Ad Analysis Paper Julia Roberts, an actress known for her role in the 1990 film Pretty Woman, was recently featured in the 2011 Lancôme advertisement that has since been banned by Parliament in the United Kingdom for being misleading. The ad, which was intended to promote Lancôme’s Teint Miracle foundation, has gone under extreme scrutiny over the internet for its evident digital alterations. Collages of the advertisement and un-photo shopped pictures of Roberts, as well as articles expressing their distaste with the beauty industry, have all circulated in response to two ads that have recently been produced by L’Oreal, the company who owns both Lancôme and Maybelline. (Poulter, 2011) The ad featuring Julia Roberts is often compared to the other L’Oreal ad banned, which …show more content…
featured supermodel Christy Turlington promoting Maybelline’s new “anti-aging” Eraser foundation.
Both ads were claimed to have been incredibly misleading and not an accurate representation of the ability of the products advertised (Mark Sweney, 2011). For example, in the Lancôme ad featuring Julia Roberts, her skin is digitally enhanced to appear unrealistically smooth and flawless, her face is brightened, and her lips are smoothed out. The picture is brightened, the contrast is adjusted, and Roberts is portrayed as perfect and ideal. According to Lancôme, the Teint Miracle foundation reflects light off skin, creating a “Lit-From-Within” effect. (Lancôme, 2014) Lancôme explains on their website the science behind the “Miracle” foundation: Lancôme science discovers the inner light of perfect skin and recreates it. Pioneer Discovery Light is not only reflected on the surface it is also naturally re-emitted from deep within the skin. This is skin's inner light. At its peak, this surface radiance (1) and inner light (3) constitute skin's aura. When visible light reaches skin, it begins a real journey: • 5% of light is reflected: this is skin's surface radiance
(1) • 95% penetrates skin and interacts with the epidermis and dermis. 55% is absorbed (2) and 40% is re-emitted at the surface (3) this is skin's inner light. Aura-Inside (TM) Technology A Lancôme exclusive which associates: • A new generation of bioptic pigments combined with classic mineral pigments. Together, they reproduce the appearance of inner light of perfect skin, by recreating the intensity and pristine freshness of its radiance. • A unique liquid light essence maximizes skin's surface radiance. Surprisingly, the reflective foundation seemed to hold up to its’ expectations, as reviews on the Lancôme website claim it’s a “Quality Product”, “Flawless”, and “A Must Have” (Lancôme, 2014). It even seems to be well-received among the beauty gurus of YouTube, as stars such as Michelle Phan have named Lancôme’s Teint Miracle foundation their favorite. (saaammage, 2011) On the other end of the spectrum, Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson petitioned to Parliament for a ban on the ad, claiming it were overly edited and falsely advertising the product. Swinson, who has a long-term feud against overly airbrushed pictures, was successful. Due to the excessive alterations, the ad was banned from the United Kingdom and L’Oreal was prohibited from using the ad in future marketing endeavors. (Aisling, 2011) In the Maybelline ad featuring Christy Turlington, her skin is evidently enhanced, and L’Oreal admitted to enhancing her lips, makeup, eyebrows, shadows under the eye, and lightning of the face (Mark Sweney, 2011). Although the ad is tailored towards an audience composed mainly of women seeking beauty by artificially enhancing their outer appearance, ads like these can be detrimental to the female population. With extraordinarily high expectations of beauty, the status of women could easily decline. Exposing these unrealistic standards of beauty to young children and teens will further progress this declination. Because of society’s standards of beauty, companies like L’Oreal continue to produce such drastically altered ads. Until society, or the marketing directors of global beauty companies, changes its mind, advertisements like those of Julia Roberts will continue to appear in the magazines consumers pay for every day in line at the grocery store.
If you are an experienced advertiser than you would now that the number one way to sell a product requires a well-known famous idol in a commercial. Proactiv is a company that sells medicine that is known to kill and prevent any bacterial breakouts. Additionally, Proactiv's commercials are known for featuring well-known celebrities to act as their spokesperson. One celebrity in particular, that was used in the selling of Proactive products was Adam Levine. Known to be the “sexist” person alive, Adam Levine is well known for his music and television show appearances. Using Adam as a spokesperson opens up opportunities to sell their products to not only his fans, but other individuals around the ages of thirteen to sixteen. While this advertisement would be effective to fans of Adam Levine, the overall information that was stated was weak and lacked any logical statements, besides the fact that “millions of people” use the treatment, that could have been used to prove their accusations true.
In a brilliant update of the Killing Us Softly series, Jean Kilbourne explains the dangers of advertisements and how they objectify women. Advertisements intelligently portray women in a sexual and distorted way in order to attract the consumers’ attention. Media sets a standard on how young women view themselves and puts them at risk for developing an eating disorder. Kilbourne’s research has led her to educate those who have fallen victim to achieving the “ideal beauty” that has evolved in today’s society.
