Imagine a World...

“Imagine a world where every girl grows up with the self-esteem she needs to reach her full potential, and where every woman enjoys feeling confident in her own beauty. Imagine the world of possibilities we can open up by helping to build self-esteem in the people we love most.”

This was one of the first quotes I read when I got onto the Dove website. Not only did it help me know what sort of stuff I was going to expect, but it also helped me know who the audience was going to be. It’s very clear that it’s focused on helping a younger generation to have more self-esteem, which not only targets the younger generation as an audience, but also the older generations so that they can be aware and help the younger generations.

After reading through this quote the next thing I went into was the link that said, “What do you wish you’d know at 13?” (Again, obviously focused on the younger generation.) It has dozens of inspiring messages to thirteen year olds from older woman of things they wish they’d know or they were just inspiring thoughts. Some of these were: “It’s okay to stand out and to stand up for what you believe in. Others will stand with you. Stay strong and be BEAUTIFUL!” “Time flies by too fast. Live life to the fullest, no matter what people may say to ruin your self-esteem,” and some were as simple as “You’re beautiful.” Along with the messages on this page there was a picture of a girl blowing the leaves off a flower. The picture draws in the older woman, such as mothers, because they can relate to that picture- every child has blown that leaves off the flower, and every mother has watched as their little girl blew it making her wish. They can see their child in that girl and they want to help that wish come true. The picture helps draw the mothers to this page.

After reading through several of the quotes, I watch a video clip. The video clip starts out with little girls and what we assume is their mother. The one girl says she doesn’t like her smile, while the other girl tells her that the smile makes her look pretty. Simple, but cute. It catches ones attention and makes them want to help promote self-esteem for this little girl. But the commercial goes on and has another girl and her mother, but this girl is older, probably in her mid-teens. It changes the audience from children and their mothers to older girls as well and by doing so it essentially opens it up to girls of all ages. Before the thought was only for younger girls, but then you realize it’s for more than that. It’s for girls in their late teens as well. Girls that are my age. After seeing that I couldn’t help but want to look at more not just for this paper, but just to know about it. Somehow seeing that girl that was closer to my age made me want to help promote self-esteem to girls of that age because those are the girls that surround me, those are the girls that I would actually have an impact on.

Besides just promoting self-esteem it also talks a bit about individuality (which is in a sense a form of self-esteem). One way used to express individuality was a story told by a lady named Maria Pascucci.
She talks about being your own person and not trying to fill other’s shoes. You don’t have to grow up to be your mom. You can be completely different from your mom, but both of you can both be amazing people. You should be what makes you most comfortable, and lets you enjoy life the most!

There were many other articles discussing self-esteem, ways to promote it, ways to feel better about yourself, and all of those sorts of things, but the one thing I noticed was that in the midst of all these they would have advertisements for Dove products. One of the times when I saw an ad for body wash I got the impression that if someone were to use that body wash they would have better self-esteem. Now I know this is a silly idea, because the type of body wash you use really won’t impact your self-esteem, but by placing that ad there a lot of people will end up buying it. So not only are they trying to promote self-esteem, but they’re making sure they get some money out of it too.

All-in-all I think the website is very well done and will capture a lot of girl’s eyes. Many people will try to help promote self-esteem so that their daughter will be more confident in herself when she grows up.