Candles by Midnight, a boutique home fragrance brand, was struggling to break out of its small, existing echo chamber. With limited posting frequency and stagnant sales, they needed a strategy to amplify their voice. By pivoting to an influencer-led campaign and elevating their visual storytelling, Qognition achieved 275k+ impressions, increased organic reach by 118%, and drove a 22% increase in sales in just 6 weeks.
1. The Challenge: A Quiet Brand in a Loud Market
Despite having a high-quality product, the brand was failing to gain traction in the competitive wellness space. Their digital presence was too quiet to trigger algorithmic growth.
Key Pain Points:
Low Visibility: The brand suffered from weak recognition outside of its immediate follower base.
Inconsistent Activity: A limited posting frequency of just 3 times per week was insufficient to maintain audience interest or signal relevance to the Instagram algorithm.
Stagnant Revenue: Sales conversions had plateaued, indicating that the brand wasn’t reaching new potential customers.
2. The Strategy: Aspirational & Influential
We moved away from simple product shots and focused on selling a feeling luxury, self-care, and ambiance.
Phase 1: Influencer Amplification
We leveraged external authority to build internal trust.
Strategic Partnerships: We partnered with 8 micro-influencers in the home décor and wellness niche.
Authentic Storytelling: Instead of generic ads, these influencers created aspirational content showing how the candles elevated their own living spaces, providing powerful social proof.
Phase 2: Curated “Mood” Content
We overhauled the visual identity of the feed.
Thematic Pillars: We designed a weekly cadence of 3 curated posts focused specifically on themes of self-care, luxury gifting, and relaxation.
Visual Elevation: We enhanced the visuals with mood-driven product storytelling, using lighting and composition to evoke the warmth and scent of the product through the screen.
3. The Results: Igniting Growth
The impact of the influencer and content pivot was explosive. Within a 6-week period, the brand moved from obscurity to high visibility.
Key Metrics:
Massive Exposure: The campaign generated over 275,000 impressions solely through influencer collaborations.
118% Reach Increase: Organic reach skyrocketed by 118%, effectively doubling the brand’s audience.
Revenue Impact: The increased awareness translated directly to the bottom line, with Instagram-driven sales growing by 22%.
Industry-Leading Engagement: The engagement rate improved to 5.4%, performing significantly above the lifestyle industry average.
4. Analytics Snapshot
Performance Overview
Views: Total views surged to 328,092, a 100% increase over the previous period.
Reach: Unique accounts reached hit 274,393, validating the effectiveness of the influencer strategy.
Interaction: Content interactions climbed to 3,321, showing that the new “mood-driven” creative was resonating with users.
Traffic: The campaign drove 2,621 link clicks, funnelling high-intent traffic directly to the online store.