Michael Kors doubles active users with Facebook Messenger tie-in

Brief:

Michael Kors saw a 105% week-over-week increase in active users with a campaign on Facebook's Messenger chat app to introduce its line of Wonderlust fragrances. The campaign, which ran July 9-23, let users enter a sweepstakes for a chance to meet designer Michael Kors and model Gigi Hadid at Rockefeller Center in New York City, per information shared with Mobile Marketer.
Messenger users who follow Michael Kors in the app were given a chance to enter the sweepstakes by sharing information about the fragrance with their contacts. Winners were given a special code to enter a VIP line to have their bottle of Wonderlust signed by Kors and Hadid.
Michael Kors also let followers learn more about the campaign in behind-the-scenes videos and shop for their favorite fragrances, per Facebook.

Insight:

Michael Kors boosted engagement with its Messenger campaign that offered the opportunity to meet the designer and Gigi Hadid, although the sweepstakes was most accessible to people in the New York metropolitan area. Facebook said a winner flew herself from Las Vegas to New York to meet the model.

The campaign highlights how the fashion brand is using Messenger for more direct conversations with customers. Followers of Michael Kors can use chat interactions to get notifications from the brand, claim free samples of Wonderlust, make direct purchases from the brand's website, find a nearby store, see new products, find a referral to a travel destination and sign up for the KORSVIP loyalty program, which also has a separate app to download for loyal fans.

The Michael Kors campaign also illustrates how Messenger is evolving to resemble WeChat, China's most popular messaging app with more than 1.1 billion users. WeChat not only provides basic messaging, but also serves as a lifestyle hub by hosting "mini programs" for shopping, payments, travel booking, ride-hailing and gaming. Those features add greater versatility to Android-based smartphones sold in China.

Facebook in its last quarterly conference call said it was rewriting Messenger from scratch to improve its speed and security amid the social network's broader promise to emphasize consumer privacy. Its plans to make Messenger more central to consumers' social interactions included features to bring together Stories, or temporary posts, from other apps into one place and to add video co-watching features, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said during the call.