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    C-Beauty Gone Global: Behind Perfect Diary's Western Market Entry Strategy

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    Perfect Diary is a Chinese makeup brand that gained popularity in China for its affordable, high-quality products. It has since expanded globally through influencer marketing on YouTube, celebrity endorsements, and acquiring established Western brands like EVE LOM. This allows Perfect Diary to learn from their experience expanding internationally. While Perfect Diary is successful using social media in China, it faces challenges establishing its cruelty-free stance and cultural perceptions in Western markets, which are more saturated and competitive. However, leveraging collaborations and targeting Asian consumers represent opportunities for Perfect Diary's global expansion.

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    C-Beauty Gone Global: Behind Perfect Diary's Western Market Entry Strategy

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    Wendy Jiang
    84 views10 pages
    Perfect Diary is a Chinese makeup brand that gained popularity in China for its affordable, high-quality products. It has since expanded globally through influencer marketing on YouTube, celebrity endorsements, and acquiring established Western brands like EVE LOM. This allows Perfect Diary to learn from their experience expanding internationally. While Perfect Diary is successful using social media in China, it faces challenges establishing its cruelty-free stance and cultural perceptions in Western markets, which are more saturated and competitive. However, leveraging collaborations and targeting Asian consumers represent opportunities for Perfect Diary's global expansion.

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    Perfect Diary is a Chinese makeup brand that gained popularity in China for its affordable, high-quality products. It has since expanded globally through influencer marketing on YouTube, celebrity endorsements, and acquiring established Western brands like EVE LOM. This allows Perfect Diary to learn from their experience expanding internationally. While Perfect Diary is successful using social media in China, it faces challenges establishing its cruelty-free stance and cultural perceptions in Western markets, which are more saturated and competitive. However, leveraging collaborations and targeting Asian consumers represent opportunities for Perfect Diary's global expansion.

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    84 views10 pages

    C-Beauty Gone Global: Behind Perfect Diary's Western Market Entry Strategy

    Uploaded by

    Wendy Jiang
    Perfect Diary is a Chinese makeup brand that gained popularity in China for its affordable, high-quality products. It has since expanded globally through influencer marketing on YouTube, celebrity endorsements, and acquiring established Western brands like EVE LOM. This allows Perfect Diary to learn from their experience expanding internationally. While Perfect Diary is successful using social media in China, it faces challenges establishing its cruelty-free stance and cultural perceptions in Western markets, which are more saturated and competitive. However, leveraging collaborations and targeting Asian consumers represent opportunities for Perfect Diary's global expansion.

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    of 10

    https://www.linkedin.

    com/pulse/c-beauty-gone-global-behind-perfect-diarys-western-david-
    experton

    C-beauty gone global: Behind


    Perfect Diary's western market
    entry strategy
    发布日期: 2021 年 3 月 18 日

    Matthieu (马修) David-ExpertonFollow


    China Strategic Market Research & Management Consulting (Hiring!)
     Like16

     Comment0

     分享

    If you are looking for a brand that best represents the craze of C-beauty consumption
    in 2020, Perfect Diary has no rivals. Founded in 2017, the Chinese makeup brand
    Perfect Diary gained widespread support on social media, with its unique brand
    positioning “high-end quality at a lower price point”. Its products mainly range from
    lipsticks, eyeshadow palettes, foundation, and brushes and so on. During the

    Alibaba’s Double-11 shopping holiday in 2019, the brand managed to generate

    15.4 million USD in sales within 13 minutes. Now, the C-beauty brand has
    turned its attention to outside China, the potential for Perfect Diary in the western
    market is wide open.

    Because of such quick success, Yatsen (逸仙电商), Perfect Diary’s parent company,

    became one of the most successful companies in the beauty industry in China.


    On November 19th, 2020, shares of Yatsen Holding debuted on the NYSE and
    increased almost 75% from an opening price of $10.50 to the closing price of
    $18.40 on the first day of listing, according to Yahoo Finance. While its products
    stand out because of their unique design, Perfect Diary’s success is largely attributed
    to its edgy market strategies. This article discusses how Perfect Diary markets itself in
    China and potential strategies of Perfect Diary in the Western market.

    Can Perfect Diary’s China market strategy


    convert to the west?

