Using Marketing Communications To Change A Social Stigma

Baker (2013) states how Dove has recently hired a criminal sketch artist to draw women in the most recent chapter of its ‘Real Beauty campaign’ to show evidence of how beautiful they are. The criminal sketch artist they used, Gil Zamora, was told to sketch women based on two different descriptions:

• The way they perceive themselves
• The way a stranger describes them

The aim of this is to allow women to recognise that they are their own ‘harshest critic’ which is often incorrect as it is often the case that others view them differently. This importance that has been placed on self-belief and self-appreciation has been consistent throughout Dove’s ‘real beauty campaign’ as they conducted this social experiment to demonstrate that women are more beautiful than they think. The experiment found that only a mere 4% of women believed that they are beautiful. The campaign is also moving onto Twitter by using the hashtag ‘#wearebeautiful’ so that women can discuss the issue.

As noted above, Dove has performed similar tasks in an attempt to boost self-belief within their campaigns but in 2011 it seemed as though they were to ditch the campaign, (Chapman, 2011). Dove launched its global Real Beauty campaign in 2004 with the aim to highlight body images issues, but in 2011, Dove approached Ogilvy London about replacing the campaign with a ’Body Language’ marketing campaign that will instead talk about how Dove products make you feel confident and attractive.

In 2011, Unilever global communications marketing manager Stacie Bright issued a statement saying:

“The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty started a global conversation about the need for a wider definition of beauty more than six years ago. The Campaign for Real Beauty slogan has not been used consistently across the brand as the tagline depends on whether we are launching a new product or having a master brand campaign.”

“Our bold vision for the brand remains exactly the same. We aim to create a world where beauty is a source of confidence, not anxiety. We are excited to give all women the opportunity to join us as we work to make our vision a reality. As discussed, we remain committed to real beauty, which will continue to be evident in all of the work we are doing.”

From 2011 Dove has evidently moved on from their initial campaign as many thought that the original campaign was rather ‘preach-like’ and some critics even said that it promoted an unhealthy lifestyle. The more recent advent of the criminal sketch artist highlights an important issue, as many teenagers are prompted by other brands and celebrities that more makeup is better, and ways to cover up imperfections or bad features, whereas Dove is approaching the issue in a positive way as men do not receive half the pressure that women do in order to ‘be normal,’ so this campaign will hopefully once again help in establishing a platform where women are confident in themselves without the inclusion make-up.