Advertising II
Since the 1950’s, American women have taken on more significant and demanding roles, some of which collide with one another. Many of these women have become more educated and therefore obtained higher paying jobs and more responsibilities beyond just caring for her home and family. The fulfilling of all these roles inevitably leads to more conflicts for these women such as time management, keeping mentally and physically healthy, staying energized, being organized, and looking good while being an excellent mother, wife, professional, homemaker, friend, and community member. These conflicts can lead to a woman’s self-consciousness. Advertisers are well aware of the sources of these self-conscious feelings that multi-tasking women possess. I want to argue that many advertising agencies and articles within magazines geared towards women are attempting to influence women to be hardcore multi-tasking heroines that should be able to prepare a wonderful meal for her husband and children in less than an hour, while looking good and feeling good either because she just won the case in court or because she just might be able to have the time and peace to do aerobics or Pilates before crashing into her bed that is guaranteed to make her feel like she slept eight hours instead of five. Phew.
Advertisers use several different techniques and methods not only to grab a potential consumer’s attention, but to convince the consumer that the product is right for them. One of the many ways to do so is to not only glamorize and sell the product, but turn the product into an element of a specific lifestyle or emotion that is highly desired. For instance, when advertised, healthy food products are usually shown as being eaten by hikers, athletes, self-conscious soccer-moms, and various other stereotypical groups of people who either are fit and healthy or want to be so. The advertisers would not want to advertise a healthy, weight-loss snack being eaten by a three-hundred pound man sitting in front of his television.
When it comes to selling products to adult women, advertisers work with several clever assumptions concerning the modern-day American woman and her various tasks she performs throughout the day. Advertisers want these lady-consumers to understand that not only are they aware of the action throughout a woman’s day, but that they are also aware of how this woman must feel concerning what she does, how she does it, and what she looks and feels like when she does it. This here is one of the clever assumptions that advertisers make: that most women are busy and self-conscious. This is a safe assumption for the advertisers to make when it comes to the magazines I looked at: Oprah, InStyle, Good Housekeeping, and Cosmopolitan. A lot of the women who read these magazines are college girls, mothers, and grandmothers that work, care about their looks, have husbands or boyfriends, go out and have fun, want to please their men, want to know what’s going on in the world, are busy homemakers, or are bored.
Yes, bored. This is one of the seven ways that I noticed how advertisers interest women. Advertisers are aware that these magazines are in doctor’s offices and other such waiting rooms. These women may be going to see the doctor because they are depressed or a part of their body is not working the way it used to. So, in these magazines, there are advertisements containing happy, energetic women who became happy and energetic because of the product that is advertised. I labeled these advertisements Get back out there and multi-task!
An advertisement for the migraine medication Topamax contains a worried-looking woman at a desk in front of a lap top. The aesthetics themselves show that she must be a professional, or busy woman. Above her head are her thought bubbles concerning the stress that she will not be able to make it through her daughter’s recital or the presentation she has to give on Monday. The last thought bubble says, “Somehow I’ll have to get it done.” Here, a woman is stressing over her inability to perform tasks due to her migraine. Above the name of the product, it is written that, “Life shouldn’t always revolve around migraines.” There are two assumptions at play here: the assumption that life should revolve around doing tasks rather than having and recovering from migraines and that women who have migraines seem to earn them in a way, because they are busy, working women.
In advertising, ailments can sometimes come across as something that is earned due to a vigorous, hard-working lifestyle. For instance, in another advertisement that encourages women to get back out there and multi-task, there is a pair of aerobic weights next to a bottle of water. This is an advertisement for Tylenol Arthritis Pain. Above this image is a paragraph that encourages women to conquer their arthritic pain. The first sentence of this paragraph states, “Arthritis pain might sound like a reason to skip your daily walk.” This sentence makes the assumption that most of the older Oprah readers desire to stay fit despite their pain.
Another get out there and multi-task advertisement from Good Housekeeping advertises Verizon. It shows a well-dressed husband and wife with their cell phone, which the wife is using. There is a close up of what can be assumed is their personal cell phone. The contact list shows “Brother”, “Club”, “Daughter”, “Grandkids”, and “Neighbor”. This here portrays this specific couple as very family, community, and friend oriented. This couple is older and above them in text is, “Retired but busy,” which is Verizon’s way of selling not only a cell-phone plan, but a lifestyle.
The second way that I noticed how advertisers interest women is by advertising the product itself as a multi-tasker, thus relating it to the multi-tasking women. I labeled these advertisements Let me do the job for you! A LiveActive cereal advertisement in Oprah states, “A fiber cereal with the ability to multitask.” Not only does this cereal regulate your digestive system and support good bacteria in your body, but it also looks and tastes great. This may be relative to a woman herself who can multitask and look and feel great.
