MKT302 Digital Marketing: A Case Study Analysis of Dove's Strategies

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Dove's digital marketing strategies, highlighting both successful and unsuccessful campaigns. It begins by introducing the Dove brand, its positioning, and target audience, before delving into specific digital marketing strategies such as buyer personas and the Self-Esteem project. The report critically examines the brand's missteps, including a controversial advertisement, and contrasts Dove's approach with that of competitor Garnier, which has employed a dynamic and largely controversy-free digital marketing strategy. The analysis considers Garnier's TV commercials, radio promotions, social media presence, and viral marketing techniques. Ultimately, the report concludes that while Dove has implemented various effective strategies, it must avoid controversies and adapt to the evolving digital landscape to maintain its market position. Desklib offers a wealth of similar case studies and academic resources for students.

DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY 1
Digital Marketing Strategies: A Case Study
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14th April 2018
Introduction

DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY 2
A digital marketing strategy is a succession of efforts that help businesses
achieve their objectives through online marketing (Young 2016). Based on the size of
your business, a digital marketing strategy entails multiple objectives that will help
your brand to grow (Young 2016). Digital marketing campaigns acts as the
foundation of your digital strategy and will enable your business to move towards
achieving that goal. This report will focus on a brand with a weak digital strategy, its
digital marketing strategies and compare it with a competitor brand that is a player in
the same industry and has been successful in its digital marketing strategies.
Discussion
A Case Study Of Dove
Dove is a personal care and beauty brand owned Unilever. The brand re-
positioned in 2004 and its products are aimed at emancipating women to feel
comfortable and confident in their original skin irrespective of age, colour or shape.
To date, Dove’s approach has continued to standout in the beauty industry despite
criticism from different corners regarding its enforcement on unachievable beauty
standards (Amaral 2017). Dove champions “real beauty” through a host of campaigns
such as “Evolution” and “Sketches” as well as empowerment programs such as the
Dove Self-Esteem project. The brand’s mission is based on making beauty the
provenance of confidence as opposed to anxiety (Amaral 2017).
Dove’s Digital Marketing Strategies
One strategy Dove has employed as part of its marketing strategy is building
detailed buyer personas on its website. Buyer personas constitute your targeted
customers (Amaral 2017). The brand and researched an come up with information
that tries to picture personas. As such, there’s a type of audience in need of skin
cleansing products, others skin care products while other require hair care. The other

DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY 3
strategy employed by Dove pertains to its Self-Esteem project whereby, the brand has
teamed up with other brands such as the Cartoon network series to teach young people
about confidence. Dove’s goal is to reach out up to 40 million individuals by the year
2020 through the Cartoon network’s six animated films (Amaral 2017).
On its website, Dove has listed several running campaigns and in one of them
referred to as image_hack, it has teamed up with Mindshare Denmark to break the
chain of how women are viewed in Media. Dove has also made headway in stock sites
such as Shutterstock given that they are not barred from uploading any image and
tagging it as they please. Furthermore, Dove has teamed up with up to 5 advertising
photographers who have previous won awards and conjured a huge volume of
stereotypical female pictures an uploaded them on their website (Arica 2018).
Dove not only advertises its products but continues to inspire women through
social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter as well which in itself is a
marketing strategy. Successful campaigns have been held on the aforementioned
platforms and once that topped all of them was Dove’s Real Beauty Sketches in 2013.
In this campaign, women were told to portray themselves to a forensic artist who
subsequently built sketches that matched their descriptions (Arica 2018).
Which Strategies Have Failed?
Not all marketing strategies employed by Dove have failed. In 2017, Dove
was at the center of a racism storm when it published a social advertisement on its
Facebook handle (Arica 2018). The advert showed a black woman removing a shirt
that matched with her skin tone to show the public that she had transformed into a
white woman donning a shirt that matched her skin tone. This marketing strategy took
a hit and the people were quick to criticize the brand labeling it racist. Dove later

DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY 4
pulled down the advert and offered an apology. In light of this, Dove ought to have
remained committed to satisfying diverse audiences (Arica 2018).
A Competitor Brand - Garnier
Like Dove, Garnier is a brand in the cosmetics industry that supplies market
products. It’s range of products is on par with Dovo’s and includes skin care items,
hair care items and hair colours. To advertise its products, Garnier has embarked on
an aggressive and dynamic digital marketing strategy. As such, it has produced
several TV commercials and engaged itself in radio promotions, and print media
advertising (Steenkamp 2017). Garner also runs promotions on its website and unlike
Dove, it tries to show its caring nature and strives to form emotional connections with
its customers via the tag line “Take Care.”
The brand has stamped its online presence on social media platforms such as
Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and hasn’t been embroiled in controversies over the
years(Steenkamp 2017). Also, the company has adopted a strategic move through a
“Viral Policy” of marketing. It entails encouraging consumers to pass on a marketing
message amongst themselves. To top it off, it has ventured into affiliate marketing
where it uses actors and celebrities for endorsements (Steenkamp 2017).
Conclusion
Digital marketing strategies are a sequence of actions that map out how to
arrive at goal within a certain period. Dovo has done well to incorporate multiple
strategies ranging from creating buyer personas to social media marketing. However,
it still faces huge competition from other brands such as Garnier and should steer
clear of controversies so as to draw audiences rather than repelling them away (Young
2016).

DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGIES: A CASE STUDY 5
References
Amaral, A.C., 2017. Dove Real Beauty Campaign: A Local Perspective (Doctoral
dissertation).
Arica, A. (2018). Dove's Incredible New PR Campaign Aims To Change Women's
Image In Media. [online] Digital Agency Network. Available at:
https://digitalagencynetwork.com/doves-incredible-new-pr-campaign-aims-to-change-
womens-image-in-media/ [Accessed 14 Apr. 2018].
Dove US. 2018. Dove | About Dove. [ONLINE] Available at
https://www.dove.com/us/en/stories/about-dove.html#. [Accessed 14 April 2018].
Garnier | Hair, Body & Skin Care Products!.2018.Garnier| Hair, Body & Skin Care
Products!.[ONLINE] Available at: https://www.garnier.co.uk/. [Accessed 14 April
2018].
Ryan, D., 2016. Understanding digital marketing: marketing strategies for engaging
the digital generation. Kogan Page Publishers.
Steenkamp, J.B., 2017. Global Brand Strategy: World-wise Marketing in the Age of
Branding. Springer.
Young, A., 2014. Brand media strategy: Integrated communications planning in the
digital era. Springer.