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Vibhav Singh
Vinod Kumar
Sachin Kumar
Archit Singh

Gillette: Shaving Gender Stereotypes

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Teaching Note
Synopsis
This case discusses the launch of a marketing campaign titled “The Barbershop Girls of India” created by Gillette
India, a Procter and Gamble company (P&G). Gillette India had been highlighting social issues for many
years. Their “Gillette soldier for women” campaign, launched in 2013, is just one example. But this time, they

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took addressing social issues up a notch by addressing gender stereotypes in Indian society through their “The
Barbershop Girls of India” campaign. The case outlines the company’s prior efforts in social media platforms leading
to the launch of the “The Barbershop Girls of India.” The case encourages students to analyze how companies
choose social issues to address through their marketing communication campaigns, as well as how marketing
communications may be integrated with corporate goals and brand identity. The case concludes with questions
about the future of the Gillette India brand, and what type of marketing efforts it should follow in the future.

Position in the Course

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This case is intended for MBA second-year students and students enrolled in Digital Marketing courses. It can
be used in Brand Management, Advertising, Consumer Behavior, and Social Media Marketing courses.

The case can be used to illustrate:

• The scope of “zones of social media” framework.
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• The “6M marketing communications” framework.

• How to design and implement a communications strategy using the brand identity prism.
• Understand the reasons behind videos going viral.
• Understand the concept of cultural branding.

Relevant Readings
• Holt, D. 2016. Branding in the Age of Social Media. Harvard Business Review, 94(3), 40-50.
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• Ignatius, Adi. 2015. Why Some Videos Go Viral, Harvard Business Review, 93(9), 34–36.
• Teixeira, T. 2012. The New Science of Viral Ads. Harvard Business Review, 90(3), 25-27.

Learning Objectives
The case provides students with opportunities to:

1. Identify and understand the social media landscape and its scope.
2. Understand and design an Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) strategy using traditional and
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digital media.
Copyright © 2022 Thunderbird School of Global Management, a unit of the Arizona State University Enterprise. All rights reserved.
This teaching note was prepared by Professor Vinod Kumar, Indian Institute of Information Technology (Lucknow), India, and
Professor Sachin Kumar, National Institute of Technology (Hamirpur), India, with the assistance of case writers Vibhav Singh,
Indian Institute of Information Technology (Lucknow), India, and Archit Singh, Texas A&M University, for the sole purpose
aiding instructors in the classroom use of the case “Gillette: Shaving Gender Stereotypes.” It should not be used in any way that
would prejudice future use of this case.

This Teaching Note is authorized for use only by ARPITA SRIVASTAVA, GL Bajaj Institute of Management & Research (GLBIMR) until Aug 2023. Copying or posting is an infringement of
copyright. [email protected] or 617.783.7860.
 3. Analyze how addressing social causes helps in building brand identity.

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4. Understand branding in the age of digital technology.

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Assignment Questions
1. Critically analyze the social media efforts made by Gillette India.
2. Assess the effectiveness of the campaign “The Barbershop Girls of India.” What factors made the campaign
go viral?

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3. How does addressing social causes in a brand communication influence consumer behavior towards the
brand?
4. What communication strategy should the marketing team adopt next at Gillette India?

Suggested Teaching Strategy

This case can be taught in a single session of 90 minutes. A teaching strategy for a 90-minute class session is
provided below:

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1. Introduction to the case 10 minutes
2. Social media communication analysis 15 minutes
3. Show “The Barbershop Girls of India” campaign videos 15 Minutes
4. The “The Barbershop Girls of India” campaign 20 minutes
5. Tactics for creating a viral video 10 minutes
6. Discussion of the videos 10 minutes
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7. What should Gillette India do next 10 minutes

Analysis
1. Critically analyze the social media efforts made by Gillette India.

Gillette India made social media efforts in all four zones of social media. The four zones of social media are:
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a. Social Community. The social community zone describes the channels of social media which are focused
on common activities and the relationship through which people with same interests interact with
each other. Therefore, social communities have an attribute of one-way or multi-way communication
with each other—conversing, collaborating, and sharing of resources and experiences. In this zone, the
primary reason for engaging in activities is relationship or community building. Gillette India built a
community through its “Gillette Barber Suraksha” program by educating, protecting, and providing
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resources to struggling barbers during the Covid pandemic. Gillette further strengthened this program
with its launch of the “Barber Parivar Suraksha” program that provided insurance coverage to family
members of the barbers.
b. Social Publishing. This zone includes publishing blogs, micro-sharing sites, media sharing sites, social
networking sites, and news sites. Gillette India made efforts in this zone by creating shaving-related
videos on YouTube, publishing related articles on its official website (https://www.gillette.co.in/en-in),
and posting the “precision checklist” on its LinkedIn page.
c. Social Entertainment. This channel offered opportunities for play and entertainment. Gillette India
stretched its efforts into this zone by partnering with Krafton Inc., owner of the popular mobile game
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Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI), and launching BGMI-inspired razors.

