Iridium Introduction
Recently, Saint Laurent announced that it has become a special partner of the League of Legends Pro League, which undoubtedly won more attention for the brand. In addition, from the joint expansion of short links between Givenchy and Jiangnan Hundred Scenic Maps, to the joint launch of joint limited products by Mao Geping and Reverse Water Cold, to the diversified cooperation between Armani and Tianya Mingyue Knife, etc., they have firmly grasped the attention of players.
"E-sports + beauty" provides new ideas for marketing, and how to link up to show more novelty and strengthen interaction is a new topic in this field. On the occasion of "Goddess Day", this issue of Iridium Nebula Business summarizes some cross-border classic cases of beauty and games, to further understand why e-sports can play a role in the "beauty economy", and to explore what new ways to deepen cooperation between beauty and e-sports.
"Beauty + Game" builds a new framework for marketing
Brand cross-border co-branding is not a new thing, but from the perspective of recent trends, the phenomenon of e-sports and beauty co-brand CP is increasing. As a carrier of e-sports, games can achieve more creative gameplay from content and experience. In the "framework" of the game, build a new marketing approach that empowers beauty.
The joint CP of the game and beauty brings a "sense of familiarity" to players and a "sense of novelty" to consumers. So as to revitalize the brand, open up the product topic, and "harvest" traffic to achieve monetization. It can be seen from Chinese and foreign brands such as Huaxizi, Mao Geping, Givenchy, armani, etc. That games can be the pioneer area for joint marketing of beauty into e-sports.
Hua Xizi x Swordsman Love Affair 3
In August 2020, Hua Xizi and Sword Net 3 jointly launched a custom limited edition Acacia carved lipstick on the occasion of Tanabata, using the relief process to carve the wings of the bird, xiangyun and sword net 3 sect logos on the lipstick paste. Among them, the Sword Net 3 Sect Seal has 15 different patterns, which are intended to give buyers a sense of surprise and a sense of achievement in collecting. In addition, the purchase of carved lipstick is also a gift worth 20 yuan Sword Net 3 Transfiguration exclusive tokens.
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Sword Net 3 is a national style martial arts game that integrates a variety of traditional oriental cultural elements from the Tang Dynasty, and Hua Xizi's product positioning also starts from traditional oriental culture. The target groups of the two are consistent, and to a certain extent, the "sharing" of consumer groups can be realized.
Givenchy x 100 views of Jiangnan
In January 2021, Jiangnan Baijingtu and Givenchy Cosmetics jointly created a New Year limited joint gift box, and the New Year limited joint gift box giveaways include limited joint stickers and game redemption cards, and buyers can redeem game props in the game through the game redemption card.
Mao Geping x reverse water cold
Reverse Water Cold is a martial arts-themed role-playing game that attracts many male and female players. In April 2021, Mao Geping and Against the Water Cold jointly launched the "National Color Allure" annual limited makeup gift box, which is a red makeup box inspired by Song Huizong's famous painting "Ruihe Tu", and the style is flap storage, giving people a festive sense of wedding dowry.
The gift box contains an eyeshadow palette, lipstick, highlighter and matching foundation brush and primer sponge. In addition, the makeup box will also be used as a gift for players in various in-game activities. The product not only meets the needs of female players to buy according to their own preferences, but also meets the needs of male players to give gifts.
Armani x Tianya Mingyue Knife
"Tianya Mingyue Knife" is the first 3D martial arts theme massively multiplayer online role-playing game independently developed by Tencent Games. Game features such as character pinching and fashion dyeing have attracted many loyal female players.
In July 2021, Armani and Tianya Mingyue Knife jointly launched the Tanabata Limited Edition Beloved Perfume Gift Box, which is limited to 1,000 bottles for sale. In addition, on the occasion of Tanabata, Tianya Mingyue Dao also launched a lot of joint ideas with Armani in the game, including joint props, makeup, and grooming actions.
In terms of game interaction, Tianya Mingyue Dao launched the "Tanabata Beauty Challenge" in the game, and also set up an exclusive "perfume" task in cooperation with Armani, giving away a fragrance pendant.
