April 14, 2008
Dove Launches Women’s Website
By Tom Ryan
On the heels of its popular “Campaign for Real Beauty” campaign, Dove has launched a new online community for women that offers entertainment, blogs, advice and advertising.
In 2004, the soap brand, owned by Unilever, made headlines for using ordinary-looking – in some cases, heavyset – women in its ads instead of the skinny models typical of beauty ads. Driving enormous publicity and coverage on “The View,” “Entertainment Tonight,” and “Ellen,” the ads contributed to the debate about the best way to promote self-esteem in younger girls.
Dove.msn.com‘s biggest draw is its original programming, such as the recently launched miniseries, “Fresh Takes.” In that series, singer Alicia Keys stars in three-minute episodes that follow the life of three young women. The minishow has been running online and on television during MTV’s “The Hills.”
The new digital channel is intended to strengthen the link between the “Real Beauty” cause and Dove’s line of products.
“How do you recognize, in a graceful way, the conversation for ‘Campaign for Real Beauty’ and the products?,” J.P. Maheu, chief digital officer at Ogilvy North America, which helped create the new Dove site, asked in The Wall Street Journal.
But, according to the Journal, one of the challenges for the website is whether consumers will turn to Dove for information and advice when the brand is obviously also trying hawking specific products. The site includes experts’ advice on women’s empowerment and skin care alongside product displays and free sample offers.
The Journal article also questioned whether women will relate to the subtle branding approach in the “Real Beauty” campaign. Tens of millions of people viewed Dove’s “Evolution” online video on YouTube and other online video-sharing sites, yet the video wasn’t surrounded by any product mentions.
“It’s challenging when you put things out on YouTube to engage that consumer with the product messages,” said Gayle Troberman, MSN’s general manager of branded entertainment. “The video provoked debates…but how do you get the product message in there?”
The Journal also noted that Dove.msn.com will be competing against other online communities targeting women, including Glam Media and iVillage. Competitor, Procter & Gamble, sponsors Capessa.com, focusing on parenting, pregnancy and weight loss.
Driving traffic to their websites has been a challenge for other brands. Dove is hoping that teaming up with MSN will help address that issue.
On the brighter side, the Journal noted that brand-driven online communities can break through. One success has been “In the MotherHood,” a social-marketing site from Sprint and Unilever’s Suave. At the site, mothers submit short scripts about their lives and see them acted out by Hollywood actresses such as Leah Remini and Jenny McCarthy. So far the web series has had 15 million views.
Discussion Question: What do you think of Dove’s website for women? What’s the key to making these advertiser-funded online communities both informative and entertaining – yet also get brand messages through?
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Authenticity is the key. Yeah, the ads and promotions are going to be there, much like the ads on any site like this, but it’s the authenticity and value of the content that is going to make it work.
I just got back from the World Retail Congress last week, and I saw the evolution video (and the subsequent parody–“Thank god our view of reality is distorted, no one wants to look at ugly people”) played not once but twice in the context of authenticity and “letting go control” so that consumers can take over. But what I did NOT see, was a discussion of Dove vs. Axe, one of Unilever’s other brands, and one that is marketed pretty much directly below the belt at men. You can see the original Dove spot (“Onslaught”) here, and the parody (note that it is all done using creative from Axe ads) here. It’s no wonder Dove has shifted direction a bit from the Campaign for Real Beauty when your best response to the accusation of hypocrisy (Dove vs. Axe) is that the creative is run by two different companies.
Dove’s website is great. The site respect the intelligence of its audience and does not overtly sell Dove products. A site does not need a heavy sales pitch to be effective. The Dove site is a good example of using the web to build the core message of a brand.
Will this work for all brands? No it won’t. But in this instance, targeting this audience, it works quite well. Hats off to Unilever and its agencies for creating a breakthrough effort.
Brands have a credibility gap online–how can you be the definitive source for 3rd party information when you have a vested interest in one source being better than all others? Among the things Dove is doing right–they are partnering with a 3rd party portal to drive more visibility and traffic and are using entertainment placed on traditional media channels to drive interest back to the site.
Ultimately, the metric needs to change from reach (total site visitors) to engagement–who’s visiting? Are they brand loyalists? Is it changing the relevancy of the brand for them and are they purchasing more? Not easy things to measure for an indirect seller but far more important than “eyeballs” will ever be.
No web site is successful without traffic. But a high traffic site doesn’t necessarily drive profitable sales. Has Dove’s site driven measurable market share increases? Or is it “reinforcing the brand” (short for “no measurable profit increase”)?
