Vaseline slides into socials to connect with young audiences

Can a 158-year-old brand win over younger consumers to boost the brand and grow in the cluttered skincare category?

Unilever's Vaseline brand has launched a new range targeting younger consumers

Vaseline has enlisted an army of “skin-tellectuals”, young beauty and skincare focused influencers, as it seeks to boost its relevance and grow the brand for a new ­generation of consumers.

The 150-year-old Unilever brand, which has strong recognition among older shoppers and families, wants to engage with younger skin-conscious consumers in a bid to drive sales and boost growth.

To win over younger consumers, Vaseline has launched a range of hand and body moisturisers that feature active ingredients, such as vitamin C and hyaluronic acid, that are more typically found in facial skincare and beauty products.

The Gluta-Hya range will sit alongside Vaseline’s existing body care ranges to attract a new younger audience who are seeking the product’s science-based credentials, according to Unilever Australia and New Zealand Beauty and Wellbeing lead Clare Standing.

“At a total category level, we’re seeing that a lot of growth is being driven by these younger shoppers and these millennials coming into the category. Vaseline’s core customer is very much a family shopper, and with the Gluta-Hya range, it targets a very unique, different shopper, which we call the ‘skin-tellectuals’.

“Skin-tellectuals are more engaged in the beauty benefits they want those active ingredients in their skincare. They’re looking for more of the kind of beauty benefits that you see within face, versus your traditional core hand and body product, which is more ­focused on moisturisation and ­hydration.”

To capture this audience, Unilever focused on social and digital channels with a significant investment in PR and experiential to create buzz and word-of-mouth among the target audience. Vaseline hosted an “elevated launch event” at Sydney’s Shell House with 200 beauty experts, influencers and enthusiasts in a bid to leverage their credibility as trusted sources.

“This kind of high-impact influencer execution is really about using those credible voices within the beauty world to ensure that we educate and drive the desire, as well as the science credentials of the Gluta-Hya product in the right platform.

“We know our research that when you’re trying to engage shoppers, and this is any sort of age group, that word of mouth is really important, and the social commerce element of that is also really important in driving that repertoire and regime.

“We know that these skin-tellectuals and millennial shoppers are very engaged with social commerce and they do 80 per cent of their research online.

“So, the way that we show up through online platforms in terms of the look and feel of the product, the additional education around the science and technology, driving that desirability of the product and the added benefits, and also focusing very much on that influencer campaign and that social commerce piece, is really key to driving that engagement with the younger audience.”

In the four weeks since launch, Gluta-Hya has sold three times higher than pre-launch forecasts and is yet to shift into promotional activities. Ms Standing said the initial sales results echo the product’s performance in other markets such as China, India, Indonesia and most recently the US.

“We’ve seen a lot of success globally,” she said.

“Everywhere it’s launched, it’s sold between two to three times above the expectations of the business. We’re four weeks in and we’re seeing about three times what we expected prior to launch.”

Ms Standing said the marketing activity would continue to focus on influencers and social channels for six to 12 months and would not incorporate any above-the-line marketing. The next phase of the campaign would also focus on driving customers to trial the product, as in-store sales remain strong for Vaseline products, despite the ongoing growth in eCommerce, which has doubled in size over the past 10 years.

“It’s really critical to get people to trial the product, so that will be the next stage in terms of how we drive that trial of the product, as well as continuing to drive the ­social element,” she said.

“The sensory piece is also ­important. If you see people ­buying hand and body or even hair care products, they’re smelling and testing before buying, so that experiential moment drives in-store purchase, which makes it even more important that we are engaging those younger shoppers with the right sort of content online to drive that instore purchase.”

The Vaseline brand is one of Unilever’s top 30 Power Brands and passed the €1bn ($1.6bn) ­turnover in 12 months milestone this year.