Can we chat about fashion Instagrammers/influencers..

[Cherrypie32]

..because I don’t have anyone in real life to carp about it to. So, I follow a few, am addicted to the stories/feeds of some but don’t always know why. The ‘high end’ ones, The Frugality, Dress Like A Mum, Emma Hill etc pop up but quite designer and high end for me. I like the ramblings of Does My Bum but I’m nothing like her body shape so don’t wear her clothes. There are a few more ‘high street’ ones I follow, Steal My Style, What Kathy Did, Forty not Frumpy and more but they tend to be repetitive. Is this because they are so heavily sponsored to flog something? At the moment they are all banging on bout All Saints leather bikers and maxi skirts. And they all copy each other so there’s not much new to look at. There are a few I follow with nowhere near the amount of followers that seem more creative and have different body shapes so I presume that they have more liberty to do this as aren’t under afflilate deals.
I don’t need advice to ‘unfollow’, I enjoy looking at it all, just interested in how it all works really.

The Pretty Pastel Please video linked a few pages back was fascinating. Does anyone have a link to the blog post mentioned about trying to break into fashion blogging? I've tried to find it, but no luck so far.

Emma Hill’s posts on ‘Fashion Week’ and ‘Blogging’

emmajhill.com/that-feeling-when-you-just-dont-fit-in/

emmajhill.com/i-dont-attend-fashion-weeks/

Fullerfigure is the absolute worst for links and she targets all the popular sites people use. It's always 'wow look at this dress..' and when you swipe up its asos/ Amazon/boohoo/Matalan... such a fucking sneaky way to get the cookies on sites you're likely you regularly use anyway. The aff link is very sneaky because most people don't know the link stays in your device for a long time. She has 20 plus links a day and it's the targeting if everyday sites that is sinister.

Also she's always raging about not hacking enough likes and comments and how it's affecting her income and livelihood. If you want a stable income then you need to get a proper job. The plus size Instagrammars are so unethical, they sell the body positive message when in fact it's really all about income streams.

Well from my experience the fashion industry isn’t always accepting of those who made their name from social media but I understand why.

By fashion industry I’m referring to B&M depts in HO’s, modelling & magazines editers. Some

I feel quite humiliated by some of the misleading. I actually believed I was following accounts of women wearing their own style and choices. How naive am I . The gifting thing just makes you think they'll wear anything for the right price. So actually it's just a shop window to sell stuff. I feel stupid for not knowing this but I've always worked in the NHS and charities so I'm not commercially knowledgeable.

The narrative around women supporting women and all being friends is just another lie isn't it.

We all follow rules of behaviour and disclosure to earn a wage at work. Why did they think they were different and didn't have to do this?

Ah well, lesson learned. Unfollowed them all and at least I have always been too skint to buy the stuff they're flogging

I’m feeling very naive about the affiliate links! The commission isn’t tiny at all if you think about the followers that will click it, and the cookies thing is so deceitful! I mostly just copy the link and open it in chrome as it has all my accounts saved but and i still giving this way? I didn’t realise it was the same with blogs, I’ve clicked so may of these What a mug.

Yes I think if you cut and paste into another browser it woulds still go through the same process and the cookie would end up on your computer (I'm no computer expert though, but this is my understanding). There is a way of checking and removing cookies which I do now and then. The blogs are the worst because often it is just a picture and they don't name the shop so you have to click on the picture to see where it is from.

Thanks Mary.

oops posted by accident!

Some of it of course is jealousy but I also think there’s a sense of unfairness & injustice. Examples I can think of is a model who despite a great portfolio & who’s a great model often doesn’t get booked because an influencer has a SM following & therefore a ready made audience, despite not actually knowing how to model. Buyers who literally sets trends & decide what the high street will be wearing & who themselves have fabulous wardrobes & great lifestyles reading an article on the next season trends by someone who interned for 2 weeks in their office. Or a featured editor (with an Oxbridge degree) who writes copy but now sometimes finds herself re writing copy for an article by an influencer. And that’s before you even look at the decline in trad journalism & the lower pay.
The main reasons the influencers have these power is exposure as opposed to talent (not saying there isn’t some good content) & their willingness to be open to the exposure. A big bugbear for many people I know is the new need to have a sm presence when they would rather be private.

Re the af links I’m sure I’ve been told that if you click a link for another link it overrides the old cookie if that make sense. So if you like a jumper on mon posted by a blogger & click the link but then happen to click another link (has to be same shop) from a diff blogger & on tues buy the original jumper blogger 2 gets the original %. This may have changed or not be true though.

That’s really interesting @fancynancyclancy, I’d never thought about it from that perspective. Hopefully like any emerging industry with low barriers to entry there will be a reckoning at some point where there is a clear line between the people who do it well (and so get remunerated accordingly) and the bottom feeders.

Those of you on iPhones, you can clear all cookies from your phone in the Safari menu in Settings:

The problem is that some cookies are actually quite useful, the ones that store my passwords for websites etc. I just want a clear way to know what cookies are affecting where commission on affiliate links may go, and that is very unclear.

