Dove : Evolution of a Brand
Harvard Business School Case
Pranav Anand
IIT Kharagpur

Dove, a brand with its origins in the U.S. in the post-world war || era.
Launched in 1957 with its strategic step to create a strong brand positioning
in health and beauty sector by Unilever.

About Unilever
Established in 1930 with its dependency on palm oil products.
And grown into packaged consumer goods in the food, home and
personal care sectors of the economy.

About Unilever
11 of its brands had annual revenues globally of over
$ 1 billion and it earns total annual revenue of $ 50 billions.

Objectives of this case

To know it strategic planning on managing both
mass communications and personal communication.
and

How has Dove evolved itself into the greatest master brand ?

Discussion on the five major aspects.
From brand point of view
To customer point of view
Media planning
Public relation
Organising for brand management

Initially,
What was Unilever strategic step on
Dove’s introduction to market
?

Its product claim that it would not dry out skin the way soap did,
because it was not technically soap at all.

From where did this formula come ?

Its formula came from military research conducted to find a
non-irritating skin cleaner for use on burns and wounds, and
contained high levels of natural skin moisturizers.

In the initial period of its evolution,
it created too much buzz into the masses with the message
“Dove soap doesn’t dry your skin because its one-quarter cleansing cream.”

Result
And the brand continued its dependency on claims of functional superiority
backed by the product’s moisturizing benefits.

Dove became one of America’s most recognizable brand icons.

Unilever entries in personal care categories beyond
the beauty bar category
and, it help

Brand point of view
Started “The campaign for real Beauty” for exploratory market research.
Idea
generator Silvia Lagnado
Greenwhich channel based global brand director
for Dove

What was the idea ?

Indulged into research to get women’s responses to the
iconography of the beauty industry,
and unearthed deep discontent.

Got information that many women feel taunted and for many, use of
young, white, blond and thin women on the advertisement and
packaging are unattainable standards.
Study insight

What was its impact ?

Use of ordinary people in supermodel context in the vision of :
Changing the way society views beauty.
Provoking discussion and debate about real beauty.
Promoting dove as a skin firming-cream which deliver a functional benefit.

Unilever crafted a mission statement to serve
as an anchor to the variety
of creative initiatives that unified
“The campaign for real Beauty”

What was the mission statement’s
purpose
?

It emphasized on more women feeling beautiful
instead women feeling more beautiful.

Dove brand builders started contest
titled “Real ads by real women”
Consumer’s point of view

To invite consumer to create their own ads for
Dove cream Oil body Wash.
Consumer’s point of view

For what purpose ?

to get people real experience what they feel, small,
see and hear after using Dove cream oil body wash.

Unilever’s media plan for “The campaign for real Beauty”
was to build out a buzz.
Media Planning

Company focuses to choose major media types like
Superbowl media, on Opera Winfrey show, and talk show of Jay Leno.
Media Planning

Unilever also created too much ads concentration for greater
brand impact without paid media.
Media Planning
Ads released on You Tube with contribution on topics like anorexia and heartfelt
Interchanges between fathers and daughters

What was its result
?

It was among the most downloaded commercial ever to appear.
It generated volumes of discussion on chat rooms.
It popularity became the subject of considerable newspaper, radio, and television coverage.

Public Relation
Unilever’s public relation strategy consists the following
as an integral approach to marketing Planning :
Advertising
Media planning
Consumer promotions
Customer marketing

Public Relation
Company created public relation channel strategy
to generate broad awareness for “The campaign for real Beauty”

result?

It establish an emotional connection with women

Final pillar of the plan

“ walk the talk ”
Unilever establish this global Dove self Esteem Fund to raise the self esteem of girls and young women.

And,
given a path

for What?

How a marketing campaign became the catalyst for a social debate.

Organizing for Brand Management
What is the Unilever’s brand management strategy ?

Organizing for Brand Management
It offers multiple brands within a product category.

What it really does
?

Organizing for Brand Management
Each brand operated as a separate business, competing
with its siblings as well as the products of other firm.

Organizing for Brand Management
Forward steps
Unilever split its brand responsibility

Organizing for Brand Management
Brand Development
Brand Building

Brand Development
It is centralized and global in scope.
It take responsibility for developing the idea behind a brand, for innovation, and for evolving
the idea into the future. It is accountable for medium- to long-term market share,
for brand health, for measures of innovativeness, and for creating value in the category.

Brand Building
It is decentralized according to the major geographic regions in which Unilever
operated. Brand-building chain of command were charged with bringing the brand to
life in their marketplace. They are accountable for growth, profit, cash flow, and short-term
market share. Working within the mission inherited from brand development, they have the
freedom to use imagination to break through their particular market’s media clutter.

What are the final conclusions
?

In September 2006,
Dove was identified as one of the 10 brands with greatest
percentage gain in the brand health and business.

What was its growth reasons
?

Much of its growth was attributable to its extension into new personal care categories,
and
much credit goes to “The campaign for real Beauty”

because

the campaign had touched a nerve with the public.

Created by Pranav Anand, IIT Kharagpur
during an internship by Prof. Sameer Mathur, IIM Lucknow.
Web: www.IIMInternship.com