My Thoughts: Beauty Reviews in the Beauty Community

I'll be discussing what I think about makeup reviews within the beauty community and my advice for product research!

Makeup is truly a wonderful thing because one product doesn't work out well for one person but is another person's "holy grail" product. Once that person has a response to a product, some will review them (like me) to an audience on social media on whether it was good or not.

People do this to create a rating balance for a product because real people want to know if a product is worth it or not. What I mean by "rating balance" is the ability to review every feature of a product from poor to exceptional fairly and getting an average star rating of it. People want to know if the quality is good, if the pigmentation is there, if it's travel friendly, so on and so forth.

My current makeup collection. I've researched numerous of reviews before purchasing the products I've bought!

I think for some time, a lot of people lost trust in beauty guru's reviews on YouTube because they felt they were undisclosed on if they were sponsored reviews or not. Drama channels drove a lot of this conspiracy because they noticed that 3-6 YouTubers were all raving about the same product around the same time or making similar themed tutorials over celebrity music video looks.

I cannot lie, it did look fishy and I too lost trust in some beauty gurus on YouTube and still don't like to watch some of their videos because it seems fake. The conspiracies did die down when drama channels weren't being pushed in my recommendations and bigger beauty gurus seemed to quit raving about the same products all at once.

At the time when I lost a lot of trust with them, I took a lot of their reviews with a grain of salt. I could tell who was being honest with their product reviews and those who weren't. Even if they weren't paid, I just had a hard time believing them. With the bigger channels pushing promo codes for Morphe in your face, this led to the rise of smaller channels that I felt were more honest.

I took reviews from the bigger and smaller channels and came to my own conclusion instead of "OMG, ____ SAID THIS PALETTE WAS SO GOOD, I MUST GET IT!" I began to read a lot of reviews on Sephora, Ulta, the product's website, Influenster, etc., because these were real people who don't have an unlimited budget and can't afford wasting money on crappy products.

I impulsively bought the ABH Subculture Palette because I had a good expectation of the palette knowing it was going to be the Modern Renaissance's sister palette. I reviewed it and I LOVED it but other people are dragging it for being super powdery. It's just the power of makeup and how it works for some and is complete trash for someone else.

With reviews, you REALLY have to educate yourself. Please do not be the person that is like "well, ____ said this lipstick was crap, I am not getting it" even though it might actually be a decent lipstick, or sit there and say "_____ said this was the most pigmented palette on Earth." Not everything works the same on everyone.

Our skin types, complexions, and features are all different and if you feel that you can really trust that beauty guru's opinion (or research further into the product) then buy the product. I am not stopping you, but don't be close minded. Do your homework.

MY ADVICE

As mentioned, I think the lack of trust within major beauty channels has kind of slowed down. I've learned to trust certain people's opinions, research the product, and keep the company's history in mind with how consistent they are. Research return policies before buying a product in case you do not like it! You do not want to be stuck with a product you do not like. RESEARCH, RESEARCH, RESEARCH.

I personally love to watch PR videos of products sent to people for them to review, make their own look, and present the product in action. It provides me a better outlook how a product will perform because people on Sephora do have the potential to over exaggerate a review, good or bad.

If you still want to try a product but the reviews are mixed, like I mentioned before, research the company's return policy, as well as any manufacturing recalls. Sometimes, you have to see the product with your own eyes to really get a solid understanding of the formula and other factors that could affect the final look. I know it's very common sense and very repetitive, but I feel that it is vital information for newbies to veterans of makeup to understand.

I hope the information provided helps with your future purchases! Here's are some return policy links for future reference!

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Question of the Post: How thorough are you when it comes to product research?

♛

Tips and Tricks: DON'T THROW OUT YOUR MASCARA WANDS

Seriously, don't. Your empty mascara wands can help out in a big way! See how you can help out animals in need. Shoutout to Twitter for showing me this honestly. Back in March of 2017, a Facebook page named "Love What Matters" posted about why we shouldn't throw out our old mascara wands, but instead donate them! This is amazing program is genius and who doesn't love to help out animals? Appalachian Wildlife Refuge started a program called Wands for Wildlife that helps local wildlife get cleaned up. Essentially you can take old mascara tubes that have expired, gone dry, or have completely run out of, clean them up, and send them to the address they’ve provided. The benefits of getting the wands clean is for the Appalachian Wildlife Refuge to clean larvae and eggs out of animal’s fur. The video of the little ducky getting brushed with the mascara wand is so CUTE , it makes me want to cry, but like happy tears. The people at Appalachian Wildlife R...

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