Latest / Skin Anarchy / Megan McIntyre, Digital Beauty Writer, Editor & Brand Consultant

Transcript

Megan McIntyre, Digital Beauty Writer, Editor & Brand Consultant · Skin Anarchy

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Hey guys, I wanted to pop in real fast before the episode and share with you my current obsession in the Skinfix space.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: I have been loving every single product by Skinfix.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if you don't know much about Skinfix, it was originally inspired in 1870 by Thomas Fitz, and who was the Form 6 at the time.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: And he was creating this bomb that was just that was working for so many of his customers for all their SkinFusters.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: So carrying that legacy and their scorer in with the current CEO and founder of this amazing line has created a wide range of products that really fit for almost everybody in every demographic.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm obsessed with the work that they're doing in the science aspect, in the self-care aspect, connecting clean beauty.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's all the good things that we want in our skincare products without compromising results.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: So again, check them out at www.skinfix.com and stay tuned for the awesome episode coming up.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks guys.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Hi guys, welcome back to Skincare Anarchy.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: This is your host, Ecta, and I have a phenomenal guest for you guys today.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: She is a beauty editor and a writer, and just I'm so excited to hear all about her journey.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: So without further ado, I want to introduce you guys to Megan McIntyre.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the show, Megan.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so, so thrilled that you're here.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Hi Ecta.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so happy to be here.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having me.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's my honor.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: I would love to get started with your, you know, your journey and beauty, your career, and all the amazing things that you've um experienced.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: If you could get us started with that.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Of course.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: So my career, I actually started, it was very traditional and then turned a little untraditional.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: I started out in magazines.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I majored actually in magazine journalism.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I was an American Society of Magazine Editors uh intern.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I interned at Self Magazine.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it was my junior year of college.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I was so taken with it.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: I was so excited.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: I met so many cool people that I decided I was going to move to New York with no job, uh,$1,000 in my bank account, and got to New York and just kind of hit the ground running and started, you know, asking other editors out for coffee.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, how did you get your job?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Getting interviews with people.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it was a lot of heartache because during those days, everybody wanted to be in magazines.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: So three months passed, and I'd gone on a ton of interviews, and nothing had passed, or nothing had had really happened.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I was down to the kind of dregs of my bank account at that point.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I managed to land an interview thanks to the generosity of Carrie Diamond, who at the time was the beauty director at Harper's Bazaar.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: She put me in touch with the beauty director, or I should say the editor-in-chief of Women's Word Daily Beauty Biz, which is Beauty Inc.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: now.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: And it turned out I ended up getting the job.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I knew nothing about beauty.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: I had not set out to be a beauty editor.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: It was not my forte.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I just kind of fell into it and knew nothing was ready to learn.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I went with it.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I was I was definitely clay that needed to be molded.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um I love that.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: I love that, Maine, because honestly, like you, you know, I feel like whenever I I talk to women, like I get so inspired because we have such like resilience, right?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like as women.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like we're just like able to go with the flow.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that you just kind of went with it and saw where it led you.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, totally.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, it wasn't the path that I saw for myself, but it was what I wanted to do.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to write.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I knew that writing was something I loved and something that I was good at.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: And it didn't matter to me what it was I wrote about.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: And I recognized the opportunity to work with someone who was very talented and a team that was very talented.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I just kind of sat there and decided to learn.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: And it worked out because unlike other traditional magazine jobs, working at a business-to-business publication, I got the opportunity to interview CEOs of companies.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: And you don't get a lot of those opportunities as a 21-year-old, as a 22-year-old, you don't get bylines for features.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you don't get to interview celebrities usually, and not back in those days, uh, you know, this was 2005, 2006.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I really had, you know, the education that a lot of people my age didn't have.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And that gave me a lot of confidence.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, and then unfortunately, the uh financial crisis of 2008 hit, and I got to experience my very first layoff, which was very fun.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh at the tender age of 24.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it was devastating, but it led me fortuitously into digital.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: And at the time, no one was really doing digital media.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: It was kind of looked at as uh step down.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: Blogs were just starting to come about.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: Digital media, people weren't really putting a lot of money into it.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I ended up at a publication called Daily Makeover.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: And Daily Makeover was had started out as, you know, this virtual makeover try-on technology where you take a picture of your face and you put on hairstyles.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: So they were looking to do editorial content, and I ended up getting hired there.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, it was again a fun learning experience.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: I got to try a lot of different things that I hadn't tried before.