Femvertising: Women who give voice to other women in advertising

08 March 2022 | Marketing

Women lead advertising and change the way we communicate.

They seek to eradicate female objectification, stereotypes, and gender violence through the strong influence of mass communication. In commemoration of International Women’s Day, we tell you what femvertising is and why all brands must join in this imminent change.

Advertising and marketing reflect societies

A person is impacted 5 thousand times a day with advertising, how to expect that the ideas of these messages do not influence their day to day? Marketing weighs heavily on the shoulders in the social matter, because its scope is enormous, and its influence is not questioned. This makes it a complex communicative system that teaches, promotes behaviors, or can reject or normalize ideals. This is the case with advertising.

Mass culture is a social power that must be taken seriously both by the people involved in the creation of these contents and by governments, who must regulate what is said and displayed. In the case of Mexico, this task is carried out by the General Law for Equality between Women and Men and the General Law on Women’s Access to a Life Free of Violence. The researcher Dr. Carola García Calderón, in her article "Representations of women in Mexican advertising", mentions: "Media messages do not operate in isolation, [...] communication is more a matter of culture than of media".

In the past, women have played a leading role in advertising, although on several occasions they have been target of degradation through sexist messages that repeatedly reproduce gender stereotypes. In ither words, women were used as a visual resource to attract the attention of consumers, women as well were always shown performing the same tasks or behaviors, such as cooking or washing. This highlights and reaffirms inequality and gender-based violence.

In addition to the social urgency to eradicate the sexist and male-dominated panorama of society, marketing has the need to adapt to the new times, where consumers no longer buy only driven by offers of large letters or colorful advertisements, they now look to connect with brands from their ideals. Therefore, brands away from social concerns are far from current and future marketing.

Societies have changed, the feminist movement has come a long way in recent years, so it is natural that marketing also changes and adapts to female empowerment. In addition, it is vital and a moral obligation for mass communication to support women who demand their rights through the dissemination of their messages and diversity of realities. The visibility of empowerment must go beyond city faces.

Advertising and marketing reflect societies

Brands are a living asset of the business and, therefore, all its manifestations, not only advertising, are relevant and prompt to deconstruct gender inequalities from the contents and expressions that are put into circulation.

Veronica Baracat, National Private Sector Specialist at UN Women Argentina.

What is the femvertising?

Femvertising is a movement of ideological change within advertising and marketing, but at the same time it is a strategy. It is defined by changing advertising messages about women by eliminating gender stereotypes, objectification, or imposition of beauty ideals to give way to the true voice and images of women.

Companies that implement femvertising as part of their communication must have a real commitment, both in their internal and external processes. For it is not a strategy that seeks to appear to connect with the female public, but a position in favor of the eradication of female sexualization and gender violence.

Brands that join the femvertising must remove messages or images that denigrate, violate, objectify women, or promote beauty idealizations. And from the inside they must exercise equal pay and provide equal opportunities for growth to all people regardless of gender.

This change, which marks a before and after within mass communication, is driven by the presence of women within the industry. They have brought their voice and that of real women to advertising and marketing. For example, in Spain, the Association of Consulting Companies in Public Relations and Communication states that more than 72% of positions in advertising and communication agencies are occupied by women. In Mexico there are still no data on this, but those of us in the communications industry are most women. In addition, communication-related careers are dominated by female students in universities.

Real, strong and empowered women.

Women have achieved a lot in advertising and marketing in recent years, but the journey is not over and more and better changes will come in favor of gender equality and women’s empowerment. Society needs publicity led by women, where real, strong, empowered women are exalted and where those who fight for their rights are given a voice from the most adverse realities are reflected. Femvertising seeks to make all women visible, regardless of their social, racial, economic or nationality status.

In Kaleidoscopio we recognize the daily struggle of women, especially our colleagues in the media, advertising, and marketing, who daily strive to give voice to women and make visible their achievements, realities, and concerns. On this International Women’s Day, we commemorate those who have carved the way for us to be here, to those women today and to those who will come.