Seed Beauty is an incubator that helped launch Kylie Cosmetics and KKW Beauty. Its first cosmetics label, ColourPop, has high engagement on social media that outpaces its star-studded competition without the weight of a Kardashian behind it. ColourPop’s strategy instead comes down to casting a wider net of influence with savvy, ever-changing collaborations and an approach to social media that encourages consumers to engage with them beyond simply hitting “like”.

In October 2019, ColourPop received more than 18 million likes and comments on Instagram– more than Kylie Cosmetics and KKW (after Instascreener removed bots).

ColourPop doesn’t have that single influencer face behind it, but it’s still dominating social media in its own way

Instascreener co-founder Sean Spielberg

There are a few different techniques that every brand uses to succeed with social media engagement and ColourPop combines them all more than any other brand out there right now.

Instascreener co-founder Sean Spielberg

Here are the 3 marketing tactics ColourPop uses to generate massive engagement and sales.

1. Constant collaborations

One of the first companies to embrace the “fast beauty” movement was ColourPop, ColourPop can create a new product from concept to completion in as little as five days. Two to three limited-edition launches are released monthly as part of its collaborations, and these launches are mostly what drive the brand’s online engagement. In 2019, the company collaborated with Disney on a line of goods inspired by the “Midnight Masquerade Series” dolls and with beauty influencer Safiya Nygaard on a six-piece lipstick collection.

Constant influencer partnerships boost the brand’s sales: Nygaard’s ran out of stock in less than 24 hours. Nygaards posts announcing the products saw more than 600,000 likes.

Although its celebrity-driven sister brands like Kylie Jenner’s Kylie Cosmetics and Kim Kardashian’s KKW employ a similar tactic, Because they depend on 1 face to promote the brand it can slow down growth. KKW and Kylie Cosmetics entirely depend on their celebrities schedule and timing. The one celeb style of promotion although can work really well early on, can also lose steam over time as the audience gets bored of seeing the same style of content over and over again. ColourPop can work with multiple smaller influencers and quickly spin up new products aligned with that influencers persona and audience. They can then test what works at a much lower acquisition cost and risk. By creating smaller production runs and having a lower sponsorship cost by working with smaller influencers – Even if the limited-edition products don’t sell they didn’t have to invest in massive upfront costs like a large stockpile of product or large cost to work with a celebrity. Instead using a tactic similar to apple where they limit the first production run and quickly add more inventory as sales ramp up.

Consumers find ColourPop particularly enticing because of its wide range of relationships, according to Tamara Gaffney, vice president of decision strategy at digital experience agency Quantum Metric. Customers want to find and connect with peers that resemble them on social media. For instance, Kathleen Lights, a Cuban-American with feminine flair, and Nygaard, a half-Indian influencer, both stand out from the typical influencer population with their unique styles. The company is collaborating with Korean beauty YouTuber Pony Park in November 2019.

Research demonstrates that influencer partnerships continue to be profitable despite consumers being more knowledgeable of influencer marketing. According to Ypulse statistics, 52% of 13 to 37-year-olds in the US said they are more likely to buy a product that has been suggested by their favourite influencer. 56 percent of this group thinks that an influencer’s support for a product shows that they genuinely like it.

ColourPop is still using this approach 3 years later. With its latest partnership in November of 2022 with the Harry Potter franchise.

2. Good Product

No Amount of Marketing Solves a Bad Product

Gary Vaynerchuk

ColourPop received over 4,000 organic influencer mentions. The brand is well-liked among makeup artists who promote it without receiving compensation because they genuinely enjoy the cosmetics (Although organic content shows that an influencer wasn’t compensated for a post, it doesn’t necessarily mean they bought the merchandise themselves). ColourPop declined to comment on its influencer approach, but a source close to the company said that each month it distributes free items to a large number of influencers.

3. Regular giveaways

Offering frequent giveaways can help beauty companies gain more engagement than posts by beauty influencers. With freebies for a wide range of new goods, including some that aren’t limited edition or associated with an influencer, ColourPop has included this into its marketing approach.

For instance, ColourPop advertised a promotion for a new Harry Potter Cosmetics line. Where 4 winners get the full collection and one winner will get the collection and a Vera tote bag. ColourPop received more than 57,000 likes for that one post alone.

When ColourPop works with influencers, they are also charged with organising giveaways because this helps attract followers from their popular personal accounts to the brand’s. In addition to obtaining her collection from ColourPop, Nygaard gave her followers the opportunity to tour the company’s factory and make their own lipstick. Nygaard’s followers have to follow ColourPop on Instagram in order to be eligible. Celebrity companies, on the other hand, frequently rely less on this tactic and derive the majority of their buzz from the celebrities brand alone.

The success ColourPop had with freebies is now being used to promote other Seed Beauty items that don’t have a well-known face on the packaging. Fourth Ray Beauty, a vegan skincare product from Seed, was the subject of a giveaway in October 2019 on the ColourPop account. Fourth Ray Beauty gains additional followers and prospective customers by requesting ColourPop fans to follow them in order to enter to win products from both brands.

This brand has social media in its DNA and you can see that it really pays off

Instascreener co-founder Sean Spielberg

Using influencers can really help create a memorable image in your target audience’s eyes and increase the perceived value of your brand. This is especially important as margins in eCommerce are typically low. By partnering with an influencer you can charge a higher price resulting in a higher margin to help power your brand in both marketing and customer experience.