Dove and Axe, two brands who market personal care products, are both part of Unilever. But, as seen in their commercials with the “The Real Beauty” campaign of Dove, projecting a positive self-image of women no matter their physical appearance, and the “Bow Chicka Wah Wah” campaign on Axe to utilize the sexual appeals of attractive females gathering around “average looking” guys, it is not clear that the two brands are united under one roof. This has caused a number of disgruntlements among the media and has spurred various discussion questions.
1. Unilever’s commitment to social responsibility among all its brands should not over power the responsibility to not use contradictory messages. Although the messages are mildly inappropriate in reference to one another, they each are focusing on two different audiences and as with the Dove campaign, they focus on the enrichment of self-esteem for the women and Axe, though it utilizes physically attractive women in their ads, does not fully degrade women because that is not their target. The target for Axe is not to tell women they need to look like the physically perfect girl on television, it instead is focusing on giving the boy confidence to talk to the girls.
2. The brands could be worked so that they respect one another’s ideas by utilizing not only the physically seemingly-perfect girls in the axe commercials, but also the naturally beautiful and showing the beauty of that girl as well.
3. Because of Unilever’s corporate structure of making certain all aspects of their company are never fully independent does create an issue that the brands are showing contradictory messages. If they are to be connected in some sense, should the campaigns not have the same values? But then you must also look at the product and the best way to promote the product. They need to maintain a hint of independence so that the brands can attend to their accurate audiences.
4. I don’t think that the Axe commercials which utilize the young, thin, attractive girls lessens the affect of the Dove campaign, but I don’t think it helps. It only projects more of the idea that women are a sexual object, but then again, if the Axe commercial is truly watched, then the audience realizes that in a way the Axe products give guys the same confidence to feel their “inner beauty” that the Dove campaigns do, just in a way that the men will respond to.
5. The idea that the Axe commercials are merely spoofs on the “mating game” should definitely change the opinions of the CCFC because they should realize that the company is not trying to promote the perfectly imaged woman but instead are mocking a cultural phenomenon of the “mating game” in which we all partake.
6. The viral nature of both Dove and Axe should represent a little better the message that Unilever tries to promote through their company. The explicit and implicit nature of the Axe site seems to abruptly contradict the Dove sight moreso than the commercials, enough that the nature of these should be altered.
7. The validity claim of CCFC’s would probably gain more credibility is these two brands were to use non-viral public relations and paid advertising, because that is blatantly showing the connectedness of the two and promoting them simultaneous on major medias.
8. The CSR element of Dove’s message should greatly influence Unilever’s responsibility for promoting non-contradictory messages from brands. Unilever should utilize the experiences they have to promote the lessening of contradictory brand messages.
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