d. Social Commerce. This zone used social media by assisting in the buying and selling of products and
services. Gillette India used its official Facebook page to redirect users to amazon.in to buy products.
The company also made the products available on all leading e-commerce platforms; e.g., amazon.in,
flipkart.com, nykaa.com, nykaaman.com, purple.com, myntra.com, tatacliq.com, and many others. The
products were also available on all leading pharmaceutical websites like netmeds.com, appolopharmacy.
in, pharmeasy.in, and others (see Exhibit TN-1).

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 2. Assess the effectiveness of the “The Barbershop Girls of India” campaign. What factors made the campaign

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go viral?

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The “Barbershop Girls” video was uploaded to YouTube in April 2019 and generated three million views
within a year. By mid-2022, the campaign video had garnered 16 million views and 8.8 thousand likes on
YouTube. The same video was also uploaded to Gillette India’s official Facebook page at around the same
time, and tallied 2.9 million views, 100 thousand likes, and 2,100 comments by July 2022.

A major reason for the success of the campaign was the use of 6M framework for marketing communications.

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The 6M framework comprises the following factors:

a. Market. This refers to the target audience for whom the message is being crafted. The campaign created
by Gillette was a mass-market campaign targeting small-and medium-sized barber shops in India, where
more than 50 million men visit a barber almost once a month. Gillette India targeted men living in
urban areas with high income with its Gillette Fusion ProGlide, as well as low-income men in rural
areas with its Gillette Guard and DE razors/blades.

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b. Mission. This refers to the main objective, or the end goal, of the communication. The objective of the
campaign was to initiate social change on prevailing gender stereotypes in Indian society. The campaign
used the AIDA model of advertising (see Exhibit TN-2):
(1) Awareness. Create brand awareness about Gillette through the campaign showing gender stereotypes
with which audiences could relate.
(2) Interest. Create interest among the target audience about Gillette’s shaving products.
(3) Desire. Build on the interest to spark a desire in the hearts of the audience and shift the mindset
from liking the product to wanting the product.
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(4) Action. The final step would initiate a call to action to purchase the product from available sales
channels (online or offline).
c. Message. These are the key points to be communicated to the target audience. The main message
given by Gillette India to its target audience was that roles and occupations are not restricted because
of gender.
d. Media. Choosing the right media for communicating the message to the target audience is key. Gillette
used social media platforms like YouTube and Facebook to roll out the campaign. Later, Gillette brought
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in traditional media to involve well-known Indian personalities like Farhan Akhtar and Sachin Tendulkar.
The story of the two sisters was covered by many local and national newspapers such as Punjab Kesri,
Navbharat Times, and Hindustan Times.
e. Money. Amount of money invested/required in designing and implementing a marketing campaign.
Gillette India’s advertising budget in the year 2021 was INR 236.38 crores.
f. Measurement. This refers to assessing the performance of the campaign’s effectiveness. The campaign
won a “Laadli Media Advertising Award” in 2020. By July 2022, the campaign had gathered 16 million
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views with 8.8 thousand likes on YouTube and 2.9 million view,s with 2,100 comments and 100
thousand likes on Facebook.

According to Kevin Allocca, head of Culture and Trends, YouTube, a video goes viral because of the following
reasons:

a. Tastemakers. For the campaign, well-known personalities with a huge fan base functioned as multipliers.
People like Sachin Tendulkar, a cricket celebrity with 37 million Facebook followers and 35.2 million
Instagram followers; Farhan Akhtar, a Bollywood actor with 2.8 million Facebook followers and 3.6
million Instagram followers; and Aalim Hakim, a Bollywood celebrity stylist with 192,000 Facebook
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followers and 854,000 Instagram followers, acted as influencers, introducing the video to a larger
audience, thus prompting them to view and share the video.
b. Community. Just after Gillette India launched the “The Barbershop Girls of India” video on YouTube,
Sachin Tendulkar posted an Instagram picture with Neha and Jyoti saying, “You may not know this,
but I have never gotten a shave from someone else before. That record has been shattered today. Such
an honour to meet the #BarbershopGirls.” Sachin Tendulkar, Farhan Akhtar, and Aalim Hakim’s
involvement in the campaign accelerated the process of viewing and sharing the video among their
community of fans and followers, making the video go viral.
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 c. Participation. By July 2022, viewers had made their interest in the video known by liking it 800,000

