LO1: Campaign Analysis - Dove's "The Code"

 LO1: Campaign Analysis 

Dove's "The Code"

Introduction 

Dove's "The Code" campaign is all about combating the uprise of AI in world, in all media sectors and industries of life; it highlights the construed beauty standards and expectations that are forced upon women, thanks to AI being a prevalent 'tool' in today's society. However, it especially targets the possibility of AI replacing "real beauty" with unrealistic and unachievable appearances that young girls and women are more frequently faced with. The problem that Dove is trying to convey is that "perfect" skin without flaws at all is an alien concept, and just simply isn't human despite how much AI implies it is, and this concept causes many individuals to be plagued with mental health issues due to how comparative the human brain is. People end up constantly comparing themselves to an artificially generated expectation of what a perfect someone is, which is perpetuated by how much people use AI systems to alter their appearances and edit photos - causing the software to learn and develop what features people are insecure about and are constantly changing. This however is the major thing that Dove is trying to say, if we keep using software to alter our appearances, we (as a society, and as the human race overall) will lose sight of what "Real Beauty" is, and therefore losing aspects of life that make humans human - imperfection.  

 

Target audience 

The main target audience for this campaign is mostly young girls and women aged 16 onwards from any NRS background, with no particular interests. This is due to the fact that beauty is a completely umbrella thing, encompassing and bringing people together from multiple different cultures and regions, and so there isn't one defining interest nor particular lifestyle that would be targeted. However, people from an ABC1 background would be more familiar with AI and so they would understand the stance Dove is trying to convey more easily, as well as the fact that these particular people and communities would have more disposable income and therefore more options to improve their appearance, artificially. This also targets people of lower income households as beauty standards effect everyone, and, arguably, they'd

be more effected as they'd be more unfamiliar with AI and thus more unfamiliar with how unrealistic and warped these particular types of software's results are. They may put more blame on themselves for how they look, and how - in comparison - their appearance differs so vastly to those people that they may see online, and on social media, without realising that what they're witnessing online is a completely manufactured and false depiction of what AI believes the perfect woman is. Although, despite not being targeted directly due to lack of coverage in the campaign and advertisements through different media, men may be a secondary target audience. This is due to the fact that men may experience a similar mental decline due to unrealistic beauty standards too, thanks to the rise of technology and AI in particular, meaning when they see this campaign they may apply it to their own situation, despite not being featured directly nor targeted directly. Furthermore, this campaign as a whole on a more subtle note is just bringing light to the dangers of AI overall, albeit the more blatant target audiences of either men or women. AI will ultimately affect everyone regardless of gender, and Dove is trying to illustrate this through the use of a pre-existing issue of female beauty standards, which is something the general public is already (hopefully) aware of so people won't be completely shocked with two somewhat foreign concepts, instead just one.  

 

Key messages 

Overall the key messages of this campaign in particular is to avoid exposing yourself to the harmful side effects of using AI to alter your appearance digitally (such as mental health degradation); how beauty standards can be warped and forced upon people, women in particular; the misogynistic outlook on women’s bodies, introducing the theory of the male gaze. Firstly, there’s an abundance of side effects of using AI to alter your appearance digitally, for example the mental health side effects and the repercussions of familiarising AI with what people want to see themselves like. However, the aspect of mental health in terms of this campaign is grave. AI has so much control over how people think, in terms of perception, having the capability to change how people live their day to day lives. People look at others online comparatively and put themselves down due to not looking a certain way, and due to social media’s growth and people’s dependency on social media, it’s so much easier to access images of these unattainable bodies that are heavily edited and photoshopped to match society’s expectation of women’s bodies in that particular era. When someone viewing these images constantly sees one body type everybody seems to have and featured that everybody possesses it construes their perception on what is deemed to be normal and perfection, so when someone ultimately compares their own body to this universally accepted, singular body type it had drastic side effects on their mental health due to the end goal and inspiration being completely unachievable. When a young person, in particular a young girl, is exposed to this, it can have even more significant everlasting effects on them – both physically and psychologically – due to the concept of something being mere fantasy simply being a concept untouched. Also, there’s a plethora of different conditions that mental health degradation can lead to, for example eating disorders, self-harm, depression, and even suicide in the worst cases. Furthermore, the idea of the misogynistic outlook on beauty standards on women is due to men perpetuating the unrealistic expectations, especially in the media. This introduces theorist Laura Mulvey’s theory on the male gaze, detailing how heterosexual men illustrate women as objects of sexual attraction and things to lust over just for their own erotic pleasure.  

