Why emotionally resonant campaigns—not influencer metrics—build lasting brand value.
By Mark Wittmer
When was the last time a fashion campaign stopped you in your tracks? When was the last time
you looked at a magazine ad for more than five seconds?
Prompted by the rise of social media and influencer marketing and the “decline” of print, PR
teams have taken on the role of the industry’s leading communicators, prioritizing the cultivation
of a brand’s image through high-profile but simplistic partnerships and endorsements over the
richly compelling narratives that shaped fashion for so long. This approach might capture
immediate attention and earn trackable metrics through social-media engagement, but it all too
often sacrifices depth and emotional resonance. The result? Campaigns that give that candy-
coated dopamine rush of recognition, yet are then quickly forgotten as the audience scrolls onto
the next thing.
But it wasn’t long ago – less than a decade even – that a very different practice was
commonplace. Think of the Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche campaigns of the early 90s, the
Balenciaga ads of the Ghesquière era, Dolce & Gabbana by Dennis Freedman and Steven
Klein, a mid-2010s Prada campaign. These aren’t images you can look at and easily look away
from. With their layered compositions, distinct creative perspective, and charged emotional
atmospheres, they demand attention, patience, emotional investment.
But this attention is more than rewarded. This image fleshes out an enduring place in the
viewer’s mind, memory, and heart, another chapter in the ongoing narrative that is that brand.
This isn’t to say that celebrity partnerships and influencer events aren’t still an important
strategic tool. We more than sympathize with the desire to build out KPIs and EMV: these easily
understandable aggregations of data can be instantly translated into marketing decisions that
get results – or at least, results in terms of social-media engagement. But what will really carry a
brand’s success in the long term are harder to quantify: memory, longevity, emotional
connection. Young people who have only engaged with fashion in the last five years don’t have
the same understanding of a brand’s character as those of us who have been engaging with
fashion storytelling for a long time. For them, these brands all look the same: a model, wearing
an outfit, under generic studio lighting, standing in front of a simple background. Their heart isn’t
in it; there’s no reason for them to buy into the overarching emotional narrative of the brand
because there is none. And with the ongoing downturn in luxury spending, this lack is starting to
show its long-term effects.
The solution? Be open to doing less, but do it better. Pick your battles and win them. A creative,
compelling campaign shoot where every element is artisanally orchestrated may produce only
six shots over the course of two days and cost as much as two months worth of TikTok
influencer unboxings, but those shots will meaningfully endure in the mind of your audience for
far, far longer.
