Dermalogica is the number one choice for skin care professionals worldwide. Their focus on boosting skin health, rather than beauty, sets them apart from the competition. Launched in the US in 1986, the brand has now grown to include 100,000 skin therapists worldwide, sold in over 80 countries and has won over 324 awards.
In 2018, they asked us to help launch 2 new products to their new Clear Start range for teenage breakout-prone skin: Breakout Clearing Booster and Blackhead Clearing Fizz Mask. The aim was to raise awareness and drive traffic through innovative creative.
Our strategic approach was informed by research and category observations:
Research: We found that skin health is a major source of confidence for young people, but that too often brands focus on beauty only, brushing over real skin concerns. We needed a story that would feel real, authentic and resonate with young people on a deeper, more meaningful level.
Ambassador Partnership: To help teens battle their skin problems and low self-confidence, Dermalogica partnered with TV personality Georgia Toffolo, the Made in Chelsea star and winner of 2017's I'm A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
Having experienced her own skin issues, Georgia was perfectly poised to help Dermalogica educate young people on all things skin care. By telling her story, we would be able to authentically position the brand as a gateway to restoring self-confidence. At the same time, Georgia's naturally fun personality would speak to a younger generation of skin care customers on their terms, boosting emotional appeal and acceptance of the message.
Our aim was to create a social-first campaign that would connect with our younger target demographic directly, through the channels they consume and trust most.
Creative Execution and Media Rollout: Once we identified a core audience of potential customers, we worked with Dermalogica to create a social campaign to introduce the Clear Start range:
Social Ads: We developed a robust paid media plan and a suite of native social assets tailored to each channel, helping nudge new audiences along the conversion funnel in a timely and relevant manner:
Engage: A two week burst to raise awareness of Toff's story and Dermalogica's new Clear Start Duo, building an engaged audience to retarget
Educate: Retarget engaged customers with best-in-class tailored content, such as learning about Toff's skin past or skin care routine, helping to drive traffic
Convert: Retarget highly engaged customers with thumb stopping, product-led messages to encourage trial.
By leveraging the product's bright and bold colour palette, we were able to create a series of distinctive video assets that not only stood out on busy feeds, but reflected Toff's bubbly personality and elevated key messages. These included: Instagram Posts & Stories, 6" YouTube bumpers, 15" YouTube Pre-rolls and GIFs.
Toff's Social: We worked with Toff to create a sequence of content that she could post to her own channels, activating her fan base to help raise awareness and drive engagement.
Skinfluencers: Dermalogica activated their tribe of micro-influencers by sending them the two new products for review. We then integrated these assets into our content programme, including UGC and real reviews, to help drive engagement and peer-to-peer recommendation.
The Clear Start Duo sold out in all retailers in the UK within 2 weeks of campaign launch
YoY sales of Clear Start increased by 94%
We reached 5.4 million of our target audience
We overperformed against web traffic estimates by +131%
Average organic engagement rate of 3.3% (vs 0.8% avg)
