Designers and celebrities score big on Instagram from royal wedding

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
May 24, 2018

Saturday’s royal wedding turned into a social media celebration for British designer names with new analysis from InfluencerDB showing just how much media coverage was generated by Clare Waight Keller, Stella McCartney, Kim Jones and more last weekend.

And it wasn't only designers who benefited as a number of celebrities also saw their ‘brand values’ being enhanced on the back of their appearances as the looks they wore at the wedding went down well with the huge global audience on Instagram.

But the biggest winner wasn't actually British, with France’s Givenchy revelling in a surge of posts as Meghan Markle walked down the aisle in the most photographed wedding dress globally since the last royal wedding in 2011.

InfluencerDB said that Givenchy generated $2.9 million worth of earned media coverage (i.e. how much it would cost to generate that level of coverage if brands advertised on Instagram). The label was mentioned more than 3,000 times and generated over 12 million likes.

And the label’s artistic director, Clare Waight Keller, also scored highly with $1.7 million in earned media value. She was mentioned over 800 times and got almost nine million likes.

Interestingly though, Stella McCartney – who created dresses for a number of wedding guests and also for the new Duchess of Sussex at the evening reception – beat Waight Keller. She earned $2 million in social media coverage, was mentioned 1,840 times and generated more than 9.6 million likes as Amal Clooney’s yellow McCartney dress and the blush pink dress worn by Oprah Winfrey received a general thumbs-up.

The data is based on posts from Instagram accounts with over 15,000 followers that mentioned the event in hashtags or captions between 08:00 on Saturday and 11:00 on Monday. Influencer DB pooled these mentions (around 84,000 of them). The overall media value is based on the number of followers of the accounts that made the mention. 

MENSWEAR AND CELEBRITIES

Back with the results of all this, while the menswear looks on show may not have received as much attention as the womenswear, new BFC Global ambassador David Beckham certainly racked up views and that meant British designer Kim Jones and the label he fronts, Dior Homme, also benefited. Dior generated more than $444,000 in earned media value, getting 340 mentions and over 1.7 million likes. Meanwhile Jones himself earned nearly $540,000 in media value, was mentioned 87 times and generated over 2.7 million likes.

Alexander McQueen, who was worn by the Duchess of Cambridge (the former Kate Middleton), gathered 1.757 million likes with 204 mentions and $271,000+ in earned media value.

On a day when hats were very much in focus, luxury milliner Philip Treacy was also one of the big winners. His hats for Oprah Winfrey, Kitty Spencer and the Duchess of Cornwall generated more than $507,000 in earned media value, with over 5.1 million likes and 148 mentions.

Other labels to score highly were Vivienne Westwood, Aquazzura (which provided Meghan's shoes), Jimmy Choo and cake-maker Violet Cakes London. Priyanka Chopra’s stylist Mimi Cuttrell was also a big name on Instagram when it came to fashion ‘brands’.

And as that fact, plus the big score for the label that dressed David Beckham shows, celebrities were very much the focus of the Instagram chatter during and after the wedding. David Beckham scored the highest with more than 9 million likes and $2.2 million in value. His wife Victoria was in second place, earning more than $1.5 million with over 5.5 million likes. 

Priyanka Chopra was next with a value of $1.226 million, but in fourth place was Sheku Kanneh Mason, the impressive young cellist who wowed those watching him in St George’s Chapel and on TV around the world. With over 700,000 mentions, his earned media value was more than $952,000.

Other social media hits from the event were Oprah Winfrey, who rounded out the top five, just ahead of Serena Williams, Idris Elba, Kitty Spencer, Williams’ husband Alexis Ohanian, Elba’s fiancée Sabrina Dhowre, Sarah Rafferty, Abigail Spencer, and Lewis Hamilton. But Amal Clooney wasn't in the list of top mentions.

The celebrity presence overshadowed the line-up of royals, politicians and other well-connected people who are the usual focus at royal events and was further proof that this particular event really was a royal wedding game-changer.