
Loading summary
Ralph Burns
Are you a beauty brand but you think you're late to the Black Friday Cyber Monday party? Well, even though we've been advocating planning your Black Friday Cyber Monday for months now. In fact, the co host of this show advocates you should start this planning all the way back on Memorial Day. Well, even though it's in and around Labor Day, it's not too late because we have put together a webinar for you late to the party. Especially you beauty brands who who need to get your act together and get a good Black Friday Cyber Monday campaign planned and ready to convert. Black Friday and Cyber Monday are the most competitive moments of the year for beauty brands and the right creative is how you win. So we are putting together a free webinar on September 9th at 10:00am Pacific 1:00pm Eastern where we're going to be talking through the angle styles and hooks that are actually selling this season, not the trends we're going to see that are oversaturated and cliched macro creative trends that will shape your Q4 creative ads and get them to actually convert holiday hooks that can be shaped to your brand to own the feed and stop the scroll. And last but not least, you'll walk away with a quick start checklist so you can apply these learnings to your beauty brand in under seven days so it is not too late. Ladies and gentlemen, head on over to tier11.com bfcm and register today. This is the most important week of your entire year, so you cannot afford to miss this webinar. It's the most competitive moment of the year for beauty brands and the right creative is how you win and we'll show you exactly how to do that on this webinar. So head on over to tier11.combFCM to register to reserve your spot today.
Lauren Schwartz
A lot of people get so hung up on just Black Friday Cyber Monday that they don't think of how their creatives are going to translate throughout the rest of the year.
Ralph Burns
What's the sort of the things that you would recommend to beauty brands right now if they're not really prepared for Black Friday Cyber Monday?
Lauren Schwartz
Brands definitely need to be focusing on.
Ralph Burns
Like you're listening to Perpetual Traffic. Hello and welcome to the Perpetual Traffic Podcast. This is your host, Ralph burns, founder and CEO of Tier11. Not alongside my co host Lauren E. Petrullo here today, but we've got a special guest for all of you beauty brands who are freaking out about Black Friday Cyber Monday because you're not ready. By the way, this show is all for directors of marketing, VPs of marketing, CMOs, people who are doing marketing every single day to do it the right way. We do that through what we call metrics that matter in growth at scales. And that's what Perpetual Traffic is all about here today. And today we are going to solve one of your biggest problems that either you thought about way back in Memorial Day when we first started talking about this, or you're now realizing that, oh my God, Black Friday Cyber Monday is coming up within like a month or two and I don't have anything prepared. Well, usually I would say that you're screwed. However, in this case, if you're a beauty brand, especially this is specifically for beauty brands today. But yes, this will also relate to to a lot of e commerce brands. And we'll talk about that. We have the goat coming back on Perpetual Traffic. The greatest of all time creative strategist on the planet in history, Lauren Schwartz, back on Perpetual Traffic to save your Black Friday Cyber Monday ass here today as a beauty brand. So welcome back to Perpetual Traffic.
Lauren Schwartz
Thanks, Ralph. Always my hype man. I love it.
Ralph Burns
That's right. I'm the, I'm your ultimate hype man. I just like walk around behind you like, you know, in your daily life. And do you know how great Lauren is? Like, come on. Like, you know when you're, like when your daughter like disobeys you, you know who you're disobeying?
Lauren Schwartz
Gotta wish.
Ralph Burns
Yeah, that'd be awesome. I'm a good disciplinarian, apparently for my kids. But today we're gonna get disciplined on Black Friday Cyber Monday because I know if you're listening to this show because you said, holy crap, that headline, a title will just suck me in as a beauty brand. And we have an out for you. First off, we're doing a training on this, which is coming up on September 9th and at 10am Pacific where you get more of what we're going to be talking about here today. So make sure you, you do register for that over@tier11.com BFC. That stands for Black Friday Cyber Monday, by the way. BFCM, tier11.com and that's 1pm Eastern. If you can't do the time translation where Lauren's gonna be getting into even more detail about some of the things we're gonna talk about here today. So maybe just give us a preview of what people can expect on that webinar. But also, like, there is a lot that you need to sort of digest all at once. So what's sort of the easy button. What's the sort of the things that you would recommend to beauty brands right now if they're not really prepared for Black Friday Cyber Monday? Maybe the past, you know, they really feel like I've left money on the table like that. Business owners always tell me that, like, I always feel like I leave money on the table on Black Friday Cyber Monday. I don't really know why everybody else is crushing it except me. So what's sort of the cheat code here?
