BOSTON — GRIN VP of Marketing Ali Fazal and Rainbow Shops’ Shayna Macklin took center stage at eTail East 2022 in Boston to discuss the value of influencer marketing for today’s leading retail brands.
For Macklin, one of the biggest points of emphasis in her influencer marketing efforts is bridging the gap between Rainbow Shops’ offline and online customers.
“Our offline audience is completely different from our online audience,” Macklin said. “And our ecommerce is vague, but we’re doing influencer marketing to expand on that.”
Since implementing an influencer marketing strategy, Macklin has noticed the conversation about Rainbow shops picking up steam online. Whether it’s organic mentions from creators or Rainbow try-on hauls, influencer marketing has done wonders for cultivating valuable user-generated content for the brand.
The key, she said, is encouraging users to become a part of the brand journey.
“That’s something you always need to keep in mind with any marketing strategy. And for us, it’s connecting those two pieces (offline and online customers) and speaking to them where they’re at and in a language they understand.”
-Shayna Macklin, Director, Strategy & Influencer Marketing at Rainbow Shops
For Rainbow Shops, that conversation begins with influencers who truly love the brand and its products. And as Fazal pointed out, those influencers can be anyone from a well-known celebrity to your friend down the street.
“And you have to listen to what those influencers are saying and chatting about online. They are always going to tell you who they are and what they like.”
-Shayna Macklin, Director, Strategy & Influencer Marketing at Rainbow Shops
Because influencers come in so many shapes and sizes, the secret is finding the right creator mix. The next step is building out your program.
“When you’re doing influencer marketing, the goal is to always do it at scale,” Macklin said. “Because if you’re not doing it at scale, you honestly shouldn’t even be doing it.”
Macklin and Rainbow Shops use GRIN to help streamline that process.
Within a week of starting the influencer marketing program, Macklin used GRIN to send more than 900 outreach emails to creator prospects. She now works with nearly 75 creators per month on multiple campaigns.
“Without GRIN, there is no way my team and I could have done that,” she said.
GRIN also helps Rainbow Shops stay organized and track performance, so Macklin knows exactly what’s working and what isn’t.
“GRIN is so instrumental in just tracking everything and keeping everything organized. These are things that we absolutely cannot do without GRIN.”
-Shayna Macklin, Director, Strategy & Influencer Marketing at Rainbow Shops
GRIN is the pioneer behind the world’s first Creator Management platform built to support every brand’s journey to connecting with consumers through authentic creator relationships. Thousands of the world’s fastest-growing brands—including SKIMS, Warby Parker, Allbirds, Mejuri, and MVMT—use GRIN to make creators feel like trusted, empowered partners and work with them to build their brands into household names.
Visit grin.co for additional resources and more information on the world’s leading Creator Management platform.
Rainbow Shops is a fashion retailer with over 1,000 locations in the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and online at RainbowShops.com. The size-inclusive brand offers trendy and affordable clothing, shoes, and accessories for women, juniors, and kids.
The eTail East ecommerce and omnichannel conference is designed to help marketers increase profits in today’s consumer landscape. The event features action-packed stories, disruptive strategies, strategic conversations, and connections with top minds at America’s most successful retailers.
Visit the eTail homepage for information on how you can be part of next year’s conference.
