Weather Impacts vary by location: In a city like Chicago, 55 degrees is an important changing point in the forecast, whereas in Atlanta it is 65 degrees. Identifying impact relative to the geo-location is critical in deciding which products should be promoted by region, state, or country.

The map above is an example of one beauty-related index developed by out insights team, the Smudge Index. The makeup smudge index is based on several weather metrics such as temperature, humidity, precipitation and dew point.

Ad Triggering

Fall means vampy lips, summer means a tinted gloss - even sunny days may reflect in golden colors, in comparison to overcast you might want darker natural colors. This can help us in ad triggering and when to showcase specific products in regards to color/look. Seasons & weather offer different skin ailments that give business good opportunities to sell products. During dry months/locations - moisturizing products, hot & humid months/locations SPF and long-wearing.

Rainy?

Waterproof mascara and waterproof products ad triggering.

Sunny?

Sun Care is generally associated with beauty at this point since its main purpose is protecting the skin and many brands (Sun Bum, Glossier, Shiseido) are focused on the sunscreen message as it relates to being a step before applying cosmetics. Additionally, many cosmetic brands (Estee Lauder, it Cosmetics, No.7) have embraced making SPF part of their line of products, especially foundations and concealers. AccuWeather’s proprietary UV index can be used to identify days where sun care is most important, and display beauty products that meet one’s needs.

Traveling?

We can leverage 1st party data to identify your destination and recommend products based on the temperatures/conditions there.

Worried about the shelf-life of your products?

Heat and sunlight have a real, chemical effect on your beauty products. Heat and humidity causes wax, oil and water to separate, destabilizing the product and rendering them useless. Steam from the shower can cause pressed powders to crack from the added moisture, while sunlight can cause oxidation. AccuWeather can curate custom content in regards to maintaining your products and recommend the best times to purchase them based on seasonality.

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Weather impacts our mood and purchase behaviors

On a relatively nicer day, say 65 and partly sunny in London, people are more likely to be spending their time outside and are willing to walk around and be in a brighter mood which decreases online sales and increases in-store sales. Conversely, during holiday seasons, weather plays a major part in determining when one should be shopping for gifts, both in store or online. If a major storm is approaching they may want to go out and pick up gift items before it become a hazard or think about placing order so shipments don’t get delayed because of poor weather. AccuWeather releases holiday shopping forecasts annually to alert users of potential weather impacts.

Creating the Connection Between Weather & Beauty

AccuWeather worked client direct with a well-known lip balm and skincare company to develop a dynamic and weather relevant advertising campaign.

/ Challenge

The client approached AccuWeather looking to evolve their advertising with more dynamic messaging and contextual relevance with the understanding that the weather has a significant impact on lip and skin care. The goal of the weather-focused initiative was to drive awareness of the lip balm product around the holiday season and winter months.

/ Solution

AccuWeather developed a customized Dry Skin Index Trigger based on proprietary weather forecasting for Real Feel, barometric pressure, humidity, etc. to ensure that the lip balm company’s ads were being dynamically served when audiences were most actionable and conditions were most relevant to the product’s purpose. The Dry Skin Index Trigger was applied to a cross-platform brand awareness campaign.

/ Results

The weather triggered campaigned garnered high click -through rates across platforms, the highest performing unit being the mobile expandable with an overall ad CTR of 10.87%- over 200x the industry standard. The success of the campaign impressed the client so much that they renewed advertising business with AccuWeather for their summer 2018 shave product campaign at a 66% budget increase and further consideration for a holiday 2018 campaign.

Without us even realizing it, the weather has an impact on the way consumers buy and use products across all industries. Especially in haircare and cosmetics, it’s essential to understand how the weather can affect performance from the initial purchase, to storage, to using them day-to-day.