L’Oréal, the company that once spent millions alleging trademark infringement by marketplaces, is seriously considering their position with Amazon and looking to shift some of their search spend to the marketplace.
The problem that L’Oréal and many similar brands have is that ever more frequently consumers are starting their search on marketplace. Gone are the days of firing up Google to search for a product, if you’ve got the Amazon or eBay app on your mobile phone then there’s a good chance that you’ll use one or t’other, at least as first port of call, when you go shopping online.
“We ultimately think it makes sense for companies such as Estee Lauder, L’Oréal, and LVMH to offer a limited assortment of prestige beauty brands for sale on Amazon, given the substantial shift in consumer shopping behavior online”.
– Mark Astrachan, Stifel analyst
Nick Buckley, L’Oréal’s UK digital director reckons that some 38% of all searches for beauty products start on Amazon and that’s a massive market to miss out on because you don’t have a marketplace presence. He also points to Amazon Alexa and how voice will fundamentally change search in the future, L’Oréal haven’t yet figured out how to maximise their returns but they’re looking at the new technologies very closely.
Ulitmately, L’Oréal are likely to use Amazon Sponsored Products to get results and there’s already a L’Oréal Men Expert landing page on Amazon (and for good measure they also have a Men Expert eBay shop)