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times on YouTube, and on Gillette India’s Facebook Page liking it 100,000 times and posting 2,100

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comments. The female population in India, who had themselves been victims of gender stereotyping,
could easily relate to the video; and the male population could feel the distress a woman experiences
because of gender stereotyping.
d. Unexpectedness. According to the mother of the sisters, the girls had become local celebrities in the
area after the video campaign was launched. Their mother had always worried about how she would
arrange a dowry for the marriage of the sisters, but after the launch of the campaign, monetary help

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started pouring in, and the sisters even received marriage proposals. No one had really expected that
Neha and Jyoti would become so famous in their village. Their storytelling revealed that one could
achieve success battling all odds, and the sisters became an inspiration to society

3. How does addressing social causes in a brand communication influence consumer behavior towards the
brand?

Addressing social causes in a brand communication helps the brand weave the brand identity into consumer

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behavior. According to the 2017 Cone Communications CRS Study, 87% of consumers prefer buying a
product from a company which supports an issue about which they care. Therefore, many companies adopt
social causes that match their brand initiatives. The effect on consumer behavior by using social causes in
a brand communication can be viewed through Kapferer’s Brand Identity Prism. In this framework, the
elements of a brand include:

a. The Physique. These are the tangible physical characteristics of a brand. Gillette’s physique—everyday
use grooming products—uses the color blue in Gillette’s logo which is highly associated with stability,
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harmony, peace, trust, and reliability in India. Thirty years ago, Gillette launched its tagline “the best
a man can get.” But in order to support social causes like anti-bullying and sexual harassment, Gillette
has been promoting a new tagline, “the best a man can be,” since 2019.
b. Brand Personality. The brand personality includes traits such as fun-loving, happy, playful, honest,
kind, and so on. Through its products and advertisements, Gillette focuses on innovation, caring, safety,
and precision as its brand personality.
c. Culture. The company’s culture is a part of the brand identity. Gillette expresses this via its TV
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advertisements, social media campaigns, and community programs. They show Gillette culture imbued
with passion, expertise, sustainability, and social responsibility.
d. Relationship. This represents the relationships a brand has with its consumers. It includes customer
expectations from a brand, excluding the products and services being offered, like good customer
service, satisfactory experiences, and superior product quality. Gillette demonstrates a relationship of
trust and reliability through its high-quality products which are used almost daily by its customers.
e. Customer Reflection. This depicts a brand’s ideal buyer and what its target audience looks like. Gillette’s
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ideal customers are thought to be well-groomed, well-mannered, quality- and appearance-conscious,

and responsible men and women.
f. Customer Self-Image. This represents the target customer’s aspirations, goals, and how they want to
look and behave. A person using Gillette products aspires to be an ambitious, successful leader, a family
person, and a goal-oriented personality (see Exhibit TN-3).

4. What communication strategy should the marketing team adopt next at Gillette India?

In the age of Facebook and YouTube, brand building has become a nettling challenge. To manage brand
building over digital platforms, companies often hire creative agencies and technology experts to introduce
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brands throughout the digital universe. Viral, buzz, memes, stickiness, and form factor have now become the
language of branding. But despite all this, these efforts produce little payoff. Since Gillette India is very good
with community building and handles social issues very well, it should include cultural branding in its future
marketing initiatives. Cultural branding is a marketing technique in which a brand depicts a lifestyle which
is culturally relevant to its target audience. Cultural branding has five principles which could be adopted
by Gillette in future:

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 a. Map the Cultural Orthodoxy. This means understanding the norms of a particular category and

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identifying which conventions to grab. In case of Gillette, it was the cultural orthodoxy that they noted

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in Indian society that women are perceived to inhabit a certain set of inferior roles and responsibilities
as compared to men.
b. Locating the Cultural Opportunity. At times, due to disruptions in a society, orthodoxy often loses
traction. At such times, consumers start searching for alternative options which provides an opening for
innovative brands to introduce a new ideology in their brands categories. Gillette realized that gender
stereotyping in Indian society could be leveraged by demonstrating that roles and responsibilities need

