Brand communities have evolved to adopt new means of communication, new outlets and new ways of learning about products — but have they really changed?
Carrie Gross, cofounder and chief creative officer of Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare, started her company with her dermatologist husband 25 years ago by going to traditional media and building a tight-knit community. Her approach hasn’t changed very much, she said at the Beauty CEO Summit.
From her husband holding skin cancer screenings at JP Morgan to Gross herself passing out products at lunch, the brand has always been high touch. “I was passing out peels and cards to all of my friends, dropping boxes on celebrities’ tables,” she said. And then with the help of fashion and beauty editors [who] wrote about the peel, it just kind of exploded.
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“We touch people’s skin [and] we touch their hearts,” Gross continued. “We’re not transactional and we built very long-lasting, authentic relationships — and it’s the same today.”
From his perspective as the cofounder of Odore, a creator engagement platform, Armaan Mehta agreed that it is imperative to be authentic rather than transactional as the creator landscape evolves. “A lot of brands are treating these relationships very transactionally,” said Mehta. “They’re treating nanos [influencers] like they’re smaller versions of macro influencers, but that completely defeats the whole point.”
Odore’s solution includes an approach called progressive engagement, where an analysis is done to understand a brand’s relationship with a creator to see value in a community over time.
As the creator ecosystem has evolved in the last year, Odore has seen a larger focus on nano and micro influencers, and while he doesn’t believe that these influencers are going to completely dominate the creator space, a multilayered strategy can be extremely valuable.
“One of the most exciting things, is that we’re seeing luxury brands embracing the concept of partnering with nano and micros,” Mehta said. “Having conversations with other luxury groups there was a lot of pushback [and] hesitation because luxury brands often want more control over their brand and messaging. But today’s consumers want that authenticity. The younger generation want to buy from brands that they can relate with, and it’s great to see that they are giving that control to the creators.”
In terms of how to measure the success of a community, Gross said that for her the most important thing to consider is repeat purchases and building super fans. “I want retention,” she said. “That’s the number-one thing I’m looking for and then there is building the basket. They might start with the peel and then hopefully we’re building a full regimen and that’s my sweet spot.”
From his perspective, Mehta said there are overarching metrics like community growth and retention to consider. You have to apply the right metrics at the right time, he said. This may mean that certain cohorts are great at generating sales and measuring how many sales they are driving through GMV or conversion rates while others are great at creating content that is driving awareness for the brand.
Bringing these ideas of measuring success while prioritizing authenticity together, Mehta said Odore strongly believes that “every creator has its own strengths.”
“Iit’s very important to give creators or your community members that opportunity to shine and give them the right briefs and the right campaigns,” Mehta said. “The biggest overarching theme is that it’s good for brands to find creators that are truly authentic to your category or your niche. You want to give them the right tools to amplify your brand’s message.”