• by Anne Zieger , December 29, 2006

Health and beauty learns to play up its best virtual features

When it comes to the Web, health and beauty marketers have a tough sale to make. After all, health and beauty products are all about the senses, appealing to the sense of smell and touch as much as to the eye.

Still, industry marketers are betting that over time they can work around this obstacle. This year, health and beauty marketers spent $470 million on online advertising, up from $390 million in 2005, estimates market research firm eMarketer. Many are spending big bucks on paid search and natural search optimization, hoping to catch more sophisticated consumers hunting for brand names when they shop online. Bolstered by such spending, nearly 14 percent of all health and beauty sales should be made online by 2010, compared with only 5.6 percent in 2005, according to projections by analyst firm Forrester Research.

But how will Web marketers get the job done? Given the health and beauty industry's high-gloss presentation, high-end creative execution is a must. But that's not enough to leave a lasting impression on consumers, who already come to such sites with high expectations.

Instead, the industry is relying on personal interaction and memorable viral marketing techniques to form relationships with online customers. Striking videos are common, with forward-to-a-friend tools a given. Personalized, interactive features - such as the ability to create your own content - are growing more popular daily. And quirky humor is becoming a staple. Consider the offering by anti-aging cream Reversa, which rewards users for reviewing product copy with sexy videos of strapping young men. Dull it's not.

"It's different than what other marketers have been doing, with getting the most eyeballs at once," says Michelle Madhok, publisher of beauty industry site SheFinds. "It's not about the impressions any more - it's about who you impress."

>>Extending the counter. For Bobbi Brown Cosmetics, a division of beauty giant Estée Lauder, the Web site is intended not only to generates sales, but more importantly to push traffic into brick-and-mortar retail outlets. "Our site isn't just a store, but really a way to help customers locate Bobbi Brown counters," says Rana Fagen, executive director of Bobbi Brown Direct. "We believe that once we get them in a chair with a makeup artist, we'll make the greatest impact."

To connect with Web visitors, the site places a big emphasis on personal communication. Five days a week, BobbiBrown.com offers access to a staff of 13 makeup artists, who, via LivePerson, counsel customers on choosing makeup products and colors that are right for them. The artists also provide real-time instant message sessions.

Also, Web site staffers respond to e-mail questions seven days a week, usually within 24 hours. Being responsive pays off: When customers discuss a product by e-mail with a rep, they're 30 percent more likely to make that purchase, and they spend as much as $10 more per purchase on the site, Fagen says.

Ultimately, the idea is to give people a taste of the service they'd get if they visited a live Bobbi Brown counter - particularly those who don't have one in their area - while giving existing customers an extra dose of hand-holding. Either way, Bobbi Brown reaches the estimated 63 percent of users who research products by visiting a company's merchant site.

"A lot of what we do is provide information to consumers," Fagen says. "E-commerce is definitely a profit center for our brand, but maintaining a Web site which is a freestanding store is also an important marketing tool for our business."

>>Creating community, generating pull.  High-end shampoo brand Alterna, for its part, recently decided that it was time to create a new, distinct online identity, built around an enthusiastic user community with a distinctive presence. Alterna, which targets 18- to 34-year-old consumers who can spend $60 or more on salon shampoos and conditioners, wanted a site that connected with its young, innovation-friendly audience.

To jump-start this effort, Alterna turned to Marina del Rey, Calif.-based e-marketing agency McElroy Interactive. Alterna and McElroy are developing a new Alterna site, slated to launch early this year, built around the prestige and credibility of salon industry celebrity Michael Shaun Corby. "There's a lot of me-too-ism in the industry, so differentiation is really critical," says Dani Mariano, vice president of business insights with McElroy. "By creating a Web celebrity out of the product, Alterna can differentiate itself."

The site will brand Corby as its signature personality, offering him as host for buzz-building hairstyle events, trainings, and behind-the-scenes footage from photo shoots. Also, Corby will sponsor his own Alterna-based hairstyling cocktails and feature those on the site. Alongside the Corby materials, the site will eventually include consumer-generated content, including both text and videos, demonstrating how consumers got results with Alterna products. If all of this works, salons will be humming with requests for Alterna products. "The Web is the best channel for pulling people into the salon," Mariano says.

Along with the Web 2.0 tactics, Alterna plans to engage in some standard direct e-marketing, including sample offers and printable coupons that can be taken into salons. "Sampling has proven to be extremely successful in driving double-digit sales growth," Mariano says. The site will also offer promotions designed to bring consumers online to win free products.

>>A viral sale. Sometimes, the best Web tactic is to convince other people to sell for you. Marketers for the Philips Norelco Bodygroom, a men's shaver designed to trim hair all over the body,wanted to move a set volume of product on a relatively small budget: less than $1 million.

In response, Philips Norelco agency Tribal ddb built Shave Everywhere.com, a site dedicated to the joys of personal grooming, well, everywhere. The site features the Bodygroom guy, a bathrobed video character with a laugh-out-loud product message and discreetly blurred private regions. "We needed to make an uncomfortable subject comfortable, and we did that by disarming with humor," says Steve Nesle, executive creative director with Tribal ddb. "We knew we were onto something when we were shooting the video and we were laughing at every take."

The video, aimed at young men and designed for sharing among guys, had a dramatic impact, with a pass-along rate of 31 percent. The site saw 313,000 unique visitors the first week and twice as many the second week. More importantly, the product moved like crazy, with the Bodygroom becoming the No. 1 seller in the personal grooming category on the Amazon site for the first two months after launch.

"The real story on ShaveEverywhere isn't that it's funny or good," Nesle says. "It's that we achieved our sales goal way ahead of schedule, and that the site is still moving product."