Marketing Happy Hour - The Inside Scoop on Influencer Marketing | Tristen Dewar of Amazon Fashion

Starting point is 00:00:00 you're listening to the marketing happy hour podcast where we discuss career and industry insights with our peers in marketing we're here to talk about it all like the ups and downs of working in social media how to build authentic relationships in the influencer and pr space managing a nine-to-five and a side hustle at the same time, how to be productive in your life and career without losing your sanity, and more. Ultimately, we're here to build a community with you because we're all trying to navigate the world of marketing together. Are you ready? Grab your favorite drink and join your hosts, Cassie and Erica, for this week's episode. I'm very, very excited for today's

Starting point is 00:00:54 episode because we have Tristan Dewar on the show from one of my favorite online brands, Amazon Fashion. Tristan sits down with Erica to share her career journey and insights learned from her current role as influencer marketing manager. Insights from Tristan sits down with Erica to share her career journey and insights learned from her current role as influencer marketing manager. Insights from Tristan include what makes a successful influencer campaign, tips for utilizing Snapchat and YouTube Shorts in your collaborations, plus predictions for the future of social media and influencer marketing. So you know the drill, grab your favorite drink and let's dive in to this week's episode with Tristan. Hey, Tristan, how are you? Hi, Erica. I'm good. How are you? I'm doing so

Starting point is 00:01:36 well and I'm so excited to be speaking with you today. But before we get started, I do have an important question for you that we ask all of our guests. And that is what is in your glass this morning? Definitely tea. I'm a tea girl all the way. I'm not a fan of coffee. Oh my goodness. Yeah. So I'm, I love green tea, chai, anything like that. Oh my gosh. That's so funny. I am like a huge fan of coffee and everyone who listens to the podcast probably knows that. So they're like, oh my gosh, it's a shock that someone's not, but that's totally okay. I've got my coffee here. And then I also have the Barbie swoon collab that they did, which as of this recording, I still haven't seen the Barbie movie. I know it's probably, you know, everybody yeah, I will. I just haven't made it to the theater yet, but

Starting point is 00:02:25 I will be there soon. But super excited, like I said, to chat with you today and all the exciting work that you do with Amazon Fashion. But first, could you just kind of give us a peek into your background in social, how you kind of found yourself in your current role? Yeah, so rewind back to 2020, mid-pandemic. Prior to actually the pandemic, I decided to go back to school. So originally when I went to undergrad, I thought I wanted to be a journalist. So for many years, I was like, yeah, journalism all the way. And to be honest, I didn't love just sitting down at a desk and just typing out articles all day. I needed something a little bit more like creative. And I decided to go back to school. So I went to LIM and I got my master's in fashion marketing there. And then around the pandemic time, I just remember kind of, I was interning with

Starting point is 00:03:39 Carolina Herrera at the time, which I absolutely loved that internship. And I just remember losing that internship and just being very confused and like not sure where I was going to go from there. There weren't there weren't a lot of opportunities at the time because obviously it was during the pandemic. So yeah, I just remember feeling a little lost, but I also knew what I wanted to do. So I applied like crazy and I got a freelance position with Health Magazine. I ended up running their YouTube for about six months and that was my first foray into social and then well after Carolina Herrera and then after that I got a position with Refinery29. So I was leading their Instagram for about nine-ish months. And then after I landed here at Amazon, and currently I pretty much run our creator campaigns and definitely support on the social strategy side, but I'm in the influencer world. I really enjoy it. I love it. And yeah, that's what I'm currently doing. And yeah. I love that. That's so fun to hear. And what a fun background,

Starting point is 00:05:15 you know, Refinery29, what a dream, you know, position to hold. And now where you are with Amazon Fashion, super exciting to hear. As we're recording this, it is Fashion Week. So I'm curious if you're there. Are you at Fashion Week right now? Oh, sadly, no. We're not doing any activations for New York Fashion Week. Last year, we had a little event in coordination with The Drop, which is, I don't know if you've heard of it, but it's just like, yeah, a subsidiary of Amazon fashion. And we did have a little activation last year that I went to, but yeah, sadly nothing this year. Oh, that's all right. Maybe in the spring, who knows? Well, I'm curious to hear about kind of your day-to-day working in the influencer space with Amazon fashion. I know Amazon is such a huge company, so I'm sure Amazon fashion is just like a

