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case study

Executive Summary

Fenty Beauty has built a strong and loyal customers group of dark skin races and it is an advantage. The executive of Fenty Beauty should focus more on the current customers and spread the brand by word-of-mouth customers. The current technology of Fenty Beauty can attract potential customers. To gain a competitive advantage in the current market, Fenty Beauty has assessed the current market condition. Analysing the ERP and CRM implementation in Loreal could provide organization identify their advantages for business. As for IS/IT solutions, Oracle outperformed Outfield and Centric in many ways. Based on Fenty's distribution network and value proposition, Oracle provides Fenty with a range of intelligent tools for online customer engagement, and superior services to uphold solid customer relationships and generate specific and effective marketing strategies, as well as other service packages covering sales and operational data management and analytics. In addition, implementing some products like Oracle Enterprise Manager and Oracle database online data dictionary can lead to a better user experience.

Introduction

As a new cosmetic brand just started up in 2017, Fenty Beauty generated a remarkable $100 million in just the first 40 days (Harker, 2020). Fenty built up its brand awareness by using Rihanna's Social media accounts, Fenty's own digital platform, and influencer marketing (Harker, 2020). It is undeniable its special marketing strategy leads Fenty Beauty to its recent success, however, Fenty did not explore any other marketing strategies besides these ways. Also, Fenty heavily relied on existing marketing strategies and failed to develop strategies to reach more potential customers should be an issue that may need IS/IT solutions.

Failure to capture the customer data may cause Fenty to lose many opportunities to understand its customer's preferences, so this may be directly related to product development. Beauty industry market leader - L'Oreal effectively utilizes any chance to collect customers' details

and becomes a data-driven company to enhance customer experience and build customer loyalty by providing personalized services (Salesforce.com, n.d.). Fenty should consider taking a similar approach to effectively use customer data to enhance its marketing strategy and develop products. We recommended Fenty apply the CRM product - Oracle CRM- to better manage customer data and personalize marketing campaigns to drive sales (Oracle.com, 2022).

The organization seeks to achieve a competitive edge by outperforming its rivals and influencing other market leaders in the sector. The start-up would surely benefit from inspiration from other global corporations in this area. Multinational businesses including L'Oreal, Estee Lauder, and Mac Cosmetics are now participating. These companies employ CRM and ERP systems to stay one step ahead of the competition and get an edge in the global market.

CRM in L'Oreal

L'Oreal is creating a customer relationship management (CRM) system that will provide a thorough view of the customer across all brands and channels, including the 200 websites, hundreds of offline point-of-sale terminals, and contact centers of the business. The L'Oreal company is renowned for continuously enhancing the caliber of its goods and services for its customers. Their products are stylish and in line with the most recent fashion trends. Despite offering a vast variety of goods, they have a wide range of costs. As a consequence, they consistently satisfy their customers. Even though L'Oreal is an established brand with exceptional quality, high-class women would still purchase the item (Gilbert, 2021). L'Oreal continually tries to maintain a healthy and sound connection with its customers by producing new and better products.

Because of its advertising strategy, L'Oreal has been able to grow not just in Europe but also in Asia and Latin America. In 2005, L'Oreal's trademark topped the list of global cosmetics companies. Due to L'Oreal's acquisitions of several brands and its substantial market

domination, which gives it the potential for a monopoly, the purchaser's position is weakened.

Similarly, L'Oreal strives to establish enduring partnerships with its retailers. Particularly, women are quite important in the purchase process. They participate regularly in the L'Oreal purchasing process. All malls have L'Oreal, making it easy for ladies to buy this product. L'Oreal is renowned for consistently raising the caliber of its goods and services for its clients. They provide stylish goods that follow the latest fashion trends. They have a wide variety of things; however, their prices range from cheap to high. They thus provide continuously top- notch client service.

