No luxury fashion retailer was leaning into the cultural movement of women’s empowerment, let alone an actual example of it. So, we created the Neiman Marcus Make Some Noise platform, championing bold women with bold voices shaking up the status quo and leading the way forward.

We launched the platform at the cultural phenomenon known as South by Southwest (SXSW), introducing a captive audience of trendsetters and cultural mavens to the Neiman Marcus brand.

We set out to create a compelling event that would not only bring the ethos of the brand to life, but create an environment giving fashionable women refuge from the crowded masses (often populated by men!).

After a successful launch at SXSW in 2014, we returned in 2015 to celebrate Noisemakers in technology, fashion, film, music, food, business and art, inspiring all women to join in, speak up and make some noise in their own lives.

With an opportunity to engage massive audiences at SXSW, it was critical to utilize the event spaces’ small footprint as a highly interactive experience encouraging social sharing reacing beyond SXSW.

We partnered with Atlantic Records to celebrate Julie Greenwald, the only woman running a major U.S. record label & considered one of the most influential women in music. We curated performances by female-fronted bands, including Marina & The Diamonds and Christine and The Queens, who both made their U.S. debuts. Additionally, we curated 6 panels/conversations featuring twelve empowering women across pop-culture.

Our Make Some Noise house featured a room dedicated to music as well:

• Fender Guitars and amps.

• Bang & Olufsen headphone installation playing music from legendary female Atlantic Records artists.

• Portraits/snapshots of female powerhouses and their inspiring lyrics.

The house’s interactive experiences included an interactive digital mural, a slo-mo video booth, a user-generated pointillism painting, inspirational ribbon wall and Twitter Mirror.

Make Some Noise penetrated the pop culture conversation, successfully creating massive buzz and awareness for programming, and garnering over:

• 263M earned media impressions.

• 100 media outlets (84 of which were in attendance), coverage included in Yahoo! Music’s “SXSW 2015 Friday Rock Highlights” and NPR’s “The Austin 100: A SXSW 2015 Mix” playlist of artists to discover at SXSW.

• 106M social media impressions with #NMMakeSomeNoise, #NeimanMarcus and #NMonRainey. In fact, 86% of program conversations included official hashtag #NMMakeSomeNoise.

• 19,000 RSVPS (a key measure of potential success of a SXSW event), 9% of which opted in for NM emails.

• 2,760 attendees over the course of 2.5 days (reaching property capacity of 400 early, barely turning over for new entrants due to early arriving guests wanting to stay until closing). 

• 5.3M impressions via Twitter Mirror; overall 6.6% engagement rate, outperforming retail benchmarks by 3.6%

• 4X the total activation cost in total media exposure

To resonate with millennial shoppers, we identified SXSW as a key moment to do something unexpected as a luxury retailer, but impactful among a highly engaged audience. This generation lives for live music experiences. So what better way to cut through the clutter of women’s empowerment messaging in culture today, then by creating a music-driven event of our own. By partnering with Atlantic Records, Neiman Marcus was able to celebrate female noisemakers (literally) and create a cultural touch-point for those in attendance and those not currently engaged with the Neiman Marcus brand.

Neiman Marcus’ Make Some Noise campaign aims to firmly cement Neiman Marcus in the cultural conversation among the next-generation shopper. The world of this new consumer is dynamically multi-faceted: they live by sharing Instagrammable moments, crave the live experience of music festivals like SXSW, and are surrounded by female-empowerment messages about leaning in, taking risks and living life to the fullest. Tapping into these core elements, Make Some Noise came to life, firmly planting Neiman Marcus into the zeitgeist of this modern young woman.

By partnering with Atlantic Records, Neiman Marcus positioned themselves not only as curators of musical talent, but as a mechanism for SXSW attendees to discover talent too. In return, Atlantic Records artists were able to not only perform among a highly, engaged audience, but at one of the most buzzed about, intimate & stylish venues at SXSW.

Karen Katz, the CEO of Neiman Marcus Group stated that “Our customers are 80% women. Our employees are 75% women. I’m a woman. It’s our responsibility to make certain that women’s voices are heard.” Neiman Marcus has always championed the clothing, but today, Neiman Marcus champions the woman.

Neiman Marcus came to us looking to make themselves relevant among next generation shoppers and cut through the cluttered fashion landscape full of retailers with womens empowerment messaging.

We developed a platform in order to:

• Engage contemporary shoppers/the next generation of luxury consumers by helping develop a new relationship between them and Neiman Marcus

• Curate inspiring & compelling content featuring women making noise

• Create celebratory Make Some Noise moments