How Did CANMAKE Grasp the Heart of Young Girls — Analyzing the Market Segmentation Strategy of CANMAKE

 Wang Jin, 1155088181

As one of the most popular cosmetics brands in Asia, the greatest strength of CANMAKE is its high cost performance. While its sales concept is to offer mass market cosmetics product with the most decent price and most usable quality, CANMAKE is widely used and acclaimed among students and young white-collars. The high quality and inexpensive price make it occupy a large percentage of market share in Asia.

It should be noted that the popularity of CANMAKE is largely due to the precise positioning of the brand on the basis of market segmentation strategy, which caters to the needs of young female customers. In general, CANMAKE mainly adopts a combination of demographic segmentation strategy and psychological segmentation strategy.  

Demographic Segmentation Strategy

While CANMAKE mainly targets at young female customers including students and white-collars, its price position is quite cheap. According to the survey conducted by HKTDC, young female respondents aging 20 to 30 are more likely to make up every day (88%), compared with mature female respondents between 31 and 45 (83%). That means the ratio of young females who have makeup habits is higher than that of mature females. On the other hand, most of CANMAKE products are only priced dozens of yuan, so that even young girls with limited economic capacity can afford them. According to the report by China Kantar Worldpanel in 2016, among the high-end cosmetics consumers, young female between 20 and 29 spend the least amount of money on their single shopping of cosmetics. Since they just step into the society, their income is limited. That’s why they prefer to choose low-cost brand like CANMAKE.

Psychological Segmentation Strategy

        According to the VALS typology, the target customers of CANMAKE tend to be makers and survivors, as they would like to buy those low-cost cosmetics which are not established brands to satisfy their needs for daily makeup. Although CANMAKE is not an international brand enjoying high reputation around the world, it is still a regular company with strict supervision system. Established in 1985, it has gained great popularity around Asia these years. Many of its products have ranked the first in the “Cosme List”, which is one of the most authoritative cosmetics lists in Japan. That’s why CANMAKE also owns many celebrities’ endorsement. Therefore, even consumers cannot demonstrate their ability of purchasing by choosing CANMAKE products, they still feel self-sufficient and assured that they have bought a reliable brand with good word of mouth, which is the traits of makers. 
        In terms of survivors, as the target customers of CANMAKE are mainly young females including students and workplace newbies, many of them might have never tried making up before. While their economic capacity is limited, it takes great risk for them to try a completely unknown brand with expensive price, for if it is not fit for them, they would waste a large amount of money. Therefore, the best option for these makeup beginners is to choose a cheap brand with high cost performance to practice their makeup skill and satisfy their needs for daily makeup. CANMAKE is exactly that kind of brand which could meet their needs without taking the risk of wasting money.

Hence, it can be concluded that CANMAKE successfully caters to the needs and psychology of its target customers on the basis of its accurate demographic and psychological segmentation strategy, which makes itself distinguished among the cosmetics brands in Asia.

References:

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