Starting point is 00:06:12 facet of that or like a section of that. Just drawing on your experience from your past campaigns that you've worked on, what does it kind of look like to be in your role and like move how you move in the creator space? It's definitely a lot of moving parts because you have to have legal involved. You have to have finance involved. You have to make sure you know what it is that you're supporting. And usually we put together kind of like, what is our goal for this particular campaign? I can speak to a little bit of a past campaign that I did, which isn't our usual, it's not my usual day to day, but I thought this campaign, looking back, it was so stressful. I did not like this at all but looking back now I'm like wow that campaign was actually really cool um and I wish we could do something

Starting point is 00:07:13 like that again but I'm not sure but it was with making the cut um the tv show that's on prime video yeah and we contracted I think about 15 or so influencers globally to create content around the winning looks per episode and I just remember being so stressed because I had to get on a call with these influencers and some of them were based in like Italy oh my goodness yeah just random places around the world and I had to get on a call with them so they can make their selects um because it was very confidential the winning looks we didn't really we couldn't like I couldn't send that through email right um I remember just being up some days at like 7 a.m calling these creators yeah oh my gosh um so that was a really really interesting campaign um and yeah looking back very cool um that the creators got to keep the winning looks um but also just showcase, you know, our partnership with this show. But yeah,

Starting point is 00:08:29 it was definitely stressful. I also had to ship because I, Amazon, I don't know what the deal was, but we couldn't ship, we couldn't ship the looks outside. So normally I would just order the looks and then ship them directly to the creator wherever they are but for some reason we couldn't ship to Europe so I had to ship them to the office and then uh and then ship them out to the creator and that is that just reminded me of what I used to do with Carolina Herrera which was these creators would loan the looks and then I would do just as the intern I would have to manually pack them up and get them to the career or whoever was taking it to the creator but yeah looking back it was a very cool campaign but very

Starting point is 00:09:22 stressful at the same time oh my gosh gosh. I am sure. And it's funny because I feel like everybody in social or influencer experiences this at least once in their early career where they're, they're the ones packing and they're the ones trying to figure out what needs to be done to get this product or service or whatever to the influencers. So that's super interesting to hear. I'm curious a little bit about, you know, with these campaigns, what is your role beyond talking to the influencers beyond, you know, sending them the product, you know, you have to vet these influencers, I'm sure you have to kind of curate what you want the campaign to look like. So what does that kind of look like, just in a general sense, not necessarily on a specific campaign, like just

Starting point is 00:10:07 trying to get, you know, any advice for someone maybe working at a brand that might not have experience leading these campaigns. Just very interested to hear. Yeah, I think definitely number one is diversity. We definitely want to make sure that we across the board are looking at like who are the creators that of course create phenomenal content but that also don't necessarily get the the face time don't normally get the opportunities um so definitely looking at that first. And then of course, looking at creators that truly love the brand. I think pretty much any brand would say that they're looking for creators

Starting point is 00:10:58 that create this content without being paid. They would normally create this content and they have a love for the brand that really shines through in their, in their content. Um, so definitely those two, uh, for sure. And then of course we have goals to meet. We have sales to drive. We have impressions, goals that we want to meet. So definitely looking at the KPIs that we are going to focus on for the campaign and how we're going to drive them. But yeah, I would say those three things are the things that we look at first. Sure. And that's what you're working on. The majority of your time is spent like trying to figure those things out. So interesting. I am curious to hear what kind of KPIs you do normally look for, you know, is it that sales driven campaign that you're

