Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Ariel Feldman Blog Post #4

While I enjoyed having some extra free time today, I did do some research on Dove's women branding and found out that this weekend is "Dove Self-Esteem Weekend", a nationwide initiative to raise awareness for the need to help girls form a positive self-image! In fact, I learned that Dove has launched an entirely new campaign beginning this month, to target middle and high school aged girls in order to increase their levels of self-esteem.

Declared yesterday, the entire month of October is now dedicated to Dove's "Let's Make Girls Unstoppable Campaign", the newest in the vain of "Real Beauty", which is described, according to Dove's website as, "All October, we are celebrating unstoppable girls. Join the  conversation to support positive self-esteem. And, on October 3rd, watch the Empire State Building light up for our partners—Boys & Girls Club, Girl Scouts and Girls Inc. Let’s make all girls unstoppable."

I think this is a really great way to tie in the Dove Real Beauty marketing campaign while creating a new message and targeting a new audience. Dove is still targeting their core demographic of young girls who are looking to be the best version of themselves, but the girls are now younger and more vulnerable and in need of help. There is a real sense of social empowerment and comfort one feels when "buying in" to the Dove philosophy and I think they're getting at that by integrating the message via different mediums. One of these mediums is "Self-Esteem Workshops", which Dove is hosting all around the country at Boys & Girls Clubs, schools and similar venues for teenage girls and young women this weekend. 

According to WXIX Fox 19, "Dove research has found that six out of ten girls stop doing activities they love because they feel anxiety about the way they look. Through its Let's Make Girls Unstoppable campaign, Dove hopes to shine a light on the girls who continue doing what they love." I think that this is such a great way to continue and strengthen that feeling of empowerment when targeting customers to "buy in" to the Dove ethos and also will create new awareness to the brand's women's products and philosophy by reshaping the "Real Beauty" campaign and targeting younger girls - high school - instead of young women in their 20's and 30's, which Real Beauty sought to do. 

In addition to partnering with The Boys & Girls Club, Girls Scouts, and Girls Inc., Dove has also partnered with Wal-Mart to buy Dove products directly from the campaign website, and has created a Twitter hashtag, #GirlsUnstoppable, to create user engagement with the brand and the campaign.

Also, they have set a goal: according to the Dove website, "Dove® is committed to inspiring all women and girls to reach their full potential. The Dove® Self-Esteem Project invites all women to join us in creating a world where beauty is a source of confidence, not anxiety. Each time you buy Dove®, you help us and our charitable partners provide inspiring self-esteem programming for girls. We have reached more than 11 million girls so far, and with your help, we can reach our target of 15 million by 2015."

I am so excited that I expanded my TTIY project to the Dove Women's Branding as a whole and not just their Go Fresh Campaign, because now I get to explore this new "Girls Unstoppable" campaign - and it is something that I am really passionate about! I look forward to learning more in the coming weeks :) 


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