Pour Moi Skincare is a young brand looking to revolutionise the beauty industry – and, well, it’s been pretty successful in doing so already. The company only arrived on the scene at the end of 2019 but has already received recognition from Time magazine for both its products and the way it helps customers find the right versions of those products.

Pour Moi is described as the world’s first ‘Climate-Smart’ skincare brand. Its products are based on research that has found that skin is radically affected by local climate. And, in response to this research, the products focus on geo-moisturisation – skin hydration based on the location you’re in.

“Its a completely new way to think about beauty, how we formulate, and how eventually the consumer buys and uses the product,” says Ulli Haslacher, President and Founder of Pour Moi Skincare.

“Since the 1950s, weve always been using, buying, and formulating skincare the same way, either by skin type, by age, by ethnicity, or by gender. But medical research found that this is not how it works – thats not me saying it, thats large clinical studies showing that the outer layer of the skin is mostly affected by the climate it is in. And that’s also how, evolutionarily, it started out and why we have different colour pigmentations.”

Pour Moi’s desire to innovate has extended to the way it sells its products customers, engaging consumers and making sure that they purchase the correct items for themselves through an on-site quiz experience.

The ‘Climate Quiz’, created in partnership with mobile experience specialists Jebbit, takes both Pour Moi’s mobile and desktop visitors through three simple questions to see which Climate-Smart product they should purchase.

“I met Jebbit a few years ago, and there was immediately the light bulb went on that said, ‘oh my god, we need to integrate that because it helps the consumer to quickly find what they need’,” explains Haslacher. “When we first met, it was more about gathering data, but I always got into it from the sales side. I needed my consumer to understand what this is, what is the right product for you, and close the sale. So, thats what I implemented.

“On our mobile solution, its right on top. You dont have to scroll, you dont have to find it, you arrive on the site and that’s where the quiz is.”

The turn to ‘quiz commerce’ has been hugely successful for Pour Moi, with 81 per cent of people completing it. The brand has also seen 60 per cent of customers buying multiple products and a 163 per cent increase in average spend.

Pour Moi’s average, first-time checkout is $104, despite its main ‘Day Cream’ products only costing $35.

“Jebbit found a way to create a tool that everybody can use to actually talk to your consumer in that mobile world. It’s extremely user friendly and we have less than one per cent return. Jebbit empowers us to serve the right product at the right time. It just has been a wonderful experience,” says Haslacher.

“When they implemented it, we didnt think it would drive sales as much as it did. I appreciate that its so fast. We cut everything out. Its just three questions, with images that are easy to see on mobile. We made it very user friendly, so that in less than 10 seconds you know what it is and you’re not getting bored with it.”

Pour Moi’s site also has a ‘Smart-Finder’, which is tied to a weather API. This feature takes the user’s current location and pairs it with the day’s weather data to select the Day Cream that matches the customer’s local climate. Despite this feature existing, “it’s still the quiz that outsells everything”, according to Haslacher.

“When women go to the store, they touch everything,” she explains. “The quiz is you engaging and it’s a little bit similar to touching the products, but it just tells you what the product is. Psychologically, for women, we want to be engaged and hold it a little bit – and that’s what the quiz is, I believe.”

Due to the success of the quiz, Pour Moi is going to start introducing more data-focused functionalities to help it learn more about its customers and gain an insight into what they want and think.

Though the brand has a strong digital focus with its on-site quiz, it has mostly steered clear of digital advertising – despite it also having over 32,000 followers on Instagram and over 13,000 likes on Facebook – except for using paid Google Search.

“Our bounce rate now is only 14 per cent, so people really look for us and find us. Our ROAS is between 12 and 16. Our conversion rates on Shopify are between 22 and 32 per cent, which makes us one of the best in the beauty space,” says Haslacher.

The focus of Pour Moi’s marketing in the early days has been almost entirely through appearances on local news stations across the US. The brand doesn’t even have a commercial of any sort yet.

“I promote the products via local news. Weather and traffic are the number one reasons why people watch local news, so I go on the local news via remote live interviews and tell them, ‘this is what you need here in Pittsburgh, this is what you need here in Miami’,” Haslacher explains. “For the Super Bowl, I did an interview in Tampa Bay. The Chiefs come from Kansas City, where there is a polar climate, and they landed in Tampa, where it’s temperate to tropical, so obviously they have to rotate their skincare.

“We launched properly in January 2020, and we were immediately shut down by the pandemic, so that’s why we came up with the idea of contacting local TV stations and setting up remote interviews. And it worked tremendously. We were gaining around 20,000 loyal without spending a single dollar.”

Pour Moi’s focus on local news won’t be lasting for much longer, however. The brand plans to debut its first-ever commercial in the summer. Alongside this, we can expect to see the launch of a new quiz, an update to its website, a new line called ‘Weatherproof Drops’, and new glue-less product packaging.