Neiman's 360- degree Campaign for Fall
● Chief marketing officer Daz McColl discusses the imagery and message behind the "Live Your Luxury" campaign.
Neiman Marcus has kicked off its "Live Your Luxury" fall 2022 campaign, an ambitious marketing effort advocating self-expression and inclusivity and incorporating "a 360-degree approach" across selling and media channels.
"Live Your Luxury" depicts designer fashion in different settings — from the elegant interiors of a stately mansion to gritty Manhattan rooftops — suggesting luxury being worn for different purposes, moods and occasions.
The campaign involves everything from store to connective television — window displays; store activations and merchandising; events; digital advertising media; digital content; paid social media; social content; email and print, or as Das McColl, the chief marketing officer of Neiman Marcus, said "an entire ecosystem" of different media and channels. It's a campaign structurally different and more complex than past campaigns "to drive connections and engagements with customers and inspire their choices," McColl said.
"Last year, our campaign was around reintroducing yourself. It was really connected to customer's desire to move past the pandemic, and there was a strong cultural relevance. As things started to normalize, we needed to think how our brand continues to evolve," McColl said. "We did extensive research to not only understand cultural shifts happening within our customer base but also their expectations and motivations as it relates to luxury and fashion. Through those insights, we have taken another step this fall in our brand evolution, which is to have 'Live Your Luxury' as a core creative idea, a strategic and creative expression. We think this really connects with our customers. What we got through the research was a number of key insights, particularly around their definition of luxury, which is way more inclusive than it's ever been. It's also about self expression, and from that we created Live Your Luxury for the fall season in a way that captures the customers' desire for newness, curation and fundamentally delivers our core positioning.
"It is not just about styles or trends and the unspoken expectations that come with them. It's about how you wear a piece or a look, when you wear it, why you wear it and what it means to you," McColl added. "It is about imbuing luxury as a mind-set and a prism within our daily paces and embracing it all."
Coinciding with the elevated fashion imagery, there's irreverence, humor and a musicality that runs through the campaign and its plethora of micro videos, casting luxury as not so stuffy as it sometimes is. "It's a reimagined perspective of luxury, which ultimately means something different and often very personal to the individual," McColl said.
Some 250 to 300 videos, ranging from five to 30 seconds, were produced, and they get phased into the campaign, launched Monday, over time. "We produce some types for TikTok. We might use something different on Instagram, something different on our microsite, and something different on connective TV.
Our customers consume more video than ever before. In terms of social channels and how they drive their algorithms, videos work better inside the social media ecosystem," McColl said.
In certain videos Neiman's style advisers are depicted humorously interacting with diverse customers, thereby telling different stories of what shoppers want. Actors were used. "We have and we continue to use our stylists in our campaigns, but to do something more comical and a bit more joyful it's sometimes more efficient to use an actor," McColl explained.
The campaign's "flagship" fashion story is "The Art of Fashion," which features sonically inspired shots of ready-to-wear from Fendi, Dior, Prada, Chanel and Gucci. In total, 418 brands across women's, men's, children, home and beauty are shown.
The Book features a section called "The List" covering style tips from Neiman's vice president of luxury fashion Jodi Kahn, Neiman's men's fashion director Bruce Pask, and others. Another section called "The Refresh" examines emerging trends in both fashion and beauty. The Book this season also contains interviews with Donatella Versace and Casablanca's Charaf Tajer; a Q&A with David Yurman's Evan Yurman, and interviews with style advisers.
Among the crowd seen on the cover of The Book is Valentina Sampaio, marking the first time a transgender woman has appeared on The Book's exterior.
"To me, this core creative idea of 'Live Your Luxury' is another step in our company's transformation, and we will continue to leverage that core creative idea moving forward, as we continue to get back into a more traditional rhythm of marketing," McColl said.