I applied online. The process took 1 day. I interviewed at L'Oréal in Jan 2011
Interview
Let's start off with I am very fortunate that I was incredibly stubborn. Not only did I apply online, but I found a key person's email address, phone number and office address and harassed the heck out of him. I was contacted a few months later about having a screening interview. For me, it was very informal, and the itself was a breeze.
I say be yourself. The night before I prepared a few answers to a couple of standard questions, but I got the feeling that the HR person was looking for a spark and not the average answer. it also helps if you get a bit personal by talking about your plans for the weekend before the conversation ends. Crack a joke or two, because that will lengthen the interview (it was supposed to be 15 mins but lasted for about 40) and relax you.
I had just the one phone interview and it took about a month for a final decision to be made.
I met the L'Oreal recruiters at a regional conference. I initially had brief communication with the recruiters at the booth. After about two weeks I got a call from the Director of HR to conduct a phone interview. The phone interview was the final step.