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not be restricted by gender, thus causing the orthodoxy to lose traction.
c. Target the Crowd Culture. After mapping the cultural orthodoxy and locating a cultural opportunity,
Gillette, through their campaign, targeted the culture of men patronizing small- and medium-sized
barber shops for their grooming needs.
d. Diffuse the New Ideology. After targeting the crowd culture, Gillette diffused the new ideology through
their video which showed that women could not only be successful barbers, but that they could succeed
in any professions where skills, like height or strength, are not limited by stereotype.
e. Innovating Continuously Using Cultural Flashpoints. A brand may support its cultural relevance

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by piggybacking on intriguing and debatable issues that dominate media and societal discussions and
debates. Thus, Gillette must continue to leverage such “hot” issues like they did in the campaign “The
Barbershop Girls of India.”

List of Related Videos

• Barber Suraksha Program Version 1, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niY1LZwo4s4
• Barber Suraksha Program Version 2, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7JRY496OMc
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• Gillette Suraksha Kit, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qp5aKXlh5xk
• How to Safely Run a Barber Shop During COVID-19, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imcK4HGgk_8
• Gillette x Battlegrounds Mobile India, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPfQnTOfLcw
• The Barbershop Girls of India campaign, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCR24jyhfZk
• Barbershop Girls—Inspiring Journey of Neha and Jyoti (commentary), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-
M0WjxU_gY
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Endnotes
1
Tracy L. Tuten and Michael R. Solomon. “Social Media Marketing,” Social Media Marketing, 3rd ed., Sage Publication,
pp. 177–305.
2
Robert J. Dolan. 1999. “Integrated Marketing Communications,” Harvard Business School.
3
Punjab Kesri, https://m.nari.punjabkesari.in/nari/news/barbershop-girls-neha-jyoti-motivational-story-1268535.
Navbharat Times, https://navbharattimes.indiatimes.com/viral/trending/up-sisters-jyoti-and-neha-who-runs-mens-salon-
in-small-village-in-kushinagar/articleshow/87314860.cms.
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Hindustan Times, https://www.hindustantimes.com/lucknow/sisters-turn-barbers-in-up-s-kushinagar-shave-off-poverty/

story-EXGjdPeDlRBYOixHI3fqYJ.html.
4
“Why Videos Go Viral” by Kevin Allocca, https://www.ted.com/talks/kevin_allocca_why_videos_go_viral?language=en.
5
The Times of India. 2019. “Teen Sisters Who Disguised as Boys Honoured, Plan to Open Unisex Salon”, 25 January,
available at: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/lucknow/teen-sisters-who-disguised-as-boys-honoured-plan-to-open-
unisex-salon/articleshow/67682180.cms (accessed 28 July 2022).
6
S. Davis. “Council Post: Is a Social Cause a Necessity for a Brand?” Forbes, https://www.forbes.com/sites/
forbesagencycouncil/2018/05/25/is-a-social-cause-a-necessity-for-a-brand/ (accessed 22 July 2022).
7
“The Best a Man Can Get | Gillette®,” https://gillette.com/en-us/about/the-best-men-can-be (accessed 22 July 2022).
8
Douglas Holt. 2016. “Branding in the Age of Social Media,” Harvard Business Review, https://hbr.org/2016/03/branding-
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in-the-age-of-social-media.

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Exhibit TN-1. Zones of Social Media

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Source: Tracy L. Tuten and Michael R. Solomon. “Social Media Marketing,” Social
Media Marketing, 3rd ed., Sage Publication, pp. 177–305.
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Exhibit TN-2. AIDA Model of Advertising

A AWARENESS Awareness
The target audience becomes
aware of the product

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Interest
INTEREST The target audience becomes interested
in learning about the product benefits
and how it fits with their lifestyle
Desire
D DESIRE The target audience develops a favourable
inclination to own the product/service
Action
A ACTION The target audience forms a purchase
intention to make a purchase
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Source: E. K. Strong. 1925. The Psychology of Selling and Advertising, McGraw-Hill

Book Company, Incorporated.

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Exhibit TN-3. Gillette’s Brand Equity Prism

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Source: Framework adopted from Kapferer’s Brand Identity prism. Framework
interpretation is author’s own.
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No
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This Teaching Note is authorized for use only by ARPITA SRIVASTAVA, GL Bajaj Institute of Management & Research (GLBIMR) until Aug 2023. Copying or posting is an infringement of
copyright. [email protected] or 617.783.7860.