Another example of a multi-tasking product is Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower Cleaner. It shows two maids (women) on either side of the product. In text it says, “It’s like having a maid times two.” This shower cleaner not only performs the task of two maids, but it saves the consumer time so that she can go about her other tasks during the day. This leads to the next way that advertisers trap women.
From on-the-go yogurts and cereal bars to long-lasting toothpaste, companies are finding more and more ways to cater to an American woman’s busy lifestyle where she makes time for everything and everyone else but herself. I labeled these advertisements Time Savers. Some of these time-saving products encourage women to relax and use a specific product to do the work for them but other products encourage women to keep on working and not waste time doing something as simple as making coffee. From InStyle, I found an advertisement for On The Go Vanilla Latte. The text says, “The perfect place for your vanilla latte? Your purse.” There is an image of a prepared vanilla latte on top of a stack of busy-work papers. This advertisement makes the assumption that it is typical of most women that read InStyle to not have the time to simply drink coffee or relax. It does not encourage women to sit down and relax, but that it is okay to be this busy because now there are companies that will help women remain this busy.
To counteract this example, there is an advertisement in Oprah for Olay Definity that shows a sleeping woman that is obviously using the sleep cream on her face. This advertisement encourages women to sleep or relax while at the same time performing the task of fixing discolorations of the skin, wrinkles, and the evening of skin tone. This also caters to beauty and makes the safe assumption that most women want to have a pleasing appearance and are worried about how the stress their lives contain will show through the wrinkles in their faces. Despite all the action of their day, they may not want all the effects of that action to show on their bodies, which leads me to the next, and very important way that advertisers interest women.
Women are busy. They are mothers. They have stress. They are wives. They are professionals. They are coaches. They are best friends. They fix things. They grow things. They clean. They organize. They listen. They pay attention. They worry. They work hard. Advertisers appear to love to show women as being dominant, strong, capable, free-spirited, independent, intelligent, care-free, yet careful, like men, and better than men. Rosie the Riveter would be proud, to say the least. Advertisers use these ideas, though, to their advantage, often portraying women as hardcore and intimidating. I call them “ideas” rather than “facts” because not all women are hardcore, but a lot of them want to be so. There are still a lot of women who feel trapped in undesirable roles and want to be like the women portrayed in these magazines. Advertisers prey on these women, as well. I labeled these advertisements, Yeah, I know I’m bad-ass. Most of these advertisements seem to be selling a lifestyle rather than a product. The product is so glamorized that it seems like it can change a woman’s life if she purchases it.
Centered in bold, pink letters, an advertisement says, “IT’S TIME TO LET NOTHING CONTAIN YOU.” This advertises a lifestyle of freedom and self-discovery while at the same time advertising Miracle Gro in Good Housekeeping. Several boxed pictures surround this bold, central encouragement. These pictures contain an attractive, young, happy-looking, free-spirited woman and her joy concerning her flowers.
Sometimes women even look like men in these advertisements. An advertisement in Oprah for DoubleTree shows a professional looking woman wearing a woman’s suit and carrying a non-gendered carrying-case. It is still obvious that she is a woman despite her hair being pulled back to give the illusion that it is short. In text, it says, “Work. Dream. We’ll leave that up to you. But as far as taking care of you goes, you can leave that up to us.” This advertisement seems to encourage women to not pay attention or care for themselves, and to instead keep working and pursuing goals; that it is not the woman’s job to take care of herself, but to take care of outward pursuits.
Another advertisement containing a woman that looks like a man also subtly portrays the woman as a man. This is an advertisement made by Good Housekeeping itself, encouraging women to use its website for quick tips to get through the various tasks women must perform each day. In the advertisement is a woman with short, boyish hair, wearing a plain, white button-down shirt, sitting on a floor, surrounded by paperwork. Next to her in text, it says, “Wish I had a wife.”
Yeah, I know I’m bad-ass advertisements are also prone to using actual, hard-working, successful women. In Cosmopolitan, Covergirl uses Queen Latifah. Good Housekeeping uses Glenn Close in a got milk? advertisement. got milk? advertisements typically always use celebrities or other famous persons to show that milk is an essential ingredient to their everyday lives and careers.
