Advertisement, as we all know by now, is about the client; who will the products attract!? The only way to be sure of who you are calling towards your goodies, is BY THOROUGH RESEARCH.
Mind you, this is about natural hair products. There are 2 very important point I would like to outline before going any further.
1. There is a huge economic recession at the moment, but it doesnt mean that GOOGLING costs alot- just to have a look at your “natural hair client” of that specific country.
In fact, the BEAUTY INDUSTRY, is one industry that cannot complain about recession; we all know that we have to look great for that job interview. As you reading this article, there is a house wife somewhere in the world getting her hair permed or relaxed, her nails done, buying a new lotion or deodorant or even breast implants . So I have no sympathy for bad advertisement especially when it doesn’t look like enough work was applied.
In few words of perfect summary- MONEY HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS.
If you willing to give a one-sided advert in a mag (that’s a lot of money wasted by the way) then you have enough money to Google your clients’ hair type and make them feel a little special in your adverts.
2. If you have read my article called “chemicals knows no race” then this last point should very straight-forward analysis for you.
A consumer does not really know the “behind-the-scene truth” of beauty chemicals because all they want is an advert is appealing to them and the product that quickly consults them(the writing on the containers). They do not know anything further!
With this point, I want to give you a very simple Ad I downloaded from Google images. This is a dove lotion ad (tv and mag’s)
Take a good look at the following images, what do you see?
Let me tell you what I see:
2.a. This company wants the return of EVERY PENNY that they’ve put in this ad, and I am very sure they are enjoying their hardwork that they have put in this advert.
2.b. These are not the only skin tone in the world not to mention in South Africa- the rainbow nation,but, there will be more than one group of people that can relate and would love to buy the product. Am I the only who noticed they used very ordinary people (the ones that actually make companies richer….the real day-to-day consumers) for this ad?
2.c. This is a company that has marketing manager who probably understanding chemicals really well!
Quick brainstorm- The chemical layer of the skin is the dermis. EVERY HUMAN HAS A DERMIS LAYER, so whatever lotion or product it is, anyone can see the chemical reaction of what the product is suppose to do. Now, here is where the problem comes in with consumers- If a consumer only sees, e.g the beautiful singer Adele as the ONLY person in the picture, but the product could work for so many other people, then unfortunately, your advert was not so successful. I repeat, not all consumers understand how hair or body lotion results work, people go for what they can relate to!
2.d. I am sure some of you are going, “wait, they must spend a fortune if the ad has to include so many different people for one product?”
Ok, so this is where the topic at hand comes in and this is what I have to say:
Who forced the company to include any models for that matter? As far as the consumer is concerned the models hair STRAND is the important part not her face,skin or so called “race”, how many USA hair ads have I come across that only include different curl patterns? I am talking, well known natural hair products in the YouTube hair communities. Some companies just use animated hair strands or cartoon pics or few human hair strands of different pattern. Who knows? all the different type of strands could be weaves!!! But at least consumers feel included and want to run to the stores and grab every bottle!
Of course, every company is different, but it doesn’t mean you should not do your research before making an ad!
LAst worDS:
I was reading this article through my phone written by my girl, Aisha and all I could do was SHAKE MY HEAD…. an example of one sided adverts…
We need a change….people who actually care about consumers and what attracts them….need to be the one working on the adverts…
check out the post HERE
We cannot all relate to everyone’s hair BUT there is something this DR miracle Thingy is forgetting, TARGET YOUR MARKET WELL, most people from the southern part of Africa have type 4 hair…so if you gonna bring products and use type 3 a and 2a hair, some consumers don’t feel “welcomed”… same applies with adverts on TV and having a “White or Indian” celeb advertising the product….why would a black person think they can even TRY the product… even MOST so called “coloreds” in southern Africa don’t have type 3a or 2a (very loose curl pattern)…this is not a product issue, this is a MARKETING ISSUE, I feel like they just DUMPED the product in South Africa without enough Marketing Research. They could have added “a few different hair types in the Magazine”…..if body/ firming lotions adverts can can do it, why cant hair products do that in magzzz?….. it’s annoying…
I’m out….
Peace!! ‘n Happy fRo-CurL groWing 
sending...
