Crisis Management: Dove Body Wash Ad Evokes Outrage on Social Media
The Crisis:
A Facebook advertisement went under fire in October 2017, after the brand received backlash and accusations that the post was racially insensitive. In the ad, Dove a leading brand for self-care products from an angle of embracing “inner beauty”, intention to expand their inclusion and promote diversity of different races of women became their latest controversy and crisis to unravel on social media.
The Facebook ad depicts three women of different races removing a brown shirt she is wearing to reveal the next woman in a light colored top. However, the crisis comes into action when audiences reacted negatively to a black woman removing her brown shirt to reveal a white woman. The image below is a snapshot of the original Facebook ad posted by a Facebook user that went viral and was responsible for generating so much initial attention to the ad.
Since the incident Dove, took immediate action to get the ad pulled from Facebook and took to Twitter and Facebook to address their fault, stating they “missed the mark in representing women of color thoughtfully.” Many people representative of diverse backgrounds took to Facebook and Twitter to express their outrage and disgust with the thought that such an ad would be granted approval to be published despite the multiple stages of review many would believe it would have needed to be reviewed under. Check out a still version of the Dove ad below.
Many fans of Dove body products shared that they were disappointed and stated that they would no longer patronize the brand. Ordinary people, celebrities including filmmakers Ava DuVernay and Lena Waithe capitalized on the power of social media to provoke Dove to address why the ad should have never been approved.
Since this is not the first time Dove has encountered a crisis where they were accused of being racially insensitive and discriminative, after making the mistake the first time, greater emphasis and protocol should be enforced to avoid issues like this.
I believe that Dove could have provided a more detailed apology statement that went beyond stating they “missed the mark”, and it would have been ideal for them to address how they will be intentional to consider all possible outcomes, responses, and interpretations to their content.
When brands experience crisis management scenarios that are rooted in values of inclusivity and appropriate representation, it also pokes at the thought of why the advertising and marketing industries should strive to promote diverse representation in these spaces. If this would have been the case for this Dove ad and previous campaigns, these sort of crises can be avoided before they have potential to catch fire on social media.
Original Dove Apology Statement
Posted to Dove’s Twitter & Facebook on October 7, 2017:
See the full GIF and check out more information about Dove’s other occurrences with racially insensitive controversy here or click to watch below.
(*Disclaimer: All tweets taken were screen captures and are accredited to the Twitter user listed in each tweet above.)