Lauren Schwartz
Wow, that's a lot. I mean, obviously, you know, good creatives, but then obviously, your offers are what a lot of people struggle with, especially for Black Friday Cyber Monday. I think, you know, when it comes to Black Friday Cyber Monday, again, it's always. It's earlier now. Usually, you know, I feel like Black Friday starts in like November 1st, as opposed to the actual Black Friday. So brands definitely need to be focusing on, like, what is their offer? Is it, you know, a bundle, is it a site wide sale, things like that. I think those are things that they need to really start figuring out now so that as they start to move into Black Friday Cyber Monday, then they can start taking that information and then really start putting it into, you know, their creatives, the hooks, you know, all the things that they kind of need in order to. To get set up for success in the beauty space.
Ralph Burns
What do you find? It's good that we're talking about this because obviously you're going to hit on this on that webinar or that tr. Really, if you're not familiar with what a webinar is, it's basically it's an online training. But the offer is always sort of the thing that's in the background that everyone is so focused on other things. It's. We talk to, you know, dozens of business owners every single week, and they're always like, oh, I just need paid ads. Well, not necessarily. You actually need to look at your offer. First and foremost. Are you offering something of value? Yes. You have validation that you're probably talking to us at this point that people do buy your stuff. But the offer is the thing on Black Friday Cyber Monday. And the other part to that is, I guess they go like, hand in hand. Here is the discount. And I find that a lot of brands, and I've seen this in the past with beauty brands, they're tentative about the discount and they're tentative about giving away too much and losing profit. Giving away too much in a bundle and then not making Black Friday Cyber Monday work because they're in the Red. They might have sold a lot of product, but they lost money. So, like, how do you avoid those kind of pitfalls? Like, how do you work through that? Because the offer and the discount is all kind of intertwined, correct? Yeah, yeah.
Lauren Schwartz
I mean, for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, most people know that they're going to get a discount. And so a lot of times I feel like with beauty brands, when they actually bundle everything together and make some sort of, like, kit, it's not necessarily like you're. You're getting a discount, like on the product per se, but you're actually, you're creating a higher LTV in that you're giving them more, but it could be a little bit of a percentage off because you're getting so much more with it. So it's not technically a discount, but it's just, it's, you know, in a sense that you're getting more because you're buying this kit, and so it's a little bit more bang for your buck, but at the same time it's. It's kind of like a. Like a smaller offer, I guess. Like it's more. So just, I guess how you position it. I feel like with beauty brands, because majority of the time their products aren't that expensive. So when you put everything together in one package, it's more enticing of an offer because they're getting all of this in one kit as opposed to having to buy it separately. So in a sense, like, if they're buying it all together separately, it could be more expensive than if they're buying it all in one kit at one price. If that makes sense.
Ralph Burns
Yeah, yeah, it does make sense. And in that kit. So for example, like, I'm looking at like Sephora is like a selling kit which is this gleamy, dreamy makeup value set for $52. And there's a ton of stuff in there. There's like 17 products. So. Well, maybe not 17, but let's say there's about 10 or 11. The point is, is that that's obviously. I mean, the price point is $52 for all of that. So there's a lot that's in there. Should brands be looking to, like, the Sephoras of the world to model their offers to a certain degree, or should you. And this is one of the examples that we use here on the show a lot because I just love this brand that's a 211 client, been so for six or seven years is they sell like a look, a specific look that's either hot at that point in time or that's it's very attractive to a specific demographic. How do you put that bundle together? Is it just a bunch of stuff together or do you try and package it around like an overall look that's maybe trendy at that point? Like what's your sense on that?
