Vintage Beauty

This vintage beauty advertisement is advertising a hair product. But would this shampoo really give you the "most beautiful hair in the world"? Advertisements like this make me very skeptical of advertising in general. There is no way to truly know whether this would give someone the most beautiful hair in the world. 

The advertisement also states that "4 our of 5 top hollywood stars" use the product. These "hollywood stars" are supposedly people we admire, and this is supposed to want to use the product because these admired people also use it. This shows ethos, because it establishes a common ground or common liking in the audience.

These two statements have no way of being proved true, and are also  very unlikely. These broad statements could also have different meanings to different people. The most "beautiful hair in the world" could be interpreted in different ways. For example,one person may think curly hair is the most beautiful, while another may think straight is the most beautiful. Either way, there is still no way to prove either one of these statements in the advertisements.

Guinness Commercial - "Made of More"

To me, Guinness commercials have a reputation of being very creative, but don't have a lot to do with the actual product. Although the commercial may be very entertaining, the feelings created in the advertisement are used to connect them to the product brand at the end of the commercial.

The cloud in this commercial is at first an "ordinary cloud" and it shows his journey through the city, becoming experienced and helpful. The personification of the cloud makes it easier for the audience to connect to the cloud. Since the cloud is not only a cloud, he is "made of more" it shows how the cloud has "feelings" and can change because of experiences. When at the end of the advertisement, it says guinness is also "made of more". This suggests that these inanimate objects have life, because they are being personified. 

Personally, i enjoyed this commercial a lot. I like how the cloud is given life and the voice over seemed very calm and relaxed which makes me feel relaxed also. I specifically liked when the cloud was over the stoplight, and was glowing in the colors it changed. I think this visual was very interesting and made me like the commercial more. 

False Advertisements

A lot of the time when things are advertised, especially food, I wonder if what is being advertised is the truth, or if it is just another attempt by a company to get you to buy their product. It seems as if subjects of advertising are always given a boost to make them look better than the reality of the object. Of course this has to be done in order to make consumers more attracted to what is being sold. 

This can be seen in the picture above. Obviously the hamburger on the left is the greatly improved version of what the actual burger at McDonald's is. If the burger on the left was in the advertisements, nobody would want to buy the not-tasty looking burger. The burger on the left is better and tastier looking in general. This would definitely attract customers, even though it may not be the reality of the product. 

A lot of the time I ignore advertisements that give a product a quality boost because it seems that almost all advertisements are fake now. I see so much of what the product is supposed to be like, but never what it actually is. I think that many people are immune to advertising because of this. We are able to filter through the advertisements that seem unrealistic, and aren't affected by them. 

The Reptilian Effect

In the film we recently watched in Critical Thinking class, they talk about the "reptilian effect" in advertising. It is the idea that we make every purchase based on subconscious desires, and we settle those desires on the outside by giving logical reasons to buy a product.

I had this experience over the weekend while buying polaroid film with a couple friends. There were many cons to buying the film, such as the cost and not knowing how the pictures would turn out. There weren't any actual logical reasons I could think of after buying the film besides the fact I find polaroid pictures very interesting. I don't know what my reasons for buying the film were, but on the outside I told myself they would look cool in my bedroom. But what was my subconscious reasoning for this? I don't know. This, I thought, was the reptilian effect on myself, and i experienced it firsthand. 

P&G Commercial Reaching out to Mothers

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ywO8DR-5NY

This commercial for P&G (Procter and Gamble) uses pathos to connect to its audience. The group that is targeted in this commercial is mothers. This commercial shows the influence moms have on their children, and uses the Olympics to show the success of children when moms are present in their child's life. This shows strong emotion and connection between mother and child in the commercial, connecting with mothers in the audience. This will connect to  mothers in the audience through their connection with their child. They will be able to see a commercial perspective on their influence in their child's life. 

This commercial is especially helpful reaching out to moms because of the diversity showed in the commercial. This doesn't only reach out to one group of mothers, but all mothers. There are moms from around the world in this commercial, which would connect with moms from many places around the world. 

Reification is used to make this commercial very powerful. The mother-child connection doesn't have anything to do with P&G, a company that produces cleaning products. The emotions generated in the beginning of the commercial are good feelings for the audience because it shows mothers how valuable they are to children, and to their children's success. At the end of the commercial when P&G is connected to the beginning, those emotions that were generated are associated with P&G, making P&G seem like a good thing. This would make people buy their products because good feelings were associated with P&G.