As someone who practically “lived” on the internet since the early days of influencer marketing, I witnessed beauty influencers going from full face, full glam makeup to adopting “clean,” no-makeup looks over the years. During the prime of the clean beauty trend, audiences stopped paying attention to glam makeup content—highlighting how audience behavior shifts with the changing trends.
Trends move quickly in the beauty industry, and influencer marketing strategies should evolve in tune.
The brands that get it right are the ones who will keep maintaining cultural relevance. In this post, I dig deeper into the evolution of beauty trends and how brands can navigate these shifts in their influencer marketing strategies. Let’s get started.
Beauty influencers have always been at the forefront of every online beauty trend we’ve witnessed in the past decade. They’ve influenced makeup looks and pioneered viral products, pivoting with the changing times. Here’s a quick breakdown of how beauty trends have evolved since the advent of beauty influencers:
Although most people trace back the origins of beauty influencers to the 2010s, the mid-2000s was where it all started. And I speak from experience as someone who was heavily involved in the scene. This was way before Facebook gained popularity and MySpace still dominated the internet. The “scene” aesthetic emerged from the platform, characterized by a blend of pop-punk and emo subcultures.
Ultra-straight hair, heavy black eyeliner, coon-tail extensions, and teased volume became signature beauty looks that we saw all over the internet. Within this subculture, influential personalities gained popularity and shaped the generation’s fashion and makeup trends. This era was all about loud and experimental self-expression.
In fact, this is the era that launched beauty influencers like Jeffree Star into prominence way before his YouTube fame. With bright pink hair and extravagant makeup looks, the influencer even became the most followed person on MySpace at one point.
As beauty influencers gained ground on YouTube, they began sharing in-depth tutorials on how to do full-face makeup. And with Instagram gaining popularity among the social media community, the “Instagram face” could be seen everywhere.
Influencers were applying a full face of makeup with hyper-defined contouring and intense highlighting—complete with the bold, microbladed brows. Kylie Jenner’s lip kits became a viral sensation as everyone strived to achieve the perfect pout. This was around the same time as when influencers like Nikkie de Jager (NikkieTutorials) championed bold, ultra-glam looks.
Then COVID hit, causing massive cultural shifts that changed how consumers behaved and made purchases across sectors. The beauty industry was no different, with consumers spending less on products that were deemed an “extravagance” rather than a necessity.
Partly fueled by economic factors and partly fueled by lockdowns, people weren’t buying as many cosmetics as before as they switched to simpler, more practical stay-at-home routines. One study found that weekly makeup usage declined by 28% between 2019 and 2022.
But sales for natural beauty products increased from 18% in 2017 to 24% in 2021, marking a growing demand for fewer, but higher quality products.
Trends like “skinimalism” took over, as influencers advocated for no-makeup makeup and a minimalistic approach to skincare. Dewy makeup and glowing skin became the signature looks of the clean beauty trend that’s been all over TikTok and Instagram.
Brands like Glossier and Rhode gained virality because they were founded on this principle, focusing on beauty essentials and intentional ingredients.
There was a time everyone wanted Glossier’s Cloud Paint to get that natural, “lit-from-within” flush that you can immediately associate with the clean beauty trend. And Hailey Bieber became the face of the clean girl aesthetic that everyone was channeling.
While clean beauty trends and the clean girl aesthetic dominated in the 2020s, there were plenty of micro-trends that emerged and quickly faded away in between. Gourmand perfumes, mob wife glam, and strawberry girl makeup were all over our feeds at one point, positioned as the “next big thing” after clean beauty.
While these micro-trends didn’t stick around long enough to completely replace the trend, there are indicators that people are starting to move away from the perfectly polished clean girl aesthetic.
Beauty influencers and celebrities alike can be seen embracing bolder, more colorful makeup once again. Gems, jewels, bright colors, and soft goth makeup are gradually seeing a revival (even if no one’s “pushing” them). Here’s one of my favorite looks on Zara Larsson for her “Midnight Sun” promo.
My point is that some trends fade away as quickly as they pop up while others turn into a whole movement that defines entire decades of beauty.
While brands should evolve to “get with the times,” there is such a thing as moving too fast. You don’t have to invest all your resources into pivoting for every new micro-trend or TikTok aesthetic that’s dominating your feeds. That’s why it’s important to make a clear distinction between what’s a fad and what’s a long-term movement.
Here’s a quick reference table to help you assess whether a trend is just a fad or something that’s worth pivoting for.
As you can see from the rapid rise and fall of micro-trends, trends flip past. Brands risk irrelevance when they tie themselves to a single aesthetic or move quickly with every fad. Here’s how you can navigate trend shifts when working with influencers in the beauty industry.