Lauren Schwartz
I mean, yeah, you could, I mean you could kind of do it both ways. Honestly, like putting your best sellers in one kit is a huge add on. Again, you're not having to buy it separately. If you get it all in one kit for one price, again, that people are going to be excited about that because you know you're going to get all these amazing products in one offer. But I do think in terms of like the trends right now, you know, sort of that styling of like you said, like base it around a look. I think that's really good. Especially like holiday looks, for instance, you know, it's like, are you wanting to do like a Thanksgiving look and you, you know, get all these products to like be, you know, have that kind of glam or whatever. Same thing with Christmas and the holidays coming up. Like, it's just, you could definitely base it around these looks that would obviously help you kind of build that story. Which one of the things we'll talk about in the webinar is how building your storytelling for Black Friday because again, not only do you need this to carry through right now, but what are you going to do after Black Friday that's going to continue on until the holidays and Q1, I think a lot of people get so hung up on just Black Friday Cyber Monday that they don't think of how their creatives are going to translate throughout the rest of the year and then onward. So building out these sort of, you know, bundles, boxes, looks however you want to do it for beauty brands is a smart way to kind of focus on what you want to do for Black Friday Cyber Monday.
Ralph Burns
So you have a bundle as sort of your feature and then with that is there an additional. Like a lot of brands do this, they'll do like a site wide discount for a specific period of time. Like how do you recommend instead of just doing one thing, but maybe that won't appeal to everyone. How do you also incorporate the discount part of Black Friday Cyber Monday into the overall look and feel of the brand?
Lauren Schwartz
So I think again, especially with Black Friday Cyber Monday, I don't always think you need to discount in order to be successful. So I know a lot of brands obviously like you are looking for that, that sale, you know, that like offer during that, that season, but you could do a sidewide sale and discount it. But again, I think for beauty brands it's all about figuring out how I can make different kits to speak to different audiences, demographics, whoever your audience is for that particular brand. I actually think going about it that way is a little bit smarter than just offering a site wide sale because I think again, like the Sephora's and the Ultas of the world are going to offer those site wide sales whereas you as the brand doesn't necessarily have to do that. But if you offer these different kits with these different products, you're just going to get more bang for your buck in that people are going to be enticed by that because I'm getting it all in one as opposed to like having to buy it separately.
Ralph Burns
Got it. So like a skin care routine bundle or.
Lauren Schwartz
Exactly, yeah, something like that.
Ralph Burns
Would you do multiple bundles or just like, okay, so I would do multiple bundles.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah, so definitely, like build out these different kits. Maybe a bestseller kit, maybe it's, you know, an acne kit. If you're a skincare brand, maybe it's a discoloration kit, like whatever it is or just again, like all the things that you want to put in these different ones, maybe offer, you know, four of them and then again you're, you're offering it with that. You're not having to buy these individually. But I get this whole set that I can try, you know, during this holiday season and you may not discount anything for the year. And this is what people get excited about because they know that, oh, I know that this brand is coming out with this holiday bundle, you know, at the end of the year. So I'm going to wait and save and then buy it then. And then again it's like you kind of, you build up that hype too.
Ralph Burns
Got it, got it. Makes sense. So, all right, so for an example, let's say you've got like a, I don't know, makeup starter kit, for example, or you know, an anti aging kit or whatever it is. And there's like four different products in there. Let's just use round numbers. You know, if you bought them all, this is probably unrealistic, but I like round numbers. If you bought them all at retail, it'd be a hundred dollars, for example. So let's just use this as an example. So for the bundle, what would you recommend for a discount? I mean, obviously cost of goods sold, you know, opex, all that sort of stuff is individual to the individual brand. But what's typical to, to get people to say, ooh, that's really good. It's, it's never like a 5 to 10% discount. I've always, I've always said, but what's the sweet spot?
