5 Reasons Why Short-Form Video Content is the Best Way to a Grow Perfume Brands’ Direct-to-Consumer Revenue
Running a perfume brand is an entirely different beast from every other consumer product. Normally, brands can scale revenue through paid media channels if they have their product, website, landing page, and paid media strategy optimized. What sets perfume apart from every other consumer product category is that most perfume brands are not able to profitably scale revenue through paid ads, largely based on the product perfume product category itself. Selling perfume, a product whose inherent value is its smell, through a screen is very difficult. This is especially true if the person is unfamiliar with the perfume brand.
This is not the case with every other product category. With fashion, you can post images or videos of the clothing to communicate the benefits or uniqueness. You can talk about the material used. For supplements, you can talk about their intended use cases and the ingredients that compose the supplement. For appliances, you can talk about their functionality. With food products, a category dedicated mostly to taste, you can transfer the value of the product through imagery and ingredients. Every single type of product can convey its value visually, or with objective criteria such as the product’s calories, ingredients, fabric material, etc. With perfume, the only objective criteria measurement is the volume of perfume. We could maybe extend this objective criteria to the performance of the scent.
The visual packaging of perfume is a selling point that can be visually conveyed, however, people don’t buy perfume for the bottle, they buy it for the juice.
I think the point has been made. The benefits of perfume are very hard to quantify, which makes perfume advertising much more reliant on brand marketing. Consequentially, the main growth channels are different.
We Dug a Little Deeper & Here is What We Found
One of the biggest levers that a brand can pull in order to grow revenue is through running Facebook Ads. Fortunately, Facebook allows you to see what ads brands are running on Meta through their Ad Library. We searched for 150 different perfume brands of every size and category and found that only 7% of perfume brands are actively running paid ads on Facebook. Of this 7%, almost all of the brands were designer brands with mass distribution and very strong brand recognition. This is in stark contrast to brands in other product categories which tend to run Facebook Ad campaigns at a much higher rate.
It is also uncommon to see perfume brands running paid Google ads. The brands who are running Google ads are almost always running a limited shopping campaign and sometimes a branded search campaign. Of the branded Google ad campaigns for perfume, the majority of the advertisers are department stores and online retailers.
For example: this is the results when you search for Chanel No. 5
So What Are the Growth Channels for Perfume?
Most perfumes are bought at department stores and large online retailers. While the exact breakdown of revenue by channel varies considerably by brand, objectively, this is where the majority of perfume bottles are being sold. The unfortunate problem with this distribution channel is, it is largely out of your control. You can influence your chances of being carried by independent perfume boutiques and other retailers, but ultimately the decision is not yours to make.
This is why you need to be focusing on increasing Direct-To-Consumer (DTC) revenue.
It has the highest profit margin of every distribution channel
Your perfume brand has more control over the brand touchpoints
You have direct control over your owned-media channels
Ecommerce as a Channel for Perfume Brands
Consumer behavior is shifting. More and more consumers are buying online. More importantly, consumers are getting increasingly accustomed to purchasing directly through a brands’ websites, not just marketplaces like Amazon or big online retailers.
5 Reasons Why Short-Form Videos Are the Best Way to Grow Your Perfume Brand
Quick Note: in this context, short-form videos are anything that meets the criteria for the big 3 short-form platforms: TikTok, Youtube Shorts, and Instagram Reels. This can loosely be defined as videos that are:
9:16 video orientation
Under 90 seconds (normally 15-20 seconds)
The Size and Scale of the Platforms
Youtube Shorts has 2 billion active monthly users. TikTok has 1.5 billion active monthly users. Instagram Reels has 730 million active monthly users. While these platforms trend towards young adults, you can find people of all ages and demographic types. No matter what type of business you operate, your customers are on these platforms. And with so many active users, you can run paid ads and never have to worry about oversaturating users with high ad frequency.
These Platform’s Algorithms Favor Pushing New Content
These short-form video platforms are the unequivocal #1 for content discovery. TikTok in particular heavily prioritizes promoting new content to new audiences. TikTok is closely followed by Youtube Shorts which is owned by Google and has a more finely tuned algorithm, paired with a larger user base. Both of these platforms are incredible for niche perfume brands that might not have a large following on social media because these two platforms promote great video content regardless of follower size. If the video content is engaging, it can potentially reach millions of people, whether you have 300 followers or 300,000 followers.
Costs Do Not Scale Linearly with Reach for Organic Video Content
When you run paid ads, regardless of the platform, if you want to reach more people, you have to pay more money. Increasing brand awareness isn’t cheap. With organic social media content, if you post a video that resonates with people, then it can spread exponentially with no extra costs. The incentives of TikTok, Reels, and Shorts are to keep people on their platform longer by promoting engaging content. This means that they are incentivized to promote good video content. If you can provide good video content then the platforms will promote the content at no extra cost to you.
You Build a Long-Term Audience
People follow accounts of brands that post content that they like. If your brand can meet this simple criterion then you can reap the benefits of building an audience. Brands will bend over backward to get attention in a crowded online landscape. By getting an audience of engaged followers, you can:
Promote new product releases more effectively
Easier to find brand collaborations
Build social proof
Get more feedback
Direct customers to your website to make sales
We Create Short-Form Videos for Perfume Brand Advertising
We take care of storyboarding, brand strategy, filming, and editing short-form videos for your perfume brand to use on Instagram Reels, TikTok, and Youtube Shorts.