Dove's New Beauty Patch

Dove recently did a study quite similar to its "Real Beauty Sketches," released 11 months ago. In the Real Beauty Sketches, Dove set out to convince women that people perceive them to be more beautiful than they perceive themselves.
Here's an example of how one woman described herself verses how a stranger described the woman:

The study was wildly popular, gaining over 138 million views of women who thought of themselves to be uglier than society perceived. Now, Dove is back at it again with their Real Beauty Patch campaign. This study interviewed several women and had them test a placebo patch that they were informed would enhance their beauty. At the conclusion of the testing period, the women were informed that there was actually nothing in the patch, but most of them reported having felt more beautiful and changed. Watch the full video here:

Dove appears to be targeting the heart's of women opposed to their heads. These women believed that their appearance was improving, however they were actually not experiencing anything new. AdAge explains that Dove is successfully targeting women by trying to change their perceptions of themselves first. Although the women in the video appear to be pleasantly surprised by the placebo, others are criticizing Dove for getting away from selling a product.

Kate Dries, a blogger for Jezebel thinks Dove's campaign is "complete crap." Dries comments, "With Real Beauty and subsequent campaigns, Unilever has basically turned Dove into a brand that's more associated with empowerment than its own products. That in itself is far more impressive than the fake magic properties of RB-X, which again, is not for sale – though Dove has a bevy of other products for you to choose from instead."  It does make you question Dove a little bit. It seems as though they are preying on women with low self-esteem and then associating a positive "change" with the brand which in turn has skyrocketed sales. Genius or manipulative...?

-Sherie