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: I ended up learning how to HTML code because it was a very small staff.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, again, something I never saw myself doing.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I was there for about three years, and I heard that another very cool, very fun up-and-coming publication at the time called Refinery29 was looking for a beauty editor.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I I knew it was, you know, the cool place to work at that time.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I think it was 2010.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: And I cold called or cold emailed, I should say, the editor-in-chief, Christine Barbarick, and was like, I hear you're looking for a beauty editor.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to come in and interview for the position.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so I I interviewed with their fashion director, Connie Wang, and ended up getting hired kind of off the street, not knowing anyone there.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I was there for five years.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: I I ended up being their beauty director and had an amazing, amazing time there, met a lot of really cool people, had a lot of amazing opportunities, and really just loved doing what I did, loved the opportunities, loved to take a new perspective.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: Because at the time, people weren't really, we weren't at at the the kind of knowledge and the kind of openness that we're at today about inclusion and diversity.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: And we were taking a very irreverent tone.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: We were taking a very all-inclusive look.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: We made sure like our models, we were really looking at not just models in terms of diversity of skin tone and ethnicity, but models in terms of body type, models in terms of disabilities, models in terms of, you know, differently abled.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: We were we were really looking at how do we represent different types of beauty that are beyond the quote unquote conventional standards?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: And nobody was really doing that.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: So we were going against the grain and looking at what was out there and going, why is this what's accepted?
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, why, why does everyone say that this is what it has to be?
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: Why can't we look at quote unquote imperfections and be happy about those?
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: Why can't we celebrate those?
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: And we also were very passionate, I was very passionate, about celebrating indie brands.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, obviously we did a lot with the larger companies, um, but we also really wanted to give a platform to these smaller brands that were up and coming and really showcase that there was a lot of innovation there.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, maybe they weren't as as well funded or they didn't have the kind of reach as a lot of these other companies did, but that didn't make them, you know, any less technology coverage.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, that was something I was passionate about.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: No, I I love that you you said that because, you know, honestly, for me, skincare anarchy has always been uh, you know, very, very similar in that way, is that you know, highlighting like, you know, the voices of of brands that don't really, they don't get that.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I know, like, you know, I grew up in the whole publication, like where magazines were everything, and you know, that timeline too.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I understand the relevance of getting published in a huge magazine, but brands are not, you know, it's just not fair.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you know what I mean?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like if someone's doing really good work and then they don't get published.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that you were at the forefront of introducing this concept of, you know, really taking a deeper dive into beauty and really, you know, redefining like what it means to be beautiful.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: I love your um that you went into that.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: And it was, it was really the opportunity and the fact that, you know, at that time, they really gave us the freedom to to do that.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we kind of had it was all fair game.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: It was like, you know what?
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Go for it.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: Have fun with it, you know, have have your voice, have, you know, how you want to talk about it, you know, go off and do that.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's like you know, a revolution is either the full revolution or nothing, you know.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: So I get it.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, that was a great, great period in my life, but I ended up deciding that I I really I really wanted to do something different.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: And at a certain point, there was nowhere left to grow.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: So I moved on to become a freelance writer and a freelance um consultant.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: So now I really work with both brands and editorial to really diversify the kind of content that I write.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: Because, you know, what I look at now, and again, my love of brands and my love of indie brands, and my love of speaking directly to consumers, yeah, you get a lot of that in editorial.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel like a lot of brands are realizing that you can, as a brand, you can still speak directly to a consumer and not feel like you're always selling to them.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of brands are recognizing the value of having an editorial voice, of having a connection, and they're realizing the value of having writers that understand that.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: And you're seeing a lot of old school editors actually, um, kind of refugees from the the glory days of magazines, yeah, uh, who are being hired and and kind of snatched up by brands for that exact reason, who are recognizing the value of having someone who can storytell and talk to their customer in a way that feels like they're being educated without necessarily sell, sell, sell all the time.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I do I do a mix of both of those things and it's really great because it it lets me, it lets me learn and it lets me, that's something that I've always said is if I'm not learning and constantly learning something new, I don't really understand why I'm doing that thing.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, whether it's I'm talking to a source about a really cool concept or topic or you know, new innovation, or if I'm learning how to write a brand book for a company that, you know, they can present to their investors, like that's a new skill set for me.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: I don't, you know, I didn't know how to do that before, but I know how to do it now because I, you know, I had to learn how to do it.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: So those are types of things that I think are really.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, when I think of beauty, I think of, well, how can you approach this differently?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: And can we can you go with the flow and can we change in society about what we think you know is beautiful and what we think is beneficial to, you know, this industry and and what we introduce consumers to.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: But to do that, you have to put yourself in the shoes of others and you have to, you know, you have to be a lot more fluid and a lot more, you know, I guess, giving, you know, and I think everything you're describing in your journey, like that just shows that, you know, writers such as yourself are are very much, you know, not only needed, but like just we need more of you, you know what I mean?
