Why Unilever Thinks a DNA Test Can Help Marketers Banish Stereotypes from Ads: The Drum

Following a unique experiment with University College London UCL the Dove owner claims that letting execs discover their own genetic makeup and ancestry in this way results in a reduction in quotstereotypical thinkingquot and unconscious biasAline Santos the company39s Executive Vice President of Global Marketing and Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer told The Drum the test group was quotoverwhelmedquot by the results and said the option to take part would be rolled out across its entire inhouse marketing team as well as its significant agency rosterAs part of its wider Unstereotypeamp160initiative which aims to banish biases related to gender background age or orientation from its advertising the FMCG giant partnered with UCL to invite 63 staff and agency execs from London Rotterdam and New York to submit their DNA for analysisThe goal was to find out whether a deeper understanding of heritage had any impact on their creative thinking and challenge them to think about their own sense of identityMarketers who took part represented the likes of Dove Vaseline Cif and Hellman39s while agencies included MullenLowe and OgilvyDNA data was anonymous to Unilever which worked with an external partner to collect itAfter learning their results the participants underwent a workshop with UCL professors focused on how to unlearn stereotypical thought patternsamp160 They were then tested on their likelihood to stereotype people via a series of imagesAfter the process scientists noted a quot35 reduction in stereotypical thinkingquot and a quot27 increase in original thinkingquotquotWhen we did this test people were so surprised about the resultsquot explained Santosamp160amp160quotSome people didn39t realize they had a geographic heritage that was coming from Asia or Africa or that they had Jewish rootsamp160 When people are surprised or get to know something new about themselves that39s the best moment for them to learn about others and understand that they should be conscious about not stereotyping peoplequotSantos said it was important that Unilever39s agencies took part in the process so they could quotwalk the walk togetherquotamp160adding that she believed the daylong workshops had actually helped agency teams build stronger partnerships with internal Unilever marketersThe executive amp160who is currently the most senior marketer at Unilever following the departure of longstanding chief marketing officer Keith Weedamp160amp160also said she was open to sharing the learnings of this experiment with competitorsamp160amp160quotHopefully we will share this with other brandsamp160 We39re keen to share any progress in this area with external peopleamp160 We decided a long time ago that we don39t want to compete on diversityamp160 The more we can help we willquotUnilever39s announcement coincided with the start of Cannes Lions which the FMCG brand has used as launchpad for its Unstereotypeamp160programamp160since it was first unveiled as a genderfocused initiative in 2016This article was originally published at The DrumClick the social buttons above or below to share this story with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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