Stereotyping in Advertising

In a world where advertising and controversy go hand in hand, and the industry is fueled by a hunger for profit despite the human consequences. It is inevitable to find cases of stereotyping in specific advertisements. The shocking thing is, most of these cases are unintended. It is intriguing to see that there are a large number of people who are unaware as to the effect, certain words, appearances, or phrases can have on a particular individual or social group. But are the stereotypes necessary? do they add some incentive for people to buy products? the simple answer in no, but yet again there never is a simple answer. This modern society is a kingdom in which media is King. From the very day that we are introduced to the world to the day we depart from it, ideologies, opinions, ideas and much more is embedded within us and is fed to us via media. The world of media sets itself up for success breeding us to believe whatever is said to us and forming stereotypes within us. Knowing this, advertisers use this information to produce an advertisement that pulls all the right strings within us. When viewing an advertisement, we almost view it subconsciously rather than analyze it in detail, picking up on what appeals to us the most. The smallest of decisions such as choosing a tall man instead of a short one, a man instead of a woman, or a white man as opposed to a black man, can cause certain emotions within us that usually serve the purpose of persuading us to consume a product. By no means does this make it justifiable, in fact, it is near abhorring the way stereotyping can be used to manipulate us, and the way people overlook it. 

Just recently I saw an Ad made by the popular rapper and film-maker "Tyler the Creator" for mountain Dew. I realized that some of the ideas he put into the video, and some of the scenes could be seen as offensive to women and to the African American community. However, upon first seeing the video I saw many faces around me that saw nothing wrong with it. To be completely honest, I also would have been at a loss on how this would be offensive except that I anticipating it. I speculated that this may be because I do not associate with either one of the two races that the offense would have been received from. This provoked my understanding of how it was entirely possible for advertisers to make such mistakes without completely recognizing them. 

But this is no excuse for the harm and offense that they may direct towards people. In fact, I believe that it should be a moral responsibility for advertisers and people in a mass media to avoid stereotypes, racism, and other offenses. 

Nivea Ad Analysis

Audience and purpose

The Ad targets young to middle aged women. since the product is a moisturizer the target audience can be narrowed down to women with dry skin. This can be observed from the focus of the image which is a woman with bright glowing skin – this can be assumed to be from the moisturizer. The main aim of the Advertisement is to sell the product offered by Nivea. This involves persuading the viewers to buy it by making choices in the visual language, style and other persuasive techniques.

Content

In the Advertisement a man and a women can be seen in close proximity to each other. The woman is the focus of the image and has her mostly bare back facing the viewer. The man is overshadowed by the presence of the woman and is cropped off in the side of the image with very little of him showing. The background is plain utilizing neutral colors, allowing the two people to be emphasized. Very little writing in included. A slogan in the center in large white letters states “For visibly smooth and touchably soft skin”. At the bottom it says that the product “repairs dryness for 24 hours in addition to smoothness. At the very top next to the Nivea logo it says “100 years skincare for life”. The main idea of the Ad is that if you use moisturizer your skin will glow and men will be attracted to you. This is especially highlighted by the woman’s awareness of the camera and viewers. Since the viewers are mostly going to be women, its as if she is looking towards the women to show them that the product works.

Tone and Mood

The mood produced by this advertisement is mainly achieved through the use of color, pose and perspective. The overall intimate yet bright mood is caused by the lighting that is natural, yet focused on the beauty of the subject. The close proximity of the man and the woman to each other further emphasizes this intimate mood especially with the poses of each of them. The arms are wrapped tightly around each other, however with the woman looking backwards and smiling, this introduces a slight playfulness and control to the scene.

Style Structure 

Post Pitch Reflection

Today I was asked - along with Cassius and Dakota - to deliver a pitch asking for funds in order to distribute emergency shelters. 

The main appeals we decided to use were the need to nurture, the need to feel safe and the need to feel prominence. We decided to incorporate these appeals into our advertisement, as we wanted to make an emotional connection with potential donators and the people that are suffering. We decided that the best way to do this is to play on the maternal and paternal instincts of the people and try and communicate the feeling of being lost and having no home in order to touch on their need to feel safe and to understand how the people in conflict zones might feel. Finally, we also decided to include some aspect of prominence into the Ad in order to help people feel good about themselves and make them feel a connection between themselves and a celebrity such as Leonardo DiCaprio - as will be further explained. 

Of course using human appeals was not enough, so we also took it upon ourselves to include specific persuasive techniques. The first of which was the idea of having a celebrity be in the advertisement and personally talk about their experiences with refugees and their own donations. Leonardo DiCaprio was chosen as he is a very popular celebrity with a large fan base following and is also a UN Messenger of Peace. The introduction of a celebrity was also meant to serve the purpose of starting a bandwagon effect with many people talking about the Ad and donating and advocating for others to also donate. Next, we also wanted to use intensity and dysphemism as we wanted strong words that would hit home and communicate the message of the advertisement with the greatest impact. Another persuasive technique is the use of scientific backing. After using the above techniques, people will want to help the people in conflict zones in any way possible. However, they still might not be sold on the idea of the shelters being built by the company. In this case, a brief yet logical explanation of the product with scientific proof on how it functions and the extent of which this will help the people is the best way to go to ensure that we get as many people as we can donating money and raising awareness.

