While the exact number is unidentifiable, the average American sees hundreds, if not thousands, of advertisements every day. With these stunning numbers comes heavy competition, which means advertisers need to find different ways to appeal to the consumers (everyone and anyone that buys or has bought anything ever). Current advertising campaigns focus heavily on the convenience of a product or service, specifically the speed of the product itself, its results, and the time it takes to buy the product, regardless of the type of product (beauty, food, medication, travel, business, etc.) The speed of a product is defined as the time needed to use the product or service. Additionally, the speed of result is the time necessary to see an effect promised by the advertiser or the time it takes to make the product. The amount of time it takes to shop for a product is generally based on the company's ability to organize the product line.
Of the 20 ads chosen for this paper, six best represent the idea that the speed of a product or service is important. In advertisement #1, the signifier in the ad is the product itself, the hair color. Nice, easy, natural, quick, and flawless are the signified. This can be identified by looking at the model in the advertisement. She doesn't seem to be wearing a lot of makeup (natural), and her hair - which is supposed to colored with a sample of the product being sold - looks healthy, shiny, and glossy, basically flawless. With this information we can conclude that the sign is quick, easy, natural hair color. In the ad, the model is the dominant figure, but models for the product can also be seen on the three hair color boxes which are superimposed over the photograph. The advert is relatively dark in color - the model's brown locks occupy the majority of the page, making her light skin pop. In addition to the contrast, the dark color also gives off a sense of mysteriousness while the locks and waves of her hair may symbolize complexity, both perfectly fitting considering the product.
The copy includes the company or brand name, Clairol, the product name, Nice'n Easy hair color, and the line extension name, Perfect 10, which is the product being advertised. Furthermore, there is a short sales pitch directly under the company name which reads, “the most dramatic beauty transformation you can make… in 10 minutes”. Until very recently, dying your hair was usually done by someone else in a salon, and those that were brave enough to do it themselves spent at least an hour applying the color, letting it set, rinsing, etc. Along the bottom of the advertisement, short bullet points are made to provide additional information about the product: “designer color,” “high gloss shine,” “flawless gray coverage,” and “in 10 minutes”. This information together gives the consumer what the advertiser believed to be the most important information about the product. To an advertising student, however, it gives the advertiser's intended meaning: by showing a young, pretty model wearing little makeup and with healthy, shiny hair, the advertiser can promote the “natural look” of the product - a concern for many people who color their hair, and a big part of the advertising for Clairol's Nice'n Easy products.
The “designer color” bullet point would also draw in consumers because many people refrain from hair color due to the high costs of having hair professionally colored and do-it-yourself hair color is generally not overly expensive (nor do you have to tip the girl that washes your hair or the hairdresser). Finally, after the advertiser has gotten the attention of the business-focused population and the chic population, the “flawless gray coverage” will draw in the remaining crowd. This has led me to believe that the target market for Clairol's Nice'n Easy Perfect 10 Hair Color consists of women of any age, who need or want a natural-looking color to replace their own. Another hint as to who the target market may be is the magazine in which the ad was found in, which is Marie Claire - while many younger women read it too, it is generally oriented towards older, at least college-age women.
Similar to advertisement #1, Sally Hansen has developed an extra strength spray-on shower-off hair remover (#2) to replace the time spent lathering shaving cream and slowly shaving each leg - careful not to miss a spot or nick yourself! In the ad, a girl is seen using the product with the last two lines of copy reading, “Last seen getting more fun out of life… Tracy Long, Santa Fe, New Mexico” Whether or not the girl in the advertisement is who the text says she is, the advertisers have placed their product in a “real-life” situation where needing and being able to quickly remove unwanted body hair in minutes can be seen in action and would appeal to many women. For the third high-speed beauty product, Sally Hansen did it again - this time with the Color Quick Fast Dry Nail Pen (#3). The pen is held and wielded similar to the way one would use a marker, but it is loaded with nail polish rather than ink. Again, the last two lines of copy say, “Last seen in the fast lane… Haley Dare, Los Angeles, California.” All three of these products are targeted specifically towards women (perhaps with a few exceptions), which is a type of demographic segmentation.
