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How The Body Shop Wrote a Self-love Anthem Using Employee Voices

Did you know that nearly 1 in 2 people feel more self-doubt than self-love?

Partnering with the market research leader Ipsos, the cosmetics company The Body Shop conducted a survey to find out how people around the world rate their self-worth, happiness, and wellbeing. The results they discovered were shocking and heart-breaking, revealing a self-love crisis that needed to be addressed.

In a podcast with the Managing Director of Woodreed Jo Moffatt, The Body Shop’s Global Internal Engagement, Campaigns and Communications Specialist Anaïs Nebel discussed the results of the Self Love Index and how the company set out to unify people.

Using music to promote self-love

According to Nebel, the survey’s findings reaffirmed how vital it is for businesses – especially those in the beauty industry – to talk about and promote self-love. With this in mind, The Body Shop decided to launch a self-love campaign and do something that had never been done before. Explaining how she came up with the idea to write and produce a self-love anthem, Nebel shared:

“I thought, what if we created a song that was designed to empower you through its lyrics and melody? What if you had a song that truly resonated with you, so that the more you listened to it, the more empowered you’d feel?”

Taking the first step to create its anthem, The Body Shop sent out a survey to employees, asking them three questions relating to self-love and empowerment. After receiving their responses, the team behind the campaign found the common themes and used them as inspiration for the song’s lyrics. Some of these themes included the feeling of not being enough, being proud of overcoming illnesses and wanting to move away from negative body images.

It is interesting to note that the self-love anthem featured people’s answers word-for-word and even included real voice messages sent by employees from around the world. Discussing people’s reactions to this, Nebel revealed that some employees had tears in their eyes as they recognised their words in the song’s lyrics and heard the voices of their colleagues.

When asked what advice The Body Shop could give to other businesses who wish to make a difference, Nebel responded: “It’s about understanding what your community needs and is looking for, genuinely listening to them and then taking a risk because good ideas are always crazy until they’re not.”
Anaïs Nebel

Anaïs Nebel

The Body Shop Global Internal Engagement, Campaigns and Communications Specialist
Anaïs is part of The Body Shop’s Connections and Engagement team, providing the global employee communications strategy for over 80,000 people. She leads The Body Shop’s global internal engagement and communications strategy for Brand campaigns, Activism and Sustainability. Anaïs also part of The Body Shop’s Youth Collective, a group of 12 young people advising the CEO and executive leadership team on strategic business decisions. Anaïs is an expert in engagement and brand strategy, with a background in both internal and external communications. She’s previously worked in leadership development, learning, social media and marketing, from small-scale consultancies to Estée Lauder Companies. Her campaigns are disruptive, with a people-centric approach, with the philosophy that at the heart of any impactful campaign lies the need to create real and vibrant human connections.
Jo Moffatt

Jo Moffatt

Engage for Success Strategy Director
Jo has been a volunteer with the Engage for Success movement since its launch.  As Strategy Director she sits on the Core Team and co-hosts the weekly Engage for Success radio show. EFS radio draws guests from across the engagement world with interesting stories to share. The Engage for Success agenda is absolutely aligned with Jo’s vision ‘to make workplaces better places to be’. Jo’s ‘day job’ is MD and founder of Woodreed, a specialist ad agency who use the tools, techniques, creativity and insight of the advertising world to engage employees inside organisations. Jo is passionate about brands and their power to move people.  She is equally passionate about employee engagement and its vital role in delivering a high performing organisation. Put the two together and she becomes almost evangelical about the power a well-positioned and consistently delivered brand has as a catalyst for employee engagement and business success.

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