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It’s What You Do, Not What You Say

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Growing up, we are all taught that actions speak louder than words.  Working in an engineering-based company reinforces this thinking for me.  It’s what you make that matters.  And in my role, in particular, I see this truth played out time and time again.  I investigate human beings.  Why? Because the inventions we create for brands need to be solving something for the people who use them or giving them something beneficial.  To understand what people really need or want, we need to go beyond what they say and look at what they DO.  Luckily we have access to people’s behaviors, namely their search behaviors, and that reveal so much.

What does this have to do with beauty?  Well, Google just published its first ever 2015 beauty report.  The piece showcases the most searched beauty items of 2015.  Some of the searches may be obvious and some surprising.  For example, one of the top searched beauty items was braids.  Looking back on the trends these past few months, I can see why.  Lots of celebrities were braiding their hair.  Another top trending searches was for male hair styles…hmmmm.  Now that’s surprising, no?

Of course the searches themselves are interesting facts.  But what is even more interesting is WHY these searches are happening and WHAT we do with this information.  And that’s where my team and I come in.  We analyze it and make sense of it as a source of creative fodder.

The most salient point to be made with this information, however, is how this high level of interest by men (as indicated by their search behavior) would not have been expected by us and probably not have been voiced by the guys we know.  After all, we still live in a culture where men are not “supposed” to care too much about how they look.

It does matter what we say, after all I wouldn’t be writing in this blog if it didn’t! Image may be NSFW.
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:)
 But what we DO tells us so much more.   For my job, this helps me understand human beings that much more. But in life in general, it has major consequences too.  We are always seeking clarity and truth. We need direction amidst the wonderful but sometimes debilitating chaos of our lives. By realizing it’s the behaviors — our own and those of others — not so much people’s words, that reveal so much to us, we can get a bit more of that clarity we need to live our lives with purpose and peace.

 


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