At Glamour, I am the Community Manager/Social Media Editor. My job includes spreading the word of the publication’s awesomeness, engaging its audience on multiple platforms (3 Twitter accounts, Facebook, Foursquare, Tumblr, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+) on a daily basis, maintaining profiles on said platforms, responding to inquiries, focusing on strategy for future online-based projects including brand collaborations, and basically being its e-voice. Overall, my goal is to give the magazine a personality that extends beyond its pages. Social media never sleeps and neither does the fashion industry—or so it seems, so why should Glamour?During my tenure at Glamour (a mere 7 months), I have more than doubled our unique social media referrals on all platforms. Why? I attribute it to my unique personality, which translates into Glamour’s online voice—a snappy, sassy, and honest point-of-view that really speaks to our readers. Coming from an email marketing background, I gained insight regarding what consumers want and hoped to translate that into successful e-based programs for the magazine. What I wanted to do was give our followers exclusive content and reward them for supporting Glamour in some way or another, big or small. Such “rewards" included a massive Black Friday deal guide (Like-gated on our Facebook page) unseen anywhere else on the Internet, live-tweeting sessions with TV celebrities on the premiere of their shows giving behind-the-scenes insight, a #wkndmani Twitter contest imploring followers to show us their manicures and enter to win nail polish, 30-to-60 minute Facebook chats with readers’ favorite celebrities, and more. The main challenge I faced was dealing with brands that did not understand the purpose or goal of a social media program. This was dealt with by throwing out a few positive statistics proving worth. Another hurdle was the lack of budget; learned very quickly that social media is a grassroots industry and, thankfully, it doesn’t require much monetary support. Aside from receiving constant positive feedback from followers, the results of my efforts are the sheer numbers: in one instance, at Glamour’s Women of the Year awards, hashtag usage increased ten-fold within 24 hours. Through cross-promotion, brands report at least a doubling of engagement on their pages when compared with the previous week. Most importantly, our readers keep coming back to us as a source of entertainment on the Web. That’s all I want.
