The EFMP’s French partners, Impact Sales & Marketing, recently developed a home demonstration sales network for Panasonic’s revolutionary high-grade professional beauty products. This type of ground breaking campaign had not previously been done and French field marketing agency, Impact Sales & Marketing, jumped at the opportunity to create something new.  It was felt that products that utilise new technology and which cost more than regular products in the market wouldn’t sell through a traditional distribution network such as consumer electronics shops or specialist stores. Panasonic needed a different strategy to sell these value-added products.

Panasonic is best known for its consumer electronics and is also one of the leading players in the electronic beauty and wellness device market. Electronic Wellness includes devices that improve blood circulation and collagen skin production. This is a fast-growing market in Asia and Panasonic wants to develop this market within France where it is not yet too competitive.  As part of this campaign, Panasonic launched a hand held device that uses radio frequency and ultrasound to stimulate facial collagen production which allows skincare products to penetrate deeper into the skin. Until recently, this type of technology was only available in specialised beauty salons, but Panasonic is now offering it to people to use for home facial treatments. Although the technology is readily available, it is expensive, and as a consequence, this type of product can’t be commercialized in traditional distribution networks where prices are usually below €100. The challenge was to increase the brand capacity to sell the value-added products and this also necessitated providing educational demonstrations and testing of the product in order for the purchaser to make an informed purchase.

Panasonic chose to use launch its electronic wellness products using home demonstrations, a method used to great success by companies such as Thermomix and Tupperware. Panasonic believe that selling a technologically advanced product that costs over €200 requires a certain amount of advice and first-hand experience of how the product works before customers will have the confidence to purchase one.

Impact Sales & Marketing were asked by Panasonic to create their nationwide home demonstration sales network. As no field marketing company was providing this type of service at the time, Impact Sales & Marketing were chosen based on their unrivalled business development capacity and experience within the French market. Impact Sales & Marketing took up the challenge and, starting from scratch, built the campaign based on their recruitment, training and management expertise and capabilities. Since 2017, a network of more than 180 brand ambassadresses has been created and this should reach 500 by the end of 2019. The campaign was a risky one but has turned into a great success with projected turnover to be 5% of the division turnover by the end of the year. The experience and expertise gained by Impact Sales and Marketing is yet another unique set of skills now readily available for other partners of the EFMP to draw on should the opportunity arise.