Viral campaigns meet anti-viral
The Dove anti-beauty industry ads are great advertising. Here is the latest:
An article by Ad Age says that only one in a hundred consumers realize that the parent company, Unilever, also owns Axe, perhaps not quite as enlightened in its advertising. Here is a Mexican execution for example:
In an era of user-generated content, hypocrisy can only lead to one place: You Tube. Here is what Rye Clifton, another ad industry man put out there:
The ad industry is becoming interactive in ways it didn’t expect. Big targets like Unilever need to understand that their critics can now use their ads against them. And they’ll have to get used to some public criticism. The more edgy campaigns of the future might come from smaller companies who don’t have to worry about corporate image so much. As for dumb sexist advertising, it won’t go away until dumb sexists do and as for the Dove campaign, it’s still great advertising.