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like we need more people that think like you because that's that's the true that's true storytelling, like you said.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: Hey guys, sorry for interrupting your episode, but just a quick shout out to brilliancebybrown.com.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: This is an amazing publication which is geared towards providing reviews and options and highlighting brands that are really good for almost any skin type, especially for men and women over 40.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um Heidi Brown is just doing a phenomenal job.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Her whole team is working so hard to bring forward products that really work for the demographic that's never really been, you know, um highlighted before in the industry.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: So again, www.brilliancebybrown.com.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: Check it out and also check out Heidi's interview on our show.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening, guys, and I'm gonna let you get back to this episode.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, storytelling is something that is is valued across the board, and it's something that I think everyone gets now.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: And be it, you know, bite-sized social media, how you communicate with people on social media has changed, even representative of visual storytelling with things like TikTok to more long-form product descriptions, how we talk about those things, to how we do editorial content pieces, both features in magazines to features in digital media and you know, interactive pieces and how those things all come together and the convenience to again speaking to the reader or the consumer and giving them the information they need in the way that they they like to consume it.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that that's that's something that a lot of both brands and publications have started to learn is you can't force them to read or or view or buy in an area that they're not willing to do so.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: You're better going to them where they are and communicating to them in the way that they like to be communicated to rather than trying to force them into your preferred method of communication.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe SMS is the best way to get your point across to them and get their eyes on it, as opposed to trying to get them to comment on Instagram.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe they don't do that.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: So that isn't working for you.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's not your customer.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: So pivot, try a different way to, you know, I hate that word.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's such a it's such an overused marketing term, but you know, it works.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but you, you know, re-reevaluate the different ways you you communicate to that person and your strategy because you can't force them to shop or to read the way that you want them to.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: You have to make it accessible to them and show them new ways that correspond to their habits.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: And once you do that, you really engage them, whatever your your focus is or whatever your goal is, be it you want to educate them to better shop and make decisions, or you want to get them to talk to their friends about their products because they are really passionate about them, or you want them to be a subscriber to, you know, your new program or regimen.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think that just comes down to how you talk to them and making sure to find them where they are.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, um what this makes me think of is a lot of the microinfluencers out there and the way that people just blindly follow um, you know, uh individuals that they might see on social media.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason I say that is because I think that the, you know, journalism has been, you know, especially in beauty journalism, has been kind of, you know, overlooked in some ways, I think, recently.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: Because, you know, when I see a brand post like, hey, you know, I got featured in such and such magazine, it's usually the picture of, you know, whatever image they used for that brand.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I often wonder, it's like, well, what about the writer?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: What about the person who is writing the story and trying to create a connection between whoever the reader is?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that connection and that ability to form relationships with the people that you're, you know, I guess, I guess, essentially targeting, that is much more difficult than aesthetics or, you know, just putting a pretty picture up or being in a big magazine.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's that's really the quality of the people that you're, you know, you're speaking to and you're telling your story to so that, you know, they're able to convey it in a way that's inspirational, right?
