Dove and Axe: Examples of Hypocrisy or Good Marketing?

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Dove and AxeExamples of Hypocrisy or Good
Marketing?
Images taken from www.unilever.com
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Purpose of Case Study
To Discuss

• How key publics can interpret messages
  differently.
• What ethical responsibility, if any, exists for a
  company to ensure its brands send
  non-contradictory messages.
• Whether the use of viral marketing impacts this
  ethical responsibility.
• What extent a company should make sure its
  corporate social responsibility (CSR) messages
  permeate across all brands.

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Outline of Discussion

• Overview of the issue
• Unilever at the corporate level
• Its stance on CSR
• Its management structure
• Unilever and the relationship between Dove and
  Axe
• Different marketing messages
• Doves Campaign for Real Beauty
• Axes Bom Chicka Wah Wah campaign
• Viral tactics used by both brands
• Discussion questions

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The Issue

• First week of October, 2007 Dove releases
  Onslaught, challenging parents to Talk to you
  daughter before the beauty industry does
• October 9, 2007 The Campaign for a Commercial
  Free Childhood (CCFC) alleges hypocrisy on behalf
  of Unilever, highlighting the different tone of
  messages from Dove and Axe
• October - December The issue is covered in
  blogs, trade publications and newspapers, while
  Unilever maintains the Axe ads are only a spoof
  and should be received in that way

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Unilever at the Corporate Level

• Its mission, To add vitality to life, impacts
• The products it develops
• The way in which it interacts with
• People
• Communities
• The environment
• Its overall goal To help people look good,
  feel good and get more out of life.

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Unilever at the Corporate Level

• Unilevers leadership on its commitment to
  corporate social responsibility
• When we talk about corporate social
  responsibility, we dont see it as something we
  do to society. It is inherent in everything we
  do. Not just voluntary philanthropy or community
  investment, important though that is, but the
  impact of our operations and products as well as
  the interactions we have with the societies we
  serve.
• -Niall Fitzgerald, former Unilever chairman,
  2003

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Unilever at the Corporate Level

• Unilevers leadership on its commitment to
  corporate social responsibility (contd)
• Corporate responsibility isnt
  philanthropy, its businessits about creating
  social benefits through our brands and through
  our interactions as a business with society.
• - Patrick Cescau, Unilever CEO,
  2006

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Unilever at the Corporate Level
Management Structure

• Brands are managed according to both product
  category and region
• Regional leaders are responsible for
• Deploying brands and innovation
• Managing the business
• Interfacing with customers
• Product category leaders are responsible for
• Brand development
• Innovation
• Research/development
• Advertising/marketing functions exist at both the
  brand and corporate levels

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Unilever at the Corporate Level
Marketing Practices

• While marketing activities for each brand are
  subject to corporate guidelines, Unilever
  recognizes each brand may target a different
  group and communicate in a different way.
• Unilever points to Dove and Axe as examples of
  this balance, noting they both support its
  vitality mission while addressing the needs of
  two different groups.

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The Campaign for Real Beauty

• Based on national and international research on
  womens perceptions of beauty
• International Statistics Only 2 of women feel
  comfortable describing themselves as beautiful,
  while 31 describe themselves as natural and 29
  as average
• National Statistics U.S. women are more willing
  to rate their looks higher than their beauty, but
  79 wish a woman could be considered beautiful if
  she is not physically perfect
• Developed around these statistics to improve the
  worldwide understanding of real beauty

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The Campaign for Real Beauty

• 2004 The Campaign asked women to judge ads
  using non-professional models as oversized,
  outstanding, wrinkledor wonderful and then
  place their vote on its website.
• 2005 Ads challenged women to Stand firm to
  celebrate their curves by showing six women of
  differing ages, shapes and sizes photographed in
  their underwear.

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The Campaign for Real Beauty

• 2006 The Evolution video uses time-lapse
  photography to illustrate how much a models
  natural appearance has likely been modified in an
  advertisement

Images taken from Evolution, available at
http//www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/dsef07/t5.asp
x?id7373filmno1
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The Campaign for Real Beauty

• 2007 The Onslaught video provides a montage
  of beauty industry images, including a multitude
  of products and cosmetic surgeries, as viewed
  through the eyes of a young girl.
• The video challenges parents to Talk to your
  daughter before the beauty industry does.

