Follow, Like, Share. Care ?
Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels and Boucheron Social Media engagement.
“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing” — Tom Fishburne
The rapid rise of the internet seemed to inspire companies all over the world, and social medias are now a big part of the marketing strategy of brands. They have changed the way we communicate, the way we share our lives, the way we are looking for information.
Social medias allows companies to have a deeper contact with their customers, and gives them the opportunity to extend their brand image internationally, by sharing with everyone their products, their lifestyle… It is a new way to engage their consumers in a new way: likes, shares, comments… People can now exchange easily with brands that were inaccessible before.
Within the high jewelry industry, several names stand out. Among them, Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels and Boucheron, 3 french jeweler.
Followers or Subscribers on Social Medias Platforms
In the chart to the left, are detailed how many followers those 3 brands have on various social media platforms. You can see from this chart that Cartier is the one that have the highest number of followers or suscribers on their accounts. I’ll concentrate on Facebook, as it is the most used platform.
Cartier
Cartier, has a long history of sales to royalty and celebrities. For his coronation in 1902, Edward VII ordered 27 tiaras and issued a royal warrant to Cartier in 1904. Similar warrants soon followed from the courts of Spain, Portugal, Russia, Siam, Greece, Serbia, Belgium, Romania, Egypt, Albania, Monaco, and the House of Orleans. This brand is the essence of luxury, synonym of elegance and originality.
King Edward VII of England referred to Cartier as “the jeweller of kings and the king of jewellers.”
With the largest followers community among all three brands, Cartier has 3,5 million Facebook followers. The brand posts frequently, several times a week. Their posts are mainly product pictures, but they also brand about celebrities that wore Cartier jewelry during special events, such as Rihanna (who definitely drew attention thanks to her HUGE yellow dress), Jennifer Lawrence or Cara Delevingne at the Met Gala 2015.
One surprising thing is that their Facebook posts never have more than 1500 “likes”. This means that among their 3,5 million followers, only a few are engaging with the brand’s posts.
Van Cleef & Arpels
Van Cleef & Arpels is a French jewelry, watch, and perfume company. It was founded in 1896 by Alfred Van Cleef and his uncle Salomon Arpels in Paris. Their pieces often feature flowers, animals, and fairies, and have been worn by style icons such as Empress Farah, the Duchess of Windsor, Grace Kelly, and Elizabeth Taylor.
Van Cleef & Arpels’ Facebook page has around 428K followers. The brand also posts frequently (several times a week). Their posts are about events, product pictures (with direct links to buy them on their website), boutiques, celebrities who wore Van Cleef & Arpels jewelry during special events, but also about jewelry works.
As Cartier, their community of followers is not very engaged, and their posts never have more than 1000 likes.
Boucheron
The House of Boucheron is a French family dynasty founded by Frederic Boucheron in 1858, with the opening of his first store in the Galerie de Valois, at Palais-Royal, during the heyday of the Second French Empire. He created his atelier in 1866 and a year later won the Gold Medal during the Exposition Universelle (1867). Boucheron was a family business : after the death of its founder Frédéric Boucheron in 1902, his descendants took over the business.
Boucheron’s Facebook page has around 126K followers. The brand generally posts every 5 day. Their posts are showing product pictures, celebrities who wore Boucheron jewelry during special events, jewelry works…
Their Facebook community is not very engaged either, and their most “liked” post only have 1000 likes.
What are they doing wrong ?
From this analysis, we can notice that even if some very known brands have a high number of followers, those followers are not always contributing to the brand community.
From an external point of vue, those brands seems to have an older clientele, not really involved in social medias, which is impacting on their social media profiles. They need to modernize their image in order to attract new consumers, which is also the advantage of social medias. From the Facebook accounts that I studied, there is a real opportunity for these Jewelry brands to create a more engaging social media ambiance and community.
A good exemple of this modern but still classic brand image is Chanel. They have almost 15 millions followers, and some of their posts appeal around 420K “likes”.
“Social media is a learning process and sometimes you have to fall in order to learn things” — Christine Korda.
The ball is in your court !
This post was created as part of the Global Luxury Management Program at the NC State Poole School of Management.
