True, influencers have more selling power than ever (Adobe data shows that this past holiday season, 20.4 percent of online sales across categories were driven by
social media and affiliate links, up roughly 16 percent from 2024), but that power is more dispersed across an ever-growing number of micro- and mega-creators. Not to mention, AI and deepfake influencers, which are increasingly populating and peddling products on
social media feeds.
To that end, today’s founder-creators are looking to build brands that first capitalize on, then transcend, their own selling power.
“POV Beauty is for anyone with a point of view — it’s very community-oriented,” said Kelly Dill, a partner at Imaginary Ventures, which backs POV and companies like Skims and Reformation. “We saw that Mikayla was someone who was really impacting the [beauty] category, and one of the things that got us excited about POV was that she wanted to create a brand that existed beyond her.”
Sincerely, Yours, meanwhile, represents Sephora’s first explicit bet on
teen skin care; Tone, which entered Target six months after launching, offers body care geared toward the
fragrance-obsessed Gen-Z male, and Monk’s false eyelash play was so true to her personal brand that viewers guessed Doting’s core offering even before the reveal.
“Success for influencer beauty brands hinges on specificity,” said Kendall Becker, head of trend and editorial strategy at Trendalytics. “Brands that perform well are anchored in a creator’s niche rather than broad, mass-appeal positioning.”
“We are very honest with our clients; we are not going to build something just to build it, because it will fail,” said Eman Redwan, partner at RangeMP. “It’s like, let’s take a step back; let’s train your audience to purchase from you; build some credibility before we do that.”
POV’s Snatch It face serum. Courtesy
Sincerely, Yours offers four facial skin care products, each priced under $30 and geared toward 14- to 18-year-olds. According to the brand, its Hit Refresh facial mist is the number-two mist at Sephora, and data from Navigo Marketing shows Sincerely, Yours comprised 1.7 percent of online skin care sales at Sephora during the last 13 weeks.
The Sincerely, Yours lineup. Isabella Behravan
Salish launched the brand alongside her father, Jordan Matter, whose family YouTube channel has more than 34 million subscribers, as well as chief executive officer Julia Straus, who has previously held that role at Tula and Sweaty Betty.
Will Sincerely, Yours maintain its teen focus as its founder and face ages up?
“We absolutely want to stay focused on this core customer, because this is the customer that is underserved and there is such opportunity to focus and build here,” said Straus. “With that being said, this is Salish’s brand, and we’ll want to evolve along with her. So it’s a bit of both, not an either-or.”
Sincerely, Yours has raised just under $7 million to date from investors including Coefficient Capital, Habitat Partners and Strand Equity. The latter firm also backs Tone, which cracked $1 million in sales three days after debuting and, like Sincerely, Yours, enlisted a beauty veteran — Nathaniel Weiss, former president of Nécessaire — to help lead its launch. POV’s CEO, meanwhile, is Ani Hadjinanian, former general manager of Augustinus Bader North America.
Doting, which is fully bootstrapped and offers four false lash styles priced at $10.99 per reusable pair, is targeting $2 million to $3 million in first-year sales. The brand has a handful of fractional employees working alongside Monk and Doolamarani, and is next looking to build out a
TikTok Shop presence and enable DTC shipping to the U.K. and Australia, where it has seen the most international demand.
Longer-term, “we definitely want to do color cosmetics; eyeliner, mascara, brows, and I’m also working on designs for some accessories that we’re creating from scratch,” said Monk. As far as retail goes? “Sephora, Target; potentially even Walmart could be cool, because it’s accessible for people. Honestly, it could be cool to ask my audience where they’d want to find Doting, and listen.”