ERP in L'Oreal

The firm discovered a way to harness the abilities of individuals who aren't there to solve this problem. To enable employees in one location to see what employees in another location are looking at in real-time, L'Oreal used "Microsoft Dynamics 365 Remote Assist on HoloLens 2." Even if they are geographically separated, they may interact with the same picture, use augmented-reality annotation, as well as convey essential information. This significantly reduces operational and travel costs while boosting productivity, producing an immediate return on investment. The results of using "Dynamics 365 Remote Assist with HoloLens 2" at L'Oreal's plants have been excellent. The system offers a more effective method of information sharing in a business where manufacturing is extremely time-sensitive (Palumbo, 2022). Problem-solving is now simpler than ever, and L'Oreal staff members have felt comfortable using the new technology. Particularly happy with the new solution's capacity to cut down on travel is L'Oreal. Fewer travel results in lower CO2 emissions and a smaller carbon footprint, which benefits the environment and supports the company's L'Oreal pour le Future goal. For onsite employees, the "Dynamics 365 Remote Assist" on "HoloLens 2 solution" is easy to use.

They further said HoloLens 2" headset was light, comfortable, and had simple controls. They also mentioned how helpful it was to have their arms free when using the headset for work.

Some insights for Fenty Beauty:

1. The aforementioned start-up must implement an ERP system across all aspects of its operations, including its accounting software, SCM tools, and HR tools (Qumer, and Purkayastha, 2021).

2. ERP tools like Epicor, Netsuite, and SYSPRO enable users to automate time- consuming daily tasks.

3. The three most common types of ERP systemscloud ERP, on-premises ERP, and hybrid ERPcan all be implemented by Fenty Beauty.

4. With the help of branding, these firms may profit from comments on social media and prompt chatbox responses.

Oracle V.S. Outfield and Centric

We are facing other valuable options quite suitable for Fenty, such as Outfield and Centric Software. Outfield is a performance-based CRM that is specialized in the beauty industry to help companies learn their customers' behaviors. They are very good at enhancing sales and marketing team production, and Olay is one of their partners (Outfield team, 2022). They help the company to reveal key insights about the market by providing valuable reports and data analytics, so the company gains an in-depth understanding of the market to make more intelligent marketing strategies. The reason why we do not choose Outfield as the best option for Fenty is that Outfield is more professional in developing a personalized sales tracking app for management levels to monitor the sales team's performance. However, Fenty's sales do not rely on the sales reps team, rather, Fenty's revenue is generated from its official websites and Sephora. It is not sure whether Fenty will form its own sales reps team to better boost sales, considering the recent stage of Fenty, Outfield's most professional field does not fit the demand of Fenty. Compared to Outfield, Oracle is a better option with comprehensive service lines to

help the company better process customer data and turn it into useful business information.

Similarly, Centric PLM (Product life management) focuses on new product development and introduction, highlighting how to quickly capture and respond to rapid consumer and market changes by providing tailored digital platforms for product planning, development, resource sourcing, quality management, and portfolio optimization (Centric Software 2022). It is more appropriate for start-up businesses to create and release a new product or for Fenty to release a new line; however, this may not be able to resolve the problems that Fenty currently faces. Even though Sephora, one of Fenty's distributors, uses Centric PLM extensively and, if possible, shares Fenty's sales data in a single system, regardless of concerns about business competition and data privacy, it appears that Centric PLM is better suited for cosmetics retailers than it is for cosmetics brands. To sum up, Oracle is a preferable option for Fenty.

Oracle for Building Customer Relationships

Since Sephora stores and online sales through Fenty's website constituted the majority of Fenty's distribution, the brand struggles to maintain good customer relationships because the Fenty team is lack engagement with customers. In this case, Oracle CX provides Fenty with solutions that enable multiple points of interaction with its customers. Firstly, The Fenty team only offers direct customer service through real-time messaging on its website from 7 am to 11 pm US Eastern time (Fenty 2022). In consequence, customers do not receive prompt responses and helpful services that can assist them to choose the right product for their skin tones, and do not have satisfying online shopping or after-sales experience. This raises operating costs in human resources and limits the company's ability to expand internationally. Accordingly, Oracle CX enables Fenty to launch a B2C real-time interactive tool based on AI and cloud algorithm, simplifying the deployment of digital assistants, and providing customers with support for both self-serve and assisted service regardless of time or location. Furthermore, Oracle CX can automatically deliver extra items like shipping labels and payment information on the chat box. For added convenience, customers can directly check on shipping details by

clicking on the label if Oracle CX is linked to DHL or FedEx. Therefore, customers can receive personalized advice and select the fittest color shade from more than 40 options without first testing a sample in a store, saving Fenty's human resources both online and offline.

