Wu Zengyun,Gao Tianbao,Chu Wenhui,Yang Zeru,Zhang Anqi,Zhao Guoqing,Tang Shengnan

YAN Information Technology(Shanghai)Co.,Ltd.,China

Abstract The number of skin care products developed scientifically and technologically is increasing in the market now.Whether it is a gimmick or a real desire to make a good product,companies are actively promoting the development and growth of the technological skin care market.The analysis of our market survey indicates that companies and consumers generally show a trend of mutual progress along with the market growth of technological skincare.Companies and consumers alternately play a leading role in different stages of progress.In this survey study,consumers were divided into four types:minimalist consumers,trendy consumers,ingredient-based consumers,and technological consumers.A series of comparative analyses for these four groups showed that consumers have the trend to instinctively develop from minimalist to technological consumer.Along with the increase of skin care knowledges,consumers can more trust and be more willing to buy the technologybased skin care products.For those ones who has no experiences with the technology-based skin care products,after gaining skincare knowledges,they are also willing to try.This is a good signal for companies.While helping with consumers being more knowledgeable in skincare,companies can lead consumers to learn about their researches and products development,which will benefit the market acceptance of the products.Users can also benefit from gaining more relevant knowledges.With these knowledges,consumers can be clearer about their own needs,more rational on skincare purchasing,and they can select the correct skincare.

Key words consumer types;technological skincare;skin care knowledges;scientific research and development

China’s skin care products market is constantly growing.[1]With the rapid development of e-commerce and new media,China’s skincare market has ushered in a period of explosive expansion.In the early days,the skincare market of China was mostly dominated by foreign products.Besides,the continuous emergence of new technologies and new ingredients also challenged domestic skin care products.[2]After a period of transformation and development,Chinese skincare companies have begun to enter the stage of independent research and development.Also,the market share has continued to expand.At the same time,great progress has been made in the research and development and sales ends.Consumers’attitudes towards skin care products have been constantly changing.[3]At the very beginning,consumers just bought products meeting some basic needs.Later,they started to catch up the trend and buy the popular products.In recent years,more and more consumers started to pay attention to the functional ingredients.

According to the answers to the “self-definition”in our consumer survey,currently,consumers can be roughly divided into four categories:minimalist consumers(no high requirements for skincare products,meeting basic daily cleaning,moisturizing and other basic functions,and some can even ignore basic care),trendy consumers(perceptual groups,follow the trend,pursuit of cost-effectiveness and freshness,easy to be affected by the content of social media channels),ingredient consumers(focus on the efficacy and effectiveness of ingredients,partial rationality,choose products mainly by comparing product ingredients )and technological consumers(focus on the technologies included in skincare production,more rational,understand the innovation and patents of technologies included in the skincare of brands,and have a deep and professional understanding of formula structure and ingredient effectiveness hiding behind the merchant marketing and ingredient list).These four types of consumers represent different stages of consumption attitudes.There is no doubt that consumers will continue to improve and update their consumption attitudes by learning more and more about skincare.

For companies,whether to actively guide consumers to upgrade their consumption attitudes or passively wait for new demands to appear is a question to consider.[4]Actively guiding the upgradation of consumption attitudes can direct consumers’ ideas to a certain extent which is conducive to spreading product lines.Companies passively waiting for new demands do not have such troubles.They can learn about the needs of consumers from the market in a timely manner,and then design corresponding products.[5]But the disadvantage of this is that companies may be labelled as “l(fā)ack of innovation” and “starting by imitating”,which make them easily lose out in the competition of innovation.

Currently,consumers hold more rational attitudes towards skin care products,especially as they are more knowledgeable in skin caring.[6]The emergence of new technology-based ingredients can attract the attention of consumers who have been tired of existing products.This shows a trend:more and more consumers are aware of technology-based ingredients and likely to pay for it.This trend brings companies a signal that the investment of skincare technology will be the key to attracting consumers’attention and generating benefits.By investing the benefits in the next step of research and development,a virtuous circle will be formed.[7]

Analysis of consumer behavior

Analysis of Basic Information of Respondents

In this survey,there were 3,160 valid questionnaires.The respondents were mainly female(95.4%)while only 4.6% were male.They mainly belong to the age groups of 18～25 years old(46.6%)and 26～30 years old(29.2%).Respondents are mostly hold a bachelor’s degree(59.2%)while19.5%are masters and above.In terms of geographical distribution,Guangdong has the largest number of respondents,which is followed by Shanghai,Zhejiang and Beijing.The detailed information of the interviewees is as follows(Figure 1).