I attended a summit of retailers not long ago where a senior marketing rep for Unilever talked about the Campaign For Real Beauty. What was particularly interesting was the enthusiastic audience reaction! Senior retail executives felt a personal connection to the messages promoting Dove. That this world-weary audience embraced the campaign so whole-heartedly speaks volumes about the genuine innovation it represents.
Unilever has made Dove a breakout brand. There is a distinct possibility that they can create a meaningful online community as a result.
The branded online community further enhances Dove’s relationship with the consumer target; it’s a very smart media component.
In order for the site to gain longevity and repeat visitors it needs to find a balance between functionality and entertainment. Content, or the activators that gain contributions and repeat visits from the readers will be critical.
If successful, the branding and promotional vehicle can’t be overstated: Dove will cultivate brand ambassadors and create priceless word-of-mouth promotion.
It really depends on the value to the consumer. Is Dove’s website of value? Does it offer information that customers can use? Is the entertainment end of it really entertaining? There if a fine line between creating an information portal and selling products at the same time. PG did it in the 50s with the invention of the soap opera.
The web seems to be the avenue that brands take to reach out to consumers. I have not visited Dove’s site yet but I am curious to see how they balance the information and entertainment with the selling. If Dove gives web surfers value at the site, then this should prove successful for them and perhaps Unilever will expand its web offerings for men and kids using the products targeted for those buying groups.
This seems to be the season for sites aimed at, as they taught us in high-school French, les femmes d’une certaine age.
The one with the biggest names that I’ve been to is Wowow, the Women on the Web, starring Jane Fonda, Whoopi Goldberg, Candace Bergen and friends, and there have been several others whose names escape me. Add to that the profusion of Boomer sites–a friend and I almost started still another one a few months back–and it’s easy to get the feeling that our moment on the web has come.
Only….
One of the women’s sites the Dove site links to as a favorite is already two years out of date.
And when I clicked on the Discussions link, hoping to get to some blogs, I got more columns. And there was a link to click on to comment, but the comments weren’t part of the design of the front of the section. Kinda Web 1.0 if you ask me–I felt talked and marketed at, and the ads were pervasive. And I love ads. I make my living doing ads!
My suggestion to Dove would be to make the community more prominent. Pull the comments out from behind the backstage curtain and restrict the display ads to the two smallest sizes–yet let some folks from the brands participate in the community as (clearly identified as sponsors, of course) community members, where they lurk on the boards and jump in to answer questions and offer helpful hints.
That’s how tech-support folks from the software companies I like monitor the user forums on their sites. And there’s a proof-of-concept site in consumer products taking a similar approach at http://www.branswers.com (disclosure: I’ve been cheerleading the development team since September). There you’ll see you don’t necessarily need to be an AJAX geek to understand how to build a community.
Besides, old broads like us just need to copy and paste widget code anyway–not really invent anything… 😉
Engaging content will build word of mouth. So it may start off attracting existing Dove loyalists, but it will soon expand as those consumers promote the site to friends and family. Even the Dove loyalists can use the reminders and updates about Dove products, so the marketing component isn’t necessarily a negative. It’s just about balance and about relevance. Dove seems to be handling both particularly well.
Brand-driven online communities can be successful however the success could be short term if doesn’t find a constant way to get attention. The site that has mothers submit short scripts about their lives and see them acted out by Hollywood actresses such as Leah Remini and Jenny McCarthy attracts 15 million views because it offers a novel approach that goes beyond the obvious of simply trying to sell product to the consumer.
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Authenticity is the key. Yeah, the ads and promotions are going to be there, much like the ads on any site like this, but it’s the authenticity and value of the content that is going to make it work.
I just got back from the World Retail Congress last week, and I saw the evolution video (and the subsequent parody–“Thank god our view of reality is distorted, no one wants to look at ugly people”) played not once but twice in the context of authenticity and “letting go control” so that consumers can take over. But what I did NOT see, was a discussion of Dove vs. Axe, one of Unilever’s other brands, and one that is marketed pretty much directly below the belt at men. You can see the original Dove spot (“Onslaught”) here, and the parody (note that it is all done using creative from Axe ads) here. It’s no wonder Dove has shifted direction a bit from the Campaign for Real Beauty when your best response to the accusation of hypocrisy (Dove vs. Axe) is that the creative is run by two different companies.
Dove’s website is great. The site respect the intelligence of its audience and does not overtly sell Dove products. A site does not need a heavy sales pitch to be effective. The Dove site is a good example of using the web to build the core message of a brand.
