Strategic Social Media Insights: An Audit of Doves’s Facebook and Instagram Presence
- faithalissaa
- Jan 29, 2025
- 6 min read
Updated: Feb 4, 2025
January 30th 2025
Faith Matheson
"Let's Change Beauty"
Dove's social media is pegged on the need for authenticity, self-love, and body positivity. This brand uses several visual contents, which range from real-person user-generated testimonials to high-end images crafted by professionals with their #RealBeauty campaign on Instagram. Engagement is relatively high, considering the polls, reels, and UGC that elicit participation from an audience that is very diversified. However, there is room for improving consistent storytelling through posts and the use of trending formats to increase reach.
Dove does community on Facebook through long-form storytelling, educational posts, and social activism. The platform is good for more in-depth discussions around self-care, inclusivity, and societal beauty standards; however, engagement can be spotty, with some posts receiving much lower interaction rates than others. Video-driven content development and optimization of post frequency might improve visibility.
Key Takeaways: While Dove has a strong brand on both platforms, native strategies will integrate more fully, refine engagement tactics, and leverage emerging trends to better position it for impact and audience connection.
Instagram Audit Report
URL Link of Dove Instagram Account: https://www.instagram.com/dove
Social Media Handle: @dove
Number of Posts Collected for the Audit: 25
Key Performance Indicators:
Total Likes: 18,239
Total Comments: 500
Total Shares: 330
Number of Profile Followers: 1M
Url Links of Top 3 Posts
Post 1: November 4, 2024
Likes: 7,602
Comments: 163
Views: 110
Total KPI: 7,875
Post 2: January 28, 2025
Likes: 6,259
Comments: 163
Shares: 110
Total KPI: 6,538
Post 3: December 3, 2024
Likes: 4,378
Comments: 162
Shares: 116
Total KPI: 4,656
Facebook Audit Report
URL Link of Dove Instagram Account: https://www.facebook.com/DoveUS/
Social Media Handle: @doveUS
Number of Posts Collected for the Audit: 25
Key Performance Indicators:
Total Likes: 3,396
Total Comments: 2,366
Total Shares: 497
Number of Profile Followers: 27M
Url Links of Top 3 Posts
Post 1: February 2, 2024
Likes: 1,003
Comments: 644
Views: 361
Total KPI: 2,008
Post 2: August 28, 2023
Likes: 1,139
Comments: 1,300
Shares: 20
Total KPI: 2,459
Post 3: December 3, 2024
Likes: 1,254
Comments: 422
Shares: 116
Total KPI: 1,792
So What Does it Mean?
Dove's Instagram and Facebook posts often focus on empowerment, self-care, and inclusivity, keeping its long-running mission of #RealBeauty intact. Brand collaborations, tie-ins with current events, and cause-driven campaigns are shared on the social pages that help place Dove within cultural conversations. Many posts center around real people, body-positive messages, product promotion, and social impact. Regarding the engagement trend, no specific pattern in likes or comments can be found, while the top-performing Instagram posts feature self-love stories, diversity representation, and brand partnerships. On the other hand, discussions around beauty standards, educational content, and philanthropy-driven campaigns are the most engaging on Facebook. This suggests emotional connection and social impact resonate the most with the Dove audience.
How is Dove’s Presence on Social Media?
Dove is more present on Instagram, the most-used social media by Gen Z and Millennials; therefore, it can be considered the key driver of KPIs. Instagram is much more popular, with a consistent number of likes, shares, and comments, which is sustainable. Besides, Dove posts more frequently on Instagram than on Facebook; that is why there is a difference in KPIs between these two platforms. Instagram's more visually driven nature enables the brand to show its creativity through reels, carousel posts, and influencer partnerships to better engage an audience and increase its shareability quotient. The brand has effectively used bold imagery with relatable storytelling, but a few static posts could have been done better to create maximum engagement.
However, they have received complaints across their platforms, made through comments where people feel Dove has fallen short in being all-inclusive or diverse. After going through their content on the internet, mainly on Instagram, one may notice that most of the models used are white, and a few People of Color are promoted. This lack of representation has been criticized against the inclusive ethos that Dove purportedly champions, thus affecting its PR strategy in ways that could make it revise its messages and visual depictions to be closer to what the brand truly believes in: diversity and real beauty.
