In today's beauty industry, SK-II has positioned itself as a premium skin care brand catering to women with mature skin. 'Discover the miracle to crystal clear skin’ or in short ‘Live Clear’ has always been SK-II's key brand communications strategy. Staying true to its heritage, SK-II branding focuses heavily on its key ingredient – Pitera. As authenticity is critical when messaging, the brand has also shared many personal stories of its consumers who have used its products and deemed SK-II as a good product. This approach is most evident in the company's recruitment of brand ambassadors, all of whom must have already been a user of SK-II products. The strong team of international artists has helped further strengthened the brand and brought out their consistent image across countries. Actress Cate Blanchett is currently SK-II's global ambassador, while the company does employ actress and models across Asia such as Singapore model Sheila Sim and the Chinese actress Tang Wei to provide a familiar face to the local markets. Apart from this, SK-II has also now forged a more interactive relationship with its consumers using the online social media platforms such as Facebook and YouTube to share its brand history and its line of products.
Building on their success, SK-II has begun expandng into the men’s market. SK-II Men Facial Treatment Essence has made its launch in October 2011, and most definitely contains their iconic ingredient – Pitera. South Korean actor and director Yoo Ji-Tae and Taiwanese-Canadian actor and model Godfrey Gao are the current brand ambassadors for the SK-II Men line.
SK-II’s main target audience are female consumers that are aged 30 and above. As their product range focuses anti-aging, these mature women are beauty conscious ladies and believe in '’working hard' in preserve their skin and maintaining their youth. Majority of their consumers are urban female whom have a relatively high disposable income that allows them to enjoy the little pleasure that SK-II products can offer.
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During the recent years, SK-II has been actively promoting their products to younger women in their 20s with the recruitment of their younger ambassador such as Shelia Sim. SK-II believes that women should start protecting their skin as early as possible and by beauty industry standards, ageing starts at the age of 25. Nevertheless, these women are also highly educated urban female who have cultivated a taste for upscale niche products and service. They may not have that relatively high disposable income but are willing to pamper themselves with the SK-II products. However, these women need to see the effects of SK-II and have a higher possibility of switching brands due their adventurous personality.
From the graph shown above, we can conclude that SK-II is possibly the No.1 beauty and personal care brand in Singapore as its has been constantly achieve the highest brand share for the past few years. However in Singapore market context, there are many competitors that SK-II is facing and the market is by far fragmented and saturated, which is why SK-II needs to constantly innovate to meet its consumers' needs and advertise to help consumers recall its brand.
Source: Beauty & Personal Care Brand Shares – Singapore (% Retail Value RSP) @ 2013 Euromonitor
