Creative Agency: AOL Media Networks/ Spectracom
Technology Vendor: AOL; IC Group
Girlspace.com is a lifestyle Web site for teen girls, produced by Kotex (a Kimberly-Clarke company). The site provides girls a place to explore and express themselves, learn more about the things that matter to them – boys, school, health, menstruation, to name a few.
The Girlspace.com Virtual Model program was created as a new activity within the Girlspace.com games section. It was created to engage teen girls, give them a format for self-expression and increase registration to the Girlspace.com. website.
The creative elements used to create the Virtual Model tool were customized for Girlspace.com, to match the main site’s look and feel while standing out just enough to draw attention. The level of customization reflects the diversity of the Girlspace.com user, and offers a wide range of self-expression. Because the site strives to give teenage girls a place to express themselves, the design was highly effective.
-- AOL Media Networks
Companies have been driven to become more creative and interactive in targeting their audiences. There is nothing that is more gratifying than to be able to produce your own look, style, and identity as a pre-teen and teenager. Girlspace.com is the answer. It is a great way to keep the young minds captivated for an extended period of time while getting used to the idea and the fun of going through puberty. It is a tough time for girls, but anything that gives a reason to laugh at an almost seemingly life threatening time like puberty is well respected. Including a chat group would be a great way to talk to other girls like, yourself, that are going through the same changes you are, which can be crucial at that time.
Although, Girlspace.com introduces an interesting concept, technology continues to move forward making this site less novel. It takes much more to keep young children interested and captivated in sites like these unless it offers something new, cool, and innovative. Many of today’s youth know much more about computers than our nation’s professionals. I found that as a viewer on the site that I was very interested in the concept, but did not feel that I was receiving the gratification that I was looking for as I clicked on the different options, even thinking as a pre-pubescent. Maybe archiving pictures of different celebrities with different skin tones, styles, features and looks would be a great final result to show to the visitors on the site as they try and build different looks. It offers a modern look that they can relate to in modern times. This gives celebrities promotion and offers the site more validity. It just makes sense.
I am very attracted to Girlspace.com because of its great design idea offered to its target audience. Being that Kotex is a need-based product, making that product sexy and hot, will get the girls talking. It’s that concept fused with word-of-mouth that will take Kotex to the next level. Even a product that is not glamorous, like tampons and pads, can become that “product that you have to go buy” even next to its competitors. Excelling to that level sets one company apart from the next. Creating marketing concepts that attract all ages is a perfect product design. Women of all ages use Kotex and the demo 18-34 has the most purchasing power while also having access to a computer while they are at work, so why not target them too? Kotex has a great product design, but I look forward to seeing how they re-evaluate their market and re-approach their market. We all are the eyes of the beholder…
-- Rochelle Webb, Vice President of Marketing, Classic Entertainment, LLC
Clearly, there’s something oddly compelling and gratifying about molding digital characters in one’s own image. Whether I’m re-creating my college house in The Sims or building a video game doppelganger (with bigger biceps) in Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, being master of an idealized, pixelated domain doesn’t ever get old. And it’s not just me, really – when the sequel to The Sims sells a million copies in its first 10 days, we’re looking at a minor social phenomenon here.
Combine this fascination with a 13-year-old girl’s natural affinity to playing dress-up, and you get Girlspace.com’s Virtual Model. Using what’s basically a digital version of a paper doll, preteen and teen girls can create a passable likeness of themselves in cartoon form, and then pass it along to a friend via the viral e-cards. Although users are limited in the degree to which they can “express themselves” through the limited selection of canned quotes to add to the card, it’s still a clever way to build site registration and get an implied endorsement for the brand from the audience’s peers.
Design is bubbly and cheery, and the virtual models are welcoming and inoffensive, not unlike the tone pervading the entire Girlspace.com site. It’s pretty easy to forget that you’re actually browsing a tampon manufacturer’s website – in fact, while the Girlspace.com branding looms large on the entry page, Kotex’s primary branding takes a very distant second place. If the Virtual Model game’s just one part of a larger strategy to position their products as an accessible, natural and non-intimidating choice for those customers just coming of age, giving users this sort of personalizable, minimally-branded experience with a “human” face is a pretty good start.
-- Jay Stakelon, Art Director, Slanted Studio