Recognizing

Common Advertising

Strategies

�What is the brand name or product?

�Who is the target audience?

�What are the significant visual images?

�What catchy words or slogans are being used?

�What needs or desires are being targeted?

�What fears are being suggested?

� Are any stereotypes being presented?

�What advertising techniques are being used?

�What is the underlying message in the ad?

�What is your personal reaction?

Things to consider when

viewing an advertisement:

Advertisers use a variety

of advertising techniques

and strategies to get

consumers to buy their

products.

Emotional Appeals - Needs

NEEDS: Successful advertisements appeal to the

emotional NEEDS of the audience using a promise

that the product being advertised can satisfy

emotional needs such as:

* The need for acceptance/belonging to a group

* The need for security

* The need for change, variety and excitement

* The need to be attractive

* The need for self-acceptance

Advertisers associate their products with luxury,

wealth, fame, beauty, family, fitness, happiness, etc.

There is a suggestion that by using their product

some of these associations will wear off onto the

consumer.

Emotional Appeals - Fears

FEARS: Advertisements also make use of the oldest

persuasion method - FEAR. They suggest that terrible

things can happen to a consumer if you don't use their

product. As consumers, some of our common fears

include:

* Being unattractive

* Being rejected

* Being ridiculed

* Being unsafe/in danger

Look at all the ads for unwanted hair, body odor,

dandruff, or weight. Society has been made to feel that

these things are not acceptable. However, FEAR can

also be used to prevent drinking and driving, drug

taking, etc. FEAR works best if it does not scare too

much.

�Ideal Kids and Family

�Are You Cool Enough?

�Amazing Toys

�Weasel Words

�Put Downs

�Heartstrings

�Cute Celebrities

Common Advertising

Strategies

�Family Fun

�Facts and Figures

�Star Power

�Bandwagon

�Excitement

�Scale

Ideal Kids and Families

� The kids in commercials are often a little older and a little more perfect than the target audience of the ad. They are, in other words, role models for what the advertiser wants children in the target audience to think they want to be like. A commercial that is targeting eight year-olds, for instance, will show 11 or 12 year-old models playing with an eight year old's toy.

� Ideal families are all attractive and pleasant looking—and everyone seems to get along! Ideal kids and families represent the types of people that kids watching the ad would like themselves or their families to be.

EXAMPLE

1

Are You Cool Enough?

�Advertisers try to convince you that if you don’t use their products, then you aren’t good enough. Maybe you won’t be accepted or have the right friends. Maybe you won’t fit in. Sometimes they will show someone uncool trying a product and then suddenly they become hip looking and do cool things. There’s an emphasis on status and “keeping up with the Joneses.”

EXAMPLE

2

Amazing Toys

�Many toy commercials show their toys in life-like fashion, doing incredible things. Airplanes do loop-the-loops and cars do wheelies, dolls cry and spring-loaded missiles hit gorillas dead in the chest. This would be fine if the toys really did these things.

EXAMPLE

3

Weasel Words

�By law, advertisers have to tell the truth, but sometimes, they use words that can mislead viewers. Look for words in commercials like: “Part of . . .”, “The taste of real . . . “, “Natural,” “New, better tasting,” “Because we care.” There are hundreds of these deceptive phrases.

EXAMPLE

4

New &

Improved

Put Downs

�This is when an ad puts down the competition’s product to make its product seem better.

EXAMPLE

5

Heartstrings

�Commercials often create an emotional mood that draws you into the advertisement and makes you feel good. The McDonald's commercials featuring father and daughter eating out together, or the AT&T Reach Out and Touch Someone ads are good examples. We are more attracted by products that make us feel good.

EXAMPLE

6

Cute Celebrities

�Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sell pizza. Spuds McKenzie sells beer. The "Joe Cool" camel sells cigarettes. Tony the Tiger sells cereal, and the Nestle’sQuick Bunny sells chocolate milk. All of these are ways of helping children identify with products either now or for the future.

EXAMPLE

7

Family Fun

�"This is something the whole family can do together!" or "This is something Mom will be glad to buy for you." Many commercials show parents enjoying their children's fun as if the product will bring more family togetherness.

EXAMPLE

8

Facts and Figures

�Advertisers use facts and statistics to enhance a product’s credibility.

EXAMPLE

9

Star Power

�Sports heroes, movie stars, and teenage heartthrobs tell our children what to eat and what to wear. Children listen, not realizing that the star is paid for the endorsement.

EXAMPLE

10

Bandwagon

�Join the crowd! Don’t be left out! Everyone is buying this product— Why aren’t you?

EXAMPLE

11

Excitement

�Watch the expressions on their faces--never a dull moment, never boring. "This toy is the most fun since fried bananas!" the boy seems to say. Or one bit of snack food and you’re surfing in California or soaring on your skateboard.

EXAMPLE

12

Scale

�This is when advertisers make a product look bigger or smaller than it actually is.

EXAMPLE

13

Let’s see if you can recognize some advertising strategies.

�“It must be the

water.”

�“Lingering at the

table since 1899.”

Brand Name or

Product – Pellegrino

Bottled Water

�“The standard 99

cent chicken

sandwich.”

�“Wendy’s new 99

cent all-white meat

crispy chicken

sandwich.”

�“Do what tastes

right.”

�“Take a rejuvenating escape.”

�“Its formula contains a sea mineral essence and has an invigorating scent.”

�“Surprise Yourself.”

�“Walt’s people

invented the idea of an

amusement park

. . . They perfected it.

They still do it best.”

quote by Richard

Corliss, movie critic

for Time magazine

�“Fabulous Hawaiian estates, millions of gamers in exotic cars and bikes. It’s a fast new life-- all at your fingertips.”

�“9 out of 10.” --UK Official Xbox Magazine

�“Indulge a new identity.”

�“Grab life by the horns.”

�“Need we say more?”

�“Guess what everyone wants for Christmas?”

�“…Blockbuster Giftcards are the perfect holiday gift.”

�“Go home happy.”

� “A bowl of Cereal May Help Reduce the Risk of Osteoporosis.”

� “In fact research shows that women who get added calcium from the milk that tops their bowl of cereal get more calcium in their diets than women who don’t.”

�“You’ve come a

long way, baby.”