Rita Palma, marketing manager of Soft & Co, explains that the brand’s products are made from natural ingredients, with very simple, quality formulae. They are very affordable in terms of price and availability, with very wide distribution. is the products are available at major retailers, but the competition is the large multinationals, with many years of Portuguese market, high visi-bility and recognition by the consumer, broad offerings and large investments in communica-tion. “We needed differentiating elements beyond communicating that we were a high quality 100% Portuguese brand. This is how the application for the “product of the year” comes up, especially with the aim of attracting attention, giving visibility, provoking experimentation. We know that sales and customer satisfaction are the natural consequence as the product had a good distribution and all tests had shown wide acceptance of the formulae and the product.
At the beginning of 2019 we received the Product of the Year for a Hydration Product award and from February we started to use the store seal on the product (a first stage in a choker and a second stage in the blister itself).
The major investment around this award was mainly in point of sale
(exhibitors, leaflets, stop-pers), social media, consumer and trade press, sponsorships, events and a lot of sampling.
It was a year of great activity and with a communication axis focused on the prize. In addition to visibility, recognition and curiosity from consumers, media, customers… the results are in sight: we increased sales by 23% in cream and 17% in the full range compared to the previous year. We also increased distribution to new chains and some customers came to the company because of Cream. Right now, with the success that the cream is having and the feedback we get from consumers and customers, we are considering new formats by extending the line. In our opinion, receiving this distinction and seal was at the right time and greatly benefited the development of the whole range, enabling it to grow considerably in a short time”.
For Mary Kay, “The Product of the Year seal was a fantastic way to value our corporate investment in this new product. The research and development lasted almost 5 years and so it was a testament to the quality inherent in this release. For 17 years, Mary Kay had not overhauled its skin care foundation set! Having won Product of the Year in this same category meant that our Consultants had even more reason to believe in its effectiveness and want to present it to their clients,” explains Rita Arriaga, Mary Kay’s marketing & communication specialist. “As we cannot label the products, we developed, right after the award was awarded, a flyer with the label and the category in which the TimeWise® 3D Miracle Set had been awarded, to be sent out whenever a Beauty Consultant purchases this set. It was fantastic to realize that not only did it add value to the company, it was so cherished by our Beauty Consultants to the point of putting it in frames to decorate the offices! I have attached three examples, two posts and a story from three different beauty consultants, where this issue is perfectly visible.
