Final Draft - 10/09/09

As per your request, an ad that is selling a product in competition with our firm has been analyzed an evaluated.

I. The Advertisement

Downy has millions of ideas for advertisements for their laundry products. One of their advertisements particularly caught my eye. A Downy simple pleasures fabric softener ad was chosen. Its optical focus is a middle aged white female and white male, perhaps husband and wife, standing in a hallway with a freshly set dinner table behind them. She is wearing a semi-formal dress and the man is also wearing a nice long sleeved shirt. The man in the ad is behind the women seductively smelling the fabric on her shoulder from her dress. Around the same area that he is smelling her, is a fictitious smoke-like image of a pleasant scent rising off her shoulder in to the surrounding air. She has her head tilted down towards the man and she is smiling at him in ecstasy. He also seems to like her smell because he is smiling with his eyes closed. If we look down towards their hands we can see that the man has his hand on top of the woman’s hand. Next to their hands it says, “staying in is no reason your alluring side shouldn’t come out.” If we look further down towards the bottom of the page it gives another line that says, “Express every side a touch more with Downy Simple Pleasures. Renewing scent pearls release with your embrace. So from alluring to serene, daring and beyond, you can feel more.” This gives the audience an idea of the chemistry that was intended to be shown in this advertisement This Downy ad seems to target middle aged women and uses various emotional appeals, and elements of effective layout. Most notably the “need for sex” appeal in harmony with the element of movement and balance. Downy uses these appeals and elements to encourage the use of their fabric softener by middle-aged women to smell sexy and bring out their alluring side.

II. Readership and Intended Audience

The Downy ad was taken from a women fitness magazine called Women’s Fitness. Considering the fact that the ad came out of a women’s magazine and the main optical focus is a women, we can assume that the makers of the ad intended to ad to be directed towards a female audience. The element of balance comes into play with the intended gender assumption of this advertisement. Since the woman in this ad is the biggest and most prominent element in this seems to suggest that it was intended for a female audience. The audience age is intended to be directed towards middle aged women. This can be assumed because most middle aged women are beginning to worry about their fading hour glass figure and read women’s fitness magazines to keep in shape. Also the age of the women in the ad is very important to the intended age of audience. The woman looks to be middle aged as well as the man so we can assume it is intended for the same age group. The class can be assumed for middle to upper class women. The man and women are both nicely dressed and the woman is wearing some jewelry, and man is dressed in a nice button down shirt. The table is set with wine and a salad which compliments why it is placed in a woman’s fitness magazine. Doctors have said that a glass of wine once a day is good for your heart and eating salad is obviously healthy. Wine has always been a symbol of wealth so they could be a clue to the target class of this advertisement. The intended race can be argued for white people because the man and women are both white. It could go the other way though because everyone has to wash their clothes regardless of race. The assumption that makers of the ad believe is that women do more laundry then men so they direct most of the focus of the ad on a women and the attention she is receiving from the man behind her because she uses Downy Simple Pleasures fabric softener.

III. Need for Sex and Gaze Motion

This ad uses the element of movement in tune with gaze motion to lead the audience to the "need for sex" appeal this ad conveys. Movement in layout is generally from left to right and from top to bottom. If the reader follows this motion they will be lead to the center image of the ad, the women wife figure. If we look at the woman’s face we see that she is looking at her shoulder. We follow her gaze and we see a male figure, probably a husband or boyfriend, seductively smelling her shoulder. This gaze motion directs the readers to the chemistry between the two people in the advertisement. It also guides the reader’s eye from one element to another and makes sure he or she does not forget anything. The sexual part of the advertisement becomes evident to the reader, most likely a middle-aged woman. The makers of this advertisement try to convey that women at that age wanted to feel sexy, alluring, and wanted by their significant other and this ad definitely shows this with the placement of the male figure behind her. This automatically sparks the "need for sex" appeal in the readers mind.
The most prominent appeal that is sparked by the gaze motion of the woman is the “need for sex” appeal. Just by looking at the Downy advertisement for a second you get a strong sexual vibe from the way the man and women are connecting with each other. The man is smelling her shoulder very seductively and she is gazing at him with a pleasing expression on her face. The placement of the man’s hand over the woman’s implies an even more intimate image to the audience. The makers of this ad are trying to persuade the women audience to use their fabric softener, because you will smell sexy and your alluring side will come out. Also the text that is placed just under this sexual image suggests a sexual tone to the advertisement. The text of the ad reads, “staying in is no reason your alluring side shouldn’t come out.” This could also be looked on in as a reason to stay in your own home instead of going out. The current times are financially straining on the society and people are finding anyway possible to save every penny, even the U.S. Census Bureau states on there website that, “more than 70 percent of families in the United States have seen a decrease in total income since 2001.” Downy is suggesting for its audience to say in and let you alluring side come out.
IV. Need for Aesthetic Sensations and Balance.
Downy uses balance, another element of effective layout, to create a successful and visually pleasing advertisement. The element of balance contains the optical center, which is the point the reader’s eye designates as the center of an area. In Downey’s ad the women in the center of the page is the optical center. She is equally distant from each side of the paper. On the left side of her is the freshly set dinner table, in association with the right side of her which shows her hand covered sensually by the man behind her. This balance presents equilibrium in the ad, because the left and right side have equal visual images that catch a reader’s eye. The equilibrium in this ad presents a different kind of balance called formal balance. Formal balance is achieved through the balance between the left and the right side of the advertisement. They both equal each other in meaning surround the fulcrum image of the advertisement. The balance of all the pleasing images in the Downy advertisement brings another appeal that most people don’t even think about. The “need for aesthetic sensations” basically means the need to create a visually pleasing image. The image of a man sensually kissing a woman’s neck and holding her hand must be visually pleasing to any woman reader. The image of a nicely set dinner table, and nicely dressed people create an aesthetic sensation and are easily catch readers attention because they are automatically pleased by the raw image of the advertisement.
V. Conclusion
Downy uses many different elements of effective layout, and emotional appeals to encourage the use of their fabric softener by middle-aged women to smell sexy and bring out their alluring side. The assumption that makers of the ad believe is that women do more laundry then men so they direct most of the focus of the ad on a women and the attention she is receiving from the man behind her because she uses Downy Simple Pleasures fabric softener. The need for sex and need for aesthetic sensations can be seen in unison with the elements of balance and movement. Balance uses formal balance to create an optical center and produce an overall visually pleasing image to the audience. While the element of movement uses gaze motion to lead the audience to the "need for sex" appeal this ad conveys. These elements and appeals are meshed together to hopefully create a successful advertisement that increases not only the amount of sales of their particular product, but also to create new consumers.