 

Engaging an audience 

In terms of methods used by Dove to engage their audience in this particular campaign, they use for example in their promotional videos on YouTube, the main layout of the video is that the user in the video is familiar with a particular software of AI, where they input many different damaging statements to generate an AI image of themselves. Some of these statements being: “Imagine perfect skin”, “Imagine a gorgeous woman”, and “imagine the most beautiful woman in the world” to name a few. What these statements have in common, is that they all begin with “imagine” which, despite also being the command word for the software to generate these images, it also suggests that the users have a desire for these particular features of women, and long to be “gorgeous”. This engages the audience as it provides something for them to relate to, effectively creating verisimilitude due to how relatable these statements may be for some women, and how women may have felt when imagining a different live for themselves through a different body. Another method would be using rhetorical questions such as “What kind of beauty do we want AI to learn” which is quite a controversial statement due to the almost taboo subject of AI, and it gets the audience involved and engaged due to the fact that it makes them question their actions, and makes them think about the consequences of said actions – as well as

implying that they do indeed have major consequences. Dove also ends their promotional YouTube video with a promise from themselves in regards to their ethics and direction of the company. They state how they “will never use AI to create or distort women’s images” which is a very large promise due to the prominence and the rise of AI in the industry as it can create things very easily, which arguably reduces the workload and therefore reduces the cost on behalf of the company. So for Dove to denote that they will “never” use something that may benefit them just for the sake of being ethical and trying to better the world, is very significant; the audience will recognise and therefore be persuaded to support the company that’s doing this, and taking a stand against something that many other companies aren’t and are abusing for their own person gain and/ or profit. A final example of methods they use to engage the audience is their choice of models. Due to their target audience being very large, they have chosen a plethora of different models for their promotional videos ranging from young girls to elderly women, who are all diverse – not having a single “token” model which makes them seem actually dedicated to the cause. This engages the audience as it makes them realise how large the issue of AI actually is. It affects everyone, on a global scale, no matter how old or how young they actually are. 

 

How demographics, issues and stereotypes are used to enforce the messages 

Dove uses a wide demographic of people to support their campaign and to take part in it. Ranging from young girls to elderly women, from many different cultures, being a plethora of ethnicities, denoting that Dove really do want to change to happen, so they’re emphasising how prevalent this issue is, and who it affects. Because the whole theme and point of Dove’s campaign is to promote the discontinued use of AI globally, the issue they’re trying to raise is obviously the harmful software that can do this. As well as portraying themes of misogyny, ageism, racism, and harmful body images. This is done through the portrayal of these marginalised groups, which brings awareness to the fact that everybody experiences this, no matter where on the planet you’re

from – creating a sense of community. Furthermore, stereotypes such as female victim hood are used by Dove however in an arguably more positive way as it positively enforces the campaign, by raising awareness and emphasising the issues. This is denoted through the cast of models being visibly upset and emotional throughout most of the campaign’s products (whether that be in the promotional videos on YouTube, or on billboard across the world), this causes people to take action and to want to take action by causing the general public to be empathetic towards these supposedly harmed individuals, as empathy is part of human nature thus bringing everyone together. Additionally, the concept of the male gaze is revisited as a group of women in particular in the video is denoted to be solely in their underwear, which could be viewed as an attempt to appease the male gaze, however it actually just emphasises and enforces the campaigns messages more. This is due to the fact that, as well as thanks to the positive music in the background of some of the campaign, it makes them seem united, communal and positive. They’re all smiling and feeling confident despite looking different, and not being completely “perfect”. Celebrating each other’s differences. 

 

The campaign’s logistics 

The target audience of this particular Dove Self esteem project can access this campaign with a plethora of different methods and ways, including: YouTube promotional videos, billboards, advertisements on TV, and even in magazines and newspapers, to name a few. This fits as the target audience is effectively all women globally and most of this target audience are either digital natives and so they will be familiar with technology and know how to access it, or are digital immigrants and so they’d see the campaign in the ways that aren’t necessarily related to using the internet (for example on TV, or in newspapers and magazines). Also, despite print circulation being in decline, elderly people can still access this in print products. Furthermore, Dove hosts many different events (e.g. confidence workshops etc.) and has many different resources to help the different demographics of women in society (e.g. resources for teachers, mentors, parents etc.) which are easily accessible on their website. On their website it also has numerous links to different articles all dedicated towards their Self-esteem Project, which “The Code” is just a small part of a bigger campaign. Running since 2004, The Self-esteem Project “combines work with leading experts with a vision of a world where positive body image equals positive self-esteem, and beauty is a source of confidence”. 

