2013 Silver Best use of Social Media for Brand Building

Client Unilever

How did the campaign make a difference? Dove's mission was to make women feel more beautiful. But for many women, beauty is a source of anxiety, especially in social media. Empowering women to use their social networks to spread positivity turned the tables on negative online advertising. And there was a 285% increase in engagement with Dove on Facebook.

What details of the strategy make this a winning entry? For women, social media is an integral part of their lives, a forum for self-expression and a way of sharing personal thoughts, content, and information about themselves. However, this makes them vulnerable because every day they're exposed to ads designed to target their body-image insecurities. A new source of beauty anxiety stems from advertisers misusing the rich personal data from social profiles to negatively target them. Beyond identifying the problem, this campaign lifted the lid on the issue and empowered women to tackle negative advertising. Social data gave us the problem; it had to be an integral part of the solution too. The campaign launched, grew and finished in social media. Women addressed the issue for themselves.

How did creativity bring the strategy to life? The campaign ignited a debate about the effect of negative advertising, releasing key messages on Dove's Facebook wall, by email, through blogs, YouTube and media outlets. Women were invited to use the Ad Makeover application, which displaces negative ads with positive messages by outbidding advertisers on keywords that target women's insecurities. This involved generating a list of hundreds of targeting keywords that advertisers would use to target women negatively: 'pregnant'/'boob job'/'lonely'/'single'/'bikini diet', etc. A system of double bidding against these keywords using Facebook's Marketplace API ensured that ads developed by real women would always take the place of ads from negative advertisers. There were also press releases, a custom-built application, a shareable video, polls that measured self-esteem levels and a constantly updated conversation about negative advertising on Dove's Timeline. Women's support was not only posted on their wall or advertised to other women in their friendship network, but also to all other women using Facebook in their country.

Results Advertising by real women displaced 3.3 billion potentially negative pieces of advertising. The campaign earned 253 million free media impressions on news websites like the Huffington Post,Mashable and Perez Hilton's blog, ensuring that the debate travelled outside Facebook and into other media, without any additional spend. There was a 285% increase of engagement with Dove on Facebook. Most importantly, 71% who interacted with the app said it made them feel more beautiful.