Engage, Educate, Entertain

Several weeks into the lockdown, the marketing staff at big brand companies are rising to the challenge of remaining relevant to consumers during the coronavirus outbreak. With the instore experience an increasingly distant memory, our favourite beauty, fragrance and fashion brands have chosen two broad methods to remind us of their existence.

The first of is to educate us in product-relevant ways with the help of expert advice, tips and how-to videos. L’Oreal’s La Roche-Posay skincare brand provides a good example with its ‘A Better Life at Home’ campaign on Instagram. Specialists from within the company or outsiders such as medics share pointers on caring for skin, body and mind in a series of live sessions.

The perfume division of Italian luxury house Bulgari offers a ‘Scents Workshop’, again via Instagram. This themed quiz asks questions like ‘How many ingredients are typically used to make a fragrance?’ (4,000 apparently), neatly underlining the sophistication of the maker’s wares.

The other route brands take to maintain contact is entertainment, often with a Covid-19 angle. Foreo, the Swedish beauty-tech company, used short-form video platform TikTok to remind us of the importance of not touching our face in preventing the spread of the virus. Originally used to keep staff safe, the #watchingyoutouch challenge went viral as consumers joined in.

Heineken has likewise built a series of amusing and uplifting videos, under the title #SocialiseResponsibly, on the idea that social distancing need not make us feel disconnected.

Clothing brand Tommy Hilfiger is playing the entertainment card too, filling its Instagram presence with an eclectic mix of content that includes home workout sessions, playlists, interviews, videos by singers, artists and more.