Does Reality Sell Beauty?
To Appeal to More Women,
Advertisers Adjust the Pitch;
Suds Fly Over Dove Campaign
When consumer-products giant Unilever asked 3,200 women around the world to describe their looks, most summed themselves up as "average," or "natural." Only 2% went so far as to call themselves "beautiful." Psychiatrists might have diagnosed a global inferiority complex, but brand stewards at Unilever sensed a marketing opportunity.
"Women are inundated by unattainable beauty stereotypes," says Fernando Acosta , a brand director for Dove soap in North America. "We understood then that we were in fertile territory."
The findings helped spark a groundbreaking global ad campaign for the company's soaps, shampoos and skin-firming creams. Dove's contrarian idea: to reassure women about their insecurities by showing them as they are, wrinkles, freckles, pregnant bellies and all. Taglines ask "Oversized or Outstanding?"; "Wrinkled or Wonderful?" Dove even has a Web site (campaignforrealbeauty.com) where visitors can view the ads and cast their votes.
The campaign, which originated in Europe before crossing the Atlantic late last year, has inspired a tide of publicity and discourse. Many women applaud the departure from typical beauty ads showing impossibly thin, young and airbrushed models. ("Awesome," says Tammy Richardson, a 37-year-old Boston lawyer.) Others are taken aback by the uber-real images. Blogger Kari Sullivan, 28 years old, says she is "horrified" by the idea of beauty ads "with women who look worse than I do."
Ads from Dove mix ages and shapes for a realistic pitch.
The mixed reaction mirrors a broader debate in the fashion and beauty worlds: In a youth-obsessed but aging society, can marketers resonate with women by reflecting more true-to-life images? Or do women want products that promise to improve upon nature, even if the standard is unrealistic?
Experts are divided. "Women will respond very positively to a brand that makes the most of the good things they have, rather than a brand that compounds their insecurities," says Benoit Wiesser, a regional director at WPP Group's Ogilvy, the ad agency that created the Dove ads.
"To say that you're beautiful just the way you are, it's a warm, fuzzy feeling, but does it make the cash register ring?" says Mary Lou Quinlan, chief executive officer of Just Ask a Woman, a New York marketing consultancy. "Women are interested in outer beauty and change. Visually or verbally, [marketers] have to make a promise."
Companies as diverse as Unilever, Gap Inc. and Estée Lauder Cos. are confronting the issue, which is being magnified by a wave of demographic change. Nearly 40 million American women -- baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964 -- are settling in to middle age, but they aren't going quietly. Appealing to women in this powerful consumer group means tapping into their still-got-it mind-set -- late motherhood, Pilates classes, Botox and all -- without going too far overboard.
"There's a fine line between denial and reality," says David Wolfe, creative director at the Doneger Group, a fashion consulting firm. "For a boomer woman she's denying the reality of her age, but the reality is that she looks younger than women of her age than ever before."
Marketers are trying in earnest to straddle that ambiguous divide, and are coming up with different approaches. The trend toward showing more realistic images represents "an overwhelming explosion in the beauty and fashion market," says Lois Joy Johnson, beauty and fashion director of 40-plus targeted More magazine. Revlon Inc., for example, has added earthy actress Susan Sarandon, well into her 50s, to the company's cast of more youthful models. In ads for its boomer-oriented line, Nicole by Nicole Miller, J.C. Penney Co. is using a headshot of Ms. Miller, the veteran designer, as well as a young blonde who models the clothes.
Eileen Fisher and Revlon
"Women love looking at other women in their own demographic," says Ms. Johnson. "That's what they tell us. I'm tired of looking at women who can't afford the products and don't look like me."
This fall, Gap is set to roll out its Forth & Towne store concept, targeted to women over 35. It launches just a year and a half after several designers created moderately priced career lines for department stores. Many of those collections, intended as boomer magnets, still are struggling to woo women with the right mix of garments that are neither too racy nor too dull.