Will this work for all brands? No it won’t. But in this instance, targeting this audience, it works quite well. Hats off to Unilever and its agencies for creating a breakthrough effort.
Brands have a credibility gap online–how can you be the definitive source for 3rd party information when you have a vested interest in one source being better than all others? Among the things Dove is doing right–they are partnering with a 3rd party portal to drive more visibility and traffic and are using entertainment placed on traditional media channels to drive interest back to the site.
Ultimately, the metric needs to change from reach (total site visitors) to engagement–who’s visiting? Are they brand loyalists? Is it changing the relevancy of the brand for them and are they purchasing more? Not easy things to measure for an indirect seller but far more important than “eyeballs” will ever be.
No web site is successful without traffic. But a high traffic site doesn’t necessarily drive profitable sales. Has Dove’s site driven measurable market share increases? Or is it “reinforcing the brand” (short for “no measurable profit increase”)?
I attended a summit of retailers not long ago where a senior marketing rep for Unilever talked about the Campaign For Real Beauty. What was particularly interesting was the enthusiastic audience reaction! Senior retail executives felt a personal connection to the messages promoting Dove. That this world-weary audience embraced the campaign so whole-heartedly speaks volumes about the genuine innovation it represents.
Unilever has made Dove a breakout brand. There is a distinct possibility that they can create a meaningful online community as a result.
The branded online community further enhances Dove’s relationship with the consumer target; it’s a very smart media component.
In order for the site to gain longevity and repeat visitors it needs to find a balance between functionality and entertainment. Content, or the activators that gain contributions and repeat visits from the readers will be critical.
If successful, the branding and promotional vehicle can’t be overstated: Dove will cultivate brand ambassadors and create priceless word-of-mouth promotion.
It really depends on the value to the consumer. Is Dove’s website of value? Does it offer information that customers can use? Is the entertainment end of it really entertaining? There if a fine line between creating an information portal and selling products at the same time. PG did it in the 50s with the invention of the soap opera.
The web seems to be the avenue that brands take to reach out to consumers. I have not visited Dove’s site yet but I am curious to see how they balance the information and entertainment with the selling. If Dove gives web surfers value at the site, then this should prove successful for them and perhaps Unilever will expand its web offerings for men and kids using the products targeted for those buying groups.
This seems to be the season for sites aimed at, as they taught us in high-school French, les femmes d’une certaine age.
The one with the biggest names that I’ve been to is Wowow, the Women on the Web, starring Jane Fonda, Whoopi Goldberg, Candace Bergen and friends, and there have been several others whose names escape me. Add to that the profusion of Boomer sites–a friend and I almost started still another one a few months back–and it’s easy to get the feeling that our moment on the web has come.
Only….
One of the women’s sites the Dove site links to as a favorite is already two years out of date.
And when I clicked on the Discussions link, hoping to get to some blogs, I got more columns. And there was a link to click on to comment, but the comments weren’t part of the design of the front of the section. Kinda Web 1.0 if you ask me–I felt talked and marketed at, and the ads were pervasive. And I love ads. I make my living doing ads!
My suggestion to Dove would be to make the community more prominent. Pull the comments out from behind the backstage curtain and restrict the display ads to the two smallest sizes–yet let some folks from the brands participate in the community as (clearly identified as sponsors, of course) community members, where they lurk on the boards and jump in to answer questions and offer helpful hints.
That’s how tech-support folks from the software companies I like monitor the user forums on their sites. And there’s a proof-of-concept site in consumer products taking a similar approach at http://www.branswers.com (disclosure: I’ve been cheerleading the development team since September). There you’ll see you don’t necessarily need to be an AJAX geek to understand how to build a community.
Besides, old broads like us just need to copy and paste widget code anyway–not really invent anything… 😉
Engaging content will build word of mouth. So it may start off attracting existing Dove loyalists, but it will soon expand as those consumers promote the site to friends and family. Even the Dove loyalists can use the reminders and updates about Dove products, so the marketing component isn’t necessarily a negative. It’s just about balance and about relevance. Dove seems to be handling both particularly well.
Brand-driven online communities can be successful however the success could be short term if doesn’t find a constant way to get attention. The site that has mothers submit short scripts about their lives and see them acted out by Hollywood actresses such as Leah Remini and Jenny McCarthy attracts 15 million views because it offers a novel approach that goes beyond the obvious of simply trying to sell product to the consumer.