The fifth way that I noticed how advertisers interest women is by what I labeled it as Taking it home. In these advertisements, the mother and wife are encouraged to be excellent mothers despite being so busy. An example of this in Good Housekeeping is for a household cleaner spray called MoldControl. In one solid image, a woman’s tasks are embodied. The image is of a piece of moldy wheat bread that is in the shape of a house. Not only are the elements of home instilled within this image, but of food, and of any disaster that can strike and cause problems for the household. The woman is the protector of the house, the food, and the killer of the mold if she purchases this product. I found it interesting that the bread appeared to be wheat rather than white. Wheat is known to be the healthier alternative when it comes to bread, and this leads me to the sixth and seventh ways that advertisers interest women.
To bring my observations of advertisements to a rest, I want to discuss two ways that advertisements encourage women to rest and contemplate the welfare of their bodies. Many women are very self-conscious and most of the time aware that their bodies are being worn down from all the work they perform. Many women feel that they need to be pampered, but just do not have the time to do so. I call these advertisements But what about me? These advertisements often compliment women for their work and contributions. Some advertisers use this idea in a slightly deceptive way. In Oprah, I found an advertisement for Culturelle, a probiotic for the intestinal tract. The image on the advertisement is a silhouette of a woman meditating. Words in the advertisement include “enlightened”, “the road to health and happiness”, and “health be with you”, equivalent to “God be with you”. This particular advertisement deceives a woman’s desires to be meditative, happy, and healthy, by promoting a product that seems needed in order to obtain those feelings.
A complimenting advertisement I found is from Cosmopolitan and it states, “You’re beautiful and smart…why pay more?” The advertisement compliments the consumer so to encourage her to buy New York Color’s Smooth Mineral Loose Eye Powder.
An advertisement that tries to reward the hard-working woman by encouraging her to rest is from Sleep Number in Good Housekeeping. It shows a woman sleeping and asks, “Are your busy days rewarded by restful nights?” It encourages women to get their needed rest, but to still remain busy during the day, when they are not sleeping in Sleep Number’s Sleep Better bed.
The seventh way in which I noticed how advertisers got women’s attention was through a way I call Me & Nature. Advertisers are aware that women are or really want to be “one with nature”. This connects to What about me? because this way also deals with what a lot of women desire for themselves. A lot of women are very careful and wary about products they use and they desire to use consume and use natural products that are eco-friendly. One of my advertisements includes a woman covered in green leaves for Physicians Formula. Olay shows a woman showering in what seems more like a waterfall than a shower stall and the text goes across her body: “Fuse the beauty of nature into your skin.”
Women are going to continue to be busy and products are going to continue to be more accessible, easy and quick to use, and defining of how a modern, American woman should be spending her time. It is both something to celebrate and worry about to think that women are going to continue to think that they must fulfill these roles. It is good because a lot of women do indeed get satisfaction from all the tasks they accomplish and the status it gives them. But it is also bad, for sometimes all those roles disallow a woman to be herself and pursue passions that are more internal rather than external. But advertisers are getting ahead of their game, advertising that peace and happiness is indeed in the game, in the job, and in the home.
Advertisers use several different techniques and methods not only to grab a potential consumer’s attention, but to convince the consumer that the product is right for them. One of the many ways to do so is to not only glamorize and sell the product, but turn the product into an element of a specific lifestyle or emotion that is highly desired. For instance, when advertised, healthy food products are usually shown as being eaten by hikers, athletes, self-conscious soccer-moms, and various other stereotypical groups of people who either are fit and healthy or want to be so. The advertisers would not want to advertise a healthy, weight-loss snack being eaten by a three-hundred pound man sitting in front of his television.
When it comes to selling products to adult women, advertisers work with several clever assumptions concerning the modern-day American woman and her various tasks she performs throughout the day. Advertisers want these lady-consumers to understand that not only are they aware of the action throughout a woman’s day, but that they are also aware of how this woman must feel concerning what she does, how she does it, and what she looks and feels like when she does it. This here is one of the clever assumptions that advertisers make: that most women are busy and self-conscious. This is a safe assumption for the advertisers to make when it comes to the magazines I looked at: Oprah, InStyle, Good Housekeeping, and Cosmopolitan. A lot of the women who read these magazines are college girls, mothers, and grandmothers that work, care about their looks, have husbands or boyfriends, go out and have fun, want to please their men, want to know what’s going on in the world, are busy homemakers, or are bored.
Yes, bored. This is one of the seven ways that I noticed how advertisers interest women. Advertisers are aware that these magazines are in doctor’s offices and other such waiting rooms. These women may be going to see the doctor because they are depressed or a part of their body is not working the way it used to. So, in these magazines, there are advertisements containing happy, energetic women who became happy and energetic because of the product that is advertised. I labeled these advertisements Get back out there and multi-task!