For its part, the Dove brand does boast some improved sales. In the first six months after the campaign's October U.S. launch, sales of its facial cleansers and soaps rose 2.8%, according to Information Resources Inc. (And on its Web site, more than twice as many voters find the models "wonderful" and "outstanding" as find them "wrinkled" and "oversized.")
Still, Dove has found that the same approach doesn't necessarily fly all around the world. One new body-lotion ad featuring women with scars resonated with European women but got mixed reviews in tests elsewhere. Unilever also decided not to use the body-weight theme in Asia or Argentina, where images of heavier women are considered a turn-off.
Realistic advertising also may work better with some income groups than others. Unilever came up with a special Dove campaign for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. The ads, which run on the retailer's in-store television network, feature Wal-Mart employees. In one, a smiling worker named Diana says, "I'll see a picture of myself and I'll say, 'whoa, I'm a big girl.' I like being an Amazon. I feel strong and powerful."
"The products they're selling are mass market, so the [realistic] positioning makes sense," says Linda Wells, editor-in-chief of Allure magazine. "It pulls them away from the crowd. I don't think it would be effective if they were selling [premium] items. Christian Dior isn't going to show real women -- that is an aspirational brand, and it is priced aspirationally."
Indeed, some high-end marketers believe that too much realism can compromise their brands. Estée Lauder, for instance, used an over-40 model in 1999 when it introduced a firming product line called Resilience Lift. The concept worked at the time, says Peter Lichtenthal, Lauder's senior vice president for global marketing. But with anti-aging potions becoming popular even among thirty-something consumers, the company's strategy has changed. For a line called Perfectionist CP+ "we made decision to use [a younger model] for a product normally associated with older women," says Mr. Lichtenthal. "Women respond to the aspiration of young skin. How you feel on the inside is how you want to feel in the mirror."
J.C. Penney
Nancy Etcoff, a psychologist who teaches at Harvard University and who helped compile the Dove research, sees a slightly less black-and-white picture. "I don't think the [Dove] campaign is totally about self-acceptance," says Ms. Etcoff, author of "Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty." "But women do want to be their best selves." Ms. Etcoff and Mr. Lichtenthal both plan to share their views and research on global beauty trends during a panel discussion today organized by the Fashion Group International, a nonprofit trade group.
As marketers find their way, some are discovering that their ads need only blush at the truth. "Our ad agency said that people think of themselves as a decade younger," says Mary Tilt, a Nicole Miller spokeswoman. "You don't want to use someone the actual age of the target audience, but someone who they identify with, who is actually quite younger."
Subtleties matter. Tone is everything. "Most women say they look better than they did at 25," says More's Ms. Johnson. "They just don't want to look like they are 25. And that's a big difference."
To illustrate the marketers' conundrum, Mr. Wolfe likes to beam a particular image on a screen when he lectures about fashion. It's a snug-fitting woman's jacket, perhaps a size six, and represents a key shape for spring. "This jacket is body-appropriate whether you're 60 or 16," says Mr. Wolfe. "The challenge for a store is 'how do we present this item when we have both customers coming through our door?' "
In the end, of course, marketers concede that advertising is a peculiar, inexact science. "I think people can get too much into the analysis," says designer Nicole Miller. "If it's the right thing, there doesn't need to be a big discussion. If they love it, they buy it."
