J’ADORE POLYVORE…

Brands are increasingly competing with mainstream media for consumers screentime, with the most forward-thinking poaching high-profile contributors from traditional media – such as Bauer’s Fiona Macintosh joining my-wardrobe.com, and Esquire’s Jeremy Langmead moving to Mr Porter – to help them to create credible content. So anything which engages a user to spend longer on that site is pounced upon. While some sites like Shopstyle offer a chance to compile an outfit, the Polyvore site takes virtual styling to a new level. It’s been around for a while, but it seems brands are now cottoning on to the opportunities for them by letting their product images be easily available to be used and shared; and running branded competitions for themed sets incorporating their products. Beauty-related contests have included US L’Oreal Paris and one for US Lancome Hypnose Senses fragrance, judged by ‘face’, Daria Werbowy, with the finalists posted on the Lancome blog.

My makeover.com

Years ago, I was Beauty Editor at Emap’s Looks Magazine. In the era before cover mounted bags, bikinis and flip flops, we produced our own promotions in-house, churning out booklets, posters, postcards and even a video. One of the most ingenious (at the time) was The Looks Hairstyler – a clear plastic sheet with nine passport-sized images of hairdos, which you could position over a photo to see how you’d look with a curly blonde bob or a pixie crop. With the right size photo or your boyfriend’s passport, hours of entertainment. And the concept continues today, although we could never have imagined the technology that would be at our fingertips. Estee Lauder are the latest brand to unveil a Virtual Makeover tool on their Facebook page and website, where you can experiment with their colours on your face, or perhaps that of Hilary Rhoda. Facial recognition technology means you can accurately map out where the colour should go. You can fiddle around with different shades – orange lipstick, no way… nude beige – that’s better… or press the 1-click feature to be instantly madeover – although it has to be said, I resembled Tammy Faye Bakker more than Hilary Rhoda. Log on to taaz.com and you can also add a celebrity hairdo and sunglassses to complement the look.

The Changing Beauty Landscape

With the mymarketmonitor website getting a makeover, it seems like the right time to take a little look at how digital is changing the beauty landscape for the industry and consumers. I think we can safely say that only a year ago, few brands were on Twitter, Facebook pages were rudimentary and bloggers press events few and far between. Friends, fans and followers meant something quite different. Now these are all key features of the beauty industry – offering unbelievable scope for reaching out to press and consumers; but at the same time multiplying the workload of the already overstretched PR.