Starting point is 00:11:59 really going for? Or is there another like brand awareness element or anything like that or does it kind of differ campaign to campaign yeah I can definitely differ um but more on the creator end it's very focused on brand awareness um we really are just looking to build our audience because I don't know that many younger people know about Amazon and the fact that we sell fashion on there. So it's definitely more on the creator side. It's definitely more about brand awareness and just focusing on getting more eyeballs on the content. That's awesome. Let's chat a little bit though. I want to switch gears and talk about more of the social aspect of things and things that you've worked on in the past. We'd love to talk about Snapchat. I saw on your intake form, you kind of noted that you touch on that a little bit. We haven't really

Starting point is 00:12:54 talked about it that much on Marketing Happy Hour. So I'm excited to hear what do you find kind of works well on that platform Snapchat? Yeah. Well, first of all, everyone go follow Amazon Fashion on Snapchat. We do have a Snapchat that we post. Sometimes it's repurposed influencer videos. Sometimes it's takeover. Sometimes we have a specific campaign that is live on there so definitely go check us out um but I find that overall snapchat is obviously very um it's it's kind of a platform where you feel like you are closer with that brand or that person whoever you're following on there um it's definitely not like Instagram where it's very polished and perfect it's definitely creators that perform well on Snapchat are usually more personable charismatic relatable um so I definitely find that overall takeovers do really well um I actually took over the snapchat

Starting point is 00:14:07 handle recently um we usually have creator events so sometimes I'll do like a behind the scenes type takeover and I'll just be like hey I'm Tristan I work for Amazon and I'm going to take you like behind the scenes so I find that um definitely having like a sneak peek into something it could be like a collection or an event um and just having either like the people that work for the brand take over the handle or finding good creators who love Snapchat and have a good audience on there works well. I also find that using a lot of their features, so like their stickers, their text on screen tends to boost you in the algorithm. And of course, utilizing Spotlight, which is different from Snapchat stories. It's almost like they're kind of, I would think of it like the For You page on TikTok. Definitely just very video-driven content. So yeah, definitely Snap is more, you can play around with it,

Starting point is 00:15:29 like have fun with it. It's not an uptight platform at all. Definitely try and connect with your audience, just having fun and kind of being relatable and showing what your brand is all about. No, that's so cool. And it kind of follows like what a lot of brands do on maybe their Instagram stories. They kind of post that kind of content too, but they can bring it over to Snapchat and reach a whole new audience. Do you typically see that it's like younger people on Snapchat still? I mean, the last time I was on Snapchatchat was probably in college so I don't even remember okay same same yeah I I don't really use my snapchat anymore I was using it for a little while um yeah back in like my college days but now I'm finding it's younger, I would say Gen Z and of course, younger than Gen Z, like Gen Alpha, which is so crazy to know that there's a whole other generation younger than Gen Z.

Starting point is 00:16:35 But yeah, I find that it skews much younger. Okay. And that's interesting to be like kind of marketing to them. And then they are probably telling their parents, I want this from Amazon. I love that. When you're a brand on Snapchat, you're so like I said, I haven't been on it in a while. Where does your content show up? So people have to follow you and then it shows up when they're looking at like Snapchat stories or does it go to like their inbox where they get all their snaps from their friends?

Starting point is 00:17:05 So we have a profile. So if you were to search Amazon fashion on Snapchat right now, you would see a bunch of our videos. I'm not sure if stories are saved on there, but I know our spotlight videos are saved. Okay. So you would see a bunch of those videos. And then you would see our stories, obviously, just like any other person's story. I think it lasts for around 24 hours. Yeah, so it's just like you, if you were to follow like your friend um it's very similar yeah oh interesting okay so it's kind of like I'm equating it to like if you go to someone's obviously this isn't the same but if you go to someone's TikTok page and then TikTok also now has stories I don't know it's a combination of like Instagram stories and a TikTok yeah it's very confusing it's very

Starting point is 00:18:01 because they all copy one another so yeah yeah they Yeah. They're, they're all trying to keep up. I don't even know what's going on, but okay. That's interesting. It's so cool to hear someone that's like actually working in the platform and like has a strategy there because I feel like a lot of brands don't, um, other than like the brands that we see, like American Eagle probably does. I'm just pulling this out of my brain. Like, I don't know, some other ones that are like American Eagle because they're always trying to reach that younger generation, but super interesting. Another one that I'm curious about too, YouTube shorts. Do you have a separate strategy for that short form video platform or is it like similar to your TikTok strategy? And what does that kind