真实考验美容品市场
消费品巨头联合利华(Unilever)曾对全球3,200位女性作过一项调查，请她们描述自己的容貌，多数女性把自己归为“平平”或“普通”一类。只有2%的女性把自己归为“美丽”之列。心理学家对此的诊断可能是自卑感作崇，但联合利华的品牌推广人员却意识到一个营销机会的出现。
多芬(Dove)香皂北美市场品牌总监费尔南多?阿科斯塔(Fernando Acosta)说，女性们被那些为美丽制定的遥不可及的标准所淹没。“我们那时候便意识到这个领域充满了商机。”
受到调查结果的启发，联合利华为旗下的品牌香皂、洗发香波和紧肤霜展开了一场极富创造力的全球广告攻势。多芬的反其道而行之的创意：告诉女性们展示真实的自我没有那么可怕，无论是有皱纹、有雀斑、怀孕后的大肚子等。广告结束语这样问道：“超重还是超出色？”。“有皱纹还是有魅力？”多芬有一个网站（campaignforrealbeauty.com），访问者可以浏览广告并投票。
这场广告攻势从欧洲开始，去年底来到北美，已经引起广泛的注意和讨论。它摒弃了典型广告中以纤瘦、年轻和精心修饰的美女为模特的做法，让不少人拍手称快。（“太棒了，”现年37岁的波士顿律师泰米?理查森(Tammy Richardson)说）。其他人则被这些过于真实的形象吓了一大跳。现年28岁的博客卡里?萨利文(Kari Sullivan)说，她被美容广告使用“看起来比我还差劲的模特”的创意吓坏了。
这样好坏参半的反应映射出时装和美容界一场范围更广的辩论：在一个迷恋青春但不断老去的社会，营销行家能通过反映真实生活形象的广告引起女性的共鸣吗？或者，女性想买那些承诺可以美化容貌、即便其标准丝毫也不现实的产品吗？
专家的意见存在分歧。WPP Group旗下广告公司Ogilvy的区域主管贝诺伊特?威斯(Benoit Wiesser)说，女性会对那些能充分展现她们优势的品牌作出积极的反应、而不是那些增加她们不安全感的品牌。Ogilvy设计了多芬的广告。
纽约营销咨询公司Just Ask a Woman的首席执行长玛丽?昆兰(Mary Lou Quinlan)表示，“听到别人说自己原来的样子就很漂亮，你会感到一种温情，但这能推动销售吗？女性对外在的美丽和变化感兴趣。不论是视觉上还是言辞上，营销者必须作出承诺。”'
像联合利华、Gap Inc.和雅诗兰黛(Estee Lauder Cos.)等多样化经营的公司都面临这样的问题，在人口构成变化的推动下，这样的问题愈显突出。将近4,000万美国女性－－出生于1946年至1964年的婴儿潮时期－－正在步入中年，但她们并不沉寂。要吸引这个强大的消费群体意味著要挖掘她们留住青春的心理－－推迟做母亲的年龄、上普拉提课程、Botox注射除皱等等－－而又不能走极端。
时尚咨询公司Doneger Group的创意总监大卫?沃尔夫(David Wolfe)称，不服老和现实之间存在微妙的界限。对于婴儿潮时期出生的女性来说，她不愿承认年龄的现实，但现实是，她看起来要比同龄的女性年轻许多。
营销行家试图跨越这条模糊的界线，而且正在拿出不同的手段。面向40岁以上女性的More杂志的美容和时尚总监洛伊斯?约翰逊(Lois Joy Johnson)称，展示更为现实形象的趋势正在席卷整个美容和时尚市场。
比如说，露华浓(Revlon Inc.)已经将50多岁的老牌女演员苏珊?萨兰登(Susan Sarandon)加入到公司年轻的模特队伍当中。J.C. Penney Co.旗下的Nicole by Nicole Miller让老牌时装设计师米勒女士的头像和一位展示服装的年轻金发女郎一起出现在针对中年女性推出的产品广告中。
约翰逊说，女性喜欢观察和她们同时代的其他女性。“那正是她们要告诉我们的。我讨厌看到那些买不起广告商品、看上去也不和我同龄的女性。”
今年秋季，Gap准备推出其Forth & Towne的概念品牌，面向35岁以上的女性。就在一年半以前，几位设计师为百货商店打造了价格适中的职业装系列。在这些旨在招揽中年女性的时装系列中，许多仍在努力吸引那些服装搭配既不过于前卫也不太沉闷的女性。