    Perfect Diary’s China market strategy is famous for being a pioneer of private


    traffic, which is equivalent to a “VIP customer emailing list” or a personalized coupon
    code in western countries. Since most Chinese customers don’t use emails to check

    brand promotions, Perfect Diary has created a fictional avatar “Xiao


    Wanzi” on WeChat that connects with customers and operates WeChat groups to
    cultivate a loyal customer base. Some of the C-beauty brand’s other China market
    strategies include:

     Working with KOCs or micro-influencers on platforms


    like Xiaohongshu (小红书). For example, when Perfect
    Diary launched Daydream, a new product launched for
    Chinese Valentine’s Day, they collaborated with over 150
    KOCs. The majority of these KOCs have less than 10,000
    followers..
     Culture-focused co-branding, such as the 2018
    collaboration with the British Museum for an eyeshadow
    palette released exclusively for the Double-11 shopping
    extravaganza. Working with large intellectual property
    (IP) not only wins traffic, but it also allows Perfect Diary
    to stand out by bringing out products that are in line with
    sophistication, novelty and diversity, which Gen-Z care
    about most. In 2020, Perfect Diary worked with the
    Chinese Discovery Channel to design its animal-themed
    eye shadow, featuring different animals including panda
    that the Chinese regard as the “national treasure”.

    We know these marketing strategies work spectacularly well in China, the question is,
    how can Perfect Diary adapt their strategy for the west? 
    Source: Perfect Diary x British Museum eyeshadow palette released in 2018,
    Tmall

    Perfect Diary’s Western market entry strategy

    Influencer marketing: Working with beauty


    influencers on YouTube

    In an attempt to break into the highly competitive western beauty market, Perfect
    Diary started to work with beauty Youtubers. On November 20th, 2020, just a day
    after Yatsen Holdings (Perfect Diary’s parent company) went public on NYSE, Kelly
    Strack, a famous beauty guru with over 886K subscribers posted a video named
    “Testing New Makeup Brand Perfect Diary” in collaboration with Perfect Diary.

    Beauty influencer Kelly Strack’s Perfect Diary promotion video

    This is one of the first American Youtubers that Perfect Diary worked with, and the
    outcome is encouraging: this review video attracted over 50K views and over 300
    comments. The majority of the comments about the brand are something along the

    lines “I have never heard of this brand, thanks for sharing”. According to Google

    Trends, web searches have been climbing, and reached a new high around the time
    of the video. Due to the timing of being published only a week before Black Friday,
    Perfect Diary was able to gain a wider consumer base and a possible sales boost.

    Data source: Google trends, Perfect Diary global web search interest index,
    2021

    Celebrity endorsements: Appointing Troye Sivan as


    the face of its eye shadow collection and
    collaboration with the Flaunt Magazine

    In October 2020, Perfect Diary appointed Troye Sivan as its latest brand


    ambassador for the animal eye shadow collection. Although this campaign was
    officially promoted in China, the campaign videos featuring the eminent music artist
    was uploaded all over online platforms in western countries such as Twitter, YouTube
    and Instagram. The population base is much smaller in Western countries, but the
    market for beauty products is relatively more saturated than in China. Having
    products promoted indirectly on Western social media platforms is an effective
    channel to westward expansion without setting up bricks-and-mortar stores early on in
    the expansion process.

    Moreover, in an  interview with Emilia Clarke, Flaunt Magazine used


    Perfect Diary makeup products. As the interview page or the video description page
    does not indicate that this is a collaboration between Flaunt Magazine and Perfect
    Diary, this is one of many first big moves/success for Perfect Diary. Although Perfect
    Diary is a fledgling makeup brand in the Western market with a limited market share,
    mainstream Western magazines have begun to use their products on large-scale
    shooting scenes. Undoubtedly, this is a kind of special recognition for the early stage
    of Perfect Diary’s western market entry process, which will also lay the foundation
    for the subsequent market development.

    Source: Flaunt Magazine, Instagram, 2019, Perfect Diary being noticed by


    foreign models is a big step for the C-beauty brand’s global market strategy

    Acquiring western brands: Perfect Diary’s


    parent company Yatsen Holdings acquired EVE
    LOM
    On March 2nd 2021, Yatsen Holdings announced the purchase of the prestigious
    British make-up brand EVE LOM from Manzanita Capital, who will still retain a

    minority stake in the business, according to Yahoo Life. As more western brands
    are interested in expanding to the Chinese market, not that many Chinese brands have
    started to break into the western world, let alone acquiring an established, high-end
    brand originated in the UK.