Secondly, Oracle CX helps Fenty in enhancing customer profiles with AI try-on technology and providing personalized make-up tutorials, which in turn helps to recommend more products to customers, resulting in sales growth as well as higher customer retention and customer loyalty. It also upends the established marketing strategies that heavily rely on KOLs posting make-up tutorials featuring Fenty products and therefore improves the effectiveness and precision of marketing by automatically launching targeted promotions to customers. Thirdly, Oracle CX allows Fenty to use customer data and feedback, such as product preferences and return rates, as well as confidential information, such as age and skin tones, with their consent, to improve the quality of their products or create new ones for more skin tones. It is consistent with their value proposition of offering shades for all women with different skin tones (Oracle 2022). In summary, Oracle CX equips Fenty with a variety of tools to interact with customers online, deliver better services and subsequently maintain strong customer relationships based on Fenty's distribution channel and value proposition.

There is an interesting function on Fenty Beauty's official website - Upload your look, which is a function that allows customers to upload their photos after using Fenty products for makeup (Fenty Beauty, 2021). On this page, we can see the many faces of different Fenty customers. However, Fenty did not explore the value of this function to collect customer data. Compared to Outfield which only provides a report of market analysis, Oracle can capture unlimited real- time data tracking across digital platforms. Oracle efficiently converts every customer interaction into useful information and based on the information gathered to nourish customer relationships and develop advocacy (Oracle, 2022). For example, if any Fenty customer uploads their look on the website, Oracle can collect valuable information to recommend personalized products based on their skin color, skin conditions, etc. For sure, this should require consent from customers. Oracle is a better option since it helps the company to unify customer data, deliver real-time relevant experiences, and easily orchestrate marketing

strategies with customer experiences (Oracle, 2022). However, the Outfield team may not be able to provide such suitable marketing solutions to fulfill Fenty's needs.

Although Centric and Outfield excelled in CRM in many other beauty brands, it seems that they do not have such a powerful collaboration for Fenty. Centric places little emphasis on customer relationships. More importantly, it is not meant to create a B2C platform, which is what Fenty most demands (Centric Software 2022). Similarly, Outfield places a focus on sales management and does not offer B2C services (Outfield 2022). In contrast, Oracle is the most collaborative system that provides B2C service that helps Fenty connect with its customers through Oracle CX, as well as advertising, marketing, sales, and other services, which makes Oracle the best choice for Fenty regarding building customer relationships.

Implementing ERP and purchasing related products

The success of Fenty Beauty has driven its competitors like NARS and Makeup Forever to enlarge the range of shades (Fenty effect) (Childs, 2022). Fenty Beauty has taken action to handle this situation. To burst sales of online shopping, Fenty Beauty has pushed out a shade- matching quiz to online shoppers (Fenty Beauty, n.d.a). It has a unique algorithm for its customers on shade matching. Customers can receive suitable choices of their shades by clicking the most suitable selection on the website. Fenty beauty can collect data from this website for product promotions. It can capture the most popular choice of selections and push out new products depending on professional advisors, which, to some extent, cater to more customers and match more customized selections. Moreover, the video meeting with the Fenty Beauty advisor can help customers to choose better shades if they are not satisfied with the consequence of shade finder (Fenty Beauty, n.d.b).

On the website, some information like customers' color and preferences is a treasure for Fenty Beauty and it can be collected with the permission of customers for the company's growth. To collect customers' data and information better, Fenty Beauty needs to cooperate with some database companies. As the report shows above, selecting the Oracle database as a partner is a good choice. Its high level of security and high return rate (Oracle, n.b.a) can bring customers confidence and make a decent profit for the business. Collecting customers' data only is not enough, the management and analytics of the data can be transformed into profits for Fenty Beauty. Oracle Enterprise Manager and Oracle database online data dictionary can also help to manage the data in the database (Yao, 2014). Oracle Enterprise Manager can simplify the process of management and Oracle database online data dictionary can monitor the condition of data so as to optimize data performance (Yao, 2014). The private information of customers like addresses can be collected and saved in the Oracle database after the customer's approval. Furthermore, the staff information from the human resource department and customers' feedback from customer relationship management can be collected and saved in the database. Fenty Beauty can hire some people who are subject to data analysis and buy some software like SAS for them to analyze the data. Understanding the drawbacks and selling points from customers' feedback can help to set a destination for product promotions. A clear profile of employees' working performance can help to manage them and drive their enthusiasm so as to increase the company's margin. The analysis of customers' information can help to figure out the popular region of its products and understand the customers' segments. Fenty Beauty can build more warehouses in popular regions so that local customers can have a better consumer experience of online shopping. Researching the preference of local people and transporting the matching products for the public can avoid incidents like lacking inventories and losing many orders for shades.

