In recent years, the beauty industry has skyrocketed. What once consisted solely of makeup brands and business owners, now is made up of freelance artists, social media influencers and brand ambassadors,
Samantha Ravndahl, a popular makeup artist based in Canada, speaks out on these issues quite often. The first issue is how makeup brands are coming out with new product.
She says, “brands are pumping out product that is not being inventive or well thought out.” Influencers are often called entitled for not being “appreciative” of receiving free product in the mail, when the real issue is that they are not receiving products that are worth being promoted. Randavaul explains, “these brands are not sending out PR because they want to be nice. They are sending out PR because they want free promotion, and this tactic costs them very little.”
These days, an eyeshadow is an eyeshadow. There are so many amazing eyeshadows on the market that it is hard for brands to compete, so they are coming out with products that are not unique or eye-catching, because they are in a rush to release a product before someone else does.
Another issue that has come to light is that brands are looking for influencers based on how many followers they have rather than how talented they are. Someone could be the most talented artist in the world, but if they only have one-thousand followers, and a less talented artist has ten-thousand, makeup brands will be more willing to send the artist with more followers their product.
“There’s a popular company with many popular influencers backing it, and a lot of the higher-earning influencers are making around $50 to $75,000 a month off their codes. But don’t worry… it really is the best eye-shadow they’ve ever tried,” says Ravndahl. An eyeshadow that is sub-par could be hyped up so much because influencers are given an outrageous amount of money to promote it. This often leads to disappointment from consumers when they buy a product that they believe is going to be the best thing they’ve ever tried.
When brands pay influencers to talk about their product, they give them a specific way to show their product, and give them talking points. A makeup artist based on Youtube named Rawbeautykristy, says on twitter, “a mention is a lower rate, generally 60-90 second mention with a few key talking points they want covered. A dedicated video is a full sponsored video where you discuss generally only their brand/product featured,” Kristy says, “I have never in my 5 years on youtube been offered money to talk negatively about a brand.”
There is a lot of confusion and miscommunication between the makeup industry and consumers. Billions of dollars are being tossed around from influencers, to businesses, to consumers, and so on. It’s not a matter of money, it’s a matter of how it’s being spent.