An advertisement for the migraine medication Topamax contains a worried-looking woman at a desk in front of a lap top. The aesthetics themselves show that she must be a professional, or busy woman. Above her head are her thought bubbles concerning the stress that she will not be able to make it through her daughter’s recital or the presentation she has to give on Monday. The last thought bubble says, “Somehow I’ll have to get it done.” Here, a woman is stressing over her inability to perform tasks due to her migraine. Above the name of the product, it is written that, “Life shouldn’t always revolve around migraines.” There are two assumptions at play here: the assumption that life should revolve around doing tasks rather than having and recovering from migraines and that women who have migraines seem to earn them in a way, because they are busy, working women.
In advertising, ailments can sometimes come across as something that is earned due to a vigorous, hard-working lifestyle. For instance, in another advertisement that encourages women to get back out there and multi-task, there is a pair of aerobic weights next to a bottle of water. This is an advertisement for Tylenol Arthritis Pain. Above this image is a paragraph that encourages women to conquer their arthritic pain. The first sentence of this paragraph states, “Arthritis pain might sound like a reason to skip your daily walk.” This sentence makes the assumption that most of the older Oprah readers desire to stay fit despite their pain.
Another get out there and multi-task advertisement from Good Housekeeping advertises Verizon. It shows a well-dressed husband and wife with their cell phone, which the wife is using. There is a close up of what can be assumed is their personal cell phone. The contact list shows “Brother”, “Club”, “Daughter”, “Grandkids”, and “Neighbor”. This here portrays this specific couple as very family, community, and friend oriented. This couple is older and above them in text is, “Retired but busy,” which is Verizon’s way of selling not only a cell-phone plan, but a lifestyle.
The second way that I noticed how advertisers interest women is by advertising the product itself as a multi-tasker, thus relating it to the multi-tasking women. I labeled these advertisements Let me do the job for you! A LiveActive cereal advertisement in Oprah states, “A fiber cereal with the ability to multitask.” Not only does this cereal regulate your digestive system and support good bacteria in your body, but it also looks and tastes great. This may be relative to a woman herself who can multitask and look and feel great.
Another example of a multi-tasking product is Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower Cleaner. It shows two maids (women) on either side of the product. In text it says, “It’s like having a maid times two.” This shower cleaner not only performs the task of two maids, but it saves the consumer time so that she can go about her other tasks during the day. This leads to the next way that advertisers trap women.
From on-the-go yogurts and cereal bars to long-lasting toothpaste, companies are finding more and more ways to cater to an American woman’s busy lifestyle where she makes time for everything and everyone else but herself. I labeled these advertisements Time Savers. Some of these time-saving products encourage women to relax and use a specific product to do the work for them but other products encourage women to keep on working and not waste time doing something as simple as making coffee. From InStyle, I found an advertisement for On The Go Vanilla Latte. The text says, “The perfect place for your vanilla latte? Your purse.” There is an image of a prepared vanilla latte on top of a stack of busy-work papers. This advertisement makes the assumption that it is typical of most women that read InStyle to not have the time to simply drink coffee or relax. It does not encourage women to sit down and relax, but that it is okay to be this busy because now there are companies that will help women remain this busy.
To counteract this example, there is an advertisement in Oprah for Olay Definity that shows a sleeping woman that is obviously using the sleep cream on her face. This advertisement encourages women to sleep or relax while at the same time performing the task of fixing discolorations of the skin, wrinkles, and the evening of skin tone. This also caters to beauty and makes the safe assumption that most women want to have a pleasing appearance and are worried about how the stress their lives contain will show through the wrinkles in their faces. Despite all the action of their day, they may not want all the effects of that action to show on their bodies, which leads me to the next, and very important way that advertisers interest women.
Women are busy. They are mothers. They have stress. They are wives. They are professionals. They are coaches. They are best friends. They fix things. They grow things. They clean. They organize. They listen. They pay attention. They worry. They work hard. Advertisers appear to love to show women as being dominant, strong, capable, free-spirited, independent, intelligent, care-free, yet careful, like men, and better than men. Rosie the Riveter would be proud, to say the least. Advertisers use these ideas, though, to their advantage, often portraying women as hardcore and intimidating. I call them “ideas” rather than “facts” because not all women are hardcore, but a lot of them want to be so. There are still a lot of women who feel trapped in undesirable roles and want to be like the women portrayed in these magazines. Advertisers prey on these women, as well. I labeled these advertisements, Yeah, I know I’m bad-ass. Most of these advertisements seem to be selling a lifestyle rather than a product. The product is so glamorized that it seems like it can change a woman’s life if she purchases it.
