.  It’s Christmas, for goodness sakes!  Show some enthusiasm, make some puny jokes (but please not overused ones – I’m talking checking your list and checking it twice) and get your customers in the festive spirit.  If you’re the reason someone starts getting into the Christmas spirit, they’ll forever remember that.

J.Crew’s Christmas Email

3) Redesign your template in holiday style.  If you normally use a certain template design, alter it a bit so regular readers of your email marketing campaigns notice that this one is special and are more likely to be intrigued by it.  You can even do something as simple as using the same template format and changing the colour scheme or adding a little string of christmas lights at the top.  Be creative!

Those are my tips! Happy Holidays everyone xx

The celebrity-like nature of Youtube stars these days is extraordinarily powerful and companies on the forefront of public relations and marketing strategies are taking advantage.  In what could be said is the peak of content creation on Youtube, Conde Nast is latching onto this heightened following of Youtube Stars by offering them hard to pass up deals where they will sponsor them in return for them starring in various series on their Youtube channel.  Adding a Youtube star and makeup guru Kandee Johnson to the marketing mix allows Conde Nast to draw from a large die-hard following of over 2 million fangirls who idolize anything that the star shows interest in.  The intelligence behind this strategy is astounding, because the ideal customer is one who is fully immersed in all the nooks and crannies of the brand, and die hard fans become immersed quickly.

Alfie Deyes, Youtube daily vlogger and content creator.

Quantum of the Seas, a new cruise ship in the Royal Caribbean collection just launched a first sail media cruise, for only press to explore all of the innovative features of the new ship.  The ship was host to some incredible attractions, such as a roller skate rink, a surfing simulator, and a ride called the “North Star” that rose many meters up into the sky while the boat was sailing.  Insane, eh?  Well, Royal Caribbean also caught onto this trend of Youtube Stars and invited daily vloggers Jim Chapman and Alfie Deyes (you can watch his vlog here) onto the ship for a free 2 day all inclusive cruise, where they were encouraged to vlog as much of their trip as they wanted, generating interest from their millions of viewers.  Again, companies like this are really catching onto the new trends of reaching a loyal, target audience.  Genius guys.