Sephora’s eCommerce Strategy, How it Stays on Top

 

By Tricia McKinnon

If you are curious about where eCommerce is headed then look no further than a retailer that’s at the top like Sephora. Sephora has long been the place to go for your beauty needs whether it’s the latest Fenty Beauty lipstick or a quick fix from The Ordinary. Sephora spends tens of millions each year on eCommerce and it shows with 58% of Sephora’s 2022 holiday sales coming from eCommerce up from 43% in 2019. From innovative digital shopping tools to fast shipments of online orders here are four elements of Sephora’s eCommerce strategy you should look out for.

1. Meet customers where they are. Properly supporting customers during their online shopping journey will be what separates the leaders from the rest. We have all gone online to buy a product only to find we have many questions and no one to answer them. Thinking about how to solve this issue, Sephora has a Live Beauty Help feature on its mobile app and website. A customer using this feature is paired with a Sephora beauty advisor in real time who can answer questions such as “what foundation matches my skin tone?”; “will this conditioner weigh my curls down?"or “when will my package arrive?”

Having a feature like this brings the online shopping experience closer to the in store shopping experience where you have the option of getting help before placing an order. If you are looking for the best red matte lipstick and you have dark skin then you don’t have to riffle through hundreds of reviews trying to figure out which brand will work with your skin tone. Instead, all you have to do is take out your mobile phone, open the Sephora app and expert advice is available at your fingertips. If you shop online a lot then you know that the friction associated with not having a personal touch can result in lost sales. Sephora’s Live Beauty Help feature is also beneficial to employees who prefer working at home. 

2. Provide faster service. At one point not too long ago two-day delivery was a luxury and now it seems lazy. Not wanting to leave anxious beauty lovers behind Sephora tries to get your order to you almost as fast as if you were in the store picking it up for yourself. To make this possible in September Sephora launched a subscription-based membership program called Sephora Same-Day Unlimited. Customers who sign up for the service get their beauty products delivered to them within two hours and there is no minimum order amount. “A recent survey found that the No. 1 service beauty shoppers want is product delivery within a matter of hours,” said Sephora in a statement. “Beauty ‘emergencies’ can happen at any time. Sixty-three percent of beauty shoppers say running out of product and needing a replacement ASAP would prompt them to seek out same-day delivery service.”

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3. Elevate the online shopping experience. While shopping online is convenient there is a reason why consumers still conduct the majority of their shopping in stores. Quite simply, there are things you can’t do online like a try a product on. No amount of customer reviews can make up for this type of friction. But Sephora has developed an innovative tool called the Virtual Artist which makes shopping from home for certain products pretty close to the real thing. 

Sephora’s Virtual Artist uses facial recognition technology to allow customers to try on products digitally. Customers scan their face using the app. Then they can try on different shades of makeup using the app. If a customer likes their simulated look they can quickly and easily buy the products without even leaving the app. Within the app customers can also take makeup tutorials. For example, if a customer takes a contouring tutorial the app will overlay the contouring look on the customer’s face digitally. This is also an excellent example of personalization at an individual level. Tools like this reduce a lot of the fear a shopper has about whether or not what they see online is going to work when it arrives in the mail. Experiences like this are especially important in high touch categories like beauty where customers like to touch and feel products before they buy them.

4. Open more stores. No ecommerce strategy is complete without considering the role of stores. Even though eCommerce surged during the COVID-19 pandemic in the first quarter of 2023 eCommerce sales in the United States only represented 15.1% of total retail sales. While eCommerce penetration is higher in categories like beauty and apparel the retailers recognize the importance of stores to their overall customer acquisition and sales strategy. 

In 2020 Sephora announced a partnership with Kohl’s which will see more than 850 Sephora shops inside of Kohl’s stores by the end of this year. “Stores are a powerful way to bring experiences to life for people,” said Sephora’s former executive vice president of omni retail, Mary Beth Laughton. “People are longing for personal connection,” Laughton says. “When they come into one of our stores, that's when they can interact with our Beauty Advisors. They can get this really personal, amazing advice.” Since so many offline shopping trips start online it’s important that the transition from online to offline is seamless by offering great customer service that is at the same level as the online experience.

Having stores also allows retailers to serve customers in the manner they want. One of the services that took off during the pandemic was buy online pick up in store. Some customers like this option because it eliminates delivery costs or they simply want to get their order faster. Sephora offers buy online and pick up in store as well as curbside pickup. “In my view, the future of retail in America is the ability for shoppers to park right next door, to jump in and out for a [buy online, pick up in store] order,” said Sephora Americas CEO Jean-Andre Rougeot. “That is what retail is about moving forward.”

Tricia McKinnonStrategy & Growth, eCommerceComment