Recently, the Business of Fashion (BoF) published an AI brand report created together with QuiltAI. Back in 2007, as BoF took its initial steps, it was a time when the iPhone debuted, and social media was on the brink of transforming our global landscape. Since then, BoF has been exploring trends and cultural shifts that go far beyond the garments we wear.
"Marketing budgets are expanding, yet our tools for measurement lag behind: Fashion brands are investing more in digital marketing, but the tools at their disposal struggle to gauge the depth of the resulting social discussions." Similarly, cities allocate resources to rebranding and revitalization projects without a clear understanding of what their efforts truly convey.
"Customers wield greater influence in shaping brand narratives: Once upon a time, brands dictated their stories. Today, brands engage in multidirectional dialogues often instigated by customers across various social platforms." Cities find themselves subject to discourse and scrutiny, but are they truly attuned to the public's voice? And can they effectively quantify these concerns?
With this era comes an abundance of data to decipher what customers are expressing about fashion brands. Yet, most available data still fixates on conversation volume—reach, impressions, engagements—over conversation quality.
BoF Insights and Quilt.AI co-created The BoF Brand Magic Index as a novel, quantifiable and trackable metric to evaluate a brand's marketing endeavours by measuring the alignment between brands and their customers. This Index harnesses the power of Quilt.AI's AI models, trained on countless cultural expressions, to assess the content shared by brands and their customers on social media.
The process was as follows: firstly, analysing the values and ideals a brand conveys in its own content, drawing from Carl Jung's 12 archetypes. Then, evaluate whether customers express the same archetypes when discussing a brand. Ultimately, Brand Magic serves as an AI instrument to determine whether customers perceive a brand in harmony with the brand's self-image.
So what can cities learn from fashion?
With vast budgets, efforts and construction materials being poured onto urban rebranding, urban regeneration, and redevelopment, cities can harness the public discourse to understand, evaluate and quantify what is being said about them, how they are viewed in the eyes of their residents, are whether their current efforts are successful, well received and well aligned with the needs of the public. Alternatively, conceptualise which efforts are necessary. As we head into recession, and continue to grapple with the climate crisis, aligned action is needed - to avoid the unnecessary use of building resources, the production of waste, and the construction of unneeded spaces.
For deeper insights into this approach, check out the video recording of my lecture at the ISOCARP and Urban Economy Conference. Video recording coming soon!