We launched the Style Insider blog in 2008. What started as a small online community has now grown into an important part of River Island’s social media conversation. As well as blogging and River Island news and events, over the years the content has evolved to include user generated competitions, Look Books, a TV channel and an international section.

Successful features have included a user generated content device, where the audience can dream up and design their own T-shirt/hats/jeans/shoes. The device allowed for both male and female channels and users could select a combination of pictures, words and colours to express their own ideas for a River Island product. It proved to be an extremely popular tool, with many users creating multiple entries.

Style Insider, which attracts over 200,000 visits a month, also hosts the popular ‘Your Style’ competition, which sees hundreds of entries every month. We created an online gallery for the River Island audience to upload pictures of themselves and the best ‘River Island style’ wins. The votes are based on Facebook ‘Likes’ and a ‘Your Style’ Facebook app has also been built to complement the blog competition. It sits on the River Island Facebook fan page, which has notched up in excess of one million fans.

Style Insider also allows River Island to partner with other brands and bring competitions and prizes to their audience. Recent promotions with Grazia and Company magazines were hosted on Style Insider, which required bespoke ‘Your Style’ competitions and these have proven to be successful case studies for River Island.

Style Insider is an initiative which allows River Island to get up-close and conversational with its audience; to have fun, to inform and to influence the purchase journey.