I see MOD is cocking a snook to the "new" rules today by posting her interiors shot. She has previously disclosed her West Elm coffee table as an AD, so she should be disclosing her previous relationship with them when tagging her sideboard, even if she paid for it herself. Disappointing to see.

reading this with such interest!

My fave fashion grammers have really pulled the wool over my eyes I mean I'm not an idiot I was aware that they got sent clothes/press samples to show case but the amount of stuff is just off the scale!

Are the rules the same for the You Tubers?

But FOD doesn't tag much either, certainly not the car or the TV, so I guess MOD doesn't feel the need to either.

Another one who feels like a bit of a fool for thinking these people were talking about these products out of the goodness of their hearts. The amount of stuff now being tagged as gifted/ads is huge.
How much stuff do these women get given?
Just seen two Hermosa handbags gifted and talked about on stories in the last 10 mins.
One was by an IGer called What Kathy Did Next, who is a teacher. Can anybody tell me how she squares the circle of teaching and accepting gifts etc. Not sure that it is against the rules in teaching per se, but as a teacher myself, I would not want pupils finding me on the Internet and seeing details of my private life and my house etc. Risky.

It’s the extent of it that is flabbergasting!

I would entreat anybody noticing bloggers/Instagrammers/Influencers breaking the new rules to report to CMA. If they are not brought to heel it absolutely will continue (see disregard for rules by influencers mentioned in their thread).

There is such a circle jerk of influencers eye rolling about disclosure and other influencers rushing to say “you are always so clear about disclosure!” Errr NO! They are not!
It’s one thing to think an influencer may have been paid for the occasional brand collaborations that they bothered to mark as #ad but another thing entirely to see that literally EVERYTHING in a photo has been #gifted by a brand - from clothes to coffee cups to food. I’m surprised they haven’t found someone to sponsor the air they breathe!
(Actually I bet there is a purifier or dehumidifier brand that has sponsored some of them so that’s not even a joke).

Sorry influencers, your audience definitely did NOT realise that you got that much stuff for free!

I suppose it goes to show that influencers were correct that being honest with their audience would not be in their own best interest. Lots of people on here are clearly really turned off by the amount of gifted products and unfollowing accordingly, or are making sure not to use affiliate links.

I mean, I can see why influencers are pissed off.

But Jean - while there’s no doubt the level of gifting is off putting, many on this thread have said it’s the depth of the deception that’s really troubling. This is only apparent now it’s clear that the rules apply and IGers are forced to be transparent. Previously IGers could get away with not being clear or upfront about it and I think that’s what has upset and shocked people the most.

I don't really agree with that. There have been plenty of people mentioned on the thread that have been reasonably transparent up to now already, and so the "new" rules are a painless transition for them and they are probably rolling their eyes at the ones that are whining now. I suspect the gifting may not have been as extensive as it is if transparency had been there from the start - the brands took advantage of ASA's inability to keep up and regulate the industry properly. I am not against influencer advertising per se, it is the deceitful nature of it that I object to. Same with affiliate links - I'd be happy to use them if I knew exactly who I was giving the commission to, and for which purchases. It is the lack of transparency that has pissed off the audience.

I think this thread is in danger of veering off a bit. I am in complete agreement that advertising goods on Instagram and not declaring it is completely unacceptable. It's good to see better disclosure happening and hopefully it will settle down and just become the norm to disclose clearly. The moaning about having to follow normal trade rules for your business is ridiculous and embarrassing.

However I don't object to advertising on Instagram overall. I think that's an inevitable evolution in marketing, just like tv advertising would have been at the time, and putting ads onto Facebook feeds. It makes complete business sense that sending someone with a decent following a chair or a dress is cheaper than hiring a model, a location and a photographer as they would normally have done and then pay to publish it in a magazine.

This is not people just getting lots of free stuff, these people are running a business advertising brands, probably in their own limited company. Which is fine, Instagram is a big magazine really. These are not our friends lying to us. If they are not declaring this form of payment to hmrc then they will be in for big problems but we don't know they are not and that's their business really. But they absolutely should be following the trading standards forbadvertising that all other forms of marketing have to adhere to.

*for advertising

@Popcorninapot not sure anybody has explicitly said they have a problem with advertising on Instagram rather that is has been and is continuing to be hidden. Completely agree there needs to be some financial remuneration for those that work on it but be clear that you are profiting in a substantial way from advertising.

I very much doubt the smaller influencers have set themselves up as a limited company for their ‘influencing’ work - just jumped on the golden bandwagon of free stuff. The large ones certainly as corporation tax is far more kind than income tax.

And also, in a way they have tricked people into thinking they are their ‘friends’ (not in the traditional phone up for a chat sense). Note the emotional responses and fangirling whenever anybody dares to call them out. Social media stars get big quickly and without a lot of talent (often) due to their accessibility. Brands have exploited this access for good reason.

I don’t get your post at all Jean

Just because they were correct that deceiving people meant they could get better growth and more £ doesn’t mean they have a right to be pissed off

The opposite is true. Consumers have a right to transparency