The Meanings And Perceptions That Viewers Take From Television Commercials

Television advertisements have been a part of pop culture for years, these quick minute long clips gain the popularity of its viewers through humor, shock, or simply good salesmanship. The ShamWow infomercial has become one the most well known television ads in America. Its popularity came from its snappy dialogue, believable offer, and enthusiastic spokesman. But what made this infomercial so successful? Today I will be analyzing how the ineffective use of the appeals of ethos and kairos, and the highly effective appeal of logos and pathos effect the audience in the ShamWow commercial.

Magazines are popular in the United States; they can be found in stores, offices, and houses. They are popular for advertising. Television, news, radio, billboards and online websites are just a few forms of media that companies use to advertise their products or services. Companies use advertisements to influence the consumer to either buy or use their products and services. Advertisements are used to manipulate consumers in many ways.

What does an ad say about a society? When viewing a product advertisement, many people never stop to think why the ad and product appeals to them. However, when a more critical look is taken, it’s easy to see precisely how ads are carefully tailored to appeal to trending values of a targeted demographic, and how that makes it easy to examine the society of those whom the ad is targeted at. In the analytic writing Advertisements R Us, Melissa Rubin provides an excellent example of this, as she crafts a logical and clear analysis of a 1950’s Coca-Cola magazine ad which thoroughly explains how advertisements can reveal quite a great deal about the society in which they were created.

Commercials, such as the 2012 Chevy Silverado Super Bowl commercial, have become part of people’s everyday life, constantly shocking, exciting, and engaging people with the meaning behind them. People see commercials every time they turn on the TV and file the information away for later situations, such as information about a cell phone data plan or a new vehicle just announced available. Each commercial watched promotes some sort of cause, object, or idea that companies want to sell to the common person. Commercials use symbolism, imagination, ethics, logic, and emotion to sell these things using their promoting techniques, one strong example of these things in action being the 2012 Chevy Silverado Super Bowl commercial.

The main purpose of commercials and advertisements is to persuade the viewer to purchase the product that is advertised, but not all commercials are successful in this endeavor. Companies, such as Budweiser and Kleenex, appeal to the viewers’ ethos, logos, and pathos in order to influence them to buy the advertised product(s). In order to appeal to each of the categories, companies use different tactics to catch viewers’ attention. The use of ethos, logos, and pathos can make or break an advertisement based on how it is being used.

The commercial’s appeal to women relies not only on the attractiveness of the actor and the settings, but to the humor that is based on the idea that such a perfect man can exist at all. Conversely, not only do these commercials reach out to women, but also there are men in the target audience and there is a message for them as well. These ads present an ideal image of how a man should be and what he should smell like. By using a good looking, fit, man for this advertisement, it gives the product an image that men want. The logical fallacy, ad populum, is present in this commercial. This ad almost shouts out the ideas that if you use the product you can look, smell, and be exactly like the man you see on your television. The Old Spice man, Mustafa, does everything better than you do and will give your woman more than you can give her. You can smell like the “ultimate man”, or as the slogan used in the ads says, “Smell like a man”. The ad

In Robert Scholes essay, “On Reading a Video Text” Scholes asserts that modern visual media or “video texts” provide a powerful vehicle for “cultural literacy.” By making use of “visual fascination” in mass media and in particular, commercials, these “video texts” use this part to bring viewers out of boredom and pique their interest. Following this, “narrativity” comes into play not only giving viewers the story but providing them with the ignition for their on context using their own cultural knowledge and experience on the commercial. The final step in the process is the ideological confirmation that is “cultural reinforcement,” the securing of one’s place in a body or group. With “video texts” more widely seen than traditional forms of

The world wide media uses Ethos in commercials and ads by showing ads that play on the emotion of the reader.Examples of these types of ads are the “Quit smoking” advertisements because they show the effects of a long time smoker and the reason the may have died in the future.There Are Many examples of this on tv because almost everyone in the world has a tv and watches it all ofthe time. The last example of how media ties into emotion is the commercial of the animal rescue advertisement where they tell you that a lot of animals die in kennels from abuse every day and that you need to send money to help them rescue the abused animals from bad homes.

