Fair & Lovely is no more. It’s Glow & Lovely now. The parent company was literally forced into changing the name of its most popular product. Usually, we would not comment on personal choices. But, it’s sad that this product is such a hit in our markets. This reflects the anxiety that women in our society have with how they look and what color is their skin. Fair & Lovely has really been excellent at identifying and exploiting this widespread anxiety. The advertising world is indeed full of such manipulations. George Akerlof & Robert Shiller call it phishing for phools and explain that these manipulative practices will thrive as long as they remain incentivized in our markets. They also point towards our markets’ inability to honor and incentivize ethical practices. But, Dove did kind of disprove that with their Campaign for Real Beauty.
What was Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty?
Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty was a quasi-social quasi-advertisement campaign. It expanded over a decade and was targeted at boosting the self-esteem of women across the world. The campaign had set out to widen the definition of beauty after the findings of a major global study proved their hypothesis that beauty had indeed come to be defined in narrow and unattainable terms. The study was, in fact, commissioned by Dove’s parent company, Unilever.
It should be noted that the brand has had its unique distinction of being associated with diversity, progress, and ethical advertisements since its inception in 1957. Dove’s advertisements, for long, have featured women of diverse sizes, shapes, and colors. The brand has also been a vocal critique of industries promoting the narrow standards of beauty. It, thus, has truly set a standard in beauty products advertising. Dove has seen exponential growth without exploiting human anxieties and/or manipulating our instincts. Does this disprove the assumption put forth by George Akerlof and Robert Shiller? Probably not. But, the Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty does prove the fact that ethical advertising can also churn sales.
Fun Fact: Fair & Lovely, ironically, is also a subsidiary under Hindustan Unilever (as is Dove). It is a common practice among giant corporates to have different brands catering to different audience groups. Is Dove also mere propaganda targeted at selected groups? Tell us what you think of this unholy relationship in the comment section below.
Origins of the Campaign for Real Beauty
Only 4% of women across the world consider themselves beautiful.
Etcoff et al., The Real Truth About Beauty: A Global Report
Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty was first launched in 2004 after a major global study revealed that beauty had come to be defined in narrow and unattainable terms.
In 2006, Dove released a short film titled Evolution in response to Spain’s decision to ban extremely thin models. Spain’s decision had come after a growing concern that such modeling promoted unhealthy beauty diets. Dove’s 75-seconds long advertisement depicts the evolution of a girl into a model after hours of make-up and Photoshop transformations. The commercial also ends with the following statement and a call to action.
“No wonder our perception of beauty is distorted. Take part in the Dove Real Beauty Workshop for Girls.”
Evolution (2006), Dove
The Social Experiment
Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty truly kickstarted with their experiment in 2013. Documented in a short film titled Dove Real Beauty Sketches, the experiment explores how women depict themselves versus how they are perceived by some stranger.
The experiment employed an FBI-trained sketch artist drawing a portrait of women volunteers as described by the women themselves. He then draws another portrait of the same woman as described by someone stranger to the woman. Apparently, the artist doesn’t look at the women until a side-by-side exhibition of the two portraits at the end of the experiment. It turns that beauty does behold in the eyes of beholders. Over half of all women volunteers accepted that they were the worst critique when it came to their looks.
Dove Real Beauty Sketches was soon made available in 25 languages, yet again boasting of their inclusive attitude. The documentary was also promoted on YouTube through in-video advertisements and mastheads. It amassed a massive 163 million views across different platforms.
Community-led Ad Makeover
Display ads must be the second most creepy things on the internet, next only to pop-ups. Big Data has made them even creepier by tracking users’ behavior and targeting them relevant ads. If you felt bad and searched up on the internet about hair loss for once, these display ads will keep reminding you that you are losing your hair. Quite depressing, right? Dove tried to change that, at least for the duration of their campaign.
The result was an engaging web application that allowed users to replace some depressing display ads about looks with a positive message promoting body positivity. Dove would then bid for these keywords, used also by the negative ads, for double the price, and place these community-made ads for display across the internet. These community-led ad makeovers looked something like the one below. It would display the name(s) of the person(s) who had written the message and encourage the viewer to also make one for display as such.