Figure 1.Consumer user portrait.(A)Age distribution of participants in this survey.(B)Occupation distribution of participants in this survey

Comparison of factors of skin care purchased by respondents

Most consumers use skin care products for the first time at the age between 19 to 22 years old.The age group of 16～18 years old ranks second.For most consumers,ages between 16～18 are high school- and college-ages during which the psychological maturity is gradually developed.[8]

In the first-purchase of skin care products,most consumers focus on prices,which is followed by brand awareness,efficacy,sense of use,and friends’recommendation.In the recent purchases,the function of product jumps to the first and becomes the most popular factor,which is followed by the sense of use and price.It is worth noting that,compared to the first-time purchase,the credibility of purchase channels and the blogger's evaluation become more influential to consumers in their recent purchases .The specific comparison is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2.Comparison of factors affecting consumers' purchase of cosmetics

Consumer self-categorization and brief introduction

In this survey,consumers can be divided into four categories according to their awareness of skin care products:minimalist consumers,trendy consumers,ingredient-based consumers,and technological consumers.Survey results show that the proportions of these four groups are:24.5%,3.6%,66.9% and 5%.These four types of consumers are detailly described as follows.

Minimalist consumers

Minimalist consumers have the lowest demand level of daily skin care products.Some basic functions such as cleaning and moisturizing can meet the needs of these consumers.Some of these consumers can even ignore the basic functions.It is normally not hard for minimalist consumers to decide the products to buy.Usually,they tend to stick to the same products with limited expenses which is normally 100～200 Yuan per month .

Trendy consumers

Trendy consumers are more susceptible to trends and willing to buy whatever popular.They usually be attracted to or abandon some products simply just by other people’s suggestions.They are easily to be persuaded and emotional in purchasing.As a result,they sometimes buy products that they may not need on a whim.Social media are the main channels for them to obtain advice on trendy products.Most trendy consumers spend more than 500 Yuan per month on skincare,which leads them to rank first among the four types of consumers on the monthly skincare expenses.The high expenses on skincare of trendy consumers makes them significantly different from the minimalist consumers.

Ingredient-based consumers

Ingredient-based consumers are different from the former two types.They are interested in the ingredients of skin care products and more rational in shopping.Ingredient-based consumers pay attention to the efficacy and effectiveness of the ingredients.When choosing a product,they will go through the ingredient list.By comparing the key ingredients among different products,they will select the most suitable one.The consumption amount is mostly between 400～500 Yuan per month,which is at an intermediate level.

Technological consumers

Technological consumers are the most professional group among the four types of consumers.They pay attention to the scientific researches and technologies included in the skin care products.With knowledges of ingredients,they have a deeper understanding of the innovative and patented technologies of skin care products than other consumers.Also,their knowledges allow them to understand the formulation and the ingredients effectiveness of the skincare beyond the “outwear”advertised by merchant.They are also the most rational consumers among the four types.Similar to ingredientbased consumers,most technological consumers spend around 400～500 Yuan on skincare per month.

Different types of consumers’attitudes towards skincare technology

When purchasing skincare,47.8% of consumers will consider the technology claims of the products.In each of the consumer group mentioned above,there are 36.4% of minimalist consumers,38.9% of trendy consumers,50.6% of ingredient consumers,and 71.7% of technological consumers care about technology claims.When investigating the actual use of scientific and technological skin care products,the same result appeared.In each of the four types of consumers,the proportions of using technologybased skin care products are:12.3% of minimal consumers,20.4% of trendy consumers,24.9%of ingredient-based consumers,and 36.5% of technological consumers.

The comparison indicates that the increasing awareness of technology-based skin care products impacts consumers’ actual purchase and use.As the awareness of technologies included in the skincare keeps raising,consumers will change their shopping behavior gradually.

Consumers can instinctively become more rational.[9]They tend to choose the cost-effective products,i.e.the most suitable products with the lowest costs,in shopping,especially during the skincare shopping.Most consumers go through the three stages,namely minimalist,trendy and ingredient based.The time staying in each stage varies from person to person.

