L’ORÉAL Paris is well known for its flawless communication. Still, besides selected premium stores, most women purchase cosmetics at pharmacies and department stores where products are crammed into one huge wall full of retail messaging. This is both confusing and frustrating for existing and potential buyers. Our messaging was successful getting people to the trade, but once there, with all the retail messaging and offers consumers ended up with other products on their hand. We needed to close the marketing loop at the most critical point, the beauty aisle. To do so, we targeted their mobile phones.

The marketing plan was executed first as a pilot at Walgreens, during the month of October 2014. With an initial successful run the program was extended to Wal-Mart in November and by February 2015 it became a permanent marketing strategy for L'Oréal Paris in Puerto Rico. Right now the program includes Walgreens, Wal-mart and CVS Pharmacy.

Chic Chat helped L’OREAL Paris increase sales by 6% across all brand categories (cosmetics, hair color, haircare and skin care) compared to the previous year (2013 vs 2014).

Most of the women who contacted Chic Chat openly said they were going to buy the product or products recommended during the chat. More interestingly, 17% wrote back and sent pictures with proof of purchase voluntarily.

The channel has become a direct CRM platform where the brand talks one on one with loyal customers.

The program was 90% more affordable and cost effective than previous efforts the brand had done at the point of sale in which they had to mobilize their experts to the trade.

Chic Chat was able to impact 100% of the stores (Walmart, Walgreen’s and CVS) instead of just a few key accounts.