Lauren Schwartz
Right? I mean, again, like, it is obviously going to be more expensive, but if you discount it, I mean, discounted it to be, you know, you're getting this like $100 bundle or whatever for the holiday price of like $80. Like, someone's going to look at that and be like, oh, sweet, 80 bucks. And I get all of this stuff. Like, that's again, you're, you're still technically, you're buying everything, but it's in this, like, kit that is, again, a little bit of a discounted price. And like you said, it obviously depends on the brand and like their cogs and everything. But, you know, putting it all together and giving them these bundling prices, you're actually again, buying more products, you're testing more things out, which at the end of the day could lead to, you know, again, as you kind of go out throughout the year, people try these products. Maybe they didn't necessarily buy the moisturizer before, but they had bought a cleanser. Now if you have this whole kit, they get to try everything and then from there they can turn into, you know, a returning customer of, oh, I love this whole entire kit. So now I'm going to buy, going forward, the moisturizer, the cleanser, the, you know, like the toner, like, whatever it is that's in this kit, like, you actually could potentially get more purchases throughout the rest of the year.
Ralph Burns
Right. So you're using this really as a. It's not specifically like a loyalty play here, although there is that element, which is sort of a whole other side subject. But I mean, we're really talking about, like, grabbing someone who maybe is a new customer and then discounting to a certain degree, maybe not making a ton of profit on that first transaction. But the whole idea is to get the refillable products after the fact. Like, once they really like that moisturizer or that toner or whatever it happens to be.
Lauren Schwartz
Right, correct. You're creating that, that value right at the beginning and then essentially you're kind of giving it them as like a tester of, like, oh, test us out. And then from there they can turn into a repeat customer.
Ralph Burns
Right. So the LTV is there. So I found that, like, when I describe that methodology to people in and around Black Friday, like, going back to my original point, they get really Tentative about the percentage discount. And you like for our fictitious example, it's $100. And you said, right, we'll offer it for 20 or for offer it for 80. So it's 20% off. Yeah, I've seen some brands go like 60% off, whether or not it's actually true, like, but that eye catching, like 65% off. I remember I saw this one, we actually had a brand that did this because it was a refillable product and they really knew their numbers. Like we're just going to go all in on Black Friday and they, you know, they sell like a million dollars in one day, you know, off our ads. But the point was they actually went in the, in the red. But because they knew the ltv, they knew the math on their products, they're like, we can do this because we know by month two, three, we're going to be profitable yet again. So how aggressive would you typically recommend somebody? You know, we're not using a percentage, but if you know your cost of goods sold or if you know your numbers, like how deep would you go, you know, in order to sort of understand and really capitalize on this and get far more volume because you're really doing a grab for new customers as opposed to, you know, just sort of satisfying your, your repeat business or your customers who have already bought from you.
Lauren Schwartz
For a beauty brand, I definitely wouldn't go more than 20%. I don't know, I just, I feel like that's like, especially for beauty products, I, I feel like any higher than that, again, I could be biased because we're in this industry, but like, I feel like it just cheapens the product and so. But I have worked on clients where I mean, they've been able to discount up to 70% off, which is again, obviously more of like an inventory play because they just have obviously a lot of inventory and they're able to do that. But then again, it kind of comes to the point, you know, I've worked on one particular brand actually where they had discounted up to 70% off. And unfortunately, because they discounted so high, the rest of the year was actually a struggle. And so then they had to wait until the next, you know, Black Friday to do another 70%. So it's like, I don't know, it's kind of that fine line of like, how much do you discount without making it so that people only wait for that time of the year to purchase your product. So for a beauty brand doing any sort of bundling and again like a 20% off I still think is a good enough amount where people will still buy the product, you know, still think it's a good discount.
Ralph Burns
Got it. Got it. Yeah. I mean you run the risk by discounting too deep. Which he totally picked up on. What I was saying is that if you do it then they always expect it that way. I mean, you run that risk no matter what. If you're constantly running sales or you know, you do like a periodic, like every, every quarter you do a flash sale, something like that, you're training your audience to wait to buy, which can really cheapen sort of the value of the product. And we were just talking about when we, before we hit record, you know, the Apple model is like, I actually asked the guy while I was there buying this uber expensive laptop, which is awesome. I was like, so what kind of deals can you offer me? He's like, Apple doesn't discount.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah, they don't.