Starting point is 00:18:41 of look like for you guys? Yeah, YouTube Shorts is definitely our newer platform. And yeah, we just, if you go search Amazon Fashion on YouTube, you'll see probably a bunch of old, older long form videos, but you'll see that we've been starting to post more on Shorts, kind of utilizing the content from our creator program. And yeah, Shorts is an interesting one. I personally, I'm not one to scroll on Shorts. I'm more of a TikTok girl, but I, so I'm really kind of learning more and more about shorts and how we can build our audience there I prior like I mentioned I was a YouTube channel manager and shorts had just come out when I was working on that job and I remember just focusing very heavily. We were very focused on our long form content at Health Magazine because it can uh it's kind of like a tease

Starting point is 00:20:08 a sneak peek um it kind of brings your audience back to the platform at a certain day and time um and they become really excited for for the longer form video um so I I found that that worked really well when I was working at Health Magazine. I know that keywords are very essential. SEO is big on YouTube. And so keyword research was a big part of my job back then too. So I'm still learning about what that means for Amazon. And we're definitely testing and learning and trying different iterations of the strategy. And yeah, I would say if you're looking at our profile right now, you wouldn't

Starting point is 00:20:56 see any like cool new longer form content. So that is definitely something that I'm interested in. And I know like as a team, we're very interested in that. But yeah, it's a really interesting platform because it's different. It's similar, but it's different. Yeah. Oh my God. Are you seeing a lot of influencers like kind of pitch that they can do YouTube shorts yet or not necessarily? Not really. And like, I haven't even really got into that side of it yet.

Starting point is 00:21:35 With these creators, we're very much focused on like Instagram and TikTok. Okay. But it's definitely something we could be thinking about for the future um yeah because I'd love to know how we could integrate creators into um not just shorts content but also longer form content and what that means for the brand and how we could build there. You know, and I look to Vogue and definitely those, like, legacy editorial brands that have done so well on YouTube. Vogue has, like, beauty secrets.

Starting point is 00:22:21 Yeah, the questions videos. Yeah, exactly. So it would be really cool to do something like that on YouTube, but we'll see. Yeah. Oh, that's exciting. That's it's so fun to like have a place that you can kind of explore and try different things too. I think that's so valuable, especially if you're just stuck in your day-to-day loop of like okay Instagram okay TikTok okay which TikTok used to be this place to play around on but now I feel like people actually have like dedicated strategy for it but it's interesting to like see that and then also with like the addition of what was it threads recently where yeah where people were like oh this is the next big thing and it's kind of like

Starting point is 00:23:00 not so far yeah um it's just, especially because people can get like so bogged down and just like trying to keep up with everything that's going on. So super fun to like stay creative and things like that with platforms like that. I'm curious to hear from you just in your experience working with creators. We have a couple creators that are listeners of our podcast that we know of anyway. And if we don't know of you and your creator, hello out there. But what makes a good creator campaign? Like what can people be doing if they are reaching out to brands to want to work with them to kind of lighten the load and be more of a great influencer for that brand?

Starting point is 00:23:43 Yeah, I would say definitely create the content on your own. I think, like I said before, brands really look for creators that are already making that content that are really passionate about it shows that you're really passionate about the brand, it shows that you're really interested in the brand and you really like the clothes or like whatever the brand offers. It also shows that your audience is really interested in that brand. So yeah, I would say definitely start creating the content too much about the numbers the numbers will come I think we brands really look for like consistency um and you know kind of that discipline that it takes to to be a successful creator um And creativity is definitely key.