Not only online, offline activities Tianya Mingyue Knife also joined hands with Armani and Red Devil Mobile phones to debut in 2021 ChinaJoy, covering a COSER dance show wearing four big embroidery, experiencing the game face pinching game, experiencing the "beloved" activity to try incense bookmarks, linking online activities, etc., to create a diversified immersive scene interactive experience.
INTO YOUx Moore Estate
Moore Manor is a role-playing game set in a real-life city where you can farm, keep pets, decorate your home, open a restaurant, and so on. In November 2021, INTO YOU and Moore Manor launched a joint lip mud lipstick, eyeshadow, and blush.
In the promotion, INTO YOU also introduced the lip mud lipstick in the tone of the game's character "Princess Momo", which is made of lip mud fruit from the seeds of the manor's strange plants, which is intended to show that the lip mud lipstick has a soft mud texture and can paint a three-dimensional full soft mist makeup suitable for autumn and winter. Let netizens call out "dream linkage"!
Combined with the characteristics of previous cases, games with a wide range of audiences such as Glory of kings, League of Legends, Tianya Mingyue Knife, Sword Net 3, etc., are more likely to gain the favor of brands and become the highland of joint products. In addition, domestic beauty brands such as Mao Geping and HuaXizi are more inclined to cooperate with ancient style national style games, and exquisite ancient style packaging just caters to player preferences and accurately docks with target customers.
"Beauty + esports team" breaks the circle to win traffic
Among the sponsors of many professional e-sports events, many beauty brands can be seen, such as Baijiling, L'Oréal, Lancôme, etc., which has brought a certain degree of exposure and traffic to brand owners.
On the eve of Valentine's Day this year, Saint Laurent YSL announced that it has officially become a special partner of the League of Legends Pro League. Saint Laurent chose to officially announce cooperation at this time, which increased the total turnover of the gift box for Valentine's Day, which played a certain role in pulling.
On the occasion of Valentine's Day, the three Valentine's Day limited red velvet gift boxes launched by Saint Laurent were on fire, and the total turnover was greatly increased compared with the same period last year. Among them, the St. Laurent Small Gold Bar Fragrance Limited Gift Box was sold out three days before Valentine's Day.
Looking back at the 2021 League of Legends Global Finals, the Chinese LPL team EDG won the championship of the finals. The EDG team integrates topic degree and traffic, and the professional team gradually changes to "artist". At that time, many beauty brands such as Dior Perfume, Skin Spring, Vichy, Lancôme and other beauty brands threw "olive branches" to the EDG team and cooperated with them.
In addition to sponsorship and brand endorsements, brands are also trying to explore new ways of creative collaboration to extend more possibilities. In January, L'Oréal Men formed a partnership with British esports organisation Fnatic. Together, the two will develop and deploy engaging, creative content, as well as activate co-branded products in the future.
In addition, L'Oréal Men will also act as the sole partner on the back of the Fnatic Team's costume. In these ways, we hope to efficiently reach Gen Z and millennial gamers.
In fact, beauty has different considerations when considering whether to choose a co-brand game or an esports team. The difference between beauty simple and game co-branding and e-sports team co-branding is that the game is more of an IP effect, which allows beauty products to add new elements of game IP on the basis of the original style, which is intended to form a single product that both the game and the beauty audience are willing to "pay"; and the e-sports team co-brand further highlights the fan effect, for e-sports fans with strong stickiness and high loyalty characteristics, the brand conveys brand and product information to it, stimulates fan enthusiasm, so as to achieve the improvement of brand and product attention and influence.
How does e-sports play a role in the "beauty economy"?
The commercial value of e-sports is prominent, and China has become a global market with great e-sports commercial value.
ACCORDING TO NEWZOO's 2021 Global Esports and Game Live Streaming Market Report, the global esports audience size will increase to 474 million in 2021 and is expected to increase to 577 million in 2024. In terms of market size, the global esports revenue will reach $1.084 billion in 2021 and will exceed $1.6 billion in 2024. The increase in the size of the e-sports audience and the growth of e-sports revenue indicate the growing commercial value of e-sports.
It is worth mentioning that in 2021, China is the region with the largest number of core e-sports enthusiasts, and it is also the highest-revenue e-sports market in the world. China has become a market with great commercial value in e-sports in the world, and China will undoubtedly become a key area for brand owners to enter e-sports.
