In many categories in which brands operate today, committee-based insight-generation workshops, a desire to maintain the status quo and the use of confidence-bolstering 'normative driving' conservative research practices lead to a communications 'pinhead disco' - one where lots of brands dance in similar ways, on the same part of the dancefloor, around the same handbag.
Around the handbag today it's the haircare category, where any idea of dancing in a different way is rejected by most brands. The comfort blanket of hair-porn, the 'swish', the 'emotional cleansing' of hair-washing and the 'physical nourishment' of conditioning manifest themselves, in the case of Herbal Essences, in an overt homage to soft porn.
In this ad the hair model twirls underwater as she 'deeply nourishes' her hair with the new conditioner - underwater being a metaphor for the cleaning experience, I suppose. Meanwhile, a sexy voiceover informs us that coconuts and Hawaiian hibiscus extracts are used to enable 'deep nourishment and shine'. A light orgasm soundtrack builds and we see a conditioner bottle metaphorically ejaculate, also underwater. To conclude, the model emerges from the sea with dry hair - a bit of a continuity problem, but I don't want to be pedantic. I'm no psychologist, but I think I can see what they are trying to do.
Hair is fundamentally linked to attractiveness, and is, in psychological terms, a transitional object that can provide confidence and safety, sexuality and control (or the opposite on a 'bad hair day'). But this 'underpin your sexuality and enjoy an invigorating conditioner' is strategy on your sleeve. The sexual overtones are seriously intentioned and not even ironic, in the way the brand's previous 'public orgasm' executions were. It is an anachronistic take on women and what a conditioner can do for them.
You can almost see Don Draper of Mad Men fame presenting the script - but maybe in the 50s the disco was less crowded.