Starting point is 00:24:47 I love finding creators that have kind of an out of the box way of creating content and that have a voice and something to say and try and find what makes you different and what makes you unique and what you truly love to do. And it'll shine through in your content. Absolutely. Everybody has a voice and everyone has their own unique story to tell. And even if you think people are out there doing the same

Starting point is 00:25:16 thing already and you're like, oh, it's so saturated, I can't make it, whatever. Like I always say, just go for it. Just keep doing everything you know you'll you know succeed in the ways that is meant to be so I love okay so moving on really quickly do you have any predictions for like the future of creator marketing or social or anything like that what kind of trends are you currently seeing with that? It's really hard to say because it's just the creator economy and social is changing every single day. But I would definitely say UGC is a huge part of all brands social strategy um so and that's user generated content um so I definitely think that's gonna be the way of um the world in years for years to come um I definitely also feel like ads looking and feeling less like an ad because I don't

Starting point is 00:26:27 know about you, but when I see ads on TikTok, for example, I just swipe as soon as I can tell it's an ad, I swipe up. But then I'm like, wait, let me actually see, like, why did I not want to like interact with that? Because like as a marketer, I want somebody doing that to my ad so um but I love when ads don't look and feel like an ad um there's this there's this weird um TikTok account that I follow and it's like I don't know if you I don't know what they're called, but they're like the little animal dolls and they, it's really, they're like little animal, like, I don't know what the word is, but.

Starting point is 00:27:16 Are they like, okay, this is, might be weird, might be showing what my TikTok shows me, but are they like mice? Are they like mouse? They're different animals. So some of them are like mice are they like mouse they're different animals so some of them are like there's like an elephant it's like all different animals okay and they it's a really really funny I need to find it and send it to you please do oh my gosh a really funny account and they do it's a really it's kind of stupid like the arguments and stuff but it's so like outrageous that it's hilarious because it's like little animal dolls oh my god I think it's

Starting point is 00:27:53 called Sylvan Sylvan I forgot but long story short I was gonna say they did a partnership or an ad with ASOS. And I watched that thing from beginning to end because I was so fascinated at how they integrated ASOS, a clothing company, into who they are as creators. And I found it so fascinating because nothing changed about the content it was only now that they mentioned ASOS kind of a little bit and I think even the little clothes that they were wearing might have been ASOS maybe made them those clothes I'm not sure but don't quote me on that but um I just it was so compelling because nothing was different about the content that's where I think the the creator economy is going is like we're gonna see more and more creators really focusing on trying to make their content not seem like an ad even though they're selling you something.

Starting point is 00:29:06 Yeah. That's super interesting too, because of just like how the influencer industry is and like how they're trying to still trying to figure out regulations around it and things like that. Like, how is that going to affect that? Like the legal side of things gets me just so confused, but like so hyped up because I'm like, oh my gosh, there's just so much to come there. And like, you know, the, the IP laws and things like that, like super interesting because I've seen that a lot too. Like you're, you're mentioning with the

Starting point is 00:29:35 little doll or the little animal figurines, which I think is the same thing that I'm thinking of. We'll have to offline about that, but with like ASMR, do you know what that is? I don't really know what it stands for, but they like whisper into the microphone. And then like, I've seen them use like the same lip mask every day or whatever it is. And like, they're just naturally integrating these things into their content and it doesn't feel like an ad. We had someone on the show a couple, I think it was probably a couple of months back now who did like paid media, paid marketing, things like that really worked on a lot of ads, especially for TikTok. And he said that, that same exact thing,

Starting point is 00:30:17 like they're just trying to figure out ways that things can appear more natural. Cause like, same as you, I'm scrolling and I'm like I don't want to see this like weird song they made up like some agency somewhere worked really hard to make up this song that like incorporates whatever brand it is I'm like I don't want to see that whatever um but and I was saying this in the episode with him um there was a deodorant company on Tik TOK too, that utilize their employees for their ads. And they, they had like a competition with the employees to see which person's bundle would like get purchased the most or whatever. And it was clearly an ad, but it was like a very different way of like doing an ad and you like wanted to support this person and whatever.