Brands that stay relevant throughout the waves of shifting trends are the ones who anticipate them early and align their strategies much faster than competitors. That’s why trend forecasting is so important for effective marketing. You need to stay on top of online discussions and identify patterns in how interest in specific topics changes over time.
This will help you anticipate which topics are gaining popularity, so you can accurately predict trends well before they blow up.
Platforms like Influencity come with social listening tools that identify trending conversations and hashtags as well as competitor activity. These insights can help you forecast trends that are gaining ground in your industry, so you know when and how to pivot.
When trends take over social media, brands instinctively feel an urge to participate. The mob wife aesthetic seemed to be everywhere at one point. People were paying attention to the topic and wanted to be a part of the trend. So it’s only natural for brands to create content about something everyone else is talking about.
But not every trend is worth overhauling your entire strategy and product lineup over because they could be short-lived fads.
Sure, you could create a few timely posts to keep the algorithm happy and retain people’s interest. But a micro-trend doesn’t necessarily deserve its own entire marketing campaign or product collection.
In the mob wife example above, you could have existing influencer ambassadors create makeup looks inspired by the aesthetic. You could have them push existing products that match the aesthetic. However, you don’t need to launch a mob wife eyeshadow palette when you already have palettes that can be used to create the look.
Before pivoting to a new trend, closely examine it for substance. Does it solve a real problem? Is there a steady upward curve in interest vs. a sharp peak?
This will help you figure out which trends to prioritize and which ones should be buried deep into your Instagram grid.
With trends fading as quickly as they emerge, having a diverse influencer roster protects you from being left behind.
And I’m not just talking about ethnicity and skin color. Rather, you’re going to need some diversity in terms of makeup style and aesthetic. This will help you expand your reach across beauty consumers with different tastes and personal styles. It’s also essential for maintaining relevance amid shifting trends.
So while one beauty influencer creates their signature glam looks using your palettes, another could be using your blush to get a dewy flush that matches their clean, minimalist aesthetic.
If you’re leaning too heavily on influencers sharing a single type of aesthetic, you risk being left behind once the trend shifts.
Brands like ColourPop are known for their colorful, high-pigment makeup (they’re my personal favorite!) So the brand regularly partners with creators who are known for putting together bold and creative makeup looks matching the ColourPop vibe. At the same time, they still partner with more “natural” nano-creators like Trishi, who has a clean and minimalist aesthetic.
This helps the brand stay relevant across diverse beauty subcultures, ensuring a stable brand presence even in the face of shifting trends.
Speaking of relevance, you have to make sure an influencer’s audience is truly interested in the products you sell. Not all beauty creators are made equal—some focus on skincare, others focus on makeup, and some primarily create content on fragrance. While you’ll find influencers who are an intersection between categories, most of them have an audience that follows them for a very specific interest.
Use platforms like Influencity to analyze an influencer’s audience demographics. So you can pinpoint which beauty influencers have an audience that’s interested in skincare vs. makeup vs. fragrance.
This will make it easier to continue reaching a highly relevant audience even as you pivot between trends.
Consumers want brands to stay on top of trends, minus the trend-hopping. When you’re quickly jumping in on every trend and shifting your influencer messaging accordingly, it can come across as “trying too hard.”
And you end up being “cringe” instead of relevant.
So even as you forecast trends and pivot your strategies, make sure you don’t force influencers to follow along. Give them the freedom to authentically be themselves instead of trying to fit into a specific aesthetic that’s “not them” only because it’s the latest trend.
If an influencer regularly tries new makeup trends, you can effortlessly have them incorporate the new trend into their content. But if someone who only creates bold and unique costume makeup looks suddenly shifts to a “clean girl” look for a brand-sponsored video, it may look out of place and inauthentic.
In an industry where new trends pop up almost weekly, brands don’t want to be left behind. Strategic trend forecasting combined with a robust partnership with beauty influencers is the key to staying relevant throughout the trend evolution. Use the tips and best practices I shared above to evolve your beauty and skincare marketing with influencers.
While not completely out of the picture, the clean girl aesthetic is gradually losing its hold on mainstream culture. Consumers are starting to shift toward color and bold makeup looks for self-expression.
“Skinimalism” and expressive makeup (think: bold applications and colorful palettes) are currently trending in beauty right now.
Soft-focus polish and extra-celestial play are some of the top Gen Z beauty trends in 2026, as consumers move toward self-expression without losing their priority on skin health.
For Gen Z, skin barrier health and ingredient transparency are some of the biggest considerations in skincare. Unlike previous generations, this generation is also big on preventative care.