Beauty and brains: highlighting the intersection of tech and cosmetics

15

October

2019

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While first beauty tools focused on solely product innovation, such as Clarisonic with its single purpose of a pulsing face brush to cleanse your face, newer technologies powered through AI and Augmented Reality can create new solutions that tailor customer demand. Nowadays technology is becoming increasingly paired with beauty and cosmetics. Companies are continuously looking for novel ways to drive innovation in a saturated cosmetics industry. Digital transformation can not only create digital in-store experiences and build a customer relationship but also empower customers by letting them try on make up whenever and wherever they want through digital devices (Draper, 2018).

From digital merchandise to a seamless customer journey
Augmented reality can be used to overlay digital images into the real world (Dudkin, 2019). ModiFace, a provider of AR technology, uses facial recognition and augmented reality to apply makeup and other cosmetic products on people’s faces through digital devices. Customers can view themselves with the make-up look applied and hence are provided tools to make a better purchasing decision. World-leading and renowned leader in beauty and cosmetics, Sephora, picked up on this trend and introduced Sephora’s Virtual Artist as a new way of shopping, improving customer experience significantly (Thomas, 2019).
As a result, customers interact with brands online and through these devices and build a connection with the brand. It adopts a bidirectional effect where not only customer experience is improved but simultaneously collecting consumer data about their (product) preferences and features. Furthermore, data capturing can lead to personalized product recommendation and optimal product personalization. PerfectCorp. announced YouCam Beauty 3.0, an AI-based augmented reality tool that recommends customers makeup against a high rate of accuracy and realism based on what will personally suit you. This mobile app increased customers’ basket sizes, led to higher conversion and overall reduced the number of returned products (Shu, 2019).

The Future of make-up
It is predicted that the future of beauty will focus on both online and offline experiences such as virtual try-on apps, skin diagnostics and smart mirrors powered through voice. This allows for efficient data collection about customer preferences and hence can be deployed targeted advertising. It also captures data about customer skin, portray how customers interact with make-up and can anticipate market trends (Avvocato, 2019).
In January this year, Procter & Gamble (P&G) announced a novel beauty product, the Opté wand, a make-up printer. The wand can scan the skin and apply delicate amounts of make-up to hide spots and other blemishes. The tiny built-in camera in combination with a microprocessor that analyses data to differentiate between different colors of skin. A micro-printer will then apply the foundation to your skin. P&G has the ambition to launch the product by 2020, after testing it for utmost precision (Thomas, 2019). Another disruptive change in the beauty industry is led by design agency, Seymour Powell with its intelligent make-up printer ‘Élever’. Make-up as seen online could be directly printed on your face through the use of 3D-printing, facial recognition technology and AI-powered image analysis technologies.

Avvocato, L. (2019). The Power of Artificial Intelligence for Cosmetics Brands. [online]. Retrieved from:
https://www.launchmetrics.com/resources/blog/artificial-intelligence-beauty-industry

Draper, S. (2018). L’Oréal Trying Augmented Reality to Bring the Makeup Counter Into Your Home. [online]. Retrieved from:
https://www.wearable-technologies.com/2018/06/loreal-trying-augmented-reality-to-bring-the-makeup-counter-into-your-home/

Dudkin, I. (2019). Benefits of Augmented Reality for the Beauty Industry. [online]. Retrieved from:
https://skywell.software/blog/benefits-of-augmented-reality-for-the-beauty-industry/

Shu, C. (2019). The company behind YouCam Makeup app launches a new set of AR tools for beauty brands like Ulta. [online]. Retrieved from:
https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/10/the-company-behind-youcam-makeup-app-launches-a-new-set-of-ar-tools-for-beauty-brands-like-ulta/

Thomas, D. (2019). Five tech trends shaping the beauty industry. [online]. Retrieved from:
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48369970

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See it, search it, shop it: shaping the future of search

26

September

2019

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In upcoming years, online shopping is predicted to become more brand-driven, sensory, accurate and focused on mobile activity. Consumers are increasingly using their electronics for all types search purposes by means of giving search commands by voice, capturing specific elements of their surroundings or using specialist search engines for browsing specific products (Boyd, 2018).
Relevant examples of the usage of specialist or vertical search engines are Skyscanner or social platform Pinterest. Pinterest contains around 2.5 billion objects across home and fashion pins which makes great possibilities for product matching and opens doors for monetization opportunities.
Another development in search, namely Voice-based searching, allows users to converse with search via voice. Applications range from mobile phones to voice assistants like Google Home or Amazon Alexa.
While voice-based searching is already ingrained in the population, another sensory searching method, image-based search is paving its way for fully user integration. As the human brain is very visual, it tends to identify images quickly (Davinson, 2018). Visual search engines rely on neural networks through artificial intelligence that recognizes patterns within the image and matches these to what it has previously learnt. One of the first adoptions, Google Lens, uses camera-based search that uses ‘style-matching’ feature to give users the possibility of what they captured and browse related items through the web (Morris, 2019).
From a branding perspective, it is becoming more important to be consistent, recognizable and a findable brand. Image-search is not only a breakthrough for retailers but also the SEO industry. Brands should not only focus on SEO but also VSO, vertical search engine optimization. By integrating VSO, which is the indexing and exposition of content on a site, category or industry in combination with advertising through that platform, it will reap the most benefits from search.
Through the 3V’s namely; vertical, voice and visual search, the industry will become an omnipresent channel that enhances customer experience and give them more choices and ultimately let them make better decisions (Betts, 2018).

 

Betts, A. (2018). The future of enterprise search. [online] Available at: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/future-of-enterprise-search/260871/#close

Boyd, C. (2018). The Future of Search 2019 and beyond. [online] Available at: https://medium.com/@clarkboyd/the-future-of-search-2019-and-beyond-f9625a04ceeb

Morris, G. (2019). Visual, Voice & Vertical: The Next Generations of Search. [online] Available at: https://blog-digital.travelport.com/visual-voice-vertical-the-next-generations-of-search

Davinson, C & Sulivan, R (2018). Visual search: The natural evolution in how we search for information. [online]. Available at: https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/visual-search-natural-evolution-search-information/1492127

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