I’ve recently found it really interesting to compare the different semiotics that a company can use to advertise the exact same product. By doing this, the company can appeal to viewers in different ways and use multiple advertising angles to sell the same thing. A company that uses many different semiotics to appeal to the viewer is Budweiser. In some of these beer advertisements, the linguistic and iconic signs are easy to interpret, but in others, the product being advertised is less recognizable.
For me personally, the most interesting types of ads are the ones that cause the viewer to watch the entire thing before they have any idea of what company the ad represents. In these ads, the point of the advertisement is the entertainment value, and then there is maybe a flash of the logo at the end. In Jonathan Bignell’s “Media Semiotics” he explains that many contemporary ads do just that, running ads that do not directly ask the customers to buy the product at all. Instead, the ads have entertainment value or capitalize on human emotion. The “hard sell” approach to advertising is not as prominent anymore, and the ads often have a more complicated puzzle for the viewer to work out, which encourages the viewer to engage in the meaning of the message and participate it.
The ad that immediately comes to mind for me is a 2006 ad for Budweiser with the Clydesdale horses: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veQAJ4qlltU. With inspirational music playing throughout, this ad shows the Clydesdale horses on a farm, and shows a young horse run off to the barn alone, put his tiny head in a small harness, and try to pull the cart. “I won’t tell if you won’t” an old man says at the very end, with a Dalmatian sitting next to him. Although emotionally captivating, there is nothing in this ad about the beer itself, and if they did not show the logo at the end, many viewers would not have any idea what the commercial was endorsing. However, the visual representations are the Clydesdale horses, which are the mascot of the Budweiser company, and therefore the connotative meaning is meant to be associated with Budweiser.
Other Budweiser ads, however, use semiotics in a different way, and it is evident right away which product is being advertised. In the same year as the Budweiser Clydsdale commercial in 2006, there was another very successful advertisement about Bud Light involving a “magic fridge:” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dHaOwC_4No. Immediately, it is obvious that this ad is about Bud Light because the refrigerator is full of them. A man trying to hide his beer from his friends makes a revolving fridge to hide it, but when he turns the switch to do so, the fridge moves into another apartment. The men in the other apartment call it the “magic fridge” and are thrilled when it arrives, grabbing the Bud Light out of it as quickly as they can. By seeing that this one man wants to hide his beer from his friends, and that the other men get thrilled to get the Bud Light, a message is sent to the viewer that everyone wants Bud Light. In this ad, instead of just iconic visual signs (such as in the ad with the Clydesdales), it is the linguistic aspect and humor that are more important.
Both of these approaches sell a product for the same company, and yet one uses completely different signs than the other. However, the connotative meaning of both is the great taste of Budweiser beer. I find myself paying more attention to the different semiotics used in advertising campaigns for all companies now that I better understand the ways that semiotics are used as strategies to appeal to viewers in different ways.
**P.S. I know this post is really early but I had to do all the reading for the week and the post this weekend because of my schedule next week!
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