China, a behemoth in the luxury skincare market, is slowing down. From a strong post-quarantine rebound, sales in the luxury skincare category tumbled by 10% in 2023 with a consumer shift towards mass trending skincare products over luxury beauty hauls.

Global prestige skincare brand SK-II was grappling with declining relevance among a consumer base that had once been supportive. During this critical period, SK-II had to act swiftly to rebuild relevance and give Chinese women a compelling reason to choose SK-II.

But how could brand love be rekindled amid a saturated landscape where every brand was selling itself?

We wouldn’t be relevant simply by telling another branded story that few cared to hear.

We had to find a way of embedding SK-II’s brand story of bare-skin confidence within an authentic, relatable story of Chinese women, told through their own voices.

It was time to dig deep into Chinese culture.

First, we needed an intuitive way to express “masking”.

The Chinese language thrives on wordplay with homonyms. We realized that the Chinese word for “masking yourself”, “装” (“Zhuang”), sounds identical to the word for “makeup”, “妆” (“Zhuang”).

“ZHUANG” became our buzzword, connoting a dual meaning of masking by ‘putting on a front’ and ‘putting on your face (with makeup)’.

It is a unique, ownable tension for SK-II, who has always supported women in transforming to their best bare skin and their truest selves.

We talked to five long-term SK-II users from their 30s to 60s who had embraced their true, authentic selves with age, and with their stories, launched “More Youthful With Age #越大越不ZHUANG (yuè dà yuè bù zhuāng)”, a series of social-first films challenging aging expectations and the practice of “masking” for women in China.

Being an older woman in China is tough.

From their 30s, women face strong social expectations that limit their choices. 4 in 5 women mask themselves to fit expectations as daughters, wives, mothers or working professionals – giving up their true selves and relying heavily on makeup, editing and camera filters to conceal signs of aging.

But there’s a small self-aspirational movement on LittleRedBook of women standing against the pressure to reclaim the narrative that life can be better and more authentic, even as they age. These women are setting a new “bare-face” beauty standard and showing their true selves against social expectations.

For decades, SK-II has championed women’s pursuit of their authentic best selves in skin and in life.

Our action was clear.

We would fuel this momentum of courageous women unmasking themselves and overturning social expectations by giving voice to their skin and life transformation stories.

Partnering with boundary-breaking photographer Shan Dian Sui who started a #LiberateYourBeauty trend on LittleRedBook, we photographed the five SK-II users bare-faced and released films on Douyin and LittleRedBook, chronicling their unconventional transformation – from pursuing passions post-divorce, giving up a high-paying job for a dream start-up, defying marriage expectations, to restarting life at 60.

Sharing how they used to mask themselves, the women spoke about embracing bare-skin confidence and living life on their own terms after deciding to “BU ZHUANG” (un-mask).

Launched on International Women’s Day, the 360 digital campaign was amplified through Bazaar China and national media. We rallied KOLs and KOCs to share their own “BU ZHUANG” stories flooding social media with unprecedented authentic content.

Disrupting traditional ‘sell-sell-sell’ category livestream executions, we ran a highly engaging campaign livestream, interviewing two of our five SK-II users who shared their authentic skin transformation journeys with viewership increasing 52 times.

1)LittleRedBook’s #1 UGC campaign:

>68,000 women shared their own “BU ZHUANG” stories. (Platform’s average campaign drives 20,000 UGC)

2)We captured overwhelming attention online,

>1.14 billion impression and 400,000 engagements on LittleRedBook and Douyin for #越大越不ZHUANG

#1 beauty livestream on Douyin, unique viewer grew by 52x vs daily livestream

3)Prompted the nation to soul-search,

The nation’s biggest media – CCTV, Xinhua and People’s Daily – joined the conversation and provided coverage on “ZHUANG”

16 leading impactful industry media

200+ newswire on national media

100+ positive media clippings

#1 viewership brand co-op video on Xinhua in a year

#1 viewership and engagements of a Douyin brand co-op video on CCTV in a year

60 million in reach and 215,000 engagements

4)And made SK-II relevant again.

Douyin searches increased 348% vs previous year

LittleRedBook searches increased 122% vs previous year

Positive sentiment KOL videos increased by 330% vs previous UGC activation