MAC Cosmetics Brings Luxe Shopping with AI in Retail

Lifetime value and a passion for the brand are two things that make MAC Cosmetic customers stand out from the rest. With the help of Coveo’s segmentation, social proof badging, and Derived Insights, the company has been able to provide the same personalized touches you’d find in-store on its ecommerce shopping site.


Scaling these small details to millions of customers is possible, thanks to the artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities. They continually improve, so MAC’s discerning customers only experience the best.

As the world’s leading makeup company, MAC Cosmetics sells products in over 120 countries and has a history of very loyal customers in both the consumer and professional markets. MAC Cosmetics is currently a top seller in the Hollywood production markets.

The UK and Ireland ecommerce teams partnered with Coveo in 2018 to bring relevant customer engagement opportunities powered by an AI solution with deep learning and analytics.

Problem: MAC’s Virtual Try-On is an important feature for site visitors, but it wasn’t getting utilized enough to produce a positive ROI.

Solution: MAC worked with Coveo to place Virtual Try-On messaging in the places visitors would most likely see and recognize it, increasing conversions and boosting ROI from each Product Description Page (PDP).

Product shade preselection

Harnessing AI technology for smart shoppers

Virtual try-on promotion

Using AI in retail to personalize every experience

Problem:Customers who return to buy their favorite shade of makeup may not remember what they bought before or become confused by the number of selections, reducing the likelihood of a completed purchase.

Solution:Coveo’s personalization tools enabled MAC to pre-select the lipstick shade each customer bought with their previous purchase. This enabled a quick “add to cart” action and decreased the time it takes to do a simple re-order of their favorite item. It offers a similar shopping experience as bringing a product into a retail store for assistance, but it's much easier.

The ecommerce team at MAC Cosmetics has been able to reduce pain points in both shopping for new products and in re-ordering by loyal customers. With an enhanced customer experience on every page level, customers can feel confident that the purchases they make are a good fit for their needs. Product recommendation goes beyond the basics; Coveo provides AI capabilities that use past customer behavior and machine learning to create seamless experiences with the same level of personalized customer service as in-store retail shopping.

About Coveo

Coveo powers the digital experiences of the world’s most innovative brands serving millions of people and billions of interactions across every digital experience. After a decade of enriching its market-leading platform with forward-thinking global enterprises, Coveo knows what it takes to gain a trusted AI-experience advantage. Coveo's single SaaS AI platform and robust suite of AI & GenAI models are designed to transform the total experience from CX to EX across websites, ecommerce, service, and workplace. Powering individualized, trusted, and connected experiences across every interaction to delight customers and augment employees, and drive superior business outcomes.

“We put customer data at the heart of our ecommerce strategy. An astute understanding of the customer, how they engage, what they click on, intent shown informs the experiences we implement. Coveo provides the level of versatility MAC Cosmetics requires to iterate and move quickly given the ever-changing demands of our customer.”

Sara-Lou Roberts

Online Manager UK & Ireland

nov 2024