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: So that's that's where I that's where I think that, you know, I I get very, very, I get passionate about this topic because I think that, you know, editors and writers, like we should be looking to them first because they're not only approaching it from an uh an area of like, you know, they're being complete with their research, but it's also about the way that you write and the way that you're able to convey human emotion and you know what I mean, like the things that you're able to invoke in people when they read a piece.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: That's more important than just seeing your favorite YouTube star, your favorite influencer post a picture of her doing her makeup again for the 59th time, you know.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's it's just you know what I mean?
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's a whole different like league.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: And and I think that people don't understand that because everyone's a beauty expert.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: So completely.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: And the way that I've always said it, and you know, when influencer culture happened, and you know, I have respect for people who are influencers because that is definitely there's a market for that.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I I have never positioned myself as an expert because I'm not an expert.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not a makeup artist, I'm not a hairstylist, I'm not a dermatologist.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: The way that I position myself is I'm your connection to the expert.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'm the person who takes the expert's knowledge, and I either give you that access or I explain it to you and I boil it down to a way that you can understand.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I think for me, I'm, you know, I'm a skincare nerd.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: I've always been a skincare nerd.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: I actually wish I'd paid a lot more attention in school to chemistry because I would have gotten a lot farther in my career sooner if I understood peptides and acids and pH.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I learned on the job.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but skincare has always, you know, really spoken to me.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: I also, you know, I suffered from acne very early on, and I still do as an adult.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's so it's something that you become very well versed in skincare.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: But I feel like skincare in particular is an area where you really need writers, you need information, you need things to be broken down for you because there's so much conflicting information.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas makeup and hair to a degree, it is very pretty, it's very visual, it's very much an aesthetic.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: And that's something where you can look at these great photos and you can see swatches.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: And that's why you see a lot of the time, a lot of influencers when they first started, it was mostly makeup tutorials, and you saw makeup for hair tutorials.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas skincare, there's a lot of science, there's a lot of medicine behind it, there's a lot of personal feelings, you know.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: I would do when I would do stories, you know, especially at refinery, there's a lot of like I tried it type stories that would do really well.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: But I would have to make decisions on would this story benefit more as an expert story speaking to someone, or would this benefit more as kind of an, you know, I tried it type story?
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if it was something like, you know, trying out a new machine that people don't necessarily have access to, uh, you know, I would go in and I would try it and give you kind of the full, is this really worth, you know, spending a lot of money on, or is this, you know, okay, instead try this, this, and this.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: Or is this uh, you know, I didn't do a lot of product reviews straight up normally because not every product works for everyone.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: So if something doesn't work for me, it doesn't necessarily mean it won't work for you.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't love doing those types of products.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: I would instead, or those types of stories, I'm sorry, I would instead like to talk about a trend.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if I saw a trend in this ingredient is very popular right now, why is it impopul?
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: What's the best way to incorporate it into a product?
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: What do dermatologists have to say about this?
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: What do aestheticians have to say about this?
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_01: There was one story that really, you know, I was so passionate about and really stuck with me.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: And again, this is speaking from someone who dealt with acne.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: Was I wanted to do a story about kind of what it means to have good skin and what it meant to people in careers or industries that were supposed to or expected to have good skin.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I ended up interviewing uh a selection or a cross-section of people in different industries who were you would think would have good skin, you know, a makeup artist, a celebrity, a public relations person for a really famous aesthetician, and you know, an influencer, uh YouTube star.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I just talked to them about their journey, about what it was like for them, about the misconceptions people had, their feelings, their their struggles and you know how people have these misconceptions.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it was one of our most popular stories because people connected it, connected with it on a very emotional level.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's real.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's real.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Very real.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, that's what's lacking in this industry, Megan.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, honestly, like, you know, there's not a lot of people I talk to that we have these kind of conversations because it it requires a certain level of understanding of like just how we are as human beings and what we really want to learn about.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, and you know, if you were to ask me, I think it's being accepted.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: And feeling accepted not only by ourselves, but like, you know, then that self-acceptance leads to more positivity and, you know, all that good stuff.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: But that starts from knowledge and it starts from education and it starts from somebody like, you know, sparking that first, you know, conversation.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: So you writing that article, yeah, people, I like, you know, if I had read that and didn't know anything about you, I would have been like, wow, you know, she really made me think.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the true beauty of a writer, a true writer.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: They can make you think and they can make you reflect.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why, you know, looping back to the influencer thing, I agree with you.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: Makeup is one thing, but you know, when it comes to emotions, when it comes to things that are more, you know, deeper, you need that professional, you know, that professional eye and that professional mind to really analyze what's important, um, like you just described about that article.
