If you’re not building your brand on social media these days, you’re not doing it right. Industries across the board are having huge success with social and influencer marketing, and beauty and personal care brands are no exception. On the other end of the spectrum, word of mouth remains the best metric for offline conversations—the other kind of “social.”
Social data and analytics firm Engagement Labs recently released its latest TotalSocial® ranking of the top beauty and personal care brands in the U.S based on social influence, a ranking that continuously measures the most important drivers of brand social performance.
Ulta is the top ranked brand, up from third in the previous ranking, thanks to leading all brands in terms of offline consumer conversations. The ranking is unique in that it combines offline and online consumer conversations. The brands in the top 10 have earned the highest TotalSocial scores in the category for the last six months, compared to the company’s previous ranking published June 2018.
Ulta edged out Bath & Body Works and Sephora among beauty and personal care brands, based on the quantity and quality of conversation engagement by consumers. The brand’s recent high point was in March when YouTube sensation Jeffree Star drew a massive crowd to a Houston Ulta store to highlight his Morphe brand collaboration. The impact could be seen in both social media and face-to-face conversations.
Meanwhile, Bath & Body Works held steady in the number two position, one of only two brands scoring above 55 on both online and offline conversation (the other such brand is Lush). Sephora was third ranked, followed by Dove Men + Care, which jumped up five ranking points to fourth overall thanks to extremely high sentiment scores, both online and offline.
“Leadership in social influence requires brands embrace a holistic strategy, emphasizing both online and offline conversations,” said Ed Keller, CEO of Engagement Labs. “The top TotalSocial beauty brands are what we call Conversation Commanders, because they excel both online and offline. That’s important because online and offline conversations are equally important in driving sales.”
Declining performance in offline conversation drove Avon from first to fifth place in the ranking.
Engagement Labs recently published a report focusing on the large differences in online and offline conversations, which underscores the importance of brands to achieve strength in both channels to drive business performance improvement.
