At the Cannes Lions, L’Oréal presents the successes of its digital transformation

The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity has been held every June for the past 60 years, shortly after the movie stars have walked the red carpet. Bringing together the world’s leading figures in advertising and marketing, the festival is an opportunity for industry professionals to discover - or to present - the best, the most innovative and the most inspiring content in creative marketing from all five continents. As before, this year’s event saw brand representatives, the media, creative agencies and consultants spend five days together at some 300 conferences, seminars and workshops. The festival was rounded off with the award of prizes for the most creative campaigns of the year.

Underlining our digital presence

Lubomira Rochet, Chief Digital Officer of the Group, used L’Oréal’s presence at the Cannes Lions to describe the profound transformation that began in 2014. After five years, the initial results are clear: 12% of the Group’s total sales come from e-commerce, with an annual growth rate of 40%. The Group’s YouTube videos achieved 6.3 billion views in 2018 – representing a third of the worldwide traffic for cosmetic brands on the platform. In addition, 80,000 influencers have become involved with the Group and are now considered to be part of the “extended marketing team.” This success is the result of record amount of online activity carried out by the Group – which has almost doubled, setting a new company record.

The new revolutions to come

“L’Oréal is now entering the second phase of its digital transformation – and has a clear mission: to recreate trust by putting people and communities at the heart of its marketing activities, and to attract people’s attention by creating the best possible beauty experience and by developing multi-channel services that will appeal to the consumer of the future,” the Chief Digital Officer said.

Thanks to technology and digital applications, L’Oréal can continue to achieve its primary mission -- being a source of inspiration for the female consumer and helping with her choice of products for her skin tone and type. This is why the Group acquired ModiFace last year. This Canadian start-up is the leader in the use of artificial intelligence for sales purposes and of augmented reality for beauty applications. The acquisition has enabled the Group to increase the scale of its digital revolution.

“As with any industrial revolution, everything is based on new talent, new expertise and new ways of working,” underlined Lubomira Rochet. With that in mind, the Group has hired 2,500 digital experts and trained 27,000 employees over the past five years.

AI and virtual reality: the latest innovation

“You need to create strong brands that have meaning, you need to focus on the female consumer, understand her wishes and her problems, and you need to be creative and innovative in your product strategy,” sums up Lubomira Rochet, who pointed out the revolutionary customer services on show at the Vivatech exhibition in May.

With the Virtual Hair Advisor, a consumer can see a picture of her or his face with any hair color, while at the same time receiving advice from a L’Oréal expert, all of which is carried out using vocal commands. Two digital products for skincare were also on display, SkinConsultAI by Vichy and Effaclar Spotscan from La Roche-Posay, both of which analyze the consumer’s skin and provide advice on the most suitable product.