What does it take to launch a viral product? And better still, how can a brand successfully turn a product’s sell-out moment into a hero franchise that can help bankroll the company’s trajectory for years to come?
During the Glossy Beauty Pop event in Los Angeles this week, senior reporter Sara Spruch-Feiner hosted a panel with three top brand leaders in the body, skin and makeup spaces to learn just that.
Each with a dynamic hero product that went viral in a different way, the founders of Lawless Beauty, Mara Beauty and Megababe shared the stories behind the bestsellers that fuel their brands. They also discussed their strategies for nurturing and building upon viral moments for long-term success.
Each product analyzed during the panel was created during a different stage of the business. “It’s my ‘Pretty Woman’ moment [for all the manufacturers that turned me away]: ‘Big mistake, huge!’” said Katie Sturino, founder of Megababe, a line of body-care products currently sold DTC and in retailers including Walmart, Ulta Beauty and Goop.
After several contract manufacturers told her no one would ever buy the products she’d dreamt up, including a women’s anti-chafe stick for thighs, she sold her first 20,000 units from her parents’ garage in under 30 days. Today, she’s sold more than a million Thigh Rescue Anti-Friction Sticks, which retail for $14. She attributes the virality to a genuine need among women.
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Allison McNamara, founder of oil-based skin-care brand Mara Beauty, said it wasn’t until 18 months after the launch of the Chia + Moringa Algae Enzyme Cleansing Oil, which retails for $58, that it went viral. That was thanks to being used by Hailey Bieber in a “get ready with me” video. “That’s really what helped us to get into Sephora — the momentum of the [viral video],” she said. Mara Beauty currently sells DTC and at Sephora, Credo and Bluemercury.
Annie Lawless, founder and CEO of Lawless Beauty, took a more measured approach after finding a patented ingredient called Maxi-Lip through a manufacturer while doing PD for her existing color cosmetics brand. It was a peptide lip-plumping ingredient that came with clinical tests she could market to her growing customer base, especially women seeing lip filler content online. After Sephora sold through her first 25,000 units almost immediately, then reordered and sold out of them again, Lawless invested in a 100,000-unit order from the manufacturer.
“It felt different than any other thing we’d launched,” she said. Forget The Filler Lip Plumper Line Smoothing Gloss, which sells for $26, is now available DTC and at QVC, Shopbop and Amazon.
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After each one of these products went viral, the brand founders began to focus on expanding the marketing as quickly as possible. “[We felt we could] go heavy and deep with that one product in marketing [because we could] actually see the ROI on those investments,” said Mara Beauty’s McNamara.
Lawless Beauty’s Lawless described her post-viral approach as “always on.” The brand has since maintained consistent marketing of the gloss, which has increased overall sales of all its SKUs, she said. “You can have fun [with your PD] and launch other things to stay relevant and create newness, but having the always-on marketing machine [for the gloss] is driving loyalty,” she said. “We are constantly repromoting our core with nothing new, just to keep it top of mind.”
“People on social media, especially on TikTok, are not seeing every piece of content,” Mara Beauty’s McNamara said. “[Your hero content is] not always as stale as you think it is.” Megababe’s Sturino agreed. “We have 35 SKUs now, but chafe is it; that’s what we [still] put our messaging behind,” she said.
Building a franchise from the viral product came next for Lawless and Sturino. After the first 50,000 units of her brand’s clear gloss sold, Lawless began adding new shades to her orders, a few at a time. Plus, she created a lip mask and lip balm stick under the same Forget The Filer franchise by using the same hero ingredients. More recently, she experimented by adding the same peptide ingredient into a face cream to see if her customer would respond. “We’re doing smart and slow product expansion in different ways,” she said. Lawless Beauty also releases limited-edition gloss shades in 10,000-unit drops, which helps to test new colors, keep loyal fans satiated and add scarcity without limiting stock on the brand’s most popular shades.
Megababe’s Sturino has since turned her viral chafe stick into a mini-size, unscented formula, as well as a version for men and a version for nighttime that helps brighten skin.
Meanwhile, Mara Beauty has also added new sizes to build on its product’s momentum, including a half-size and a travel mini. In addition, McNamara has invested in sampling programs with Sephora. Combined, these strategies have created a sliding scale of cost that’s become a way to get the product into more hands. “Whether it’s [the] ‘smart sampling’ or ‘deluxe sampling’ [programs at Sephora], it’s a really great way to keep the excitement alive. That’s especially for people in the luxury category that aren’t ready to spend $58 for a cleanser, but they will try a half size or a small size [if they love the sample],” she said. “It’s an easier way to try the product without investing.”
To keep the buzz going, Lawless Beauty also regularly seeds press and influencers “booster mailers” to introduce new users to the original gloss and its clinicals. “Keep hitting people over the head with the same messaging,” Lawless said. “Education really helps to sustain the momentum because you can’t let that fire die.”