Starting point is 00:31:03 So yeah, super interesting to see you say that as well as like something that you think is going to be the new norm. For sure. And definitely I feel like we're going to see more creators becoming more involved in just like the creative processes of these brands because we're seeing definitely ambassadorships and long-term partnerships and creators becoming creative directors and contributors so I definitely think that that's going to be happening more and more and more. I also saw one creator mention that they feel like social is going in a direction of where we're going to start using like our Instagram, for example, as identification, which I thought that was really interesting.

Starting point is 00:31:59 Yeah. Wow. And I could definitely see that happening. Especially in the world of how they were talking about, which I haven't really heard a lot about since, you know, like last year or something, but how they were talking about like NFTs and like the digital wallets and things like that serving as identification and like proof that, you know, I guess you would have like proof that you went to whatever college or proof that you like worked at whatever job or whatever. So you couldn't like lie on your resume or whatever, something that I heard about. Super interesting though, that they think that social will be used in that way too. All right, Tristan, we are approaching the end of the interview here, which I feel like we could talk all day about fun little figurines and them being in TikTok ads. But let's just talk a little bit about things that you

Starting point is 00:32:49 kind of wish you knew earlier on in your career. This is something that we kind of ask every episode and just like to hear different perspectives on, you know, where you are now and what you kind of wish that you knew a little earlier on? I would say I just wish I knew that everything was going to work out and not to worry so much and stress so much about the future. I'm at that point in my career where I've had quite a bit of experience, but I'm also not where I want to be. So I'm learning now that I'm not worried. I'm in a good spot. I'm not going to panic or stress about moving up in the corporate ladder as long as I'm

Starting point is 00:33:39 doing what I love and I enjoy it and I'm able to wake up every day and say that I did the best that I could and I enjoyed my day then that's good enough for me oh my gosh totally and it's such like a shared sentiment that you say that because that's what a lot of people say when they answer that question is like it's going to work out the way it's supposed to don't be discouraged, like keep moving forward. And we've heard that a lot too. Even we've had a couple of people on the, on the show that have been either laid off or, you know, going through a time of change in their career and they sometimes can feel super lost, but that like hope that, you know, it's going to work out the way it's supposed to is very great to hold on to. I feel like a lot of people learn that too late, like you're saying. So very good that you've

Starting point is 00:34:32 learned that. Well, where can everybody follow you follow along with what's going on with Amazon fashion? What kind of social platforms are you on and how can we keep up with you? So for me, you can find me at Tristan, T-R-I-S-T-E-N, Zaryn, Z-A-R-Y-N. And definitely follow along with us on Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, and YouTube at Amazon Fashion. And I definitely just want to shout out the, the ladies that I work with are some of the coolest people. So shout out to Avery, Deanna, Malika, and my boss, Samantha, you know, doing what I do would not be possible without them. So definitely shout out to them. And yeah, go follow us. Oh my gosh. So fun. Shout out to them. I hope they listen to this and love it. But we'll link everything out in the show notes so people know where to go,

Starting point is 00:35:30 where to follow you. But thank you so much again for joining me. This has been awesome. Thank you so much for having me. This was a blast. Thanks for listening to this week's episode. We hoped you loved it as much as we did if you enjoyed the conversation we'd love to get your feedback on the episode head to the review section of your favorite podcast app and let us know what you thought thanks for listening and we'll see you next week We are so excited to share that our first ever free marketing happy hour digital resource is now available. Download the dream career game plan today at marketinghappyhr.com forward slash freebie. That's marketinghappyhr.com forward slash freebie. This five-step workbook

Starting point is 00:36:27 will guide you through defining your goals, building your network, diversifying your skills, influencing where you're at, and investing in your growth. Cassie and I created this resource with marketing careers in mind, but the framework can be applied to any industry. Our hope is that this workbook will help you truly elevate your career, whether you're in the market for a new position or just looking to make your mark in your current organization. No matter where this resource finds you, we are cheering you on every step of the way. So go check it out at marketinghappyhr.com forward slash freebie to download and make your career dreams come true.

Marketing Happy Hour - The Inside Scoop on Influencer Marketing | Tristen Dewar of Amazon Fashion

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