• 23:26
  unknown: Yeah.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I think again, and I think it extend extends to brands and speaking about that vulnerability and that that positivity.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, you're seeing it with a lot of brands that are trying to promote skin positivity, but there has to be an authenticity to it because you know it's one thing to say it's okay to have acne try this product.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, you talk to people we don't want acne you know like it's great that you're all accepting of it, but no one with acne is running around going, I'm so happy I have acne.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly like no, I'm I'm not really that happy to be showing it off.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'm, you know, I'm 37 years old and I'm like what the hell is still going on here?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: But it's it's nice that this you know veneer of perfection has been removed.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I also want you to talk to me in a way where I don't feel shamed.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like there's something wrong with me.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like I need to hide it.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: But I also don't you know you're not giving me this like false veneer of positivity where you know be really happy about it.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: But conversely here are some products that will hide it.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there needs to be that balance and you know connecting with your customer connecting with your consumer about you know we get it we understand it and we're not going to sit here and tell you that there's something wrong with you.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_01: But you know here's a really great skincare system and here's the education you need to help navigate you know a really hard time in your life or a really tough thing that's going on with your skin.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I think you know brands that understand how to communicate to the customer in that way are able to do that better.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: And you know unfortunately people who are you know have been trained in marketing don't really know how to do that.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: And you know that's not through no fault of their own.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's just not the kind of training in the background that they've gotten and it's you know it's rare to have to see that.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: And you know more power to the ones that can but it's I've seen some founders who are able to do it in a really great way.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: And you know again more power to them to be able to do that because it is you know I struggle with it on occasion.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's not easy to tell that story.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_01: So you know a lot of brand founders it's translating their vision translating their ethos their mission into something that's digestible to the consumer that has the consumer understand okay this is what this brand's about I stand behind that but also here's how their products fit into it here's how their products fit into my life and you know that's that's the challenge that I think a lot of people are are really struggling with.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah I agree.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that you know everything you said is extremely important to keep in mind because I think consumerism right now is it really is shifting because before I felt like it was you know people were being sold you know hope for a perfect solution to something and they were buying into that and now it's like you know the new thing is well promote knowledge and let the consumer have that power so that they're buying into knowledge.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: They're investing in knowledge and education and and informed decisions rather than just you know well okay I have to get I have to look exactly like this person.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: How do I do it quickly?
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: And that like taking advantage of that fear and taking advantage of like that's where I I've had such a huge problem with you know some brands in the past because it's like you know I almost feel like you're taking advantage of people's vulnerability rather than you know um exploring it and coming up with solutions that are not only good for your brand but also good for your consumers.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there's a level of ethics and morals that are involved with anything that has to do with humanity any way that we interact with another person, we have to keep ethics and morals at the forefront.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if you sell someone false hope, then you're the worst kind of person.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know like you have to be real.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah yeah so but you know Megan I've I've enjoyed really I've really enjoyed talking to you and interviewing you.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: You're such a unique person and I and I love how you think.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for all of this insight it's it's really really you know invaluable and I love it.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: This is such a fun conversation to have um everyone listening out there if you have any comments or questions or you know any kind of you know you want to keep the conversation going please leave us some feedback in the comment section for the art for this episode and um I will be back next time.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you again Megan thanks by guys so I hope you love that episode please make sure to hit subscribe if you're tuning in to us on any podcast platform we are available on so many different platforms so wherever it is that you're tuning in just go hit subscribe you'll be immediately notified when we publish new episodes this way you're able to tune in to amazing insights from experts brand founders industry leaders authors all the wonderful people that we host and that's very important for me because I love to hear from you guys and really understand what you love and what you want to hear more of.
• 28:39
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• 28:46
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• 29:02
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• 29:09
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• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.