    Unlike mature beauty brands in the west, Chinese makeup brands lack longstanding
    history and a product formula that’s been tested over and over. Although EVE LOM
    was originally a niche skincare brand, after 20 years of history, it has successfully
    penetrated the North American, European and Asian markets. The benefits of the
    acquisition of EVE LOM is more than EVE LOM’s existing consumer base and brand
    influence: it represents the opportunity for Perfect Diary to learn from EVE LOM’s
    international market entry experience, access to unique formulas and manufacturing
    plants. Such an opportunity will not only improve the quality of the Perfect Diary
    product itself but also make its production more in line with the preference of Western
    consumers.

    What are Perfect Diary’s chances of success in the


    west? A SWOT analyis

    Strengths

    Perfect Diary is well-versed in social media or general online marketing. While a


    large proportion of Chinese brands fail to break into the Western market because of
    their lack of experience in effective communication with Western customers, Perfect
    Diary is confident to make a positive, lasting impression through its efficient social
    media strategy

    Perfect Diary has already gained some popularity because it collaborated with big
    IPs such as the MET and the British Museum

    Weakness

    “Cruelty-Free” commitment is prevalent in Western countries. However, after


    checking Perfect Diary’s website and connecting with customer service on the Tmall
    shop, it seems that Perfect Diary refuses to take a stand regarding whether they have
    used animal testing for their products.
    As one of the first Chinese makeup brands trying to break into the Western
    market, Perfect Diary does not have many precedented Western market entry case
    examples to consult.

    Opportunity

    As one of the several Asian beauty brands in the western market, Perfect Diary
    can differentiate itself by designing and targeting its products towards Asian skins and
    features.

    Perfect Diary can leverage collaborations on different channels a bit more. “Referrals”


    only account for 4.34% of the total traffic source of the Perfect Diary’s Website.

    Threat

    Cultural gap: Political and cultural considerations make Chinese brands often

    misunderstood (i.e. the “cheap and nasty” connotation). With Perfect


    Diary’s brand positioning of “an affordable makeup”, it is questionable if it won’t
    suffer from such accusations.

    The western beauty market is already relatively saturated, the stiff competition may
    make it extra difficult to own a big market share.

    How Perfect Diary international gets web


    traffic
    Source: Perfect Diary Traffic Sources in the west, SimilarWeb, designed by
    daxue Consulting, 2020

    A high proportion of Perfect Diary’s web traffic is organic – with display ads only
    making a fraction of a percent, and web search and direct traffic making the majority.

    In most cases, up to 60% of “direct traffic” is actually web searches or other


    organic sources. A high amount of organic traffic for Perfect Diary’s foreign
    facing website means high brand awareness and good SEO practices.

    According to SimilarWeb, 10.9% of total website traffic to Perfect Diary Website is


    in the United States, and only 4.3% of the total traffic sources account for referrals.
    Compared to established beauty brands who are experts in leveraging traffic on
    YouTube or other social media, Perfect Diary still has some room to improve. This
    tactic will not only improve product awareness among western shoppers but also
    implement that “KOC reviews” style of marketing tactic which has already succeeded
    on Xiaohongshu (小红书). This strategy would work well early on in the expansion
    process because customers of Perfect Diary in the western market would heavily rely
    on each other’s opinions before making a purchase, as they are not familiar with the
    products and the products are not widely accessible as other established brands.
    A promising future ahead of Perfect Diary‘s
    westward expansion
    All in all, the future of Perfect Diary in the western market looks promising. YouTube
    collaborations help Perfect Diary gain a customer base who follows trends and are
    interested in new, unique C-Beauty brands. Working with big celebrities like Troye
    Sivan allows Perfect Diary to have a first taste of the influence of this campaign
    overseas while also leveraging on Troye’s popularity in China to build a solid base of
    Chinese consumers. Moreover, the newest acquisition of EVE LOM allows Perfect
    Diary to build a more diverse consumer base and an international network with
    western brands through the connection of EVE LOM. Though Perfect Diary is still in

    the preliminary stage of its westward expansion, the success of Florasis


    abroad sets a great example to follow.

    If you are interested in learning how Daxue Consulting can help your company with
    international market entry strategies, please feel free to reach out to us

    at [email protected].

    This article was originally published on our website, and I am now sharing


    with permission of the author, our media intern Jenny Wu.

    Learn something new? Stay updated on the Chinese


    market by following daxue consulting on WeChat,
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