Effectiveness of Product Placement in Advertisements

Consumers are bombarded with advertisements every single day. On almost all forms of media, companies use advertisements to convince consumers to purchase their product. A large medium for advertisements are magazines. Most of the advertisements in Parents magazine appeal to parents because that is the target audience of the magazine. A cat food advertisement would appeal to a lot of parents because many families have cats. Sheba and Fancy Feast both had advertisements in the magazine, but one of the advertisements is clearly more effective. The Fancy Feast advertisement is more effective than the Sheba advertisement because of product placement, color, and model placement.

The Sheba advertisement’s product placement was rather poor. The product is in the bottom left hand corner and is quite small so the product does not catch a consumer’s eye. A consumer’s eye would go to the cat on the

advertisement, not the actual product. Also, the product is quite small, which diminishes its effectiveness. When a potential buyer is flipping through the magazine, the product can easily be overlooked. This is highly ineffective and will not do the job that Sheba had in mind.
The Sheba advertisement’s use of color was too simple. With a black background, a gray cat, and gold type, the color would not get the attention of a consumer. Also, the color is too simple and is not bold enough. In order to use color effectively, the advertisement must have bold colors that correlate well with the product. This advertisement does not do this well. The only color in the advertisement that is bold is the blue eyes of the cat, and that does nothing to advertise the product. Therefore, the Sheba advertisement was not successful with the use of color.
Lastly, the model placement on the Sheba advertisement did not do a good job of advertising the cat food. The cat is very big on the page, which really overshadows the cat food. Also, the cat does not seem to care about the food, which would help advertise the food even more. The cat’s placement was not thought through very well, but the cat is very good looking and catches a consumer’s eye.
On the other hand, the Fancy Feast advertisement appeals to cat owners very well, because of product placement. The product is well placed in the middle of the advertisement. The cat food is big enough to see easily, which makes the advertisement more pleasing to look at. Whereas, Sheba’s product placement is in the bottom left hand corner and is not easy to read. This diminishes the effectiveness of the advertisement and does not promote the product well.
Also, Fancy Feast’s color coincided well with the product, which is highly effective.

The blues and whites catches a consumer’s eye and brings out the other elements of the advertisement. This is in stark contrast with the Sheba advertisement. Their advertisement’s color did not go well together and did not seem to fit. Also, the Fancy Feast advertisement had good texture, which helped catch the eye of consumers. The Sheba advertisement did not have much texture and was very bland.

Lastly, Fancy Feast used model placement much more effectively in their advertisement. The white cat at the bottom of the page is looking up at the bowl of cat food at the top of the page. This alludes to the fact that the cat really wants the food, and this appeals to a cat owner effectively. Cat owners want their cat to like the food they are eating, and this advertisement accomplishes that nicely. On the other hand, Sheba’s advertisement placed the cat in the middle of the page, which did not work well. Also, the cat does not seem to care about the food in the bottom left

corner.
These two advertisements in Parents magazine were very different. The Sheba advertisement focused more on the cat and not on the product, which did not advertise the product very well. The Fancy Feast advertisement, on the other hand, placed the cat at the bottom of the page looking up at the food. This does a much better job of advertising the product. Therefore, the Fancy Feast is a more effective advertisement because of product placement, color, and model placement. This appeals to cat owners much more than the Sheba advertisement did.