Catching the Eye with Custom Labels

When it comes to marketing your beauty products, packaging is one of the major ways to reach an audience. Marketing and other forms of customer outreach are important, but when it comes down to a shopper in a store making a choice about what to buy, it's your label design that will sway the buyer one way or another. If you've gone several years without refreshing your product labels, now may be the time to change. Working with third-party printers is an easy way to add new flair to your entire line of offerings, enabling quick and effective changes of branding.

What Works in Beauty Package Design?

When creating new imagery for cosmetics and other beauty needs, it pays to focus on proven concepts that customers naturally react to. Cosmetics Design recently spoke with brand strategy firm CEO Terri Goldstein about what shoppers are looking for when they search for beauty products. Before sharing her expertise, Goldstein reiterated that it is truly important to create a good visual impression, because more than three-fourths of purchase decisions regarding these types of products are made while customers browse, rather than in advance.

The strategist told the source that when it comes to designing a package for a beauty product, color is the most important element. The color of an item is the first thing a consumer will recall when thinking of that product, so it's worth working on compelling hues to spice up custom labels and other parts of the visual presentation. Since shoppers typically spend only 5 seconds looking at a single item on a store shelf, complex branding elements aren't as important as picking a distinctive, memorable color.

Further down the memory hierarchy is text - but that doesn't mean this isn't an important part of branding. Goldstein went on to note that when the words on a box are friendly and conversational in tone, the package becomes its own salesperson. The emotional reaction to a well-phrased statement on a beauty product label can be compelling, adding one more element that makes the item memorable. Any given shelf will have dozens of beauty products, and anything you can do to ensure yours stand out is worth a try.

Making Smart Visual Choices

There are dozens of little decisions that go into designing a great new visual identity for beauty products. Packaging Digest delved into a few more of these ideas, explaining the differences between different sub-categories of items and the divergent reactions customers have. For instance, some products receive a bigger boost from having promised results printed on the label. The source indicated 94 percent of skin-care item purchasers are influenced by listed benefits. That percentage is slightly lower for cosmetics and personal grooming products, 80 and 79 percent respectively.

Benchmarking Co. managing partner Denise Herich, writing for Packaging Digest, explained that it pays to think like a customer when deciding what to print on a beauty product label. If you were about to select one of these items, what would you want to know before leaving the store. While text is sometimes considered a secondary consideration when it comes to labeling, it is your big chance to make a pitch to the audience and let people know what your brand promises and stands for.

Brand storytelling may be the key theme when it comes to creating a compelling label design. Herich explained that you are creating a narrative when you create a package, carrying over from the themes expressed on your website and other branded locations. People who have seen your brand in other contexts will want continuity and the carry-over of elements they recognize. Those who are discovering your products for the first time in that store will want a capsule summary of why your offerings are great.

Time for a Line Refresh

Of course, you may believe that you can't afford or handle a rebranding effort or new labeling strategy at the moment. This is a natural reaction, considering that there is pressure to make the new look as strong as possible. However, in the era of digital label printing, it's just not true. Buying a new batch of product labels is now a quick and affordable process, no matter how many or few you need. The items purchased from providers such as Lightning Labels are sharp and colorful, bringing a high-quality look to your items that can draw customer eyes.

With so many people browsing stores without having decided on which brand of beauty product to purchase, you can't afford to have a nondescript packaging strategy. There's no sense in passing up the last-minute interest of shoppers and losing out on their business. It's up to you to decide on a strategy that brings your consistent and strong branding out onto store shelves, then work with a trusted labeling partner to bring that vision to colorful life.

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