Know-How Exchange : Social Media

Effectiveness varies quite a bit. It depends on the specific execution, integration with other elements of the marketing mix, the specific target audience, location, sales channels, basic positioning, and probably a dozen other things. At a minimum you need to narrow the topic -- to a specific geography, specific beauty products, and specific social media vehicles.

Repeat after me: Thou shalt not use social media to sell. Here endeth the first lesson. For most people selling most goods and services online, all social media is a waste of time, effort, and brain cells. The two most powerful and yet, the two most underused tools for selling anything are a blog and e-mail marketing.

Read: https://www.cosmeticsdesign-europe.com/Market-Trends/Cosmetic-brands-are-ut..., https://www.socialnomics.net/2014/03/20/the-role-of-social-media-in-the-cos..., https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/21/dove-real-beauty-campaign-turns-1..., and https://www.beautytrendsconference.com/programme

Examples:

https://www.piercemattie.com/blog/promoting-beauty-products-via-social-medi...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/caroltice/2014/01/22/girlfriend-power/

Variables:

Income
Age
Geographic location
Economy
Personal style
Access to technology
Trends
Competition
Site audience

There is a lot of truth to Gary Bloomer's comment. Basically, you can't rely on social media alone. But social is a very good tool for feedback, promotion, brand recognition, and customer relations.

Pinterest is trumping other networks right now (in terms of ROI). And LinkedIn is rising up to the top as well. Actually, all of the networks are growing and trying to make changes for better interactions. Everything is moving so fast...it's hard to keep up!

You should also dig around in Facebook Insights and Google Trends to get more demographic info. Run some basic google searches to get more articles. Just copy and paste this into the search box:

social media as a marketing tool in selling beauty products

Hope this helps! Good luck!