BeautyCon: Rubbing Elbows With Today’s Top Social Media Influencers

This past weekend was the second annual BeautyCon conference. BeautyCon is the first international online beauty and fashion summit for the internet’s most influential video-bloggers, celebrities and their fans. BeautyCon was designed to provide a valuable opportunity for fans to meet their favorite social media influencers and for brands to to connect with top tier content creators IRL and showcase their latest products. I attended this year’s conference which was a whirlwind of connecting, schmoozing and learning from the best in the biz.

This year’s conference kicked off on Thursday night with an insider event at the newly designed industrial modern You Tube space in LA. Celebrities, high profile bloggers and industry icons were showcased as panelists at this kickoff event which included: Kandee Johnson, Mr. Kate, Elle and Blair Fowler, WendysLookBook, Christina Milian, Sophia Bush, Mandana Dayani (VP Rachel Zoe Inc), Alisa Gould Simon (Founder of Pose), and Leslie Blodgett (Founder of Bare Minerals.)

Posing at BeautyCon Industry Night with my girl Mary of The Recessionista

These leading experts spoke to over 1,000 attendees and offered advice, trends, and insight about creating content in the digital sphere. Media and guests were offered tours of the YouTube space, and enjoyed meeting/gifting by brands such as Neutrogena, Jurlique, Joico Hair Care, Revitalash, Lightening Whitening, LORAC, Destiny Candles, and bareMinerals.

The main BeautyCon Event was held, Saturday, August 24th at Siren Studios in Hollywood. This coveted beauty event was sponsored by NYX Cosmetics, Style Haul, and The Platform and was a HUGE success with over 10,000 rsvp’s, lines around the block and the #BeautyCon hashtag trending on twitter in the number one spot throughout the day.

BeautyCon offered guests/fans who love fashion/beauty the ability to meet and hear some of their favorite You Tube personalities, celebrity beauty gurus, accredited stylists, fashion gurus, bloggers, pinners, instagrammers, vloggers, and celebrities speak on over 11 panels. They also had the opportunity to experience clever activations with a social media twist with over 25 brands like: Bare Minerals, See You Monday Clothing, Minx Nails, Million Dollar Tan, Bellami Hair, Proactive, Epoxy, Uber, Pose, and Lulu’s.

Posing with the famous HOLLYWOOD sign and Rocking my retro style at BeautyCon

The night ended with the NYX FACE Awards, a competition that spotlights 6 up and coming beauty vloggers in a real time make-up competition judged by a panel of leading beauty industry experts. One winner is chosen to help launch their career with a $25,000 cash prize and access to influential insiders, consultations with top industry experts, and national publicity. This year, Missy Lynn start2finishmua was crowned 2013 Beauty Vlogger of the Year.