I have examined and analyzed the COVERGIRL™ NatureLuxe advertisement that uses common feminine stereotypes. In this advertisement, COVERGIRL™, which runs in Seventeen magazines, targets women through their choices of colors, fonts, and images used. Certain stereotypes are used; such as, those who are more feminine tend to prefer lighter, happier colors, such as pink. Also, the use of a celebrity, who many young women look to as an icon, assists in the advertisement of the COVERGIRL™ product. COVERGIRL™, more than likely, is able to successfully market their lip-gloss product in the United States by using common gender stereotypes to show femininity and how those, mainly women, should be presented in today’s society.
The documentary Killing Us Softly 4 discusses and examines the role of women in advertisements and the effects of the ads throughout history. The film begins by inspecting a variety of old ads. The speaker, Jean Kilbourne, then discusses and dissects each ad describing the messages of the advertisements and the subliminal meanings they evoke. The commercials from the past and now differ in some respects but they still suggest the same messages. These messages include but are not limited to the following: women are sexual objects, physical appearance is everything, and women are naturally inferior then men. Kilbourne discusses that because individuals are surrounded by media and advertisements everywhere they go, that these messages become real attitudes and mindsets in men and women. Women believe they must achieve a level of beauty similar to models they see in magazines and television commercials. On the other hand, men expect real women to have the same characteristics and look as beautiful as the women pictured in ads. However, even though women may diet and exercise, the reality...
Like McClintock wrote in Propaganda Techniques in Today’s Advertising, it is the “most-loved and most-used propaganda techniques.” It is the easiest way to win over customers. They see a celebrity they admire, and they think if they use the product, so should they. In L'oreal's ad for instant tan lotion, the viewer sees the beautifully tanned, clear skinned, long-legged model Karlie Kloss. Her hair blonde, effortless wavy hair paired with an unbuttoned white dress shirt and stiletto heels is the L’oreals definition of beauty. Next to her in ‘handwriting’ font has a quote of her saying “In an instant my skin is ready to glow.” For those who are familiar of Karlie Kloss, her modeling career, or just after seeing her appearance, they might buy the product to try because they trust her “judgement” and hope to maybe look as flawless as she does. L’oreal uses Testimonial to teach women that they should strive to look as flawless as Karlie Kloss using their
A Lancôme makeup ad for lipstick, L’Absolu Rouge the vintage reds collection has famous celebrity, Kate Winslet wearing black clothing laying down framing her face with her hands, focusing the viewer attention there. Moving over is a large, dark red rose with four lipsticks in different tones of red with the brand name repeated on the packaging and emblem facing forward. Above the rose and products is the collection name and website in white text. Near the bottom of the advertisement is the brand name, Lancôme Paris in black text, which also has Kate Winslet name close by in smaller, black text letting the viewer know who the model is. By analyzing the Lancôme advertisement to determine how effective they presented their product using two of Aristotle’s three appeals; ethos and pathos.
Cover Girl cosmetics have been the top-seller since 1961 and are still going strong. It is hard, with all the advanced lines of make-up for one product to go as far as Cover girl has, so how does Cover Girl cosmetics do it? A lot of Cover Girl’s strong, on going successes are due to changing the look of the product, exceptional promotions which the public can’t look over, giving a cosmetic appeal to both older and younger aged women and most importantly by using near perfect women and teens to model their products. Although it’s wonderful that Cover Girl has been and still is so successful, it has put a dentation in today’s society in what women’s appearance should and shouldn’t be. Women and young adolescence are confused of what their appearance should be. Cover Girl has many famous models; one inparticular is the famous country singer Faith Hill. Faith is tall, skinny, and flawless. When women see models like her doing the advertising for Cover Girl, they automatically feel that they should look the same. Later in this paper I will go into semiotics which derives from the Greek word semeion meaning sign, it basically describes how people interpret different signs, such as models, and how these signs might effect one’s life and self-esteem. Proctor & Gamble are the owners and starters of Cover Girl cosmetics. To keep up the success of Cover Girl they must keep on top of the advertising game to stay above the competitors. To do this they do many promotions, some include using famous singers, changing displays, giving away samples and one of the most important advertisement of all is the models Cover Girls incorporates in their ads. Cover Girls did one promotion with Target stores to promote their product. They used the famous group 98 Degrees to make a sweepstakes called, “Fall in Love with 98 Degrees Sweepstakes.” The grand prizewinner of this sweepstakes is an appearance in the new 98 Degrees music video. This advertising doesn’t just take place in the Target stores; it also takes place in Teen magazine, stickers on the new 98 Degrees CDs, a national radio campaign, and the national Teen People magazine. Because it’s teens that mainly listen to the music that 98 Degrees produces, it’s the teens that this particular promotion is focused on. I s...
