Lorraine Twohill is the Chief Marketing Officer of Google. Here, she provides the details of her team’s ongoing efforts to make Google’s advertisements more inclusive and representative.
A variant of this view was previously featured in Adweek.
The legendary educator and advocate for inclusion Reggie Butler once told me “Habits don’t change if you use the head alone. You need to engage the heart too.”
In my current position, I’m in two different industries: advertising and technology, which I strongly believe in diversity, but where traditional practices hindered advancement. As Google’s CMO I am aware that it is my job to change this.
This year, I wrote about some of our lessons learned. Since then, we’ve achieved progress, but, as with many other companies, the journey continues.
Use our work on creative projects as an illustration. While reading reviews of our creative work over the past year, I was feeling like I saw more variety in our cast.
There is some truth in this. We have been conducting audits of our work through automated reviews and machine learning for a while. The amount of women who are screened in our ads has increased to 48 percent this year. The average age of those who appear in our advertisements is now more representative of the overall population. In addition, 23% of viewers featured in the ads we run in U.S. ads are Black.
But I didn’t get the entire picture. It turned out that we were casting mostly individuals with lighter complexions as well as an over-saturated number of interfaith couples. In addition, when we were casting different complexions, we typically were casting them in stereotyped roles. Three out of three depictions of Black individuals were restricted to music, dancing, or sports.
There’s more to a person’s face. Identity isn’t simple. Diversity exists within diversity.
I realized that we’d been looking at diversity from just the broadest of terms females, LGBTQ, Black, Latino. But there’s more than an individual’s face. Identity isn’t simple. Diversity is a part of diversity.
To correct this problem, we must change the way we live our lives. How do we accomplish this in a way that is scaled? What can we do to alter the ways we conduct our agencies and teams? There is still a lot to master. However, here are nine practical tips we’ve discovered to be helpful:
1. Ensure everyone feels responsible
We depend on females and other people of color to highlight challenges in the workplace that are a result of diversity. The responsibility doesn’t lie solely with them. Our Diversity Core Team is comprised of senior executives, regardless of whether they’re of one race or gender, or sexual preference. We’ve given everyone the obligation to correct their own personal prejudices.
2. Join agencies that are committed to your needs.
The majority of our work is created with our partners from our agency. Therefore, it is crucial that we partner with agencies that are for the inclusion of all people. We’ve put together a list of organizations that excel at this. We recently contacted our top 70 partner agencies asking them to disclose the percentage of representation they have. We, along with my team have sat together with their CEOs for a discussion about their diversity strategies and to learn from each other.
3. Use real people in our work
One of the most effective methods to stay clear of stereotypes is to make use of real footage and found footage. This is what we’ve been doing. Black Girl Magic Black Girl MagicA campaign we ran to mark International Women’s Day featuring real Black women who have left their mark on history has been one of my favorite examples.
4. Consider all aspects of casting
Relatability and empathy in the creative field are a result of paying focus on the finer details such as who’s speaking and the person who holds or is using the product. We’re now employing more diverse editors, directors, producers, and others in front of the cameras. For instance, the multicultural agency Cashmere was awe-inspiring. Cashmere was phenomenal when it came to creating an amazing Childish Gambino Playmoji creative for Pixel 3.
5. Take a holistic approach to media and creativity.
In the past year, we conducted a Chromebook campaign that included an integrated TV media strategy and a specific imaginative that was specifically designed for a Latino audience. We observed 1.5X more consideration lift for Latino audience members compared to the general public. We are currently forming an organization to ensure that there is a multi-cultural media strategy for each campaign.
6. Work with other people to assess the progress made
We’re building upon prior collaborations together with Geena Davis, her institute for research in order to determine the gender representation of advertisements on YouTube with machine learning. We’re also collaborating with the U.S.-based Association of National Advertisers’ #SeeHer initiative to increase the scale of our technology to assist companies measure representation and implicit biases in their advertisements.
7. Take a look beyond our bubble
As a tech-focused company trying to recruit diverse talent, there’s only the amount of work we can accomplish within our local Bay Area. One of our first areas has been to broaden our recruitment area. We’re currently developing a pipeline of active candidates in cities such as New York and Los Angeles.
8. Include it as a daily practice for your team
External experts, such as GLAAD and ADCOLOR have helped us create training for our staff. In addition, we recently launched internal campaigns, which include posters that are on display throughout our offices. Transparency and accountability are also helpful. We share biweekly updates on our team’s representation figures with managers.
9. Don’t forget about the heart
We’ve discovered that everything starts and ends with the managers. With Reggie Butler’s guidance, we got the heart involved with an innovative training program that assists managers to improve their behavior by demonstrating their commitment to inclusion in addition to the business motives. It’s known as Examined Human.
Google creates products for every person. We believe that everyone should be able to feel included in our work. This can be achieved through the right routines. There is a lot we can learn from the leaders in this area. We are enthusiastic and determined to do the work needed to get there.