Ralph Burns
And then there was like dead air for like five to 10 seconds. I'm like, oh yeah, that's right. He's like, you're not going to negotiate this. I'm like, well I was going to try but like Apple has trained us because the brand is bespoke. Like each beauty brand has to sort of figure that out. That's more of a business model, like what's our vision as an organization kind of question. But yeah, you run that risk if you discount too much too often.
Lauren Schwartz
So yeah, correct, definitely.
Ralph Burns
So. So tell us about some of the. One of the things that I, I think is going to be really cool that you're going to talk about on this webinar. It's over tier11.com BFCM of course. And it's September 9th, 10am Pacific, 1pm Eastern. I'm going to say Eastern first and then Pacific later. But you guys are on the Pacific or the West Coast. So anyway, so yeah, so make sure that you register for that right now over@tier11.com BFCM one of the things I love is that you're kind of talk about hooks too. Like can you give us sort of a little bit of a teaser on some of the hooks that people should use? Because this isn't just like, go out and buy it. Here's my stuff, here's the discount. Like there is creative, obviously, which is a huge part of this, especially with beauty. Beauty. Like we've now we've, you've known this for years and years. But it's like now that we're so embedded with so many different beauty brands, it's like, oh, my God. Creative is just everything. So, yeah, how do you hook people in? Like, what are your sort of some of your tips there maybe a little bit of a reveal of what you're going to be talking about on the webinar.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah. I mean, so we do, you know, do give you some beauty hooks that you can obviously kind of work off of, along with, you know, some trends that we're seeing and, you know, that you could definitely test out and kind of a checklist. But I would say one of the hooks, you know, again, something that we're trying to push is, you know, you know, for instance, I'll give you one of the hooks that we're doing. So it'll be pov, you just unwrapped the glow you've been wishing for. So again, it's like, it's unwrapping. It's, you know, talking about a glow for your skin care. It's a pov, which is definitely on trend. So again, like just kind of taking those hooks that you normally would use for your brand, but kind of twisting it in a way where it's more towards the gifting angle. Because, again, you're in the holiday season, so you definitely want to start talking about that, unwrapping that, unboxing that sort of like those types of angles. So again, those are kind of some of the things that you'll be getting a list of, just some of the hooks that you can start testing for your brand.
Ralph Burns
So it's interesting we had Allison on, who's really our boss at the end of the day, the test, like, we're both, like, nervous before we recorded. We're like, I hope, hope. I hope Allison likes what we're going to do here. Sorry. She's our social media marketing manager at tier 11, very involved in our marketing. So. But she mentioned when you talk about, like, hooks, angles, styles, trends, you've got to kind of put your own spin on it, so it doesn't come across as cliche. Can you talk about that a little bit? Because I think if, you know, if you're scrolling your Instagram or your TikTok for, for beauty, you're going to see some of these trends are going to become apparent to you. But like, how then stand out utilizing a trend, but put your own sort of spin on it. And maybe that's something that you're going to be talking about in the webinar. Maybe we can, you know, tease that a little bit here.
Lauren Schwartz
It's all in how you're talking to your customer. I mean, however, you're kind of talking to your customer in your current marketing. I would say, again, just put that spin on it and that you want to definitely start talking more about the gifting aspect. I think that's going to be like using some of the top performing creative that you actually have in your ad account, but then giving it that holiday twist and unboxing kind of moment, a gifting sort of angle. Like, I don't think you need to necessarily always reinvent the wheel. If you have things that are working in your ad account now, just kind of do a little twist on it, a little iteration of it, but just make it more towards like the holiday gifting aspect, which I think would be more beneficial to you because you already know the ad works. But again, you're kind of moving it into that position of a gifting style sort of hook.
Ralph Burns
That's a killer tip right there. Just because, like, it's so obvious, right? It's like, look at what's working. Yeah, we did a show on this a couple of weeks ago when we were actually talking about just businesses that we've helped in the past and they're like, oh my God, I can't believe you told me to do that thing that I was already doing that you told me to do more of.
Lauren Schwartz
Right.