Realizing the roles played by ingredients in skincare products is the most significant change of consumers during their knowledge increase.[9]It is important to companies to be aware of consumers’knowledge increase as the reliable ingredients is a premise of launching new products.Clinical trials and efficacy tests are main ways to confirm the reliability and effectiveness of the ingredients.As the saying goes,hearing is not as good as seeing.Only the visible effects can convince consumers best.The skincare technologies that consumers pay attention to are shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3.Technologies included in skincare and how consumers concerned about them

Technological skincare products,which represents these skincare developed based on scientific researches,obtain high evaluation from users.According to the survey results,79.4% of consumers believe that the technology skin care products they have purchased are in line with their expectations.Also,the percentage of people who are willing to recommend technological skin care products to others is as high as 91.2%.Besides,70.7% of technological skincare products users believes these products are better than ordinary skincare,which is much higher than the 43.18%found in nonusers.This also support the above conclusion that the increase of consumers’ scientific and technological knowledges can substantially promote the sales of technological skin care products.

Signals that companies can get

Cultivating consumers’scientific and technological concepts

The rise of consumers’ awareness on technologies involved in skincare positively impacts sales of the products.Thus,how to lead consumers to learn and accept scientific and technological concepts contained in skincare is the first consideration for Research &Development(R&D).[10]Leading consumers to be more knowledgeable in skincare brings three benefits to enterprises:knowledgeable consumers contribute to a faster and easier market acceptance of skincare containing new technologies;Knowledgeable consumers can realize their own real needs more clearly.Also,they can provide more accurate feedback to enterprises;[11]The professional recommendation given by knowledgeable consumers to people around them can be more convincible,which can help with spreading the products.

Enterprises’own strength needs continuous improvement

For enterprises,paying more attention to scientific research affects not only themselves but also consumers.The survey shows that,regardless of the technological cosmetics purchasing,90% of consumers care about the increase investment in R&D in companies’ annual report.Nowadays,abundant information resources,especially the online media channels,allow consumers learn massive news of the skincare market quickly without leaving home.[12]The efforts enterprises have made in R&D investment can give consumers a signal:we are really working hard to meet consumers’ needs and our products target to solve consumers’ problems.The money consumers paid for products will become a potential investment in skincare researches,which will produce better skincare for consumers themselves.[13]

In our survey,95% of technological skincare consumers mentioned that they will keep paying attention to the brands and other products of these brands which they have technological skincare experiences with.This is a good sign as well as a new challenge for brands.The good sign is that,once a product has gained excellent reputation,the collection it belongs to will benefit from it as users are willing to try other products of this collection.[14]The challenge is how to create such a word-of-mouth product.This brings us back to the two issues discussed earlier:the scientific research investment of enterprises and the rational consumption outlook of users.The scientific and technological investment of enterprises can increase their reliability among consumers.Consumers,who become more and more rational today,drive enterprises to invest more in scientific research.

Launching new products by simply following the technologies of a popular and successful product perhaps can gain a certain degree of attention in the market.However,in the long run,only companies with independent research and development capabilities can maintain a high degree of activity while gaining the attention of most consumers.[15]The effects brought by consumers’ awareness of scientific and technological skincare to the market can be reflected by products sales.Consumers’ attitudes of a product can be fully shown by the survival of this product in the market.

Summary

Generally,consumers tend to be more and more rational.The growing number of rational consumers can promote the standardization and diversification of the skincare market.To satisfy consumers,companies need to work harder on their products,from which they can obtain better sales.The hot-selling brought only by fancy advertisement of a product which is an imitation of some popular products normally cannot lasts long.Only the brands and products based on serious research and development can always have their places in the market.The good reputation of these brands and products can be spread around among consumers so more consumers will be willing to pay for them.More consumers mean more profits.More profits can furthermore support the skincare research and develop.A virtuous circle could thus be developed.One way to promote this virtuous circle is to help consumers with being more knowledgeable.Knowledgeable consumers can understand the ingredients and effects of skin care products in a better way,realize their actual needs more clearly,and not blindly catch the trends.Consumers’knowledges about skin care may also contribute to an easier decision-making of purchasing.As knowledgeable consumers know exactly what they need,data produced from their shopping records could be more valuable to companies for the next step of products development and the adjustment of their production line.

To sum up,for companies,help with consumers with enhancing their scientific and technological knowledges about skincare can positively impact their sales as well as develop a virtuous cycle in the whole process of sales.For consumers,by gaining knowledges of skincare,they can recognize their real needs,choose skin care products more scientifically,and carry out skin care activities correctly.