Dove Hair faced difficulty penetrating the US market as consumers perceive Dove to be a personal care brand, specializing in body care rather than hair care. In 2015, Dove Hair planned to introduce a new range of curly hair products and needed to turn the category performance around. For the first time, we devised a campaign that would leverage the overarching Dove brand voice and communicate emotionally with our consumers versus functionally.

We found curls to be an emotionally and culturally charged topic, tightly connected to self-esteem – the core pillar of the Dove brand equity and social mission – an important issue which crosses curl type, texture and cultural background. We found that women with curly hair had fragmented feelings that often skewed negatively. Dove’s history and heritage in self-esteem left us poised to intercept that negative conversation and motivate a positive one among media and consumers alike.

We conducted research in support of our hypotheses and brought the findings to life in a digital film that took girls on a journey from hating their curly hair to celebrating and embracing it through the power of a song. The film closed with a CTA for all women to show their curl-love in order to inspire future generations to do the same. We aimed to create a celebration of curls by leveraging the unique voice of the Dove brand, prompting millions of women to show the world how they love their hair, in favor of our mission and hashtaging #LoveYourCurls

The first step was to create excitement around the film and our mission. We debuted it on NBC’s The Today Show in a (paid) 3 day series, seamlessly integrating within show content. We then widely syndicated the film partnering with Visible Measures, maximizing visibility across properties and encouraging social chatter with Facebook/Twitter paid support. The campaign continued with an integration on daytime show The Real, product TVC support, digital display and print placements connecting Dove Hair with relevant “curl” moments. The campaign was so popular that the paid activity unlocked additional earned media across channels, amplifying our social movement.

Not only did we ignite a sustained and meaningful conversation around curly hair, we created a movement that brought women from all ages and background together.

-In total the music video clip was viewed more that 27M times.

-The campaign resulted in more than 1.6 billion media impressions with 95% positive sentiment overall.

-It was Dove’s fastest starting film and reached the #2 position on the Ad Age Viral Video Chart during its first week.

-With 450 million social impressions and over 7,000 UGC engagements.

- #Love Your Curls trended nationally on Twitter.

-Over 1000 Radio broadcasts.

-At Launch sales of Dove Hair’s curl range was 55% higher than originally forecasted at retail, and it is on track to be Dove Hair’s most successful product launch to date.

-It has lead to an overall Dove Hair sales increase of +9% vs. YAG since it launched.

The campaign has inspired a social tipping point, motivating millions of women and girls to love their curly hair and themselves.