Men's fashion brand brings Instagram to its TV ad
Menlook, a Paris-based men's lifestyle and e-commerce site, is reversing the usual marketing strategy by launching a television ad featuring photos of its brand shared on Instagram. Instead of following the trend of repurposing TV campaigns on Instagram like many brands do. Menlook said "we wanted to take Instagram out of your smartphone", through this, Alain Bretillot, head of brand content, hopes to assert Menlook's 'digital DNA'.

In an era when fashion brands and publications are flooding the zone with influencer posts on Instagram, one brand is taking the reverse approach and bringing Instagram into its traditional television spots.

Menlook, a men’s lifestyle and e-commerce site based in Paris, is launching a television advertisement today composed entirely of Instagram photos shared by fashion influencers around the world.

The campaign was developed by the digital agency Kindai and utilizes the “flat lay” trend on Instagram, a technique that involves organizing items into an aesthetically pleasing arrangement and photographing them from a birds-eye view.

“We wanted to take Instagram out of your smartphone: It’s a way of cutting loose from communication standards in the fashion world and asserting Menlook’s digital DNA,” Alain Bretillot, head of brand content at Kindai, said in a statement.

This trend is best depicted in accounts like @thingsorganizedneatly, which won a Webby Award in 2015. Instagrammers also refer to this technique as #knolling, which has been tagged more than 700,000 times along with #thingsorganizedneatly, according to Menlook.

Featured influencers in the advertisement include Will Taylor, founder of Bright Bazaar and Tareq Q, a sneaker collector and streetwear enthusiast based in Kuwait.

In addition to the television ad, Menlook will also share photos by 25 other bloggers on its Instagram during the month of April and launch a competition for consumers to win €10,000 ($11,400) by using the hashtag #MyMenlook on their flat lay photos

“Today, brands repurpose their TV campaign on Instagram, but we have chosen to capture the creativity and spontaneity of this social network and transpose it to this long-established advertising format,” Marc Menase, president of the Menlook Group said in a statement.

Menlook sells more than 1,000 mid- and high-end brands in menswear ranging from ready-to-wear clothing to shoes, accessories, sports gear and tech items. Similar to women’s wear companies like Stich Fix, which has worked closely with Pinterest to help collate looks for consumers, Menlook utilizes a team of style experts to hand-select items for their consumers.

Menlook also shares editorial content on Menlook Tribune, including trend updates and interviews with fashion influencers.