Neutrogena Semi-Annual Sale

Every summer, Neutrogena offers a semi-annual sale to draw interest and introduce consumers to new products they might want to try, and 2021 was no different. However, on top of revenue growth, the skincare and beauty brand wanted to glean specific insights from the campaign and worked with email agency of record Merkle to develop and execute the strategy.

On the cusp of major changes to Apple’s privacy policy, Neutrogena sought to use email performance from the semi-annual sale to optimize its email experience before performance metrics became unreliable. Throughout the semi-annual sale – running from mid-May through June 2021 – five different emails were sent with different A/B tests for subject lines, button copy, and email design.

Neutrogena encouraged subscribers to “layer skincare like a pro” by sending an image-heavy email that showcased the brands’ most popular products in the order that they are used in a skincare routine. This gave subscribers a great visual to see if they were missing any steps in their routine, needed to replace empty products in the routine, or switch to a new product.

Neutrogena discovered that discount offerings in subject lines performed better, its audience doesn’t have a preference for subject line emojis either way, and ‘shop now’ is the best CTA button. Lastly, all five emails tied to the semi-annual campaign were in the top 10 for emails sorted by revenue and were among the highest revenue per email (RPE) in 2021.