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Convosphere | Monthly Digest | February 2019

  1. Influencer marketing, the new go-to digital marketing form for major brands, has been found to deliver 11 times the return on investment of all other forms of digital media. From the US to Korea, our latest blog post looks at the local nuances and market differences that companies need to grasp and how the Convosphere team can help brands successfully launch cross-cultural campaigns.
  2. In recent times, drug manufacturers have increasingly turned to influencer marketing as a customer acquisition method. But as pharma brands partner up with influencers to inject social media users’ feeds with a new kind of aspirational health ideal, the ethics around UGC (User Generated Content) and medical promotions is coming under scrutiny. This article explains the current status of pharma sponcon and how the regulatory grey area impacts pharmaceutical companies and consumers alike.
  3. Screen time is often among the first issues to be brought up in debates around teens’ mental health. But, according to new research, tech might not deserve the bashing it’s been getting. Examining data from over 300,000 adolescents and parents in the UK and US, the study is “the most definitive to date” and shows that technology use has less impact on teenagers’ wellbeing than eating potatoes and wearing glasses. ‘Our findings demonstrate that screen use itself has at most a tiny association with youth mental health,’ said Oxford Internet Institute’s lead researcher Professor Andrew Przybylski, who says that bias and selective reporting has influenced previous research in the field.
  4. Having wowed both the US and UK on their Love Yourself tour, South Korean boyband BTS is fast becoming a household name around the world. In India, BTS fan club @BangtanIndia asked followers to join their #BTSTourinIndiahashtag project to encourage the K-pop group to add the Southeast Asian country to their tour list. India’s culture of prejudice against “softer” forms of masculinity, combined with a scarcity of big enough concert venues, makes the country an unlikely destination for the band. Yet the extreme viral spread of the campaign, which saw the hashtag trend on Twitter within minutes of launch, served to prove the band’s popularity in India and a growing desire to challenge traditional ideas about gender in the country. Never heard of BTS? Then this video should show what the fuss is all about.
  5. Algorithm-based fashion? Yes, it’s a real thing. Considering the hours we’ve spent zooming in on photos and referencing the size guides when clothes shopping online, it’s not hard to see the potential in a more streamlined and personalised alternative. Upstart e-commerce Stitch Fix delivers customers monthly clothing boxes to match their taste and fashion needs in exchange for their data and a lengthy list of personal style preferences. Already signed up to fruit & veg, meat and special diet meal boxes, we clearly have a weakness for subscription services. What’s your experience of these modern mail order clubs? Share your thoughts on our TwitterFacebook or LinkedIn pages.

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