Benefits Of Hiring A Beauty Copywriter

“Make it simple. Make it memorable. Make it inviting to look at. Make it fun to read.” – Leo Burnett

Did you know that I am a beauty copywriter?

Well, before I started working full-time in-house in an advertising agency, I was a full-time freelance lifestyle and beauty copywriter. In fact, I still work with beauty brands on a part-time basis as part of my work at The NUC Agency.

Many new freelance copywriters want to get into beauty copywriting. And many beauty brands need help figuring out how to perfect their copies and boost their sales.

Whether you’re launching a new beauty brand or you’re the marketing manager of an already established beauty brand, chances are you’ll have come across a need for using compelling words to shape your customers’ experience. Established (and even budding) brands in every industry do this using a variety of techniques, including evoking a sense of familiarity, playing with the senses and having a memorable story.

The beauty industry, which encompasses skincare, cosmetics, personal care and fragrance businesses, remains one of the fastest-growing industries globally. Statistics shows that, despite taking an 8% dip in 2020, the beauty industry is picking up pace with revenues expected to exceed USD$646.20 billion in 2024. As a business owner in this industry, you expect to get a decent slice of this enormous pie. Is there anything that might prevent you from getting great returns from your beauty venture?

Your brand and product copy can.

Beauty copywriting is one of the crucial differentiators between successful beauty businesses and the ones struggling to turn a profit in a highly competitive market. Between 2024 and 2028, it is projected that beauty businesses in Africa will experience an annual growth rate of 5.99%, reaching up to US$65.93bn in 2024 alone. With Nigeria experiencing an increase in demand for natural and organic beauty products as consumers prioritise sustainable and eco-friendly options.

How will your beauty brand attract this new wave of beauty shoppers and still maintain a strong foothold over traditional stores?

Read on to learn who a professional beauty copywriter is, and how they’ll transform your business online and offline.

Who is a Beauty Copywriter?

A beauty copywriter is a writer who writes marketing material for beauty brands. These marketing materials include website copy, blog posts, packaging copy, and product descriptions. The beauty copywriter creates the brand’s messaging and chooses the best words to use to market your beauty products to consumers. These products range from hair care, skincare, cosmetics, hygiene products, and essential oils.

Most beauty products are the same. What makes most brands stand out is their marketing and packaging. Despite using different formulas, the variations are typically very minimal for most buyers. Therefore, the need to use compelling, carefully-chosen words for marketing within the beauty industry cannot be overstated.

Have you ever bought a body lotion to “reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles”? Or purchased a soap to “cleanse your skin without stripping it of its natural oils”? Congratulations! You’ve fallen for the strategy of a beauty copywriter.

Of course, keep in mind that all copywriters work to sell products and services. But the beauty industry is unique because it depends on marketing and branding. A company’s choice of beauty copywriter can make or break a product or brand’s financial results.

And great beauty copywriters are hard to find! For that reason, a great beauty copywriter can make bank.

What Does A Beauty Copywriter Do?

From website copy and product descriptions, to email campaigns, social media and blogs, a copywriter can help define the tone of voice of your company. How your brand speaks should not only be consistent, but also resonate with and ultimately attract your target demographic.

A beauty copywriter turns your marketing and product into a story. These stories tap into the needs of consumers looking for these products. While they will talk about the unique formula, the priority is sounding relatable to the potential buyer and showing them why they should have your product in their dressing room.

Given how make-or-break your marketing and brand messaging can be, your choice of a beauty copywriter is the lifeline of your product launch or sales.

When Should You Source the Services of a Beauty Copywriter?

Beauty copywriters are not limited to writing marketing copies alone. Some also promote and review beauty products. Typically, they’ll have a significant following of beauty consumers who turn to them for authentic reviews and take on emerging brands, products, and trends. Some, like me, also create user-generated content (UGC) for beauty brands to use as part of their digital marketing campaigns.

This means that you can contract the services of a beauty copywriter at two stages of your brand or product development. This can be at the early or later stages, covering before, during, or after your beauty brand or product launches. 

