Comment by Brian Ritchie on April 22, 2013 at 3:21pm

Since I originally posted this, I have heard some negative perspectives on Dove's marketing approach stating: 1) there are not proportionally enough ethnic groups represented from a time versus race perspective and 2) through preference for the prettier sketches, Dove is reinforcing the notion that external beauty is an (the most??) important factor in assessing the quality of a person. After hearing this, my two older children and my wife, Loreen, all watched the video. The consensus, at least in our little focus group, was, the piece is a positive message. One comment made by one of the women that underlined the conclusion of the experiment for me was “I should be more grateful of my natural beauty”. 

That is good enough for me, but I definitely welcome your thoughts on whether Dove’s social experiment and its conclusion delivers a net positive or negative message.

Comment by Lorne Alan Riley on April 24, 2013 at 1:12am

Ultimately, it's marketing. They are choosing a message that appeals to their demographic to sell more product. That said, it is a nice change from bio-babble that breaks down the product's chemical composition. As for the criticisms, if you want to poke holes in anything you can. But I think it's a nice message. People do care about their looks, whether they want to admit it or not. I recently looked at a few pictures of myself from my mid-twenties...and to be honest it was a bit depressing ...not insomuch as I feel my looks have deteriorated to the point where I can't stomach my own image in the mirror...just saddened by the passing of 25 years in what seems an eyeblink. It reinforced my belief that we should live life to the fullest...spend time with the people we love, pursue our passions and leave a legacy of caring, laughter and only fond memories! (ok that's the goal...not sure I'm ticking all of those boxes quite yet!)

Comment by Brian Ritchie on May 1, 2013 at 11:42pm

You may wonder why I am continually commenting on my own blog. That's because I have been receiving comments off-line which criticize Dove's approach. Perhaps I can eventually draw some of those off-line commentaries out with this Dove ad that I spotted yesterday. 

Some of the comments on the "Beauty Sketches" video centred around the notion that it continues to promote the idea that a woman’s value is tied her outward beauty. While the video does promote that other people see you better than you see yourself, it still focuses on connecting personal self-esteem with how attractive you are. I am still not convinced that the message is net-negative but beyond that, I would like to introduce another ad; this one delivered through a billboard campaign in downtown Toronto investigating the relationship between self-perceived looks and engagement in community sports, namely soccer.

What makes this ad (or corporate social responsibility (CSR) piece) different is that it attempts to isolate sporting skills, or participation in sports, from the way that young ladies see their body. The ad is delivered across 3 billboards which make the claim that many Canadian girls drop out of sports because of how they look.

Yet another criticism of the Dove ads which, at least somewhat effectively, speak out against traditional views on beauty, is that while Unilever is doing some positive work with the Dove ads, they are also the company behind the extremely shallow marketing messages promoting other products such as its Axe body spray. My opinion is that while Unilever may be guilty of shallow marketing in some cases, its efforts of using its Dove brand to tear down traditional beauty stereotypes are at least a step in the right direction.

Comments are welcome.

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