Centered in bold, pink letters, an advertisement says, “IT’S TIME TO LET NOTHING CONTAIN YOU.” This advertises a lifestyle of freedom and self-discovery while at the same time advertising Miracle Gro in Good Housekeeping. Several boxed pictures surround this bold, central encouragement. These pictures contain an attractive, young, happy-looking, free-spirited woman and her joy concerning her flowers.
Sometimes women even look like men in these advertisements. An advertisement in Oprah for DoubleTree shows a professional looking woman wearing a woman’s suit and carrying a non-gendered carrying-case. It is still obvious that she is a woman despite her hair being pulled back to give the illusion that it is short. In text, it says, “Work. Dream. We’ll leave that up to you. But as far as taking care of you goes, you can leave that up to us.” This advertisement seems to encourage women to not pay attention or care for themselves, and to instead keep working and pursuing goals; that it is not the woman’s job to take care of herself, but to take care of outward pursuits.
Another advertisement containing a woman that looks like a man also subtly portrays the woman as a man. This is an advertisement made by Good Housekeeping itself, encouraging women to use its website for quick tips to get through the various tasks women must perform each day. In the advertisement is a woman with short, boyish hair, wearing a plain, white button-down shirt, sitting on a floor, surrounded by paperwork. Next to her in text, it says, “Wish I had a wife.”
Yeah, I know I’m bad-ass advertisements are also prone to using actual, hard-working, successful women. In Cosmopolitan, Covergirl uses Queen Latifah. Good Housekeeping uses Glenn Close in a got milk? advertisement. got milk? advertisements typically always use celebrities or other famous persons to show that milk is an essential ingredient to their everyday lives and careers.
The fifth way that I noticed how advertisers interest women is by what I labeled it as Taking it home. In these advertisements, the mother and wife are encouraged to be excellent mothers despite being so busy. An example of this in Good Housekeeping is for a household cleaner spray called MoldControl. In one solid image, a woman’s tasks are embodied. The image is of a piece of moldy wheat bread that is in the shape of a house. Not only are the elements of home instilled within this image, but of food, and of any disaster that can strike and cause problems for the household. The woman is the protector of the house, the food, and the killer of the mold if she purchases this product. I found it interesting that the bread appeared to be wheat rather than white. Wheat is known to be the healthier alternative when it comes to bread, and this leads me to the sixth and seventh ways that advertisers interest women.
To bring my observations of advertisements to a rest, I want to discuss two ways that advertisements encourage women to rest and contemplate the welfare of their bodies. Many women are very self-conscious and most of the time aware that their bodies are being worn down from all the work they perform. Many women feel that they need to be pampered, but just do not have the time to do so. I call these advertisements But what about me? These advertisements often compliment women for their work and contributions. Some advertisers use this idea in a slightly deceptive way. In Oprah, I found an advertisement for Culturelle, a probiotic for the intestinal tract. The image on the advertisement is a silhouette of a woman meditating. Words in the advertisement include “enlightened”, “the road to health and happiness”, and “health be with you”, equivalent to “God be with you”. This particular advertisement deceives a woman’s desires to be meditative, happy, and healthy, by promoting a product that seems needed in order to obtain those feelings.
A complimenting advertisement I found is from Cosmopolitan and it states, “You’re beautiful and smart…why pay more?” The advertisement compliments the consumer so to encourage her to buy New York Color’s Smooth Mineral Loose Eye Powder.
An advertisement that tries to reward the hard-working woman by encouraging her to rest is from Sleep Number in Good Housekeeping. It shows a woman sleeping and asks, “Are your busy days rewarded by restful nights?” It encourages women to get their needed rest, but to still remain busy during the day, when they are not sleeping in Sleep Number’s Sleep Better bed.
The seventh way in which I noticed how advertisers got women’s attention was through a way I call Me & Nature. Advertisers are aware that women are or really want to be “one with nature”. This connects to What about me? because this way also deals with what a lot of women desire for themselves. A lot of women are very careful and wary about products they use and they desire to use consume and use natural products that are eco-friendly. One of my advertisements includes a woman covered in green leaves for Physicians Formula. Olay shows a woman showering in what seems more like a waterfall than a shower stall and the text goes across her body: “Fuse the beauty of nature into your skin.”
Women are going to continue to be busy and products are going to continue to be more accessible, easy and quick to use, and defining of how a modern, American woman should be spending her time. It is both something to celebrate and worry about to think that women are going to continue to think that they must fulfill these roles. It is good because a lot of women do indeed get satisfaction from all the tasks they accomplish and the status it gives them. But it is also bad, for sometimes all those roles disallow a woman to be herself and pursue passions that are more internal rather than external. But advertisers are getting ahead of their game, advertising that peace and happiness is indeed in the game, in the job, and in the home.