How many times have we heard the expression “Sex Sells” and associated this with the display of attractive women in television and media overall. It doesn’t matter in which industry we look at the car racing competition, boxing matches, rap videos or American football half-time shows it seems as if the women in the media are subject to a specific group of viewers - men. However, what we as marketers should know is that it’s also crucial for us to be aware of how women are depicted in mainstream media. There is a theory called the male gaze, which deals with this depiction of women from a heterosexual male viewpoint. Or in other words: to sell “sex” to the male viewer.
What is the male gaze?
The male gaze in short is the idea that women in media are reduced to what the male director thinks what the audience wants to see. This is further intensified by men in front of the camera who select for certain scenes, shots and angles, for the men who would possibly buy or watch whatever is presented to them. The male gaze is a concept in feminist theory to describe how male dominated domains such as cinema for example always represented women in movies for their appearance rather than the role itself. A classical example is Megan Fox in Transformers. In the movie she plays the hot, popular highschool girl who later falls in love with the protagonist who is more at the bottom of the hierarchy in highschool. The movie has several scenes in which the male gaze becomes quite obvious such for example when Megan Fox repairs a car. Movements such as the feminists movement, body positivity and many more try to combat the male didacted narrative and emancipate female characters in movies as well as creating more diversity in female representation in media.
What about the female gaze
Although less common but growing in recent years, the female gaze is the solution to the often neglected female perspective on things in media. Hence, the focus lies on the female spectator from a female point of view. Similar to the male gaze the female gaze can look at men and women differently. For example, in Magic Mike the male protagonist is viewed from the female perspective. For those who didn’t watch the movie it is about a male stripper fulfilling the desires of women in the movie as well as in the viewers mind. Whereas in Suicide Squad the female protagonist Harley Quinn is solely viewed from a female point-of-view as supposed to Transformers, in which Megan Fox is clearly viewed from a male point-of-view. The difference here is that in Suicide Squad Harley Quinn is her own character emancipated, strong and free of any societal expectations from men, whereas Megan Fox in Transformers fulfills the “Cool Hot Girl” trope, which is a popular trope for men in general. Compared to Harley Quinn in Suicide Squad, James Bond represents the ultimate alpha male but from the male perspective.
Why is this important in marketing
How all of this affects marketing can be seen in its most essential aspect - to get the attention. Sex sells works because sex is one of the fastest ways to get attention because of our basic need for reproduction. However, since traditionally men held most of the power of society and things are slowly getting more equal and more diverse within the consumer market. The customer isn’t as homogenous as they to be and therefore, for us as marketers, knowing who our target market/group is becomes more important day by day. Moreover, a help for that might be concept of the ideal customer avatar. The ideal customer avatar is basically a client profile consisting of demographic, geographic and psychographic details. Especially, the psychographic category is continuously subject to change.
What can we learn from this?
As marketers we should always ask ourselves who we market to as well as how we want our message to come across. Having insights into people wants, needs, beliefs, opinions etc. might drastically change the outcome of a campaign. Furthermore, being aware of the male gaze or female gaze can help us adapt to the rapid societal changes which leads into more diverse consumer markets. Therefore, having an ideal customer in mind will be of much help.