How does a beauty and cosmetics store in the GCC get repeat customers?

By reaching the customer at the moment the first purchase runs out, through a channel that does not charge per message. Almost every store has the timing data and spends the reach budget anyway.

The mechanics of a second order

Work out the median gap between first and second order. Whatever that number is, the reminder belongs slightly before it — after it, the customer has already solved the problem somewhere else.

Winning a customer costs money and selling to them again costs almost nothing, and most budgets are spent as though the reverse were true. For a beauty and cosmetics store in the GCC, the answer turns on one thing in particular: Beauty is bought again on a schedule — a serum runs out — so the second purchase is predictable in a way most categories are not.

What is different about the GCC

The GCC is not one market. Payment habits, delivery norms and language expectations differ enough that a single approach underperforms in at least one country.

Payment preference varies by country more than most planning assumes.

What is different about a beauty and cosmetics store

Discounting to grow trains people to wait for the discount. It works once.

Where a mobile app comes into it

A category bought monthly is the strongest case there is for an app: reordering in two taps rather than five.