Leah Hardy (2010) argues that models in today’s magazines are no more than works of the digital retouching. Digital retouching is the use of computer program to remove unwanted impurities of the body, making a person look ideal. Digital retouching is sending a negative message to women because it sets up a false sense of what beauty is. It is impossible for women to look like a digital retouch models, because they are not real. In the film, Killing Us Softly 4 Jean Kilbourne argues that advertisement sends out the same type of message to women (Kilbourne, 2010). Kilbourne states “Advertisement tells women that what’s most important is how they look, an advertisement surround us with the image of ideal beauty. However, this flawlessness cannot be achieved. It’s a look that’s been created through airbrushing, cosmetics, and computer retouching ” (Kilbourne, 2010). Women are being told that in order to fit in society, they have to look a certain way, yet it is nearly impossible because the standard is too high.
Dove is a personal care trademark that has continually been linked with beauty and building up confidence and self-assurance amongst women. Now, it has taken steps further by impending with a new advertising strategy; fighting adverse advertising. And by that it means contesting all the ads that in some way proliferate the bodily insufficiencies which exits inside women. Launched by Dove, the campaign spins round an application called the Dove Ad Makeover which is part of the global Dove “Campaign for Real Beauty” what has been continuing ever since 2004 and times print, television, digital and outdoor advertising. As Leech (1996) believed,” commercial consumer advertising seems to be the most frequently used way of advertising.” In which way the seller’s chief goal is to sway their possible spectators and attempt and change their opinions, ideals and interests in the drive of resounding them that the produce they are posing has a touch that customer wants that will also be in their advantage, therefore generating false desires in the user’s mind. Dove is vexing to influence their viewers to purchase products they wouldn’t usually buy by “creating desires that previously did not exist.”(Dyer, 1982:6)
To sum up, it is often said that advertising is shaping women gender identity, and some have been argued that the statement is true, because of the higher amount of sexual references of women that advertisement show and the damages that occur on women’s personality and the public negative opinions of those women. As well, the negative effects that those kinds of advertisements cause to young generations and make them feel like they should simulate such things and are proud of what they are doing because famous actors are posting their pictures that way. Others deem this case as a personal freedom and absolutely unrelated to shaping women gender identity. On the contrast, they believe that, those sorts of advertisements are seriously teaching women how to stay healthy and be attractive, so they might have self-satisfaction after all.
Advertising in American culture has taken on the very interesting character of representing our culture as a whole. Take this Calvin Klein ad for example. It shows the sexualization of not only the Calvin Klein clothing, but the female gender overall. It displays the socially constructed body, or the ideal body for women and girls in America. Using celebrities in the upper class to sell clothing, this advertisement makes owning a product an indication of your class in the American class system. In addition to this, feminism, and how that impacts potential consumer’s perception of the product, is also implicated. Advertisements are powerful things that can convey specific messages without using words or printed text, and can be conveyed in the split-second that it takes to see the image. In this way, the public underestimates how much they are influenced by what they see on television, in magazines, or online.
For Maybelline’s price they offer low competitive While stating in text the lipstick is truer and crisper from their rich pigments and creamier and more sumptuous feel from their nourishing honey nectar. The consumer can actually read those objectives off the advertisement. For a visual aspect you can physically see a flower dripping nectar onto the lipstick, as the lipstick glistens. In addition, the consumer can also see a beautiful model wearing one of the shades of pink to see how rich the lipstick really is. CoverGirl uses both verbal and visual messaging to accomplish the advertiser’s marketing objectives.
The media favors one women's body type; the tall blonde with perfect, tan skin and long, beautiful hair. Because the images of women in advertisements are unattainable, it keeps them purchasing new products in their quest to be like the models they see (Moore). The actual women in these advertisements can't even match up to the
In the capitalistic society, sexual objectification of women has become one of the most popular and effective ways of promoting a product. Female bodies are used in a lot of commercials. Not only do females reveal their body parts for the sake of ‘sex appeal’, they are often identified as a product itself, sometimes even regardless of the context.
In “Beauty… and the Beast of Advertising” Jean Kilbourne argues that advertisements sell a lot more than just their products: “They sell values, images, and concepts of success and worth, love and sexuality, popularity and normalcy” (1). Kilbourne states that in advertising there are two types of women, “Housewives” and “Sex objects”. Kilbourne calls the sexually objectified women “a mannequin, a shell” because their beauty is flawless, they lacks all of the imperfections that make people appear human (2). Kilbourne also states that these women are all skinny, often tall and “long-legged”, and youthful (2). She claims that all “beautiful” women in ads obey this “norm” (Kilbourne 2). Kilbourne strongly states that advertisements lack the sense