Buying Beyond Appearance: the Digital Power in the Skin Care Industry

Abstract

The beauty & personal care industry, including skin care, colour cosmetics, hair care and fragrances has shown substantial growth during the last decades reaching a global size of approximately $500bn in sales annually . The industry has been strongly impacted by the 2020 pandemic with retail sales in the beauty segment declining in all categories, especially in colour cosmetics. Indeed, during the pandemic consumers have changed their beauty routines, previously focused on makeup products, and they have started to increase their spending in the consumption of skin care products. The consequences of the pandemic combined with the recent development in the tech industry have brought a substantial level of innovation in the beauty industry. Firms have started offering more sophisticated selling approaches, reliant on increasing digitalization, and also customers have been more demanding in terms of omnichannel experience. The pandemic resulted in a turning point for many firms operating in the beauty industry; radically changing the selling paradigm and shifting the attention toward e-commerce channels to meet newly established consumers ‘needs. Considering the aforementioned dynamics and the digital trends observed in the beauty industry, this paper will analyze the recent developments in the skin care industry with the aim of understanding the customer propensity to acquire these products through online platforms. The paper discussed, presents the following structure. Chapter two is dedicated to the analysis of a specific segment of the beauty landscape: the skin care industry. The aim is to provide more in-depth market research which also includes products, services, consumer targets and the latest trends. The third chapter is devoted to providing a useful literature review of the e-commerce and social network dynamics with some hints about the origin and the Italian current acceleration. Considering the natural boundaries implied by the Internet, the chapter concludes by discussing the advantages and disadvantages in the use of e-commerce for companies operating in the skin care market with the aim of better understanding how is important today to follow an omnichannel strategy, for developing a strong experience for customers. Moreover, this part of the paper, will analyse how companies are able to convey the physical features, such as the fragrance and the texture of skin care products which cannot be touched and tried before the purchase. As mentioned before, chapter four is devoted to examine the consumer's behaviour of purchasing skin care products online, in particular following the pandemic. With the use of an in-depth questionnaire, this section depicts the customer journey in this market identifying the strategies and the factors that push consumers to buy skin care products online beyond appearance. Also, the questionnaire will discover which are the most effective marketing strategies used nowadays by skin care brands. The paper ends with a chapter dedicated to give a summary of the topics discussed in the previous chapters offering some points for reflection towards a stimulating question “Is all social what people apply to their skin?”.