As technology continues to advance, beauty gets more convenient for consumers. From appointment booking apps to skin matching technology, beauty businesses are becoming more innovative with the products and services that help enhance the customer experience. In 2019, beauty technology is all about personalization–and there are a few businesses in beauty that are leading the way. Read on to discover how the trend of personalization in beauty is transforming the beauty industry in 2019 and how some notable companies have mastered this trend effectively:
Better Ingredient Selection Based on Skin Type
Today’s innovative beauty companies are shifting away from pushing standard beauty archetypes to embracing one that is personally made for the consumer with ingredient selection based on the customer’s skin type. With the help of advanced technology, companies can embrace this shift towards inclusion and enhance the customer experience at the same time. One of the most notable companies making their mark with personalization and embracing inclusion in the realm of skincare is Clinique. Clinique’s clinique iD hydration system helps consumers customize their skin care based on their skin care concerns.
This hydration system helps shoppers create a custom-blend of skin care using one of the brand’s Dramatically Different moisturizer lotions and combine it with a cartridge filled with active ingredients designed to address the skincare concern the customer has. For instance, if you have very dry skin and your goal is to even out your tone while hydrating your skin for at least eight hours, then you can select the moisturizing lotion as your base and combine it with the concentrated cartridge designed for evening skin tone. With a customized way to address skin care issues, Clinique is leading the way for beauty companies to embrace inclusion.
Personalized Products and Advice with AI/AR-enabled Technology
Customers want advice catered for them and Perfect Corp. is on its way to perfect the shopping experience through personalization. Perfect Corp’s YouCam Beauty 3.0 helps personalize the shopping experience for consumers by taking advantage of human touch learnings, AR and AI to help consumers get beauty advice on-demand that’s personalized with its live, in-app Beauty Advisor consultations. The company’s app also leverages advanced technology to help customers find their shade of foundation and monitor skin care concerns with features, such as the AI Smart Shade Finder and AI Skin Diagnostic.
Improving Shopping Experiences with Enhanced Facial Analysis
If you want to keep customers coming back for more, it’s important to create an individualized shopping experience catered to their needs. Japanese beauty brand SK-II is making this a standard with its innovative Future X Smart Store. The Future X Smart Store combines the physical and digital world’s to create a “phygital” shopping experience that uses SK-II’s skin diagnostics and science technology combined with artificial intelligence (AI) to offer product recommendations and facial analysis customized for each shopper. It’s creating a customized experience that focuses on simplifying purchasing skin care, removes the pressure of sales from beauty consultants and enhances the customer experience with one that is more tailored to their skin care needs.
Beauty Technology Personalization via Digital Platforms
Beauty applications have made it increasingly convenient for consumers to book makeup appointments, select the ideal eyeliner and take care of other beauty concerns. But Avon is one company that is embracing personalization as a way to connect with its customers, and it’s worth taking a cue from this beauty juggernaut with its new algorithm-powered mobile app, Personalized Beauty.
Thanks to its partnership with Techkon to create its color-matching technology, Avon’s Personalized Beauty app helps tailor the shopping experience for its customers by providing helpful beauty and makeup tips while also supporting Avon sales representatives to help customers better match foundations and makeup to their skin tone. With 70 percent of women selecting the wrong foundation color for their skin tone, this app can prove beneficial in enhancing the customer experience.
The app goes beyond augmented reality overlays featured in other beauty apps by also incorporating the shading and lighting around the customer for a more accurate depiction. This helps to improve the color matching so representatives can help customers find the right products to match their skin tones.
Mass Customization Equals Mass Personalization with Customized 3D-Printed Face Masks
The beauty technology trend of face masks continues in 2019 and Neutrogena has taken mass customization to another level with its Neutrogena MaskiD that it revealed at the CES 2019. This concept app empowers shoppers by putting more control in their hands with the ingredients that go in their face mask. Shoppers get to print out a face mask based on their skin measurements by taking a selfie with the app. After accurately measuring the beauty shopper’s face and evaluating their skin care needs based on six different skin zones, shoppers can further infuse their customized masks with five different ingredients to enhance skin care. The app also encrypts the images and user information and is further enhanced for accuracy when used in combination with its Skin360 product.
Final Thoughts
Taking your beauty technology business to the next level requires innovation and mapping out effective strategies continuously. But if you want your business to stand out from the rest, it’s time to get personal with your customers. By leveraging technology to facilitate personalization, you attract new customers, nurture existing clients and enhance the customer experience to improve your bottom line.