 

Legal and ethical issues 

Due to the controversial and somewhat niche topic of AI, Dove has had to consider alot prior to exhibiting this particular advertising campaign in the outside world. For example, publicly criticising AI means publicly critiscing companies that develop said software, as well industries that use it, however Dove released it anyway. Also it’s argued that due to the “obsession over the pursuit of the perfect female body” being one of the most “integral parts of the capitalist system, If women were suddenly content with their appearance – accepting their body size, skin tone, wrinkles, graying hair, and the size and shape of their breasts, amongst other things – entire industries would collapse”. This is a point that’s commonly discussed about in the media regarding not only Dove’s approach to body positivity, but many other companies too, and so they took a huge risk to their profit and sales by putting this out. However, Dove’s parent company Unilever also own Axe, a mens hygiene company, who constantly and consistently use women in very negative and harmful ways in their advertising. Objectifying them and

sexualising them in order to profit off of them. So this is an ethical issue they had to personally and internally consider prior to advertisement. Additionally, Dove did have to consider legal issues too when creating and attempting to publish their advertisements. This is because one of their initial Self-esteem project advertisements about the dangers of social media (which is similar to the key messages of The Code), received roughly 136 complaints to the ASA due to the ad being too “sensitive”, and attempted to challenge whether the ads were irresponsible and distressing, in particular to those affected by insecurities about their body image or those affected by an eating disorder. However the ASA stood alongside Dove, with their response being about how they didn’t “uphold complaints about an emotive ad campaign raising awareness of the impact of social media on mental health in young people. Despite the ad’s potentially upsetting content, the ASA held that Dove had approached the topic responsibly and had limited the likelihood of young children viewing the ads”.  

 

How each media enforces the key messages of the campaign 

Overall, the campaign employs it’s messages through a wide and varied range of media products (promotional videos, billboards, posters, and website etc.), each one enforcing the key messages of the campaign beneficially. In terms of the promotional videos, it enforces the key messages of the campaign by using a diverse ensemble cast of models to represent today’s post colonialist and multi-cultural society, connoting how the dangers of AI are very significant and affect everyone regardless of who you are. Secondly, for Dove’s billboards they do this through having thought provoking rhetorical questions on them, alongside thought provoking and bizarre images, causing the audience to actually think about what Dove is trying to say and the consequences- therefore raising awareness. Additionally, for it’s posters Dove uses a similar method as it does for it’s billboards to enforce it’s key messages of the campaign. However, due to more space on posters, it enables them to add even more images alongside a main image, to

emphasise how large this issue is and imply that these images are what people are generating themselves on this software, causing it to feel very personal. Finally, for their website it’s a lot more informative and educational than what it denotes on its other media mediums. They have links to articles that aid a plethora of people to learn more about these issues, as well as then create workshops for young children to be informed about them too. An example of one of these articles is the “#SelfEsteemAtHome Body confidence classes for kids” which aids to help children feel more body positive and learn how to become accepting of others a themselves. This enforces the key message aswell as also denoting how it affects another demographic of women, young girls, as well as portraying that Dove not only calls out and brings awareness to prevalent issues, but also tries to provide support and to resolve these issues – as well as showing others how to do so too. The idea of community in this campaign is huge, and helps people feel more connected to this campaign. 

Call to action

Dove uses call to actions throughout the campaign to engage its target audience to be less complicit and passive when it comes to the use of AI, using thought provoking interrogatives such as "What kind of beauty do we want AI to learn?'', and their hashtag "#KeepBeautyReal". These are very thought provoking and insightful subtle call to action's, and instead of making the audience physically do something, it instead persuades them to think about it psychologically, relying on an audience's sense of compassion and empathy to digest the campaign in it's intended way.

Regulatory bodies

This campaign complies with regulation and standards set out by the ASA and OFCOM, in order to stay visible for the audience, to stay up and in circulation. Despite the mature and serious theme of this campaign, they stay relatively censored and sensitive in order to not breach these standards and the guidance set out for them by the ASA. For example, there's no nudity or sexual content within the campaign, nor is there active hate speech or derogatory language. Despite these legalities, the ethical issues with this campaign in terms of regulation is because of these sensitive themes of body image, which could be quite triggering for some.