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campaignasia.com20 campaign December/january 2015

nesia. “Their line is made from all natural and halal in-gredients, designed specifi-cally for Asian Muslim wom-en’s skins,” explains Qoolio Chigurh, strategic planner at JWT Jakarta. “However, in re-

cent years, they’re moving to-wards expanding to the broader public as more and more non-Muslim Indonesian women have chosen Wardah as they consider it to be a ‘saf-er’ choice for their skin.”

Brands are unequivocally paying more attention to their relationship with Muslim con-sumers. This is certainly true of the cosmetic and personal care industry with huge de-mand for halal cosmetics and personal care products from Malaysia, followed by Indone-sia and Pakistan.

While the halal label is al-ready well-established in the food sector, it gained popular-ity in cosmetics when the Ma-laysian government intro-duced a hala l cosmetics standard in June 2010.

Striking a balance between faith and beauty can be tricky for Muslim women, though. Many fear that mainstream cosmetic products might con-tain alcohol or by-products de-rived from animals forbidden by Islam. Shelina Janmoham-ed, VP at Ogilvy Noor, says the growth is also being driven by concern that products Muslim women put on their bodies af-fect who they are.

The brands making a mark in this sector, Janmohamed says, tend to be smaller com-panies set up by entrepre-neurs who thought, “There is no product that suits my need to be halal so I’m going to set one up for myself.”

One such brand is Wardah, particularly popular in Indo-

cally for hijab-wearing young Malaysian women. Cultural sensitivities meant the brand couldn’t show the women washing their hair or flaunt-ing hairstyles. So the cam-paign depicted the hijab as a fashion statement, while still respecting Muslim values. Not a strand of hair appeared while women were shown en-joying an active lifestyle. After a decline of 5 per cent in 2012, Sunsilk grew by 9 per cent in 2013 a nd bra nd scores amongst Malay hijab-wearing women grew by double digits.

In a similar vein, Henkel launched its Gliss Restore & Refresh line last year in the Middle East, which it claims is “the first haircare specifically for veiled hair”. Colgate-Pal-molive, meanwhile, has intro-duced a halal toothpaste.

“As the demand increases, brands need to cater not just the basic needs for halal cos-metics in general but also for different age groups and life-styles,” adds Chigurh.

This view is backed by John Goodman, regional director at Geometry Global. “[Futurist Muslims] are very at home with the modern world, but are still strong believers and loyal to their faith. Brands should take care to neither of-fend nor patronise them.”

Long ignored or misunderstood by the mainstream, Muslim women’s beauty needs are being championed by a new wave of niche brands, to commercial success, writes Matthew Carlton

Beauty brands eyeing halal cosmeticssector study MusliM consuMers

Hair today… sunsilk’s clean & Fresh was specifically aimed at malaysian muslim women

In terms of marketing, these brands tend to take a two-pronged approach. “They are clear that the ingredients are halal-friendly and the sec-ond reflects the lifestyle of the audience that they are speak-ing to,” says Janmohamed.

Research has shown, she says, that marketing by West-ern brands fails to appeal to Muslim women because it shows “an ostentatious type of beauty” which doesn’t speak to who Muslims are or what they look for.

Some Western advertisers are bucking this trend though. Sunsilk’s Clean & Fresh vari-ant was formulated specifi-

expert opinion Marketing to Muslims calls for cultural understanding, not sweeping generalisations

The global muslim population is often cited as a ‘global

community’. but in fact it is not a

homogeneous market segment that can be qualified by one primary differentiator — age, language or skin colour — or through attitudes and

behaviour. unlike other cultural

consumer segments, the global muslim consumer segment is made up of a myriad of socio-cultural sub-sets that have been influenced by emigration and adaptation to different social and environmental norms depending on their current place of residence. This has resulted in today’s

diverse mix of muslim consumers who each have a strong, unique value system and identity that is yet based on and governed by the values of islam.

brands targeting the global muslim community need to adopt more strategic customer-centric approaches to meet the pace of change. enhancing personal relationships is

very important in attracting and retaining customer loyalty. To do that, brands have to listen and listen well to each muslim consumer’s individual cultural statements and create experiences around that in order to resonate and engage with them.

The way to establish a strong brand in this community is through

understanding the consumer’s sociocultural background and their physical environment, and commonalities of values must also be clearly communicated and perceived.

Joy Abdullah is the head of marketing and communication at INCEIF, the Global University of Islamic Finance

Market 2013 2014 2015australia & nZ 1.34 1.36 1.37china 17.3 19.98 18.74Thailand 20.4 21.61 23.01india 77.89 84.62 92.23pakistan 119.7 130.52 142.85indonesia 255 283 315.74malaysia 306.68 340.41 379.56Total 798.31 881.5 973.5

Source: Technavio

hSamsung’s dominance of mobile coming under threatPage 22

Halal beauty market (us$ million)