How beauty influencers changed the beauty industry

Things are not like they were in the days of Mary Kay and Avon anymore. Vogue and Cosmopolitan used to dominate the beauty industry. Mary Kay and Avon were vanguards of a multi-level marketing scheme that, though still around, isn’t quite at the same level of prominence it once held in nineties America. Vogue and Cosmopolitan held the hearts and minds of teenagers and ladies throughout America, and beyond into the wide world.

Even so, in a strange way, much as America felt as though she were stuck in the fifties until the eighties, things seem “nineties-bound” today. Though it’s 2021, many communities came to a sort of mature point of prominence around 1997, and decided to “keep on keeping on” from that point, only altering lifestyles gradually as necessary.

The internet was waiting in the wings of society, though, and has changed things fundamentally. While those in positions of power tread water in the “rut” of life they found 20 years ago, the rest of the world moved on; and now it’s gotten to the point where we carry around smartphones in our pockets more powerful than some corporate networks in 1997.This has affected all industries, not least of which being that which defines beauty today. As technology made visibility more attainable than ever, a new family of social media influencers began to change social conventions in the beauty industry. Now, instead of corporate magazines and brands defining the industry, social media influencers do. Lets explore this in more detail.

The technological component has been a game-changer for the beauty industry

Who reading this remembers MSN Messenger? Email and Messenger apps, as well as the occasional chatrooms, filled the void before MySpace came along and dominated it, eventually being upstaged by Facebook as of 2006. Soon Instagram came along and decided to dominate the social media scene. TikTok is a chief competitor today, though.

Now, Between IG and TikTok, social media influencers can throw on some blush, shoot a one-minute video, and be instantly popular with literally millions of strangers. Certainly, getting to that point takes time and effort—social media influencers must regularly produce content to become so visible. However, regularity is common in such groups, and easy for influencers.

They’ve made a lifestyle out of continuously updating social media profiles, and as a result marketing teams took note. They began using social media influencers for product placement. At a certain threshold of popularity, such social media influencers become able to represent products in a way profitable enough for companies to pay them for their effort.

So now, it’s not about a product becoming popular with “the cool kids”, it’s about the cool kids determining what’s popular. Essentially, social media has inverted the rules of the game. However, this isn’t a total change. Some social media influencers don’t get to places of prominence “organically”, as it were, and are funded in their rise to a state of influence.

Taking advantage of apps adored by the “new” celebrities

The “new” celebrities are now social media influencers. Some come to prominence organically. Remember the crew associated with Bam Margera? Maybe you do, maybe you don’t. Celebrities like Johnny Knoxville are rooted in that crew, who became famous through Camp Kill Yourself, or CKY, which eventually led to a major MTV brand.

Well, now the same sort of influencers across IG become their own media brand. A lot of them use niche apps to process photos or videos, and some make apps popular just as they do certain clothing and makeup brands. So which selfie photo app do celebrities use? Well, FaceTune is popular, and it’s one of many.

Essentially, new apps become popular based on who uses them, and you can tell based on the sort of filters available. If you see a bunch of filters and editing options which can’t be found on conventional social media, there’s probably some new app involved.Beyond makeup, clothing, and other styles, social media apps are definitive. The right app can throw two hours’ makeup on a person with the tap of a screen, and that picture might go viral. Pop culture is more defined by actual influencers than ever today.

A continually shifting kaleidoscope of trends

Technology and availability have made it so the “common man” can have an influential “weight” similar to traditional celebrities without having to be a core component of some multi-billion dollar media conglomerate. Accordingly, businesses with products in the beauty industry are leaning on social media influencers.

If you can learn to use trending apps and build a following, you can see your own influence rise. It takes time and effort, but reaching such influential “plateaus” represents a more attainable outcome than ever.

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