Lush on Quitting Social Media Platforms
For years now, Lush has been one of the global brands that have been vocal about various political and social topics. From partnering with Allout back in 2015 for the #Gayisok campaign to combating animal cruelty and even donating profits from its sales to keep the internet open, safe, and free for everyone, Lush is no stranger to high-stakes marketing decisions.
The British cosmetics brand’s latest decision was to join the Global Anti-Social Media Policy, where the company took a pledge to stop sharing content across four of the major social media platforms – Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Tiktok.
Instead of social media marketing campaigns, the brand is planning to launch a series of initiatives that include activities such as growing the brand’s presence on YouTube. Lush will also be creating email newsletters to connect with consumers, using Twitter for customer support, and relying on Pinterest for inspirational content.
According to the company’s chief executive, Mark Constantine, the decision came because of the problems that Lush has been seeing with social media regarding users’ safety. In a statement, Constantine stated that he’d spent his life trying to avoid putting any harmful ingredients in the Lush products, and the same would be translated to the brand’s marketing too, which is why the company stopped using the social media platforms.
Additionally, the move from Lush was prompted by various news stories regarding whistleblowers revealing the negative impact of social media algorithms on the mental health of users. Given the fact that the brand’s core demographic is young girls and that the company designs products that look after people’s health, using social media platforms was counter-intuitive.
The campaign itself is being rolled out across 48 countries globally, and Lush joined in on Black Friday. However, Lush has also taken a stance on the negatives of social media platforms before as well, with an announcement back in 2019 that the brand would be taking a break after it grew tired of fighting with the algorithms.
During that break, the company encouraged its audience to engage with the individual social media accounts of its employees, staff members, and stores, as well as the Lush Labs app and its eCommerce website.
Once the pandemic started, the digital team had no options but to return to social media so they could engage with customers. However, with the latest changes in the global pandemic and the world slowly being opened up again, it was once again time for Lush to re-establish its position and stand by its digital ethics.
Although this strategy isn’t going to work for every brand or corporation, as those that don’t have customer loyalty and brand awareness are going to suffer, as long as companies have other ways to reach their audiences, it can be beneficial. That’s because customers are going to see the brand as authentic and exclusive because the company won’t be trying to communicate with everyone.
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For years now, Lush has been one of the global brands that have been vocal about various political and social topics. From partnering with Allout back in 2015 for the #Gayisok campaign to combating animal cruelty and even donating profits from its sales to keep the internet open, safe, and free for everyone, Lush is no stranger to high-stakes marketing decisions. The British cosmetics brand’s latest decision was to join the Global Anti-Social Media Policy, where the company took a pledge to stop sharing content across four of the major social media platforms – Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Tiktok. Instead of social media marketing campaigns, the brand is planning to launch a series of initiatives that include activities such as…