Question

Skin care and cosmetic products are necessities for ladies nowadays. People are more than willing to invest in these items to increase their charm. In the meantime, cosmetic companies strive for better ways to deliver product information to potential customers and arouse their interest in purchasing. Besides offering discounts there are many other ways to trigger sales. Evelyn Lauder, an executive at Estée Lauder and member of the Lauder family, created the Clinique brand name and developed its line of products. Lauder worked as the training director for Clinique. She was the first person to wear the trademark white lab coat, now worn by Clinique salespeople at cosmetic departments worldwide. Here is an example of how Clinique, one of the cosmetics and skin care companies, promotes its mascara brand through various channels. With the key objectives to acquire new consumers and further grow the mascara franchise, Clinique adopted a series of promotion activities to achieve them.

Aggressive Print-Ad Campaign

Targeting the right group of female consumers, Clinique in Hong Kong advertised intensively on several selected magazines such as JCODE, Elle, and CosmoGirl to create awareness among them.

Mascara Exchange Online Campaign

The purpose of this campaign was to invite customers to visit Clinique stores and get a mascara sample by returning used mascara. The exchange program was to encourage people to take the very first step to experience Cliniques’ new mascara. The main channel of promoting the campaign was via the Internet. Pop-up ads were used on popular search engines like Google and Yahoo! HK. On top of that, electronic direct mail was also sent out to subscribers of Beauty Exchange, Jessica.com, Elle.com, and She.com, to reach a larger group of target consumers. Various activities were launched by Clinique, aimed at encouraging trials from potential female customers. Campaigns like the Mascara Preview Party at Clinique counters and the Mascara Makeup Demo at road shows generated customers keen on trying out the new mascara.

“Big Eyes Competition”

Another promotion activity adopted by Clinique was the “Big Eyes Competition,” meant to create launch excitement. This competition took place in road shows, with the use of Clinique counters in shopping malls. Clinique makeup artists helped customers put on the new mascara. Photos were taken later, and those with the biggest and brightest eyes as judged by Clinique were awarded prizes of Ghs1,000 worth of Clinique coupons. With such marketing campaigns, Clinique’s efforts paid off. According to Beaute Research in 2010, the ranking of Clinique mascara went up, from sixth to second.

REQUIRED

a. Discuss the various elements of the communications process used by Clinique in the different promotion

programs.

b. Analyze this campaign in terms of the following key elements:

i. Identification of target audience

ii. Design of the campaign message

iii. Choice of media through which to send the message

c. Do you agree Clinique’s integrated promotion program was effective? Why or why not?

Answer 1

c.i agree that Clinique’s integrated promotion program was effective, because their results shows it According to Beaute Research in 2010, the ranking of Clinique mascara went up, from sixth to second. this is because their promotion program makes grater impact in the customers buying make up products behaviour.