In the first instance, you can hire a beauty copywriter in the earlier stages to help you build your products and brand from scratch. At this stage, the copywriter helps you to set the brand’s tone and messaging, providing you with the brand guidelines for creating future copies.

In the second instance, you can hire the copywriter later on your brand’s journey and only have them create a copy within existing brand guidelines. Typically, this will be a product review, UGC or promotional material.

With this in mind, here are a few ways that hiring a copywriter can work wonders for your brand:

1. Harness specialist industry knowledge
   
   An experienced copywriter will know the industry inside out, which means you need to spend less time briefing about the market and your competitors, and instead focus on what makes your product unique. They are also likely to have lots of great content ideas, as well as their finger on the pulse of any emerging trends.
   
2. Save yourself time
   
   Marketing or running a brand can often involve wearing many hats and having a never ending to do list. By leaving your content and copywriting needs to an expert, you can instead focus on the other aspects of building your business. If you choose to work with me, you’re also welcome to repurpose any material across your collateral and social media channels – so, it’s a win-win!
   
3. Bring your brand to life
   
   A specialised copywriter will be able to help your brand or offerings stand out from the rest by using evocative language that focuses on the benefits for the consumer. Features are important, but the bulk of your copy should emphasise how your product(s) will solve a pain point and speak to the wider dreams, wants and aspirations of your target market.
   
4. Be SEO savvy
   
   Hiring a content writer or copywriter with an understanding of Search Engine Optimisation gives your brand a stronger chance of being found organically online. If you choose to work with me, I’ll carry out some light keyword research as part of the project and ensure that your chosen keywords are seamlessly weaved throughout your website ready for Google’s crawlers.
   
5. Have a copywriter as an extension of your team
   
   If they have chosen to specialise in copywriting for your industry, it’s likely they are going to be as passionate as you about all things industry-related. This makes for great conversations, a genuine connection and a shared commitment to getting your brand the recognition and revenue It deserves.

6. Be Establish authority, trust and drive sales
   
   Everything written by an expert copywriter is strategically created to establish the brand’s image and reputation. Writing a few simple words does not make just anyone a copywriter. With the specific and highly persuasive strategies of a copywriter, you will be able to:

• Build loyalty through brand recognition,
• Create a sense of urgency to buy your product or service,
• Tap into a need that only your product can fulfil,
• Keep customers moving beyond general interest all the way to checkout, and
• Reaffirm to the customer that they made the right choice in purchasing their product.
  

7. Provide objectivity
   
   Yes, you love your brand, but it’s not about you. You want to be cautious of being too close to your product(s) to sell them. Being too close to the brand positions you to run the risk of overselling, and if there is something we all know, it’s that we don’t like to feel “sold” to. Clear messaging and brand perception plays an important role in establishing your brand. If your customer can’t see themselves needing the product, they don’t want it. The last thing you want to do as a business owner is to fail to represent your customers because you can’t detach from your business. Copywriters build your brand around your customer, not the other way around.

8. Make selling products online easier
   
   The beauty industry, even in Nigeria, still heavily relies on traditional sales channels, although online sales are quickly picking up. This makes selling beauty products exclusively online a colossal challenge. Moreover, most online coverage has been hijacked by big brands running viral channels. With a beauty copywriter, you can carve your way through the hardened online marketing channels using compelling messaging written on your digital ADs (like Facebook, Instagram & Google Search). This way, you will feature more on your consumer’s search and social media feeds, improving your chances of selling online.
   
9. Help you understand your customers better
   
   Before writing any marketing material, a beauty copywriter’s first task is to understand your consumer well. They research them and extract demographic details such as gender, age, income level, lifestyle, career, colour, and beauty problems. As explained above, if you’re working with the copywriter at the early stages of product and brand development, this buyer persona can be pivotal in designing your brand and products to speak to this demographic. At a later stage, the copywriter can use this information to curate compelling product and brand messaging that addresses the pain points of this demographic and promotes your beauty product as the solution they’ve been searching for.

What Qualifications Should a Beauty Copywriter Have?