Response to Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty
Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty expanded over a decade of campaigning since its first launch in 2004. By the 10th anniversary of the campaign, it had amassed the following.
- 4.6 billion impressions
- 163 million views on the Dove Real Beauty Sketch documentary
- 275,000 followers on Google+
- 60% increase in sales (from $2.5 billion in 2004 to $4 billion in 2014)
- Brand loyalty, social achievements, etc.
How Could Dove do That? Plus What Your Small Enterprise Can Learn
At the core of this massive campaign remained some fundamental concepts of brand building and human relationships. These fundamental concepts are universal. Small enterprises may not have a massive resource for such a wide-scale campaign, yet, there is a lot to learn from the most innovative campaign of the century (so far).
Value Creation
We can’t emphasize value creation enough. Don’t sell products, sell values. Products are easily replaceable. Your customers today won’t hesitate to purchase from your competitors tomorrow. On the other hand, values are difficult to replace. Values help your customers understand your enterprise as something more than a mere business. In our example, Dove hardly promoted their products in their Campaign for Real Beauty. So, what did they sell for the millions of dollars that they spent on their campaign? Simple, Dove sold values. The campaign had a mission to help women of all ages boost their self-esteem, and yet, it helped them sell more. Below are a few more examples of how businesses may sell values.
- Wow is a personal care brand popular for its no-chemicals products. In a recent purchase, I noticed they were using a recycled carton for their shampoos.
- Amazon India has been using their boxes to publicize the individual sellers behind the massive online store.
- Domino’s offers free of cost pizza(s) on late delivery. What more? They once replaced my half-eaten pizza upon complaining about the poor amount of cheese burst.
- Even a local Dhaba in Ajmer once served my professor free food upon complaining of poor quality.
The first two are examples of complementary value creation. Sell a product, offer more. Let your customers know that you are a responsible social being and are not just some savage mercenary. The last two examples use incidences of service gaps to their advantage. As you would have noticed, value creation is not a thing only for giant businesses. One may not remember a roadside Dhaba or have a preference for one over the other. The one in our example used an incident of service gap to serve a memorable experience for the customer.
Engagement
First of all, do not take these points in isolation. These are all complementary to each other. Your business cannot create value without engaging stakeholders first. Then, engaging your stakeholders without specified objectives will hardly lead to anything. We may now come to why and how to engage your stakeholders. And, the first rule is to think beyond your customers or potential customers. Think community. Dove’s mission is to help women boost their self-esteem. It includes every woman.
Then, engaging your audience first requires their identification. This may be called audience identification. Begin with making a list of everyone who may either be your beneficiary or could benefit from your services. You should try to take this to the next level by identifying people who may have been negatively affected because of your business’ operations.
The next step may be called audience segmentation. Segment your large audience into smaller groups. See if two or more of these groups can and should be reached out to together.
Next, do not assume what your audience may like. Instead, ask your audience what they’ll like. In our example, Unilever commissioned a study that informed Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty. Dove’s Community-led Ad Makeover was also plausibly innovative. It helped Dove achieve a significant ratio of impressions to engagements.
Conclusion
Dove’s quasi-social advertising campaign helped them to sell value, and through selling values, they could increase their sales by over 60% through a decade-long campaign. Their Ad Makeover Campaign was plausibly innovative and helped Dove achieve a significant ratio of impressions to engagements.
Small Enterprises can also benefit from a fundamental understanding of human relationships. Remember, products are easy to be replaced, values are not. Sell values and think community.
For further readings
- Refer to Chapter 3, Phishing for Phools by George Akerlof and Robert Shiller (purchase a Kindle edition here). Akerlof & Shiller takes a dig at manipulative advertising through a historical exploration of the field.
- David Ogilvy’s Confessions of an Advertising Man is a one-stop classic for advertising professionals and businesses.
- Read the complete study that informed Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty, The Real Truth About Beauty: A Global Report.