Valentine’s Day in Social Media

Valentine’s day is upon us. Cards, chocolates, fresh roses, fancy dinners, even diamonds — showing how much you love someone translates into big bucks for businesses. Last year, the report issued by the National Retail Federation forecast a total spending of over $18 billion, or $130 per person on average for Valentine’s day in the US.

The “holiday” celebrated on February 14 is the first major opportunity of the calendar year for many retailers. As a matter of fact, as soon as the Christmas decorations get taken down, store windows are adorned with pink hearts and cupid cutouts, and special aisles are stocked with Valentine’s day must-gives. In social media, Valentine’s day starts being on people’s minds a little later, and takes a few weeks to really become a topic of conversation throughout the social web. The following graph (trend over eCairn’s database of 850 influencers located in 17 countries) shows that talk around Valentine’s day really picks up speed in the first days of February (with around 15,000 conversations in the first week of the month). This week, our database recorded more than 30,000 conversations mentioning the holiday.

The transversal view of our database provided by the eCairn Tribes Insider draws a less commercial picture of what happened in social media in the weeks leading up to Valentine’s day.

As expected, dads discuss Valentine’s day plans more than any other tribe in proportion (150 conversations for every 1000 conversations published over the past 6 months). The event management and dating tribes also show strong numbers. More interesting are the numbers for crafts and children related tribes: all craft tribes combined published more than twice as many conversations about Valentine’s day per 1000 than the dads’ tribe. In short, for the influencers the most vocal about the celebration of love, Valentine’s day is about showing how you care in a unique way, without necessarily breaking the bank — and what is more unique than a home-made gift?

Is the strong emphasis on crafts and DIY Valentine’s gifts in social media going against the interest of retailers? Not if they manage to engage these customers in a way that caters to their needs and is in line with their philosophy.

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