Being a beauty copywriter doesn’t require any formal or standardised courses. Despite a rise in copywriting courses and training programs, many are not industry-recognised. Therefore, they don’t form a solid basis for judging the skill of a copywriter. So what should be a good foundation for qualification?

Typically, a copywriter needs a passion for the industry they write for and excellent research and learning skills to remain relevant and upskilled. Therefore, the best qualification for a beauty copywriter is on-the-job experience.

Questions You Should Ask a Potential Beauty Copywriter Hire

So, how do you judge the experience of a potential beauty copywriter hire? Here are three essential questions you should ask.

1. Links to their website, blog, or social media handles

Most copywriters use their websites, blogs, or social media handles as an extension of themselves. These platforms improve their visibility and make it easier for clients to spot them and give them work. Therefore, they provide a good indication of how much experience they have within the beauty industry. For instance, an experienced beauty copywriter may have a vibrant Instagram account where they review several beauty products. They will also have a loyal following of readers who trust their opinions on brands and products.

Blogging is perhaps the most popular tool used by professional copywriters to showcase their skills and work. A beauty copywriter with a blog will most likely have a niche they’ve specialised in. For instance, copywriters passionate about sustainability may run a blog focused on vegan skincare. These types of beauty copywriters will appeal to a well-defined audience who view them as an authority on the subject. 

Social media posts also show how well the copywriter can write short and compelling content. On the other hand, blog posts show their prowess with long-form content 

2. Portfolio

Social media, websites, and blogs can speak volumes about the abilities of a beauty copywriter. However, you may need to check their portfolio as well. Portfolios hold a comprehensive list of previous works they’ve done and, in some cases, the feedback from their previous clients.

Portfolios show you the quality of the copywriter’s work and how well they take feedback and criticism. They also show their versatility in creating compelling content for different niches and products. This trickles down to finer details like writing for different demographics while selling virtually the same product.

For instance, through their portfolio, you can tell how versatile the copywriter is if they wrote two compelling product descriptions for an all-purpose moisturiser, with one copy targeted at retired women and the other at teens.

3. Their networks within the industry

Experienced beauty copywriters have deep networks within the beauty industry. They are often well-known in beauty industry events and trade shows, where they connect with other businesses and industry players to promote brands and products. Also, they usually have a loyal following of consumers who take buying recommendations from them.

You can leverage their networks to deliver direct pitches that are usually better and more effective than generically promoting your brand or products. 

A Copywriter’s Typical Process For Preparing Your Beauty Copy 

Copies for different beauty brands and products will look very different. However, the process for preparing them is typically the same. Using my process, I’ll break this down into sequential steps.

1. Brief: The beauty copywriter needs to receive a briefing about the campaign, product, and marketing material. This information will help them to know the kind of copy that is needed and the buyer persona they should target. 
2. Draft: Using their own insights in the industry, the beauty copywriter will piece this information together and come up with a compelling copy that addresses the customer’s concerns and offers your product or brand as the best solution.
3. Edit: After writing the first few drafts, the beauty copywriter edits and refines the final copy in collaboration with you and your team to ensure that it covers all details and meets all expectations. Sometimes, the legal and regulatory team may need to read the copy to ensure that it meets all standards.
4. Delivery: Now, the beauty copywriter will send the draft to the appropriate person in the workflow. This may be a graphic designer, creative director, or web developer. These professionals will place the copy in the right medium, be it the landing page, packaging, or marketing video.

Securing the Services of a Reputable Copywriter

A professional beauty copywriter is essentially what’s standing between you and great sales for your beauty business. Identify your niche and start changing how you market your brand to consumers by contacting a professional copywriter today.

Your business needs to make a difference. Your brand needs to reach the right people, establish trust and authority, and keep it there. Beauty copywriters help you get it right and engage your audience from day one. Don’t let your brand get lost in all the noise. 

Want to Talk Copywriting or SEO?

If you’re nodding along thinking “I need one of those! “, then get in touch with me today. I have over 8 years’ experience writing for some amazing brands like Kanda, a made-in-Nigeria natural skincare brand.

Schedule a 15-minute call with me today, and find out how I can help you create marketing that works.