就多芬品牌而言，销售额确有好转。根据Information Resources Inc.的数据，自广告于去年10月份在美国推出后的头6个月，多芬品牌的洗面奶和香皂的销售额增长了2.8%。（而在多芬的网站上，认为那些模特“超出色”和“有魅力”的投票比认为她们“超重”和“有皱纹”的投票要多出一倍以上。
尽管如此，多芬发现同样的策略不一定哪儿都适用。新款身体乳液的广告中出现了带有伤疤的女性，它得到了欧洲女性的共鸣，但在其他地方的测试中反响好坏不一。联合利华还决定在亚洲或阿根廷市场不用体重来做文章，因为在这些地区高大强壮的女性不受欢迎。
实际一点儿的广告对某些收入群体的效果可能要好于其他收入群体。联合利华为沃尔玛连锁公司(Wal-Mart Stores Inc.)特别制作了一个多芬广告，在这家零售商店内的电视网络上播放，广告的主角都是沃尔玛的雇员。在其中一个广告里，一位名叫戴安娜(Diana)的员工微笑著说，“我要是看到自己的形象，我会说，'哇，我可是一个大块头女孩。'我喜欢做亚马孙。我感到又强壮又有力。”
“联合利华销售的产品针对的是大众市场，因此现实的定位很明智，”Allure杂志的主编琳达?韦尔斯(Linda Wells)说。“这让它们与众不同。”她认为同样的方法在销售高端产品时不会奏效。“迪奥(Christian Dior)就不会展示真实的女性－－它是一个激发欲望的品牌，它的定价也充满欲望。”
确实如此。一些高端产品营销行家认为过于现实可能损害品牌形象。比如说，雅诗兰黛在1999年推出一款名为Resilience Lift的紧肤产品时，曾聘用一位40多岁的模特。当时这样的概念很成功，雅诗兰黛负责全球营销的高级副总裁彼得?利希滕塔尔(Peter Lichtenthal)说。但随著抗衰老的护肤品越来越流行，甚至在30多岁的消费者当中也是如此时，雅诗兰黛改变了策略。像Perfectionist CP+系列，“我们就决定使用年轻一点的模特，虽然这种产品的目标客户通常是年长一些的女性，”利希滕塔尔说。“女性对年轻肌肤的追求孜孜不倦。你内心的感受就是你希望在镜子中看到的形象。”
哈佛大学(Harvard University)心理学家南希?埃特考夫(Nancy Etcoff)认为事情并非那么简单， “我并不认为多芬的广告完全是关于自我接受，”她说。埃特考夫帮助编制了多芬的研究报告，她还是《漂亮女人的生存之道：美容的科学》('Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty')一书的作者。“但女性确实希望达到最好的状态。”埃特考夫和利希滕塔尔计划在由非营利性贸易团体Fashion Group International组织的研讨会上分享他们在全球美容趋势方面的观点和研究。
随著营销行家不断摸索，一些人发现他们的广告要做的只是对事实感到难为情。“我们的广告代理商说人们总认为自己比实际年轻十岁，”Nicole Miller的发言人玛丽?提尔特(Mary Tilt)说。“不要使用和目标观众实际年龄相同的模特，这些目标观众认同的是那些年轻得多的模特。”
细微之处见分晓。基调就是一切。“多数女性表示她们看起来要比25岁的时候要好，”More杂志的约翰逊说。“她们只是不想看起来还是25岁。这可有很大的区别 。”
为了说明营销人员面临的难题，沃尔夫在发表有关时尚的演讲时喜欢在屏幕上展示一张特别的图片，“这是一件女式夹克，或许是6码的，适合春季穿著。”无论你是60岁还是16岁，这件夹克都很合身，”Wolfe说。“问题是，当两个群体的客户都来光顾我们的商店时，我们该怎样展示这件夹克呢？”
当然，最后营销行家承认广告是一门独特的、不严谨的科学。“我认为人们分析得太多了，”设计师尼科尔?米勒说。“如果是正确的事情，没必要大肆讨论。如果人们喜欢，他们就会买。”
