By: Jillian Manon Chopin
April 12, 2010
Public Relations and the Future
When I first began with courses such as Intro to PR, Writing for Mass Media, and News Gathering, I was being taught the basics of PR ... and even traditional PR at that. As I have progressed through all required classes however, and as I am now in my final semester of campaigns with Dr. Carstarphen here at OU, I can say that I’ve learned much more about PR. I’ve learned about how I can use PR in countless ways ... simply because it can be molded to fit so many different needs and desires within all industries. For example - upon graduation, I plan to move back to my home city of Dallas, Texas and begin my search for a job in the fashion industry. Similar to what has been explored in several blogs for this assignment, I've found that social media has given notable rise to several industries around the world. The modern advancement of the fashion industry has exponentially expounded on a World Wide Web basis thanks to the possibilities within the social media sphere. Whereas a "back-stage pass" used to be just that, backstage – people from all different corners of the earth are becoming more and more exposed to the fashion industry via fashion blogging, through this sort of "back-stage pass."
Nowadays, if you are interested in going into the public relations field of the fashion industry, you must, and I emphasize must, be willing and able to navigate your way around social media websites such as Twitter and blogger in order to effectively promote your brand, reach your target publics, and basically – keep from being 'fashionably late' to what everyone else may already deem as 'last season.' Fashion, at its core, is a phenomena forever searching for the ‘up and coming’ so to speak. What is trendy right now - versus - what was trendy five minutes ago are things one must know when aspiring to strut upon the runway amidst other public relations fashionistas. Using my own personal Twitter account to follow fashion designers, bloggers, and so forth, I am quickly learning the ins-and-outs of how to be a public relations fashionista via social media. I now follow 74 Twitter pages, roughly 85% of which are related strictly to fashion. I follow designers such as Lanvin, Louis Vuitton, and Yves Saint Laurent and I am also following several fashion magazines and fashion blogger Twitters.
What I am learning from following these pages is that, first off – nearly everybody who is anybody is participating. There is so much to gain from relating to the public through social media that ultimately, you do not want to miss out on the countless opportunities that can be gained. The difficulty comes when deciding what to tweet about and how to format your tweets. Obviously, when you are given only 140 characters to convey your message, you must be concise, clear and catchy. Fashion goers tweet about everything from up-coming events to who is wearing what and where did they purchase it. For example, VogueParisLive constantly tweets about fashion shows, and provides links of pictures to engage their Twitter followers even more. WhoWhatWear posts tweets daily with a certain celebrity’s name and then a link to the most recent paparazzi photo flashed, while then attempting to identify each piece of fashion that person is wearing. This sort of thing is good for a brand because when a celebrity gains enough clout within the industry, they become an influential – especially within the fashion and pop culture society. These are the people who create fads, who introduce news trends, and who deem what is cool for the times. Therefore, a tweet as simple as a picture of Kim Kardashian can turn into drastic increase in sales for designers and brands that she frequently wears such as Bebe and Hermes. People who are interested in influential’s want to know what they are wearing and where they got their items. It is at that time when a public relations fashionista must come in and take advantage of the opportunities available through social media to increase their brand recognition and success.
There are also Twitter pages devoted specifically to fashion PR such as PR_Couture, ShineMediaPR, LolaPR,, and FashionBlogNews. These Twitter pages are dedicated to tweeting about public relations within the fashion industry. Provided below is a direct link to a interview that was held with the Creative Director of Nine West. Now, as this video does not directly address public relations and fashion together, it shows how modern day practitioners have a great opportunity to reach fashion craved obsessors worldwide and deliver truly valuable know-how, insight, and back-stage knowledge about using social media to project fashion onwards. PR_Couture is the Twitter for a fashion blog entitled “PR Couture – Fashion PR’s Haute Spot.” If you go to their actual website, abundant information is provided for the interested and aspiring public relations fashionista.
In conclusion, this new public relations trend within the fashion industry of using social media to strategically and creatively provide an all-access pass to those interested is only going to become more and more advanced and involved. Nowadays, you can live-stream fashion shows, you can follow fashion blogger web sites, discover frankly who anybody is wearing, and you can become a fashion icon within your own right simply through blogging, tweeting, and most definitely – posting pictures of your most proud moments walking down the catwalk of life in what ever ensemble you see fit, pun intended. What is marvelous about this advancement of social media with fashion public relations is that is delivers to the customer, delivers to the supplier, and creates a cycle of never ending expression, innovation, and modernization. Also, everything is so visual, and with fashion being visual at its very nature, all things collaborate so chic-ly when combining fashion, public relations, and social media.
Picture from: http://hautpr.com/fashionpr
Interview with Nine West Creative Director: http://www.prcouture.com/2010/04/12/fashion-pr-interview-nine-west-creative-director-and-sr-marketing-director-in-san-diego/
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