Hailey Bieber’s new skincare launch has lessons for marketers

Last week, Hailey Bieber joined the likes of Rihanna, Ariana Grande and Selena Gomez and launched her own beauty brand.

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Her brand, Rhode Skin, is initially focusing on skincare with a range of products to help consumers emulate Bieber’s glowy skin, promising ‘efficacious, intentional skincare’.

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It’s a smart commercial move. Though some may say the market is becoming oversaturated with celebrity beauty lines, skincare is big business and we’ve seen Rihanna previously branch out into this field with Fenty Skin.

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In fact, global skincare sales are set to reach $181 billion by 2025 and a US survey published by Klarna last year found skincare to be the most shopped-for beauty category across all age groups.

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It’s also the key to the hearts of younger generations: 41% of Gen Z and 40% of Millennials in Klarna’s survey said skincare was the product category they currently spent most on, followed by 31% of Gen Xers and Boomers.

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But it’s not just Rhode’s focus on skincare that should make beauty marketers pay attention. Bieber’s launch was a study in the ways brands can use media channels and evolved marketing tactics to reach new audiences and launch a product with impact.

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Let’s take a look in a bit more detail.

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The power of influencer marketing

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Even if beauty consumers missed the Rhode announcement in top-tier publications like Vogue, Grazia and Elle, they learned about Bieber’s new line through her social media.

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Hailey Bieber’s own name has great social and commercial power but her team has supplemented this with influencer outreach. Tap on her Instagram Story and you’ll see a series of reposted videos and pictures, showing celebrities and influencers receiving their Rhode PR packages.

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Bieber isn’t unique in this but has embraced a marketing strategy that’s become very popular among beauty brands and businesses across a range of sectors.

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According to Influencer Marketing Hub, influencer marketing is estimated to grow to approximately $16.4 Billion in 2022 and more than 75% of brand marketers say they intend to dedicate a budget to influencer marketing in 2022. It’s a space that’s rapidly growing, with global influencer marketing services and companies growing by 26% in 2021.

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There’s good reason for this.

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Influencer marketing can not only introduce products to a wide audience, but uses the relationship between influencer and follower to positively increase brand perception.

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When Sofia Richie posts that the Rhode peptide lip treatment is a ‘major summer essential’, it’s likely her 7.5 million followers will start to think so too.

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Influencer marketing is also particularly powerful within the beauty industry, where consumers want to see the visual effect of a product and learn how they should apply it - which an influencer can demonstrate. And there’s the additional element of wanting to look like an influencer whose style and aesthetic you admire.

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But influencer marketing isn’t just for brands with Rhode’s budget. Even if a brand doesn’t have the resources to work with mega influencers with millions of followers, they can still reap the benefits of this marketing tactic.

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For instance, when it comes to product sampling campaigns, data from Odore’s platform shows that influencers with fewer than 50k followers still generate, on average, remarketing opt in rates of over 50%.

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Using video content to grow brand reach

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Another strategy the Rhode team has embraced is the use of video content.

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On Bieber’s Instagram Story, interspersed with influencer reposts, you’ll find videos from the Rhode TikTok channel showing Bieber applying her products and even explaining the amount of product she personally likes to use.

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Then there’s the YouTube reviews already being posted by influencers who have received Rhode products and Hailey Bieber’s promotional appearances on channels like Vogue, as well as her own channel.

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Bieber and her team are right to recognise the power of multi-channel video content when launching a beauty brand or new products.

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Klarna’s US survey also found that the majority of Gen Z and Millennials prefer to discover beauty items on channels like YouTube, Instagram and TikTok.

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We’ve talked before about the ability of video-based social media to make beauty products go viral. And such is its power, beauty retailers have begun setting up ‘trending’ displays in-store, grouping together viral beauty products for quick and easy purchase.

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Again, this beauty marketing strategy is accessible to smaller brands.

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Whilst securing a spot on Vogue’s YouTube channel might be out of reach, there’s nothing to stop brands creating - and collaborating with influencers to create - video content for social channels.

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In fact, this should be a core part of their social media strategy and they can increase their ROI by combining it with marketing personalisation tools. Using tech that matches consumers with the content that best suits them is a crucial way brands of all sizes can maximise their marketing budget, not to mention build a closer, more personal relationship with individual consumers.

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Brands with a social and environmental conscience

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Another way the Rhode launch embodies the new era of beauty marketing is in emphasising a brand’s social and environmental responsibilities.

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News outlets have noted that the Rhode website explains how all the brand’s packaging is made using recycled packaging materials and that it will invest in and support 1,000 women and their families by 2023, through the Rhodes Futures Foundation.

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The sustainability consversation is growing louder within beauty and we’re seeing more and more brands begin to centre sustainability in their work and messaging.

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There’s the moral imperative but increasing pressure from consumers too: a recent study conducted by Provenance and Cult Beauty found that almost half (48%) of beauty consumers are looking for more information and clarity about brands’ values and commitments to the environment.

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And if brands aren’t deemed ethical or environmentally responsible enough, they’ll watch sales fall, particularly among younger consumers. Recent Deloitte research, among all types of UK consumers, found that 28% say they have stopped buying certain products due to ethical or environmental concerns, jumping up to 45% among Gen Z consumers.

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How Odore helps beauty marketers

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Hailey Bieber’s launch demonstrates the new tools and tactics available to beauty marketers in 2022.

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But actually using them to launch a campaign is another question. If brands are to similarly leverage these strategies to reach new audiences, grow brand awareness and drive sales, they need the right tech to do it.

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That’s where Odore comes in. Our platform gives brands the ability to create, edit and launch marketing campaigns in a matter of clicks.

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Our array of integrations - from Instagram and Mailchimp to Salesforce and Shopify - makes it easy to launch multi-channel campaigns, whilst monitoring performance, all in one place. And our rich analytics tools empower brands to hyper-target customers, at scale, and highly personalise their marketing.

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We also have experience helping brands embrace influencer marketing.

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Odore recently worked with a brand on a product sampling campaign that used influencers to direct consumers to their sample interface, achieving a strong opt in rate of over 60% and distributing more than 4,500 samples.

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This campaign also included a sample questionnaire, allowing the brand to better understand consumer fragrance habits, to inform future development and outreach.

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The questionnaire responses additionally helped them learn more about the preferences of individual consumers, allowing them to pursue hyper-targeted marketing.

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Sustainability at Odore

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Sustainability is also something that is deeply important to Odore and we make sure we put these values into action.

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We offer sustainable and 100% recyclable packaging and printing as part of our product sampling platform so the brands and agencies we work with can ensure their sampling is sustainable. We print clear recycling symbols and instructions on our packaging to assist consumers with recycling and responsibly disposing of their packaging.

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The packaging we use in our fulfilment centres is also sustainable and recyclable and we offer batch processing so samples are shipped in bulk to minimise packaging and emissions. And our digital sampling platform implements extra address checks to make sure products aren’t sent to non mailable addresses, which racks up unnecessary road miles.

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Additionally, we recycle or reuse all electronic waste, invest in improving the energy efficiency of home and shared offices and work with ON A MISSION to offset our carbon footprint and actively support reforestation.

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See for yourself how Odore can help your marketing team. Book an introductory call here.

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