Twin-fluencers: The Latest Influencer Phenomenon

The influencer realm is starting to see double.

Twin influencers, aka twin-fluencers, are a rising phenomenon, with duos such as Veronica and Vanessa Merrell launching their own fashion label, True Img, and Brooklyn and Bailey McKnight collaborating with Arizona. The notion of twin duos isn’t anything new to fashion or beauty — think Dean and Dan Caten of Dsquared2, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen of The Row or Jean and Jane Ford of Benefit. But when it comes to the influencer sphere, what makes twins so appealing?

“It’s a family thing,” said Gabriela Fernández, talent manager at Socialyte, an influencer marketing and casting agency. Socialyte works with popular twin fashion designers-turned-bloggers Sam and Cailli Beckerman of Beckerman Blog. “As a unit, they’re actual characters in real life. People like family and feeling like they are seeing something organic and genuine versus one person posting like an influencer or a really well-known Instagram boyfriend and girlfriend — who knows if they’re going to break up next year?”

“People already have a fascination with twins. It’s an eye-catcher,” said Shannade Clermont. She and twin Shannon are former reality TV stars-turned-models who count more than 900,000 Instagram followers. They have worked with brands such as Yeezy, Buffalo London, I Am Gia and Laquan Smith.

The family aspect is part of the appeal of twin-fluencers, and it shows in their number of followers. This, in turn, grabs the attention of brands.

YouTube twin-fluencers generally have the largest followings, with Niki and Gabi DeMartino, Ethan and Grayson Dolan and Brooklyn and Bailey McKnight leading the pack. Their videos range from the “we tried it” variety to “a day in the life”-style clips to reaction videos to pranks. In one video, the McKnight twins recreate popular Instagram posts by the Dolan twins, Merrell twins, DeMartino twins and Lisa and Lena Mantler, identical twins from Germany who have nearly 14 million Instagram followers.

“Being twins, people assume that because we do everything together and go places together that we’re the same people, but we are not,” said Vanessa Merrell. She and twin Veronica were flown to Paris by Dior for a collaboration with YouTube during Paris Fashion Week.

“Our fans are very supportive of us individually and together,” added Veronica Merrell.

Lexi and Allie Kaplan, twin artists who have 153,000 Instagram followers, said they play up “the twin thing” for their online personas, maintaining their individuality off-line.

“In the beginning, we didn’t want people to know [the difference between us],” said Allie Kaplan. She and Lexi are known for their nude depictions of celebrities such as Emily Ratajkowski, Amber Rose and Nicki Minaj. They have previously worked with Juicy Couture, Good American, Tretorn and Diesel.

Kamiu Lee, chief executive officer of influencer marketing company Activate, said she has noticed brands are interested in working not just with twins, but with duos — friends, siblings, couples. Activate curates lists of influencers for its clients and Dynamic Duos, as the company calls them, is one of the most popular ones.

“With twins, you can showcase two different variations of a product,” she said. “We’ve seen folks wear two outfits by the same brand and showcase that. If it’s a couple that shares the account, you can talk about gifting in a much more natural way. It’s not just a gift guide, but you gifted this to your boyfriend or fiancé and that personal story can come through.”

She added that with duos, there’s an increased level of creativity that may not necessarily result from working with a single person.

One example are the Beckerman twins, who posted a video of themselves applying two shades of the same Sugarpill Hello Kitty product on Instagram in June. The video was viewed by more than 21,000 of the Beckermans’ 165,000 followers.

Cailli Beckerman said people generally enjoy seeing her and twin Sam wearing the same looks — beauty and fashion — in different colors. This has been the case since she and Sam were little; their grandmother would dress them in the same outfit but in different colors.

“Seeing little twins in the stroller wearing the same thing [but] different color, you just go, ‘aw,'” she said. “To be wearing the same thing different color is a cute and borderline crazy thing when you get older. It’s fun.”

The Beckermans are represented by Socialyte as one unit, according to Fernandez, who said she has yet to see one of their clients request only one of the twins for a paid campaign. The twins confirmed they have always done brand partnerships together with the exception of one time — when Cailli had her appendix removed, leaving Sam to go solo to a music festival.

The Clermont twins added that being twins is their “brand,” which is why going solo wouldn’t make sense.

“It doesn’t make sense to have just one twin working on one project,” said Shannon Clermont. “It may sometimes hurt our business because maybe they do just want one twin and we turn it down. But we stay true to [our brand].”

Fernandez said Socialyte also measures performance for twins as one unit, looking at earned revenue, following and engagement. She declined to talk rates, but sources said twin-fluencers generally charge double the rate of a single influencer. Rates depend on a variety of factors — following count and engagement, included — but twin-fluencers with less than 100,000 followers are said to be able to charge $3,000 for a post, while twin-fluencers around the one-million follower mark can charge $50,000 per post.

Data doesn’t necessarily show that twin-fluencers have higher followings or engagement rates than those of single influencers, according to Fernandez and Lee. But Lee did note that duos are apt to generate more organic content when working together. This translates to an added bonus of content for the hiring brand.

“If you were tapping, for example, two influencers who are great friends in real life, we see so much more additional organic content come out of it,” Lee said. “You’re going to an event with your friend, taking pictures or creating videos together and showcasing it to both audiences. You have two personalities come through, you can have that back and forth. That creates a much richer story.”

She has also noticed a rising trend of twin DJs — Angel and Dren Coleman, Simi and Haze Khadra and Jordan and Loanne Collyer, for example.

“We’re seeing a trend of influencers that have creative jobs as their day jobs — designers, artists, DJs,” she said. “We’ve seen more brands wanting to tap folks that may be chefs or interior designers and have what we call three-dimensional creators have real passion points that are their full-time jobs. So when they’re creating content, it bleeds into their professional life. Definitely seeing that trend within the duo category.”

Below, a list of the top twin-fluencers and their following counts.

Niki and Gabi DeMartino
YouTube: 7 million subscribers; Instagram: 2.6 million and 2.7 million, respectively; Twitter: 1.79 million and 1.26 million, respectively

Ethan and Grayson Dolan
YouTube: 6.8 million subscribers: Instagram: 4.3 million; Twitter: 6.65 million and 6.81 million, respectively

Brooklyn and Bailey McKnight
YouTube: 5.5 million subscribers; Instagram: 3.9 million; Twitter: 360,000

Teagan and Samantha Rybka
YouTube: 3.8 million subscribers; Instagram: 554,000; Twitter: 2,712

Veronica and Vanessa Merrell
YouTube: 3.6 million subscribers; Instagram: 1.3 million each, 1.1 million on their joint account; Twitter: 416,000 and 353,000, respectively

Lisa and Lena Mantler
YouTube: 845,000 subscribers; Instagram: 13.8 million; Twitter: 191,000

Cailli and Sam Beckerman
YouTube: 119 subscribers; Instagram: 165,000; Twitter: 7,557

Lexi and Allie Kaplan
YouTube: 799 subscribers; Instagram: 154,000; Twitter: 1,401

Shannon and Shannade Clermont
Instagram: 921,000

Simi and Haze Khadra
Instagram: 836,000

Molly and Reese Blutstein
Instagram: 206,000 (double3xposure)

Aya and Ami Suzuki
Instagram: 170,000 and 144,000, respectively

TK Wonder and Cipriana Quann
Instagram: 158,000 and 186,000, respectively

Jordan and Loanne Collyer
YouTube: 1,500 subscribers; Instagram: 54,000; Twitter: 7,542

Angel and Dren Coleman
Instagram: 19,800; Twitter: 779

Sabrina and Sarah Guess
Instagram: 2,108 and 2,088, respectively

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