On Facebook, Dove enjoys the benefit of longer on-page content, the ability to link externally, and discussions, which allow for deeper storytelling when discussing self-esteem, education, and related advocacy initiatives. However, Facebook is not as active as Instagram, and the content becomes less noticed and valued. Though the look of Facebook is not as aesthetically intriguing as Instagram's, it does work very well in telling longer stories that an older audience may appreciate.
Reels drive the most consistent engagement across both platforms. These bite-sized, aesthetically beautiful videos are easy to consume and have repeatedly proven to increase interactions and shares, thus being an integral part of Dove's social media success. The top-performing reels have focused on seasonal product launches, especially the winter edition line. Of note, videos centered around the "Sugar Cookie Sprinkle" scent have done exceptionally well, reinforcing the power of seasonal and sensory-driven marketing.
3 Strategic Recommendations to Enhance Dove's Social Media:
Recommendation 1:
Diversify Representation
In diversified representation, there is quintessentially a connection with more audiences because that represents the real world. If tokenism is avoided and an amalgamation of various ethnicities, body types, gender identities, ages, and abilities is added, then perhaps Dove will stand for the slogan of 'real beauty' through their ads. Representation needs to be visible and meaningful; this can be further diversified in looks and stories shared. This is especially imperative to Dove because it has, until now, been under scrutiny for ads failing to espouse the complete range of beauty. These vary in scope and size, everything from a severe lack of models featured to complete exclusion of one from any marginalized community to represent those standards of old that are now no longer the case. By opening up toward diversity, Dove will create an intimate emotional linkage with followers who, in particular, feel discriminated against or invisible according to the ideals of beauty shared. Such a change will support its commitment to the care of empowerment and self-esteem. It will be an excellent avenue for it to assume a front-runner role in challenging narrow standards of beauty- the ones the industry has so often perpetrated. With authenticity and inclusiveness, Dove will make people feel they fit in and encourage them to love the beauty that makes them unique, regardless of background or appearance.
Recommendation 2:
Strengthen Community Engagement Through User-Generated Content (UGC)
More UGC will allow Dove to increase authenticity and create a loyal community for stronger community engagement. Availing opportunities to your followers and sharing experiences and stories of captured photos with particular products keeps them relaxed and makes the brand inclusive. The confident journeys of any specific campaign could show self-esteem or body positivity. Dove needs to bump up its level of engagement by showcasing UGC on its Facebook and Instagram pages; this would make contributors more discoverable, but at the same time, the followers feel seen and valued. Branded hashtags, such as #DoveRealBeauty or #MyDoveStory, let the community engage positively with social media in creating shared experiences and feeling part of the movement. A degree of interactive engagement like this helps seal the brand image as one that listens to its audience and empowers genuine and diverse voices- a mirror image of the core message of embracing all forms of beauty.
Recommendation 3:
Leverage Influencer Partnerships for a Broader Reach
Influencer partnerships will help them to reach more and more customers. This will give Dove more opportunities to expand its audience and solidify its position on social media. Recently, the art of brand and product promotions through partnerships between companies and relevant artists or influencers has become popular because it often dramatically increases brand awareness and reach. For instance, Tim Hortons' most recent collaboration with the world's favorite pop star, Sabrina Carpenter, is highly in demand because her sure fans flooded in to try her special drink. This way, Dove can partner with several influencers who stand for diversity, self-esteem, and empowerment to create a more significant and active reach. Influencers, especially smaller ones with super-engaged audiences, can expose Dove to new communities and create more authentic engagement. These collaborations create relatable, organic content that resonates with followers: product reviews, tutorials, or personal stories about beauty and self-confidence. Dove can also partner with micro-influencers of all backgrounds to ensure its sets are inclusive and representative of the wide range of beauty experiences that the brand promotes. In a partnership with relevant influencers and artists, Dove will receive recognition among new classes and layers without losing one bit of the core message of authentic beauty and self-love.
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