Steve Rainwater Essays - Marketing, Advertising,

Steve Rainwater 10-19-98 Mrs. Maynard English 1A The Advertisement "Wear it and be Happy," What is behind the words of advertisement? Besides how many different ads tell us the same thing, "buy, buy, buy." It seems like today, that all ads are summing up, that if you use their product, then your life will be better. Ads are supposed to attract the reader's eyes, just like this advertisement caught my eye with the quote. In the Clinique "Happy" ad, their quote is "wear it and be happy," but how can a perfume make you happy. Sure it may smell good and get you a compliment or two, but it is not going to make your life any easier or take away any of that non-wanted stress. So what is in an advertisement? This advertisement is trying to sell a product to a perfume buyer. At the same time, it's telling you something that it is completely incapable of doing, which is making you happy. It is working and this is what an advertisement is supposed do, sell. This advertisement, as I said in the paragraph above, caught my attention with their quote. The quote is about being happy and forces you to glance at the picture on the ad verse the bottle that they are trying to sell, which will probably be a one hundred-pound, beautiful model who is happy because she has everything that is out of the usual. On this advertisement they have this beautiful model with a big beautiful smile being kissed by this handsome man. It implies that if you wear this perfume then you will be just as happy as this woman on the cover does and possibly have good looking guys just like her. Well this is why I find advertisements somewhat ridiculous. When young girls look through these magazines and see these ads, it begins to influence them for what they are supposed to look like and be like. As these girls grow up, they will become more and more depressed because they won't have those size zero waists, those big fake breasts, or that perfect complexion. Instead the y will be bulimic, or possibly anorexic just so they can look and feel like these models do. What is an advertisement? Is it a picture of the product by itself in a single colored back round? Or could it be a picture of the product in use? Well the majority of advertisements today are not of the advertisement itself. It is normally of models and or roll models in a picture with the product showing that they use it, so it would be "cool" for you to also. Here is a product that must do something or else people won't buy it. For instance, this ad is of perfume and it does something, it smells. So to spice up the ad, they through in a girl being kissed by a guy who seems to be in glee. The product is not in the picture but it is on the side of the page next to the name. The girl just bought this perfume and because it smells good, she's happy and is falling in love. I believe this is what the advertiser wants people to think when buying his product, and why blame him, he's out there just like every other business man for only one reason, to make money. Advertisements can be good and bad in two ways. They can show the product off without being stereotypical, or they can show the perfect model doing something in the ad without really advertising it. This advertisement in particular gets me thinking to where really you don't need a model. If a product, such as perfume, is going to sell, it's going to sell due to it's reputation of having a good smell and not what kind of models you have advertising it. In conclusion, I choose this ad because I feel that there isn't a perfume on the market that can change a person's personality. If someone is going to be happy, then it's going to be because something or someone makes them happy by an act of kindness and not a smell.