Greenlight has revealed the retail brands that have the strongest affinities to the audience of Love Island, who could be missing out on an opportunity to drive sales if they are not harnessing interest in the popular ITV2 show to target the captive audience across social and digital advertising.

Research and analysis conducted by Greenlight during the weeks running up to and following its 4th June air date which looked into profiling the audience of Love Island and matching this against brand audience profiles has revealed that the brand with the strongest affinity to the show's avid fans is retail powerhouse ASOS.

The data shows the percentage of each brand's audience that have an affinity to people sharing the hashtag '#LoveIsland'. Despite sponsoring the show, Greenlight's research reveals that Superdrug fails to top the list and comes in at number 11 on the list with a correlation of around 60%.

The list of brands and the affinity to Love Island fans:

ASOS – 95%
Missguided – 94%
River Island - 92%
Boohoo – 91%
Gymshark – 89%
Topshop - 87%
Primark – 82%
Pretty Little Thing – 79%
JD Sports – 74%
MAC – 65%
Superdrug – 60%

Brands still have time to develop social media and digital campaigns to target audiences who are watching Love Island, and should consider whether it is a timely opportunity to tap into an audience base that is engaging with the show online.

Indeed, Primark has been quick to respond to the popularity of the show by releasing a Love Island capsule collection, which is highly fitting considering the brand has an 82% affinity with the show’s audience.

As such, Greenlight urges brands to more generally consider how pop culture phenomena can provide a good point of reference when it comes to assessing and targeting audiences.

Hannah Kimuyu, director of data insights at Greenlight, said: “It’s important for brands to look beyond traditional audience personas and actually dive into behavioural, conversational, and attitudinal data points to uncover unique insights and affinities that are a truer reflection of their audiences.

"Digital marketers really need to have a clear understanding of who their customer is, what they’re buying and saying online, and how they’re behaving from a cross-channel and cross-device perspective”.

The research also highlights the specifics of those tweeting the #LoveIsland hashtag, including the fact that 72% of the audience is female with 63% of them are under the age of 17. Coming second to this age group is the over 35s, who make up 18% of people engaging with the show on Twitter.

Andreas Pouros, CEO at Greenlight said: “The popularity of Love Island last year took everyone by surprise, and it was only once the show had ended that brands started to see the scale of the opportunity. With Love Island fever now in full swing once again, brands should be aware of the commercial opportunity that the show presents and how they can maximise the captive audience.

"The important thing is that brands have the insight to know which pop culture trends their audience align with the best. Having that insight can help inform campaigns, provide inspiration and, most notably, help direct timing, content and targeting specifics for a campaign."

Top tips for brands looking to maximise the opportunity presented by shows like Love Island:

Ensure you have access to data that can provide you with the insight needed to monitor popular cultural or social events that could be relevant for your target audience and, where possible, try to make sure data ties up nicely from a cross-channel and cross-device perspective so you can have a ‘single customer view’ of your audiences’ behaviours and preferences

Don't assume that your audience follow a strict, rigid demographic – use data audience and insight tools to explore different, and perhaps unexpected, places your audience could be congregating online

Use social media listening tools to monitor those interacting with these shows on social media. What kinds of topics are cropping up regularly? How are they referencing brands? Does this help you understand your audience further?