I just saw a new Unilever Dove ad promoting Dove's Men+Care. Reminded me how good Dove is at getting to know what really makes their customers tick, targeting their products and tailoring their messages, employing a variety of media platforms, and all the while maintaining their identity and authenticity. Their campaign (Ogilvy) launched with this Super Bowl Manthem ad last year:

Dove's success is rooted in listening. Just like they did to create their Campaign for Real Beauty which targets women, Dove started with deep research - The Dove Men+Care Global Study. The study revealed that even though men (late 30s to about 50) have reached a stage in their lives where they are comfortable with who they are, they do not always have comfortable skin to match. The number one skin complaint was dry skin. What resulted was Dove's Journey to Comfort program.

In a recent eMarketer interview Robert Candelino, marketing director for Dove's Men+Care, described the key insight this way:

“Journey to Comfort” is rooted in the powerful insight that our target male has experienced many unsung moments in his life, such as marriage, fatherhood and professional successes that amount to a personal journey. These moments have helped him reach a point of comfort in his own skin. By bringing to life the journeys of our target’s favorite athletes, Dove Men+Care was able to produce content on multiple platforms—including online, mobile and social media—that is compelling, relevant and organic.

The many Journey to Comfort ads beautifully leverage the metaphor "be comfortable in your skin" by connecting the personal meaning with good skin care; in other words, literally being comfortable in your own skin. This elevates Dove from being about personal care products to just being personal. They are so good at tapping into fundamental human wants and needs, and then linking their products to those core wants and needs. On top of that, Dove knows how to deliver their messages to overcome the most likely objection from their target audience of men. Who better to legitimize skin care for men than professional athletes... from MLB, NCAA, and the NFL. The explicit message in many ads- that each star is comfortable in his own skin, is delivered with humorous glimpses into their personal lives, and virtually no Dove product mentions. The implicit message of course, is that skin care is a manly thing to do.

One more ROI quote from Candelino:

"We believe that creating a rich, loyal community leads to brand affinity and results in sales."

I strongly recommend any large B2C organization looking to generate and sustain customer loyalty in today's rapidly changing marketplace, look to Dove as a great example.

Old Spice figured out who holds the purchasing power in their target market's household. In previous campaigns, they targeted end users' (men's) awareness and liking. Look at their old ad with the shouting macho dude that would annoy maybe 200% of women. However, men may actually like the fact that women don't like the ad, with this logic: Because women don't like it, it is automatically manly. Who said we're not shallow.

Now to focus on a better outcome - selling their product - in the newer campaign, they are targeting and winning the buyers' preference by appealing to women, and through women, to their men.

This ad has multiple messages. What women doesn't want a man to bake them a cake in the dream kitchen he built with his own hands??  But the message doesn't negatively affect men's awareness or liking of Old Spice. Men appreciate that Old Spice understands their "situation" - another way to sell manliness.

As marketers, we know Old Spice probably conducted copious amounts of research to intimately get to know and understand their customers and the the purchase decision process. To Joe Bro, it feels like he just had a "manversation" consisting of mostly grunts, nods, and maybe a fist bump with Old Spice. Then the product he (and she) wants magically appears in his bathtub. Cha-ching.

The most powerful marketing axiom I know is "If you can't fix it, feature it!" (read more here). Here's a new example: 3floz.com. Knowing that a lot of travelers have problems with the "3 ounces or less" airport security rule, this new webshop features the problem, with 3 oz. containers of luxury beauty brands like Dr. Hauschka, Archipelago Botanicals and others (all of which I never heard of, which is of course not the point). Their value proposition: No more worries about TSA confiscating your fave beauty products. Interestingly, they broaden their target audiences to "those who travel, those who are curious, and those who can't commit." Next up they hope are airport kiosks for people to pick up their luxury beauty products on the go. It's a beautiful thing.