An attractive advertisement with a reasonable price can help to maintain its competitive advantages. Oracle Advertisement can generate the best campaign according to the customers' data (Oracle, n.d.b). The feasible advertisement can drive customers' willingness to purchase and attract potential customers to enlarge the customer group. Providing the best consumer

experience is the next step needed to be implemented. When a customer registers with an email address, the email address can be collected and what the customer browses can also be collected with his permission. Many personalized pages will be created for various customers and an email will be sent to the customer at the right time by computing with machine learning. By analyzing the rate of replication to the page, the system will categorize the new customers into specific segments (Oracle, 2021). Customers will receive what they want and have a good consumer experience.

Oracle Built-in Test and Employee Training

The implementation of the ERP system is an innovative and challenging approach for a company that would alter the way Fenty was operating. The implementation of a successful ERP system can help boost productivity and the effectiveness of communications within an enterprise. However, it would also backfire if the system were not utilized properly. Therefore, it is indispensable to run several built-in tests before running the system in practice. Maintaining a functional ERP system is not a simple task due to the complex nature of the ERP system. It requires Fenty beauty to offer related training on the usage and knowledge about how to take advantage of such a powerful tool to their employees. In some cases, Fenty beauty might also need to think of hiring new employees who specialize in data science or data analytics to make sure the system is implemented smoothly as Fenty is expecting. Since Oracle is the product that suits Fenty the most, collaborations between Fenty and Oracle would be vital. The staff working for Fenty need to constantly communicate with the external consultants of Oracle on what value or insight they are looking for from the data system and the more understanding there is between the Fenty and Oracle, the more effective the communication will be during the consultation. Inadequate communication with consultants about user needs, goals, and desires can undermine the implementation of an ERP system (Maditinos, Chatzoudes & Tsairidis 2011). That is, employees must have a great understanding of what the system is and how the system works so that Fenty can make full use of the Oracle system and maximize the value of the implementation of the system.

Potential Challenges of the Implementation

There are increasing numbers of companies looking to the implementation of all sorts of big data technology to positively enhance operations and ameliorate costs by cutting unnecessary labor. Concerns and risks are also brought along with these amazing new problem-solving methodologies. For example, ERP systems are developed according to a "best practices" model. As a result, their implementation often requires organizations to restructure their business processes around these practices, as is evident in recent research (Ali & Miller 2017). The implementation of the system not only depends on Fenty but also Oracle. That means Fenty needs to build and maintain a healthy and collaborative relationship with Oracle in order to achieve a long-term and sustainable relationship. Utilizing the big data methodology means an evolution of how Fenty operates and makes strategic plans and management. There will inevitably be more costs for Fenty since they need to pay Oracle for the IS/IT system and consulting fees if they need further help with the system. Employees are expected to change the way they work since they have to learn new knowledge about the implementation and the usage of the system and they may also need to establish new working relationships, share information across departments, acquire new skills, and take on additional responsibilities (Grabski, Leech &Lu). The integrity of the system is also one of the major concerns since Fenty Beauty is a cosmetic company and the data it needs is various and sometimes complicated. The lack of integrity of the system would negatively affect the user experience and encumber the operational decisions of Fenty.

Question

Using the organisation your group project team has chosen in the course (my one is fenty beauty), explain how your project could be implemented using the Systems Development Life Cycle (also known as Waterfall Methodology) OR using Agile Development Methodology. Justify your answer using specific examples in the context of your team project scenario.