Randall Rothenberg, president-CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, believes there is much for marketers to learn from Dove's "Real Beauty" campaign. In fact, in an article on AdAge.com, Mr. Rothenberg offered four particularly important lessons to be learned from the Dove experience.
The first is that solid ideas (aka marketing messages) do work globally. The idea for the campaign, he pointed out, came from the Ogilvy office in Dusseldorf, Germany. The campaign was picked up as a news story that equated it having more to do with politics than marketing. A nerve had been touched and the campaign built momentum as it dealt directly with women's perceptions of their own beauty.
Lesson number two, according to Mr. Rothenberg, was the campaign continually sought to further innovation. New media elements were added, for example, with real time consumer surveys via cell phones. Results were displayed on billboards in selected locations.
"We were and are always reminding ourselves that the big ideas have to be media neutral," Shelly Lazarus, chairman-CEO of Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, told Mr. Rothenberg. "Too many times, you automatically veer into a television script."
Lesson number three is the campaign worked because it served as a vehicle for dialogue. As such, Dove needed to stake out a clear point of view on what is both a societal and political topic. Using online media as much as it did, the campaign was able to keep the dialogue focused in terms of its role in a public reflection than in its aim of driving Dove brand sales.
The last lesson was that playing it safe is a recipe for failure in modern marketing. Blogs on the "Real Beauty" site are not always complimentary. For instance, a mother objected to images of older women in the nude because she did not want her son to be able to view the material. Many others, however, connect with the acknowledgment that beauty comes in a variety of looks and attitudes.
Discussion Questions: What do you think are the most important lessons to be learned from the Dove Real Beauty campaign?