The audience and context also played a major role in the development of this Ad campaign. Since the Ad will be targeted towards the general public - within the age of possessing a credit card  - this impacted our decisions on the appeals we would use. For example, if this Ad was targeted towards the red cross or another charity or not - for - profit organization, they would have already been aware of the issues being faced by refugees and all they need is to be convinced of the logical reasons for buying this product. The Ad is also set in a global context, so the messages have to be mutually understood by a vast majority of people. so instead of translating the words and the speech in the Ad, we thought it would be more powerful to limit the words and speech, and instead have a video that shows the people the truth. This includes videos of destruction, crying children, distraught faces, destroyed families and so on. 

The images used in the pitch were simply to help convey the message of what we were attempting to communicate. The emotional image of the two children alone was to show the company exactly how effective an image can be in introducing the appeals of the need to nurture and the need to feel safe. It also shows them how emotion can deeply impact a person's decision-making process and the ease of persuasion. The next image was an image of Leonardo DiCaprio in formal attire speaking before the entire united nations placing him in a position of honor and showing him as a role model. This was to further communicate his importance in the Ad. Finally, the last image was the actual product itself with a visual representation of how the product works to show how we might portray its functionality in the Ad. 

Finally, when looking back at the way I felt during the pitch and after watching the video. It was very obvious that I was not prepared. My confidence was not bad, however, my biggest issue was remembering to include all the important information. I had forgotten to talk about most of the main points and lost my rhythm of speech. As for my stage presence, I believe that my movements were not too minimal or too excessive, I just need to know what to do with my hands. After watching the video I realized that I was crossing my arms, or playing with my button or my shirt. I feel as though my overall pitch did not communicate my ideas to a great enough extent and that I should work towards improving this. 

Colgate Total - Ad Analysis

In our latest English class, we talked about Aristotle's Rhetoric and Ethos, Pathos and Logos which are included in the elements of persuasive language. Ethos is credibility and trust, Pathos is emotion and Logos is logic or proof.

I decided to relate what I learned in class to the real world and find out to what extent Ethos, Pathos, and Logos are used in our lives. The most effective way to do so would be to analyze a persuasive commercial. The commercial that I chose was the Colgate Total Tv Advertisement as I believe it embodies all of the three components.

Colgate Total Ad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ULR68LTmbw#t=33.476513

First of all, I wanted to identify the audience targeted by the commercial. Since this commercial is more scientific based and logical, not creative and fun. I believe that it is targeted towards adults that could already be suffering from dental issues. This can also be extracted from the language used such as a reduction in plaque and gingivitis anticipating that the person is already affected by plaque and gingivitis. The language used is also advanced and subject specific which further supports the claim that the commercial is for adults that understand these terms. The people they choose to interview about their review on the product are also in a similar age group which is the mid-thirties to forties indicating that these are the people that should use their product. This age is also the age when tooth deterioration can become witnessed and is the age were cosmetic care is still highly valued, unlike when a person gets older and is not as concerned with how they look.

This commercial also does a great job utilizing Ethos effectively as can be seen throughout the video. Not only does the Ad use dentist recommendation and promotion, it also has short stories that back up the company claims, from users of the product about how the product has impacted their lives and helped them with their oral hygiene. Having a dentist or any medical specialist recommend the product is also very reassuring to people as they have always been viewed as credible sources as they are experts in their field.

Logos is also used in this commercial as statistics were used to back up what the dentist was saying about the product. The video also goes into as much detail as possible to explain how the product works so it seems more believable to people. Knowing how a product works to achieve what you want is always a good way to lure customers. The statistics also can be used by people as proof in order to tell themselves that this is a product that is worth the price and should be bought. the balance of Ethos and Logos is what makes the company creating the product seem like they now what they are talking about in order to sell the product.

Of course, Ethos and Logos alone are not enough to captivate the viewers of the commercial, so this advertisement also used the emotional component of Pathos. Although it uses was not as obvious and was more discreet, it was more effective in allowing the viewers to lean towards it. This was evident in the part of the video where the two women talk about their experiences with the product. First, they talk about problems they had which makes you feel pity towards them, or feel a connection with them if you have the same issue. Then they talk about how their issue was solved through the use of this product which immediately makes you feel happy for them but also the human sense of good guy bad guy kicks in and you view the company as a "good guy" beating the plaque or the "bad guy".

As you can see, just a simple TV commercial can utilize elements of persuasive language to effectively sell a product, why don't you have a look at other examples and explore language in your daily lives.