Beauty is only skin deep. Please pass the lotion.

          A beautiful woman asked me why all the ads use beautiful women. This woman is a psychologist, so I guess it was a question that came directly from her subconscious.

          It was ironic because yesterday my marketing class discussed the Dove campaign --- what they called "the campaign for real beauty". It was the anti-cosmetic ad campaign Dove had been running to ostensibly promote women's self-esteem. The company told women that Dove believes women are beautiful just the way they are, with perhaps a few dollops of Dove firming cream.

          While L'Oreal was saying "You're worth it", Dove seemed to be saying "Don't spend it". The Dove campaign got a lot of publicity, showing good-looking women of every age and body type. (One of my students was quick to point out that Dove doesn't make cosmetics, so they had nothing to lose by knocking them.)

           There are questions about how well the campaign worked. Sales were up at first, and then off. Apparently women do want to look more beautiful, even as they age, despite what Dove says. Some women flatly concluded, "Dove doesn't work".

            I don't think advertising can work if it's too far ahead of its customers. People have been painting and decorating themselves since prehistoric times. It's a long time to be age-defying, as Revlon calls it. Women want to look beautiful and I want them to, too.

           Which brings me around to the original question. I believe that we find beautiful people appealing. We want to look at them and be like them. We want to emulate them. And advertising and fashion magazine spreads are one way we get information and guidance on how to do so.

           I'm not saying it's right, or making any other moral judgement. I'm discussing feelings, and I think they're human universals. We in marketing are paid to make and sell stuff and good looking models and spokespeople are among the ways to do it.

           Times are always changing and advertising will change with them. It will have to; ads can never be effective if customers are beyond them. Cosmetics are changing, too, becoming more natural, organic, less obvious, more fun.

           In the end, how we want to look is how advertising will look. And we'll say, "Isn't she beautiful!"

Are you as smart as you look?

            Here's a quote from Sidney Katz, on "The Importance of Being Beautiful":

            "If you're a good-looking male over six-feet tall, don't worry about succeeding at your career." He went on to discuss a survey revealing  that men who were 6-foot-2 or taller earned 12 percent more than men under six feet.

            "We send out three (female) prospects to be interviewed and it's almost always the most glamorous one that's hired." says Edith Geddes of the Personnel Center in Toronto. It's called the "halo effect". If you look like Angelina or Brad, you're more generous, trustworthy, sociable, modest, sensitive and interesting.

            This kind of thing shows up everywhere. A friend of mine, Arlie Hochschild, a sociologist at the University of California in Berkeley, studied male and female flight attendants. Passengers treated them quite differently. Passengers felt more at ease asking for things from female flight attendants, expected more services, and felt more free to criticize them.

             Lena Nordholm presented 289 doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals with photos of eight attractive and unattractive women. They were asked what kind of patients the eight would be. The good-looking women were judged more cooperative, better motivated, and more likely to improve.

             It seems Leo Tolstoy knew that would happen. "It's amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness," he wrote.

            Also check the Greek and Roman exhibits at your art museum. Were the ancient gods and goddesses beautiful or homely?

            So now it's up to you. As a marketing person, are you going to go with human nature, or against it?

            Gloria Steinem, where are you when we need you?

       

Mirror, mirror on the wall.

          A psychologist asks this interesting question: if slim models in ads make women feel bad about their normal-weight bodies, would plus-size models make us feel better about our bodies?

          That can be extended to another question: do advertisers show slim models because they make the clothes look better, or because they're making an unspoken promise of what you'll look like?

          These questions probably have sophisticated psychological nuances, but maybe not. Maybe fashion advertisers are merely playing follow the leader, or waiting for Simon to say hands on hips. I suspect that's the case.

           I was told that Kate Moss is so popular as a model because she is "the perfect hanger to put clothes on". Everything looks great on her.

          Maybe we give the media too much power over our own self regard. And stereotypes undoubtedly play too big a role.

          A recent Newsweek magazine study of 202 corporate hiring managers revealed that 57% felt that qualified but unattractive candidates had a harder time landing a job. More than half of the hiring managers said candidates should spend as much time and money on looking attractive as on their resumes.

          So where do we get our ideas of what's attractive? From the media, I would guess. Should recruiters have signs in the lobby explaining what they find attractive? "I tend to hire more blondes". "Plus-size bookkeeper wanted for accounts payable. Must have childhood issues." "Short brunettes need not apply, even with great programming skills". Of course that's silly, but it appears that looks do count.

          I've been told that the Fox News Channel always seems to have smart female anchors --- who happen to be beautiful. Hey, rating points are rating points! I hope the other networks adopt the same policy.

         The news is so ugly these days.