Modern Beauty: How Mary Kay Transformed Consultant Experience
44K+
consultants adopted the enablement platform
34.4
average lessons completed per consultant
195,553
badges awarded for positive behavior change
Mary Kay is one of the most iconic and influential beauty companies in the world. An original glass ceiling breaker, Mary Kay Ash founded her dream brand in Texas in 1963 with one goal: to enrich women’s lives.
That dream has blossomed into a global company with millions of independent sales force members in more than 35 countries. For 60 years, the Mary Kay opportunity has empowered women to define their own futures through education, mentorship, advocacy, and innovation. Mary Kay is dedicated to investing in the science behind beauty and manufacturing cutting-edge skincare, color cosmetics, and fragrances. The company also believes in preserving our planet for future generations, protecting women impacted by cancer and domestic abuse, and encouraging youth to follow their dreams.
Currently headquartered just north of Dallas, Texas, and equipped with its own manufacturing and Research and Development facility, Mary Kay is set up for another 60 years of success! Yet how does such an organization enter the 2020s – the digitalized, post-pandemic age – with the tools to attract, retain, and empower a new generation of Independent Beauty Consultants?
Digital Transformation of the Educational Experience
The education provided by Mary Kay, Inc. to new Independent Beauty Consultants most recently included a glossy print magazine that contained 100+ pages of sales education, process guidelines, and so forth. As technology advanced, they introduced a linear Learning Management System that Independent Beauty Consultants could use on their computers.
This solution was successful in the beginning. However, as technology improved, Mary Kay decided to pursue a more dynamic online platform.
Rallyware’s Performance Enablement Platform
In late 2023, the US Sales Force Education team chose to engage the services of Rallyware because the company had the technology that met their needs, as well as a track-record for providing excellent customer service.
Education and Gamification for Mary Kay
Because Mary Kay independent beauty consultants are 100% independent entrepreneurs, each with a different goal and path, having a digitized and targeted education nerve center is vital.
Currently, the company offers education via different online and digital educational platforms. Their goal, however, is for MKConfident, the name of their Rallyware-based platform, to be the one-stop-shop for digital education for all their US sales force.
Building MKConfident
MKConfident has been architected and designed by the Mary Kay US Sales Force Education team, in collaboration with Rallyware’s Customer Success experts, with the aim of supporting independent beauty consultants as they self-educate, regardless of their business goals. And since Mary Kay is in the business of skin care and cosmetics, the company has also designed the platform to be especially aesthetically inviting, well-laid-out, intuitive, and effective.
The platform is only going to expand to reach more target audiences of the sales force. Sr. Specialist for Strategic Sales Education, Pamela Presbitero explains, “With the successful launch of our educational modules for new Independent Beauty Consultants, we’re now planning to add education for Independent Sales Directors and Independent National Sales Directors, as well.”
In building MKConfident, Rallyware and Mary Kay migrated and produced a number of courses into Rallyware’s all-in-one, single-sign-on platform, creating a truly modern experience for Independent Beauty Consultants, regardless of their business goals.
The Mary Kay Sales Force Education administrators love how easy it is to upload, modify, and distribute content. So far, beauty consultants love this bite-sized, targeted education, and “that’s what we were looking for when we first launched,” says Pamela.
Rallyware Results and the Future of MKConfident
Numbers don’t lie: Since the initial kickoff in the Fall of 2023, Mary Kay’s Rallyware implementation has already been immensely successful. As of September 2024, over 44,000 independent beauty consultants have become active users.
Out of these nearly 44,000 users, 1,052,007 lessons have already been completed, with the average number of completed lessons at 34.4 per beauty consultant.
195,553 virtual badges have been received, further gamifying and recognizing completion of optional business education. Mary Kay’s administrators are hugely pleased with these engagement numbers and look forward to building out the platform further.
In May of this year, Mary Kay launched their Product Education courses ahead of their annual conference in July. Completion of these product education courses resulted in specific “bling-buttons” that were printed on event badges at the conference, further gamifying and recognizing participation.
