Skindie Newsletter

Role: UI Designer, Community Engagement Consultant, Contributing Writer

Project Duration: 10 months

Deliverables: Hi-Fidelity Newsletter in Mailchimp, Social Media Graphics, Newsletter Articles, Patreon Launch Plan, Style Guide

Highlights

  • I used my graphic design, and copywriting skills to redesign the newsletter layout and created materials for the newsletter such as feature image graphics, ad postings, and written article content

  • I mentored 3 students in the Rutgers MBS Externship program as they created a marketing promo video for Skindie

  • I initiated community engagement strategies using Patreon and Discord for future implementation

  • I project managed my own timelines and worked on this in free hours outside of a full time job.

 

Impact

Grew the newsletter audience by 68% and Increased newsletter inbox open rates from 31% to consistent 45% open rates.

Launched new article series to form consistent collaborations with early-career folks and beauty leaders in the cosmetic industry

Overview

Skindie is a beauty newsletter powered by accessible science and on a mission to spread the truth in beauty. It is run by a team of cosmetic industry experts who curate content on current beauty trends, and provides cosmetic science education through light hearted research backed articles for the Skin care loving community. I discovered Skindie from browsing LinkedIn and immediately contacted the founder to see if I could contribute as a UI/UX designer and Writer.

I worked at Skindie by redesigning their core product - the newsletter, contributed as a writer and graphic designer for social media, website and newsletter content and helped set the foundation for their community engagement strategy. My experience working with Skindie has allowed me to merge my background in cosmetic chemistry and UX/UI design and gave me the opportunity to work with people who were just as enthusiastic about making cosmetic science accessible to the everyday consumer as I was.

Check out this newsletter “Back-to-Basics”, where my Q&A was featured!

Newsletter Redesign

I was given the task of redesigning the Newsletter template to better align with Skindie’s branding and create a better reading experience for Skindie’s members. To start off the redesign, I did a full audit of the current Newsletter template:

Sketching

For the most part the sketches of the new bi-weekly Skindie newsletter layout included the same sections as the current newsletter, but with differences in the layout within each section. The following updates were made:

  1. Increase white space on either side of the newsletter content

  2. Under each feature article is a button to “Read more” that will direct the reader to the entire article, and options to share the article through the reader’s social accounts

  3. Condense the Beauty Recap section to the top 5 featured beauty news, and start off each point with an emoji

  4. Organize Jewel cards with the image to the left and the description to the right

  5. Group all “stay in touch” options in one section to allow readers to at a glance decide how to engage with Skindie

Throughout my time at Skindie, I also made templates for special edition newsletters such as the Rec Edition newsletter featuring the top 4-5 products that readers such try out, and also product picks by the founders

Bi-weekly template sketch

Rec Edition Template Sketch

Prototyping

Mailchimp made it really easy to create newsletter templates by dragging and dropping image or text into sections of the newsletter. Following my sketches I created the bi-weekly newsletter template and the rec-edition template. Then I designed section title graphics and dropped them into the template. Since each week the content of newsletters would be different, I gave flexibility for the editor to switch out title graphics from a library of titles. On a weekly basis, I would also design the feature image graphic and add them into the placeholders of the template as well.

Style Guide

View my full brand guideline here.

Selected Works

Below are samples of my favorite pieces from my time with Skindie and designing for cosmetic science education.

2021 Rec Edition - Featuring product recommendations from 2021 skincare launches

 

Newsletter Feature Article graphics to accompany articles covering topics from Drugs store skincare classics, Ayurvedic beauty, and Q&A segments

 

Templates for Instagram (left to right): product comparison, recommended products, skincare memes

 

Digital Illustrations to accompany “Skin 101” series of articles