Ralph Burns
Like, yeah, that's kind of the obvious thing. So look at your data. Obviously data is super important. You know that. We know that. We Talk about the 211 data suite here all the time. So creative and traffic obviously are one and the same. Really now, creative is so vitally important. But go into your ad account, even if you don't have a olution, like tier 11 data suite, you can look inside your, your meta ads and just figure out like, all right, well, what angle is working for which product right now? And then do us do a holiday spin off on that or a hook on that is sort of a, a good starting point from what it sounds.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah, definitely. And I think that's where a lot of people unfortunately miss it. Is that for the holidays they're like, oh, I have to think bigger, you know, I have to think super outside the box. But in reality it's like, yes, you can, but if you already have things that are working, just give it a little, give it a little twist and most of the time it will still perform.
Ralph Burns
Right, right. Yeah, it makes sense. So last question here is, is holiday hooks? Like, how is that? Because when I was just doing the ads for these, like, I don't even know what Those are. Maybe Lauren can explain like happy holidays. Here's a bundle. Like what is a holiday hook? Can you give us a little.
Lauren Schwartz
Well, yeah, again, one of them, again, like I said was kind of that like POV unwrapped. So like again like that's like a gifting angle in that it's speaking to the holidays. You can obviously, you know, when you're doing these sorts of holiday type angles, like especially if you're doing bundles, obviously you can talk about that within the ad. But just hooking them with that or if you don't discount, you know, I think a lot of people too sometimes kind of the hook I always see is, you know, we never discount. So you know, get this bundle which like I actually think is, is a little cliche. Like that one is, is like okay, but do you really, do you really not discount? Like, you know, so I would actually shy away from those ones and try to be a little bit more creative and how you're mean.
Ralph Burns
Tell the truth. You got me. That's insane.
Lauren Schwartz
We're marketers, we don't do that ever. Yeah. So I would kind of just again, kind of keep it to that like, like subtle. Because I think sometimes subtlety is actually more intriguing than like always in your face, flat out offers. Because really at the end of the day that's what people are going to see when they're on their feed is all these sales that are coming up and people are like, yep, sale, sale, cool, cool. But if you're kind of just being a little bit more native and conversational, I actually think you might get more people to actually watch and engage as opposed to just always throwing it in their face. That's just my take might be a hot take, but yeah, no, you never know.
Ralph Burns
Well, it's, it's good. I mean I think that's, that's a good starting point for people. So like last thing here is like, why should people attend? Like what else are you going to be talking about here? Just your opportunity to, to pitch yourself here a bit when the webinar comes on. September 9, 10:10am not p.m. 10:00am Pacific.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah, I mean again, we're going to have, you know, a lot of tidbits on the hooks, talking about, you know, kind of this bundling, you know, really discussing some of the trends that we're seeing. But really I think the biggest thing is that we are going to have a pretty big Q and A section, I think, which is, you know, I think what a lot of people want. And so just giving that time and space for you to ask those questions of, you know, different offers or, you know, if there's different hooks or things like that that you could try. I would say, like, we're, you know, you're able to talk to me and really kind of dive into your creative a little bit more with some of the questions. So. But you are going to get a couple freebies. So that's obviously always a good thing too as well. And kind of a quick, quick start checklist of what you can be doing for Black Friday Cyber Monday.
Ralph Burns
Yeah. So for all of you procrastinators, I think that's probably the, the, probably the biggest takeaway.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah.
Ralph Burns
If you're freaked out, if you're, yeah. You're in a marketing, you're the marketing director and your CMO is telling you like, you know, so what are we doing for Black Friday Cyber Monday? And your answer is, I'm working on it. So this is the reason to join on September 9th. So it's September 9th, 10am Pacific, 1pm Eastern. It's over at tier11.com forward/bfcm. Register now. I'm not going to say register now. Our spots are going quick, but they are going quick. So I don't know what the capacity is of this. We're just going to say there's not unlimited capacity. So make sure that you do reserve your spot right now. Tierlum.com forward/bfcm. Amazing to have you on the show yet again. This is like your sixth or seventh or eighth time coming on Perpetual traffic.
