One of the most successful public relations campaigns was used by Dove, a “personal care brand” that’s owned by Unilever (Liyana Harris, 2020). This brand has taken the world by storm, as it sells its products in over 80 countries around the world (Liyana Harris, 2020). But, Dove didn’t always have such a strong reputation. In fact, it wasn’t until around 2004 when the brand released its “feel-good” public relations campaign, called “Real Beauty.” that the brand took off (Liyana Harris, 2020).
The message behind Dove’s campaign was to challenge the “idealized depictions of beauty.” (Staff, 2019) The brand stumbled upon this campaign idea after research indicated that only about 4% of women see themselves as beautiful (Kavarnos, 2018). With this information, Dove created a campaign that would allow more consumers to relate to the brand.
To debut their campaign, Dove decided to create a video that related strongly to their brand’s message. This video included an FBI sketch artist drawing a few selected women (Kavarnos, 2018). To draw them, the artist was only able to listen to how the women described themselves without being able to see them (Kavarnos, 2018). After this sketch was finished, the artist had a complete stranger describe the same woman to them and drew that as well (Kavarnos, 2018). To people’s surprise, the two drawings came out completely different from each other, although they were drawings of the same women (Kavarnos, 2018). This further verified the findings of Dove and was one of the first ways that Dove released the message to love yourself, just the way you are. This video was the beginning of one of the most successful public relations campaigns, as it was shared about 3.74 million times in the first month alone (Kavarnos, 2018).
Why was the Real Beauty campaign so effective?
Dove created an image for the brand that inspired customers to feel good about the way that they look. This image is something that resonates deeply with consumers, as it connects with an “issue of deep concern in the customer base, their appearance and self confidence.” (Liyana Harris, 2020) Aside from this, the campaign was also able to address the “insecurity and self-esteem issues of young women.” (Liyana Harris, 2020) In other words, consumers began to have a more positive perception of Dove because they could relate to the brand’s message. This message is something that Dove’s target audience are able to empathize with because it is something that many people go through.
Another thing that Dove got right when running this campaign was that the images that they were releasing were actually relatable to the audience. Usually, many beauty brands are based around the “perfect” body or trying to set a standard that consumers have to live up to. But, Dove decided to instead create a way for “women to be in charge.” (Liyana Harris, 2020) This, again, created a message that the audience was able to identify with, which created a positive image for Dove as a whole.
After the first 10 years, Dove’s annual sales for the brand rose from $2.5 billion to over $4 billion, earning it PRWeek’s 2006 Consumer Launch Campaign of the Year (Staff, 2019). This is all due to Dove’s ability to create a campaign that consumers are able to identify with. In turn, this created a long-lasting positive image for the brand.
Sources:
Kavarnos, E. (2018, May 17). Dove, 2004, “The Real Beauty” campaign. Retrieved November 29, 2020, from https://medium.com/ad-discovery-and-creativity-lab/dove-2004-the-real-beauty-campaign-99599f38a28a
Liyana Harris, I., & Posts. (2020, June 05). Dove Empowered Women And Found Success in 80+ Countries. Retrieved November 29, 2020, from https://www.referralcandy.com/blog/dove-marketing-strategy/
Staff, P. (2019, November 21). The 20 best PR campaigns of the past two decades. Retrieved November 29, 2020, from https://www.prweek.com/article/1493241/20-best-pr-campaigns-past-two-decades
Raigan Novotny 