In recent times, beauty brand campaigns are no longer judged solely on creativity or product quality. How a brand chooses its stories, responds to public conversation, and represents women in its campaigns has become fodder for discussion on social media.
One illustration can be seen in the following composite scenario. A beauty brand runs a dedicated account for reposting user-generated content (UGC). One day, the account reposted the story of a young woman who married a man 43 years her senior, then gave a response that the public perceived as an endorsement of that story.
Online conversation split down the middle. Some saw it as simply an ad and a personal choice, while others questioned the power dynamics behind the story. The debate kept rolling until the product being promoted was drowned out entirely by arguments over power dynamics, the representation of women, and the meaning of the campaign itself.
This composite scenario shows that audiences today evaluate not only the product a beauty brand sells, but also the communication decisions behind its campaign. Influencer selection, representation in advertising, UGC curation, and how a brand responds to public conversation are increasingly seen as a reflection of the values a brand holds. In other words, communication decisions have become part of a brand's identity, and the public judges them accordingly.
Debate over the representation of women in advertising and marketing campaigns isn't actually new. But the growth of social media has sped up the spread of that conversation and widened its reach. In Indonesia, the Digital 2025: Indonesia report shows internet users are active on an average of around seven social media platforms every month. This means a campaign is no longer judged only by the audience a brand planned to target, but is also interpreted and debated by a much wider public.
It's this shift in how consumers read marketing messages that presents a new challenge for players in the beauty industry.
This article examines how shifts in the way the public interprets campaigns affect brand communication strategy. The focus isn't on determining whether any feminist theory or brand communication decision is right or wrong, but on how various interpretive frameworks — such as the male gaze or choice feminism — are used by the public to read campaigns, and what that means for brand communication strategy.