Advertisements are the powerful tools to draw the audience’s attention to the definite product or service and influence the customers’ attitude to the brand. Effective advertisements need to contribute to increasing the customer loyalty in relation to the definite product or brand.
That is why, much attention is paid to the visual and verbal codes provided in the advertisement because they should evoke certain emotions and reactions in order to stimulate the product or service selling (Rayner, Wall, & Kruger, 2004).
To understand the particular features of the advertisement in relation to its impact on the target audience, it is important to pay attention to the printed advertisement developed by Lexus for the Western audience and markets to promote 2013 LS F SPORT (Lexus LS Marketing, 2012).
The advertisement provides both the visual and written messages to attract the audience to the product and evoke the desired associations which can be effective to stimulate the customer in choosing this product instead of the other one.
The advertisement represents a car of the discussed model as the centre of the illustration’s composition. A man and a woman are walking on near the car. They are physically attractive and fashionably dressed. The woman is looking at the man. The background is formed by the people participating in the party who can be observed behind the glass wall. Different tones of the metallic grey and green colours are used in the picture.
The above-mentioned details provide the description of the visual part of the advertisement without references to its meaning. Thus, this description adds to the discussion of the advertisement’s denotative meaning (Rayner, Wall, & Kruger, 2004).
However, it is significant to pay attention to all the details of the picture in order to discuss the connotative meaning of the advertisement. These attractive man and woman can be discussed as the owners of the top-class car. The persons’ facial expressions emphasize the feeling of pride in relation to owning the deluxe car. The woman is looking at the man with admiration because this strong man can afford everything he wants, including this car.
To accentuate the association of the car with luxury which is available for the successful persons and leaders, the blinking metallic colours are used. The potential customer receives the message that the owners of the car are also sparkling as the real stars.
The advertisers use the typical associations of the people’s success with sparkling and metallic glance in order to provide the definite message. The people who make the background of the picture are excluded from the main composition because only three ‘stars’ can be present, the owners and the car.
The slogan provided in the picture helps emphasize the audience’s associations with ‘stars’ in spite of the fact the models are not the famous people. The slogan states “The world is your stage. Make it a memorable performance” (Lexus LS Marketing, 2012). The words ‘memorable performance’ are capitalized to draw the audience’s attention to this message and strengthen the association with success, ‘stars’, and necessity to live the full and vivid life.
Nevertheless, the potential customers of cars of that class usually need more information about the product. That is why, the additional information is presented in a rather expressive style below the slogan in order to describe the advantages of the model. The associations with the stage are strengthened with references to the phrase “You open the door and the show begins” (Lexus LS Marketing, 2012).
The necessary information about options which can be interesting for those people who intend to buy the car is provided in a small size font at the bottom of the poster. The text message helps not only explain but also accentuate the visual image in order to provide the audience with more vivid and clear chain of associations.
From this perspective, the advertisement aims to attract the customers who belong to the upper middle social class because they want to accentuate their status or who are the representatives of the upper social class because it is their style of living. The meaning is imposed by the advertisement, and it is based on stereotypes. The advertisers combine the stereotypical visions with the accepted pictures of wealth, glamour, and luxury.
The character of the text message helps attract businessmen and people who are interested in the car as the source of comfort for them. It is important to note that the emphasis on luxury and the public life ‘on stage’ is necessary to accentuate the class of the car advertised. The target audience should be determined with the help of these messages.
Appealing to the representatives of the upper class, the advertisement can also affect the other audience because of evoking the desire to belong to the upper social classes or to improve the social status.
Thus, the advertisement promotes the definite culture associated with glamour and luxury. The car is presented as the symbol of the luxurious life which is available for respectable persons. That is why, the potential customer can feel the strong desire to buy this car.
References
Lexus LS Marketing [Image] (2012). Web.
Rayner, P., Wall, P., & Kruger, S. (2004). Media studies. USA: Routledge.