Fascinating dissection Anu, and your framework makes so much sense. In terms of reports coming from social platforms, what dyou make of Pinterest Predicts?
Thank you Philip! Oh I have so many thoughts on Pinterest Predicts. More than anything else, I think it's a very fun, sorta genius marketing play on their part. It doesn't really make a lot of sense from a trend standpoint for many reasons. The primary being that social listening is not a great forecasting tool when used alone. It can be helpful for specific purposes and as one piece of a larger toolkit — but generally, what consumers are currently searching for is not a great indication of what they will be be searching for in a few months. It's the classic: most consumers don't know what they want until it's in front of them. If they were able to segment specifically for a subgroup of early adopter users and analyze the data of just those people, that would be much more interesting. The other big issue is, they have this list of 20 "trends" that exist on several different levels/planes. "Cherry Coded," for instance is simply a color trend (and an outdated one, in my opinion), while "Mix and Maximalist" is a bigger aesthetic shift rooted in culture (which is actually on point). And then you have things like "Terra Futura" which, based on their description, seems to just be a fun name for sustainability with no specific meaning? So yeah. Perhaps a useful resource for pulling imagery, but not much more.
Wow, thanks for your thoughts, Anu! I find trend forecasting so fascinating, so I appreciate all of this. Agreed, seems like an overly simplistic methodology, driven by motivations of commercial expansion more than anything. As for the trends themselves, I also find it odd how they try to coin these artificial subcultures to legitimise each trend. Some of them even seem like derivative dupes of existing subcultures. 🤔 And I’m glad you picked up on Terra Futura cause that one got me really scratching my head! To the point where I wrote a whole post about it. Kinda bleak how they created that trend by referencing solarpunk, which is a subculture with an anti-consumerist ideology. Only to push an agenda of promoting consumption through it 😅 https://mutantfutures.substack.com/p/001
Hi! Yes, that would be okay with me, as long as there is a citation & link, as well as a note for readers requesting any further usage includes citation & link. Thanks!
such a great read, thank you! super helpful in making sense of what feels like a whirlwind of trends.
great read! super insightful & very well put together!
This is great girl
This is most useful. Thanks for sharing. I derived benefit from this from the point of view of a trend report creator and consumer.
This is fantastic! Thanks for sharing
Love that you shared the rarely depicted and very intimate process of how you dissect and interpret the data.
As trend report enthusiasts, this was such a treat 🤓
love to hear it!!
Omg this is great, thank you for sharing ✨
Fascinating dissection Anu, and your framework makes so much sense. In terms of reports coming from social platforms, what dyou make of Pinterest Predicts?
Thank you Philip! Oh I have so many thoughts on Pinterest Predicts. More than anything else, I think it's a very fun, sorta genius marketing play on their part. It doesn't really make a lot of sense from a trend standpoint for many reasons. The primary being that social listening is not a great forecasting tool when used alone. It can be helpful for specific purposes and as one piece of a larger toolkit — but generally, what consumers are currently searching for is not a great indication of what they will be be searching for in a few months. It's the classic: most consumers don't know what they want until it's in front of them. If they were able to segment specifically for a subgroup of early adopter users and analyze the data of just those people, that would be much more interesting. The other big issue is, they have this list of 20 "trends" that exist on several different levels/planes. "Cherry Coded," for instance is simply a color trend (and an outdated one, in my opinion), while "Mix and Maximalist" is a bigger aesthetic shift rooted in culture (which is actually on point). And then you have things like "Terra Futura" which, based on their description, seems to just be a fun name for sustainability with no specific meaning? So yeah. Perhaps a useful resource for pulling imagery, but not much more.
Wow, thanks for your thoughts, Anu! I find trend forecasting so fascinating, so I appreciate all of this. Agreed, seems like an overly simplistic methodology, driven by motivations of commercial expansion more than anything. As for the trends themselves, I also find it odd how they try to coin these artificial subcultures to legitimise each trend. Some of them even seem like derivative dupes of existing subcultures. 🤔 And I’m glad you picked up on Terra Futura cause that one got me really scratching my head! To the point where I wrote a whole post about it. Kinda bleak how they created that trend by referencing solarpunk, which is a subculture with an anti-consumerist ideology. Only to push an agenda of promoting consumption through it 😅 https://mutantfutures.substack.com/p/001
Good insight 😌 Can i translate part of this article into Spanish with links to you and a description of your newsletter?
Hi! Yes, that would be okay with me, as long as there is a citation & link, as well as a note for readers requesting any further usage includes citation & link. Thanks!