The "she game" prevails, activating the "her economy"; the genderless concept prevails, activating the "he economy" and "his mind".
According to the "2021 China E-sports Industry Development Report", the proportion of women in China's e-sports users increased to 39% in 2021, from 30% to 39% in three years, and the gender proportion difference gradually weakened.
It can be seen that the e-sports industry is no longer just a male position, the traditional stereotype is slowly being broken, and women are becoming an indispensable part of the e-sports industry.
As the main force of cosmetics consumption, women, after establishing an emotional connection with e-sports games, will have a strong interest in game peripherals and beauty co-branded products, which can stimulate consumer desire.
In addition, the "concept of genderless consumption" in modern society is becoming more and more popular, and men have begun to pay attention to "exquisite life", and men are more and more favored by men's makeup brands.
It is worth mentioning that in the "she/other economy" upgrade play, e-sports can also be jointly branded with industries such as food, automobiles, mobile phones, home, and lifestyle department stores, and get unexpected marketing games in a variety of cross-border collocations.
In addition to focusing on "her economy" and "his economy", beauty brands also have marketing "offensives" in activating "his mind". Beauty brands have launched marketing strategies on the e-sports platform for "straight men" to "contribute" to straight men who lack romantic cells to meet the needs of "straight men" gifts. At the same time, the brand has also received positive reviews from women and increased the degree of topic discussion.
The beauty target demographic is highly compatible with esports players.
Public data shows that China's e-sports users as a whole are young, accounting for nearly 70% under the age of 34. In addition, the overall education of Chinese e-sports users is high, and personal income of more than 3,000 yuan accounts for more than 60%, of which more than 8,000 yuan accounts for 20%.
This means that beauty and e-sports audience age groups have a high degree of compatibility, and e-sports users have a certain spending power. As more and more college students enter the society and improve their spending power, the commercial value space of e-sports in the future will continue to rise.
Specifically, e-sports has penetrated into the lives of young people, and the main force of beauty consumption is also concentrated in the younger generation. Beauty brands can radiate more conveniently, more directly and more efficiently to young consumers through e-sports traffic and carry out "youthful marketing".
Not only that, beauty brands can also find games that match their brand positioning, accurately find target customers, enhance player experience through diversified creative marketing, and achieve efficient conversion of game IP traffic.
Business Watch
On November 5, 2021, the Hangzhou Asian Organizing Committee officially announced the eight e-sports events selected for the 19th Asian Games. This is the first time that e-sports has appeared on the Asian Games stage as a "positive survival". In addition, many places in China have successively introduced support policies related to the e-sports industry to strive for the "fragrant food" of e-sports and attract "investment fever". It can be seen that this has broken the stereotype of "e-sports not doing business" to a certain extent, and has made many e-sports users pay more attention to the Hangzhou Asian Games.
Based on the upcoming Asian Games, China's support policies continue to increase and other benefits, and "e-sports +" is a good way for brands to increase exposure and young marketing. It is worth noting that the cooperation model between beauty and e-sports continues to deepen, and it is more interactive and innovative in creating content and experience.
For example, beauty brands can open channels, short link jumps, implant mouth broadcasts and other ways to achieve e-sports user traffic conversion and rapid purchase on the game platform; on the game platform, they can also insert mini games co-branded with beauty brands, or hold online interactive activities to enhance users' interesting experience. Previously, Givenchy released related makeup products with Nintendo's game "Dynamics", allowing players to download and use them in the game, with the intention of cultivating consumer interest in the brand.
In addition, offline game interaction can be carried out to improve consumer participation enthusiasm and form social fission. Qingyang has united many supermarkets to launch the King of The Competition. By participating in the 1VS1 confrontation, the winner receives a clean shampoo. In order to further enhance consumer enthusiasm for participation, Qingyang also invited professional players to have close contact with fans; it can also explore the cooperation between beauty and e-sports to create digital immersive experience stores and pop-up stores in shopping malls, so that consumers can experience immersive interactive game scenes in terms of gameplay experience and visual senses, stimulate consumer desire, and so on.