Insight
Central America has a population of 42.4 million people from which 52% is composed of women and 84% of them belong to the medium and low social economic class. In most cases, these very women are the head of the household and are responsible of their family´s nourishment. Because they have to prioritise their expenses and focus their income to supply basic family needs, they consider facial care as a luxury that they can´t afford. Due to their economic situation, they disregard their personal appearance and their self-confidence diminishes. Unfortunately, they don´t feel beautiful any more, up to the point where they don´t want to show the real beauty in their faces or look at themselves in a mirror.
In the past two years, Dove Beauty bars hadn´t experienced sales growth and the communication had only focused the product as a soap bar concerned for corporal care. The brand had hurdles to overcome: positioning the Dove beauty bar as a leading facial care cleanser accessible to everyone. The approach Dove Beauty bar followed was to portray the brand as an option for women´s facial cleanliness, moisture and care; achieving a trade up from ordinary soap bars to a dermo-cleansing soap bar.
Strategy
To learn and understand more about Central American women, Initiative conducted a survey to obtain information about their habits and lifestyle, their major influencers, the role mass communication plays in their life and if they had a specific facial cleansing routine.
Among the most important findings, it learned:
- Some women don´t use soap to clean their faces because they consider that it will strip/ damage their skin.
- Watching TV is part of their daily hobbies; which allows them to spend time with their family without additional expenses.
- Their most important beauty tip influencers are their very own family and TV hostesses.
- They stay connected with TV hostesses and TV shows through their social media profiles.
To achieve the brand´s objectives and tackle the consumer insights, the agency had to make the Dove Beauty bar stand out and demonstrate itself as an alternative for facial cleansing and incentivise customer via trials. As a result, special content was created in alliance with TV channels to communicate key messages, via opinion influencers in Central American markets, that Dove Beauty bar leaves the skin moisturised, soft and clean.
Execution
The most important TV talk shows from five Central American countries were selected to create special content for the brand. Initiative negotiated with these TV channels so that their hostess could become an opinion influencer because, as determined in the study, they’re more likely to influence women within the target audience.
Dove Beauty bar launched its “7-day Dove Challenge” and the selected hostesses from the TV talk shows started to participate by using the product daily, demonstrating why the Dove Beauty bar can be used as a facial cleansing routine, and how it leaves the skin clean and moisturised.
The 7-day Dove Challenges that hostesses undertook were documented and broadcasted via the TV talk shows and their social media profiles; where consumers could follow their day by day progress, track how they looked and felt more naturally beautiful, and learn how the Dove Beauty bar had improved their facial appearance since day 1.
In order to have a boost with the “7-day Dove Challenge”, it was negotiated with TV channels that hostesses, when narrating their experience, could appear without makeup; something that is almost unheard of. This approach would accent their natural beauty and motivate consumers to be real and also show their faces with confidence and sureness.
Consumers followed daily the Dove challenge through social media; and some of them expressed that they were using Dove Beauty bar and had experienced how the product left their faces soft without having to try or moisturise with other products.
Results
After 2 years of sales decrease, Dove Beauty bar was able to revert this tendency and reach the leading position in the cosmetics category segment; increasing sales, in only two months, by 26.1% vs. the same period from the previous year.
Press and digital media spaces were obtained without additional costs equivalent to 60% of the campaign’s total budget of $34,400.
The message was broadened via the different TV talk shows´ digital assets without cost; delivering it on their social media profiles to approximately 120,000 fans. Consumers could witness the progress and the results of the “7-day Dove Challenge”, generating confidence in the consumers.
A branded content integration in 5 Central American markets created a parallel communication across selected channels in each country.
Dove Beauty bar was able to have a closer approach to Central American consumers through a valued proposal. The brand became the best allied for facial care; returning their confidence. Through social media, positive comments were received, among these, a consumer shared how she avoided being in family pictures and how she preferred to be the photographer. Once she started using the Dove Beauty bar, she witnessed changes in her face. Today, she can take a selfie without shame.