Lauren Schwartz
Yeah, it's fun. I love it.
Ralph Burns
Yeah. I always learn something as well. So the goat, Lauren Schwartz, greatest of all time, creative strategist. Once again, the webinar. You can't miss it, especially if you're a beauty brand. If you're a non beauty brand, should you come to the webinar too? Because like a lot of these concepts are conceptually can be relayed to other industries, correct?
Lauren Schwartz
Oh, for sure. Yeah. If you're not a beauty brand, definitely, you can definitely take all these and still translate them into your audience. For sure.
Ralph Burns
Yeah. Amazing. All right, well, thanks so much for coming on today. And of course, if you need our help and you say forget it, I'll just want to hire Lauren and all the smart people at tier 11, minus Ralph, you can do that over at tier11.com forward/apply. So I really appreciate y' all listening here today. Make sure that you do register for the webinar. I've already said it like 17 times so far. So I'm not gonna repeat myself again on behalf of my non Showing up here today because she had other things to do. Lauren Ippetrulosh. I think she's gonna be, you know, attending the webinar because she needs to learn a few things about all this. Anyways, just FYI, until next show. See ya. You've been listening to Perpetual Traffic.
Podcast: Perpetual Traffic
Episode: The Unfair Advantage: How to Dominate BFCM as a Beauty Brand with Lauren Schwartz
Date: September 5, 2025
Host: Ralph Burns
Guest: Lauren Schwartz (Creative Strategist, returning guest/“GOAT”)
This episode tackles the urgent needs of beauty brands looking to succeed during Black Friday Cyber Monday (BFCM), even if they've delayed their planning. Ralph Burns and guest expert Lauren Schwartz discuss how to craft compelling offers, avoid deep discount traps, leverage bundles, and create holiday-ready ad creatives (hooks). The aim is to equip beauty marketers—especially those feeling behind—with actionable strategies they can implement within a week.
Quote [01:48] Lauren Schwartz:
“A lot of people get so hung up on just Black Friday Cyber Monday that they don't think of how their creatives are going to translate throughout the rest of the year.”
Quote [06:04] Ralph Burns:
“The offer is always sort of the thing that's in the background that everyone is so focused on... but the offer is the thing on Black Friday Cyber Monday.”
Quote [07:13] Lauren Schwartz:
“When they actually bundle everything together and make some sort of, like, kit... you're creating a higher LTV in that you're giving them more, but it could be a little bit of a percentage off.”
Quote [16:50] Lauren Schwartz:
“For a beauty brand, I definitely wouldn't go more than 20%... any higher than that, again... it just cheapens the product.”
Quote [15:19] Lauren Schwartz:
“You're creating that value right at the beginning and then essentially you're kind of giving it them as like a tester... and then they can turn into a repeat customer.”
Quote [21:52] Lauren Schwartz:
“If you have things that are working in your ad account now, just kind of do a little twist on it... just make it more towards like the holiday gifting aspect.”
Quote [24:52] Lauren Schwartz:
“Subtlety is actually more intriguing than like always in your face, flat out offers... you might get more people to actually watch and engage.”
Quote [12:19] Lauren Schwartz:
“Build out these different kits. Maybe a bestseller kit, maybe it's, you know, an acne kit. If you're a skincare brand, maybe it's a discoloration kit...”
Quote [18:01] Ralph Burns:
“If you're constantly running sales... you're training your audience to wait to buy, which can really cheapen the value of the product.”
Quote [09:24] Lauren Schwartz:
“Not only do you need this to carry through right now, but what are you going to do after Black Friday that's going to continue on until the holidays and Q1?”
Register for the BFCM Webinar:
September 9, 2025 — 10am Pacific / 1pm Eastern at tier11.com/bfcm
Attendees receive live Q&A support, checklists, and free holiday hook ideas.
For agencies and marketers outside beauty:
Principles and playbooks discussed are widely applicable to eCommerce brands of all categories.
This summary covers all strategic and tactical gems from the episode, so even latecomers to BFCM prep—especially beauty brands—can hit the ground running.