Advertising Techniques
Have a look at the range of adverts below. What techniques can you spot being used in them in order to sell the products on offer? Could there be more than one technique at work in some of them?
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Compare The Market
Halifax - Lucky You
Plenty - Juan Sheet and the Juicy Lady
The Dogs Trust
Remember The Techniques?Can you remember what these techniques are?
If you can not remember what some of these mean then take a look at this definition sheet.
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The Aims of Advertising
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Creating NeedsAll advertising is designed to fulfil certain aims. The pyramid opposite demonstrates the basic aims of advertising. The further up the pyramid you go the more powerful and effective the advert is. However, this more powerful effect would probably only effect a small number of the audience whereas the whole of the audience would be reached in terms of providing information or making the audience aware.
In order to sell their products advertisers create FALSE NEEDS by making us think that we need the products tat they are trying to sell. Download your own copy of the Aims Of Advertising Pyramid below.
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Maslow's Hierarchy Of NeedsMaslow studied how people accumulated wealth and studied what people in society chose to spend their money on. He developed a system of needs, each one a step up from the last, that people in society seek to meet - even through the things that they buy.
The idea is that an individual will always seek to satisfy their core needs first - the ones at the bottom of the pyramid - and then would work towards Self-actualisation and beyond. The theory is manipulated by advertising by making a product seem to fulfil one of these needs when it is advertised therefore making the audience desire it in order to satisfy that need. |
Talking About Audiences
When discussing who a text is for, or how it might effect different groups of people that might consume the text, we use various different categories and terminology. Below are details of the three main ways of categorising the audience for a text.
Demographics
In order to understand their audience and target them effectively the media tends to group them together according to certain societal markers such as:
One of the aspects that Demographers use is the socio-economic scale which takes into account a person's job both in terms of financial position and social standing. |
Socio-economic Scale A- Higher managerial, administrative, professional e.g. Chief executive, senior civil servant, surgeon. B - Intermediate managerial, administrative, professional e.g. bank manager, teacher. C1- Supervisory, clerical, junior managerial e.g. shop floor supervisor, bank clerk, sales person. C2 - Skilled manual workers e.g. electrician, carpenter. D- Semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers e.g. assembly line worker, refuse collector, messenger. E - Casual labourers, pensioners, unemployed e.g. pensoiners without private pensions and anyone living on basic benefits. |
Rubicam and Young's 4C's (Cross Cultural Consumer Groupings)
Rubicam and Young are an advertising agency which decided that they could target audiences through their beliefs rather than the more traditional ways of segmenting an audience.
The benefit of this system is that it centres around motivation and so can be used to target audiences across different areas of society. The system is known as the 4 C's - Cross Cultural Consumer Categories. For a larger image of the categories and a definition of each of them click on the image to the left. |
Lifestyle Segmentation
As well as social groupings audiences have also been segmented according to their lifestyle. When done effectively this can reveal more about the situation that the audience may find themselves in and could be a better basis for assumptions about core values and habits.
The list opposite outlines some lifestyle groupings but these are constantly changing as societal shifts cause people to live their lives in slightly different ways. For a larger image of the categories and a definition of each of them click on the image to the right. |
Putting It All Together
Analysing an Advert How does the advert seek to persuade an audience to buy the product advertised?
This looks like quite a big question but you have everything that you need to answer it. Follow the simple steps below and you will have your first piece of media analysis written before you know it! STEP 1 What would you identify as the audience in terms of DEMOGRAPHICS? (Age, gender, Socio-economic Scale, etc) Why? Where is the evidence in the advert? STEP 2 What categories from RUBICAM & YOUNG'S 4'Cs would be attracted to this advert? (Look at the information on this page or in your book to help). Why? Where is the evidence from the advert? STEP 3 What needs are being created here? (Use MASLOW'S HIERARCHY OF NEEDS). Why? Where is the evidence from the advert? STEP 4 What TECHNIQUES are being used and how effective do you think they would be at selling the product to the TARGET AUDIENCE that you have identified? Where is the evidence in the advert? Now all you need to do is follow the structure to the left here for each point that you want to make and remember to reference details from the advert itself. You should also try to use as much media language as possible. |