SheKnows Media has decided the winners of the second annual #Femvertising Awards, which recognize brands that create ads with the purpose of retooling the way we think about gender stereotypes.
The winners are slated to be announced during the company's Advertising Week panel, "The Key to Next-Generation #Femvertising: Ever-More Authentic Portrayals of Humans," later today.
Honors will be awarded to brands in categories like Humor (Bud Light for "The Bud Light Party: Equal Pay"), Social Impact (Badger & Winters for "#Women Not Objects"), Inspiration (Under Armour for "Rule Yourself: Women's Gymnastics"), People's Choice (RedElephant), Wildfire (General Mills won for its agency diversity initiative), and Next Generation (Girls Who Code for "Why Girls Can't Code").
"This year, we're looking much more at how men are represented in advertising," said Samantha Skey, president and chief revenue officer of SheKnows Media. "The majority of our focus last year was on how women are represented and we've expanded our contemplation of #Femvertising to look at how all genders are represented and where the stereotypes and the negative representation exists."
A new category, Dadvertising, was added this year to reflect the company's plan to look at the representation of both genders. Pantene scored the Dadvertising award for its "Dad-Do" campaign.
SheKnows also tapped its Hatch Kids program (which aims to teach kids to use media and technology in positive ways) to award a brand. Organic Valley's "Real Morning Report" was picked for the Hatch Kids #Femvertising award.
The other winners were determined through a voting process, which garnered over 7,000 responses on the company's website.
Madonna Badger, chief creative officer and founder of Badger & Winters, the shop behind the #Femvertising Social Impact winner, said, "The point of our campaign has been that objectifying women has always been incredibly detrimental for girls and for women. What happens is that they begin to self-objectify and when that happens young girls and all of us start to believe that our only value is in how we look and not who we are and what we can do."
SheKnows is also releasing data from its national #Femvertising survey (see data points below) which includes information about how ads can be damaging, as well as the brands that are most likely to propagate gender stereotypes and are the most damaging to equality of genders.
"We're shaping culture with advertising and media and as such we have accountability to the values we're shaping," said Skey.
Here are the winners:
Humor
Bud Light: Equal Pay
Hatch Kids:
Organic Valley: Real Morning Report
Inspiration
Under Armour: Rule Yourself
Social Impact
Women Not Objects: We Are #WomenNotObjects
Next Generation
Girls Who Code: Why Girls Can't Code
Dadvertising
Pantene: Dad-Do
Here are some salient points from #Femvertising's new report:
- 64 percent of respondents believe ads have become more generally inclusive of gender, race, and sexuality in the past year
- 59 percent of women have followed a brand in social media because they like what they stand for
- 60 percent of women and 49 percent of men believe it is important that the people who create ads are diverse
- The top 3 brands that respondents say portray women in a negative light are: Beer commercials, Victoria's Secret and Carl's Jr and Hardee's
- The top 3 brands that respondents say portray men in a negative light are: Beer commercials, Axe body spray, laundry/cleaning commercials
- Almost half (46 percent) of women have stopped buying a product because they didn't like they way they were portrayed in that brand's ad
- Dove is the most recognized brand for sending positive messages to women and girls, with 65 percent of all respondents believing they make an impact. Rounding out the rest of top 10 brands doing it right are: Always (39 percent), CoverGirl (36 percent), Nike (32 percent), Olay (29 percent), Secret (28 percent), Playtex (27 percent), Hanes (26 percent), Yoplait (25 percent), and Pantene (25 percent)