What is a Foundation Shade Finder?

Sushil
  -  
June 25, 2024

The foundation shade finder quiz is a type of eCommerce quiz (specifically meant for the Beauty industry) that helps shoppers find the correct skin shade and skin undertone.

This is how a foundation shade finder work:

  • The quiz consists of several questions which include questions to gather data about a shoppers’ skin shade and skin undertone.
  • Further questions in a foundation shade finder quiz depends on the brands requirements as per what data they want to collect from the shoppers.
  • Based on all the answers given by the shoppers, they are recommended best cosmetics with the correct foundation match.

The foundation shade finder quiz is being marketed by various other names such as Shade matching quiz, Shade finder quiz, Foundation quiz, Foundation finder, etc but the rest of everything is the same. There are various brands like Estee Lauder, It Cosmetics that provide shade quiz. This is a must tool for the beauty/cosmetics brands on their website to boost their eCommerce sales.

Why do you need a foundation shade finder?

There are a set of women who know their skin shades and undertones. That’s really good. They generally know what to buy. But there is a larger set of women who still have doubts about their skin shades and undertones.

Your shoppers are confused about which shade is good for their skin. And it is stopping them from buying products from your store.

Why?

Because there are so many options that it is easy for the shoppers to get a grab of choice anxiety before they can decide a product.

There are just so many stuffs for a lot of shades and undertones people are around us” – says Evelyn, a foundation expert in New York city.

But it is critical for your shoppers to know their correct skin tone and undertone to match it to your products to place the order, she further adds.

There are several traditional ways and a few new ways of knowing shades and undertones. One for example, take a good look at the veins on your wrist under natural light for an easy way to determine your undertone.

But before jumping into that, let me tell you a little about skin tone and undertone.

Skin Tone and Undertone

It is important to know why knowing these parameters is important. It helps shoppers pick the right makeup and skincare products that complement them. It helps you to recommend the correct products to them.

The skin tone is the upper skin surface color and is determined by the melanin content (its the skin pigment) on the top skin layer. There are basically 4 main types of skin tone but obviously, it can be divided into more categories because of the skin complexions( such as “ very deep”, “very light” etc). For now, let’s stick to the major four. They are :

  • Deep
  • Medium
  • Fair
  • Light

The subtle hue beneath the skin tone is called the undertone. There are 3 main types of undertone. They are:

  • Cool
  • Warm
  • Neutral

Skin tone finder by Tangent AI Selfie QuizTM platfrom

Different ways to find the skin tone and Undertones

So there are different ways to find skin tones and undertones.

For Skin tone:

  • Naked eyes

Although there is no guarantee that this is a perfect approach, it generally gives a good idea.

  • Examining the jawline

Examining the jawline gives a better idea about the skin tone since it does not change as the other part of the face does.

For undertones:

  • Vein Test
  • Jewellery Test
  • White Paper Test
  • Sun Test
  • Color Test

All these ways are standard ways to find the shade and undertone, but getting accurate results is always a problem.

Now it becomes really important for you to make sure that you let your shoppers (who come to your website) know what their shades and tones are, as well as guide them to the best products that would suit them.

Read this to delve deeper into process of building your own skin undertone test (highly recommended).

Different approaches brands take to make shoppers discover their shade and tones

Here are the ways shoppers discover accurate skin shades and undertones:

#1. Virtual assistance for skin tone & undertone

Some brands ask shoppers to share their selfies with them and some beauty consultants would analyze them manually. The results are then shared with the shoppers via mail. This is a time-consuming process. And brands need to pay the consultant some fee as well.

Screenshot of Estee Lauder Virtual consultant

#2. Educational content

There are different ways to find shade + tones and those content are being mentioned on the brand’s website. That’s good but then the drawback is that it is still unclear if it’s correct or not. If it’s wrong, it really affects the product recommendation. And consequently, reduce customer satisfaction.

#3. AI-based Selfie shade match question

There are some companies like Tangent, which provide a selfie-based shade match question. It asks for a selfie just before the questions, and with the help of artificial intelligence, they are able to identify the shade and undertone with maximum accuracy. This is really helpful in reducing the questions in the quiz and helps in more quiz completion. You can check out one example of the Selfie shade match question here. This is super fast and super accurate than any other approach.

Screenshot of AI identifying the undertone from the Selfie QuizTM platform

Use technology to know your skin : Foundation shade finder

This is the recommended process:

There are some companies like Maybelline, Amazing Cosmetics, that have a selfie-based shade match questions.

They ask for a selfie just before the question starts, and with the help of artificial intelligence, they are able to identify the shade and undertone with definite accuracy.

Result, instead of asking 20+ question to understand the customer needs, selfie based questions help in reducing the questions and leads to more product engagement. This is a good approach to recommend accurate products to shoppers and engage them with your platform.

Please get in touch with us here to deploy the selfie-based shade match questions for your shoppers

Screenshot of Selfie QuizTM platfrom made by Tangent AI