Caring for your skin is simple, right? Not always! With so many products on the market geared toward getting us glowing, it can be tough to know what our skin really needs.

Skin care secrets

If you’re confused as to how best to cleanse and care for your complexion, we have a no-fail plan.

We asked skin care expert Kirk Brierley, National Training Manager at RoC Skincare, for his tips on how to create the ultimate skin care routine.

Beauty basics: Skin care 101

Healthy, happy skin shouldn’t be a chore to achieve. Brierley shares this simple four-step plan for squeaky clean skin.

Step 1: Cleanse and tone with your favorite products.

Step 2: Treat your skin. Apply serums, gels and any topical spot treatments and let them soak in for five minutes. Spread serum onto damp skin for extra hydration.

Step 3: Nourish your skin. Dab eye cream around your eyes and apply your favorite moisturizer to the rest of your face.

Bonus steps: Be sure to exfoliate skin once or twice a week. On the evenings that you don’t exfoliate, use a purifying or hydrating mask to pamper skin.

Serums: Do I need one?

Brierley mentioned serums in step two, as a way to treat skin, but are they necessary? “The primary reason we recommend using a serum is to get more nutrients and moisture into the deeper layers of your skin that a regular moisturizer is usually not able to reach,” he explains. “Regular moisturizers have large molecules, which can only penetrate the first layer of the skin as they hydrate and seal in moisture. A facial serum is made of smaller molecules, and because of this, it is able to penetrate deeply into all the layers of the skin.”

After cleansing, use an alcohol-free toner and then apply your serum to toner-dampened skin. This helps the ingredients in the serum to penetrate deeper into skin to give you better results.

3 Mistakes to avoid

If your skin is looking less-than-ideal lately, your skin care routine could be to blame. Make sure you’re not guilty of one of these bad skin care habits, says Brierley.

Over-washing: Excessively cleansing your face strips it of necessary oils, dries skin out and can cause irritation. At most, you should be washing your skin three times a day.

Using harsh cleaners: All you need is a mild cleanser to clean your skin. Most people buy harsh or abrasive cleansers thinking that they will do a better job, but these often create more harm by irritating skin.

Not knowing your skin type: You need to know your skin type in order to find the right type of cleanser for you. Do you have oily skin or dry skin, or somewhere in between? Do you suffer from an occasional zit or persistent breakouts? Learning your skin type will help make sure you buy the correct product to care for it.

No-fail skin care rules

“The best skin care rules go back to basics,” says Brierley. “By incorporating these five skin care rules into your daily lives, this will ensure that you maintain healthy skin and put your fresh face forward.”

• Avoid over exposure to the sun and practice daily sun care
• Drink more water
• Manage stress
• Maintain a healthy and balanced diet
• Daily, gentle cleansing and appropriate moisturizing

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