Image from Onslaught, available at
http//www.campaignforrealbeauty.com/dsef07/t5.asp
x?id7373filmno0
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Axe and Bom Chicka Wah Wah

• Advertising/marketing communications from Axe
• Rely on the theme of Giving guys the edge in
  the mating game.
• Utilize suggestive language in describing
  products by
• Referring to Axes 9 scents as the 9 ways.
• Suggesting men use the Clix scent because the
  mating game is all about amazing figures. Spray
  on, sit back and count you clicks.

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Axe and Bom Chicka Wah Wah

• Advertising/marketing communications from Axe
• Assert Axe products create the Axe Effect,
  which its website describes as an
• Internationally recognized name for the
  increased attention Axe-wearing males receive
  from eager, and attractive, female
  pursuersRegardless of where you live, you can
  get you some Axe effect by going to a store
  near you.

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Axe and Bom Chicka Wah Wah

• The Bom Chicka Wah Wah Campaign
• References a musical sound popular in 1970s
  pornographic videos
• Understood as a pop-culture term for a sexual
  encounter
• Features four girls
• named Bom, Chicka,
• Wah and Wah,
• supposedly in a
• 1970s style rock
• band

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Axe and Bom Chicka Wah Wah

• The Bom Chicka Wah Wah Campaign
• Commercials Five commercials depict young,
  attractive women who spontaneously blurt bom
  chicka wah wah when they encounter a man wearing
  an Axe scent
• Website
• The In Your Area section includes a map of the
  United States where viewers can Choose a
  hotspotand watch women across the country loose
  their inhibitions, their mindsand often their
  clothes.
• The Watch the Video section features a music
  video of the Bom Chicka Wah Wah band singing
  lyrics like your libidos in control, surrender
  to the mist.

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Viral Tactics from Both Brands

• Campaign for Real Beauty
• The website provides
• A variety of materials that can be forwarded to
  friends, including
• Self-esteem development materials for young girls
• Self-esteem training materials for moms and
  mentors
• Campaign videos
• Online discussion boards
• An opportunity to contribute to the Self-Esteem
  fund or forward a request to someone else

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Viral Tactics from Both Brands

• Campaign for Real Beauty
• Viral Videos (available on both the website and
  YouTube)
• Evolution
• Generated over 12 million YouTube views in its
  first year
• Provided an estimated 150 million in free
  publicity
• Onslaught
• Viewed over 500,000 times in its first month and
  over 1 million times in its first 3 months

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Viral Tactics from Both Brands

• Axe
• Received millions of views from its Axe Effect
  videos as they were forwarded by email when the
  brand launched in the United States.
• Created a video-sharing campaign on the Boost
  Hookst mobile network to launch its Naughty to
  Nice promotion.
• Provided online games and downloadable promotions
  with its Axe Efffect, Naughty to Nice and
  Bom Chicka Wah Wah campaigns.

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Discussion Questions

• How much does Unilevers commitment to social
  responsibility among all its brands impact any
  responsibility it has to ensure they do not use
  contradictory messages?
• 2. Could the brands be positioned in a way that
  sill respects their target audiences while also
  respecting each others ideals?

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Discussion Questions

• 3. Does Unilevers corporate structure, which
  oversees the marketing activities of all brands
  and prohibits any one from operating with
  complete independence, make it more accountable
  for ensuring brand communications do not
  contradict?
• 4. Do Axes marketing messages, in which young,
  thin, attractive girls find any man who wears an
  Axe scent to be sexually attractive, make those
  of the Campaign for Real Beauty seem less
  truthful?

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Discussion Questions

• 5. To what extent should Axes Bom Chicka Wah
  Wah campaign, along with its others marketing
  messages, just be considered spoofs of the male
  approach to dating? Should the CCFCs
  hypocritical assessment of Dove and Unilever be
  any different even if the ads are only intended
  as jokes? If so, how?
• 6. How, if at all, does the viral nature of both
  the Dove and Axe campaigns impact any
  responsibility Unilever has to ensure its
  communications messages are not contradictory?

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Discussion Questions

• 7. Would the validity of the CCFCs hypocrisy
  claim be any different if both brands used either
  paid advertising spots or non-viral public
  relations tactics to send their messages?
• 8. To what extent should the CSR element of
  Doves message, which relates directly to
  important issues of self-esteem and self-worth
  for women, influence any responsibility Unilever
  might have to ensure its other brands do not
  contradict these messages?