We had no actors; our cast consisted of real doctors and nurses from different nationalities with visible marks on their faces from protective gear. Social media and the real world became our casting agency. So over a frantic 72 hours, we reached out to dozens of real frontline workers from around the world, across multiple social media platforms, eventually gaining their permission to use their photos. We wanted to specifically honour the doctors and nurses who inspired our campaign. So, we transformed the most impersonal outdoor medium, into something personal: we thanked them directly through strategically placed billboards right beside their hospitals and along their routes home. By identifying their commute and shift times, we programmed billboards to broadcast our tributes to them at the exact time their shifts started and ended. Through use of outdoor, we gave frontline workers a dose of encouragement to keep on saving lives.

Courage is beautiful

Early into the pandemic, Dove set out to celebrate the bravery of front-line healthcare workers. However, photographers were not permitted into the impacted hospitals.

This constraint led to a powerful solution: to use the “selfie” photographs that front-healthcare workers were sharing on their personal social media accounts. Their images conveyed the physical and mental toll of the pandemic with raw, unretouched authenticity, capturing their selfless care after a long shift.

Searching hashtags on various social platforms, we found real healthcare workers’ personal images and then DM’d them to invite them to participate. We then juxtaposed the images of their battle-worn faces with our message.

Running in 15 countries, with each nation featuring local healthcare workers, Dove evolved the definition of their long-standing “Campaign for Real Beauty”, showing that beauty isn’t how you look, but what you do.

The campaign imagery not only featured heroes, it was photographed by heroes.