It is interpreted in different ways depending on your style of life and how you react to the angle of the advertisement. Entrepreneurs will find this extremely helpful, it gives them information on how GoDaddy operates and the prosperity they provide to flourish their thriving businesses. It is a first look on what the company strives to help you with and how they will enhance the level and value of your website. It gives them a sneak peak to the world of service they have to offer and insight advice to take the guidance they provide. But, this ad is also objectifying women as well as portraying stereotypes which limits their flexibility as people as well as distinguishes them by how they appear. The way this commercial represents women is inappropriate, they reduce us to instruments, there for just the sexual appeal and to provide a toy for men. It offends me as well as the rest of the female population. This commercial in a way illustrates us to make us look like we are only have the capacity to be beautiful and flawless constantly. We are incapable of being smart, funny, kind or sporty because we are always there to just brandish our looks. This commercial is the opposite of feminism, instead of supporting our abilities and the positive impacts we create this ad brings us down to point we are just objects of enticement and used for little else. It fails to appreciate our worth and influence. Also, this advertisement shows off intelligent people as short, chubby, unattractive, geeky people. This is a stereotype that is commun. But, unfortunately it limits these people who are represented. It concludes that these people are only smart and nothing else, that’s what they are there

In conclusion, the ads overall message is that if you are a well dressed man with alcohol, all you have to do is stand over the most attractive of women and she will be instantly attracted. This message clearly shows the stereotype of women being dominated by men while being seduced at the same time, which is a common stereotype that has been used

The commercial starts with a woman swimming with a shark next to her. The on-duty life guard spots the event, pluges into the ocean, preventing the woman from the brutal attack, giving the notion that a woman must depend on a man to rescue her. This portrays the female gender as weaker than men, and the man is somewhat expected to rescue the defenseless woman. Immediately after that incident, the life guard is shown heroically carrying the woman out of the water while she helplessly dangles in his arms. The woman then stares at the lifeguard as if she was going to give him a kiss, which implies to the viewer that women can be won over simply by being brave and rescuing them from a possibly tragic event. Saving a life is a good thing, but should not be advertised in an objective manner for only sex appeal in return. "Some young men actually think Axe body spray will drive women crazy," says writer of "Magazine Trends", April Reese Sorrow. In the concluding scene of the ad, the woman looks focus on an astronaut. Instantly, her attention goes from the lifeguard to the astronaut. As the objectification continues, it is obvious that the woman is attracted more to monetary value, according to the scene when her attention immediately change from a strong handsome life guard to a wealthy

Ethnographic methods can help advertisers by digging deeper into their desired consumer audience to reach a more clear understanding of what, and how the advertiser should communicate their messages. The decisions that consumers make, and how they go about identifying their needs and wants are important factors those advertisers try honing in on. Other methods such as survey that advertisers would use to obtain this information due to the thought process that if you want answers to their questions, let them ask. However, with ethnographic methods advertisers can delve more into the consumers’ world by seeing firsthand for themselves what goes in their lives.

The television commercial was telecasted in November 17, 2008 (11 years ago) through known as banned comedy type commercial. It’s a controversial ad produced by Pepsi co where a kid tried to get drink from vending machine included both Pepsi and coke. He put down 2 cokes under feet and reached the higher button to get Pepsi. At the very beginning this advertisement was telecasted in TV channels but after imposing new advertising law this ad banned.

Different strategies are used in all advertisements. Every aspect of the advertisement is strategically planned to appeal to the audience. For example, an advertisement that does a great job of using sex appeal to reach its audience is “Carl’s Jr all natural burger”. This ad appeared during the super bowl forty-nine, and it was a big hit. The ad features ,22-year-old model buxom, Charlotte McKinney. Throughout the video it shows her walking through the town and appearing as if she is nude. She gets all the attention from the guys in the town as she saunters past. in one scene there’s a man reaching for a tomato as she walks by, she turns around and gives him a flirty look and it emerges as if he is grasping her gluteus. At the end she appears in a bikini nearly nude “I love going all natural,” she purrs, opening wide to take a bite out of a big, juicy, “all natural” hamburger. Advertising appeals aim to influence the way consumers view themselves and how buying certain products can prove to be beneficial for them.

There was a time when advertisement were made only to market and sell the products but now dramatic changes have taken place in this field (Shead and Dobson 01). Today companies not only want to sell their products but also aim to create emotional attachment with the customers for which they do emotional or subliminal advertising.