HAPPINESS AS A MARKETING TOOL

Thinking of being able to break down the foundations of marketing by studying one advertisement is a really tough assignment and actually a goal really difficult to achieve, especially when taking in consideration that those hundreds of advertisements a regular person is exposed to in a daily basis, are the result of hundreds of years of development of what some call the art of marketing, which for many is comparable to political views, and even to religion itself, on how these tend to convince masses of what they should believe in and what they should do in order to achieve wellness and happines. The ad that will be studied here is just as most of the ads anyone will find nowadays in any type of written material, in terms that they want to seize certain audiences and convince them to buy their product. This particular ad appeals to the reaching of happiness, like assuming that sadness is something these audiences should be going through and that the only way to overcome the sadness is by buying their product. It suggests that happiness is an achievement siezed through the use of what they refer to as an ageless formula (a combination of a facial cream and a dietary suplement). The creators of the ad try to sell the idea that happiness is automatically linked to what they call ageless beauty; but they have not invented this idea, what they have done is to find a way to simply agree with the common feelings of most of the mature adience they are aiming for (women). And by doing this, their product becomes an allye in the strugle of these women with the fact that they are growing old. This audience show their agreement with the creators of the ad by purchasing the product, like admiting that it is fundamental to obtain or keep that ageless beauty as soon as possible, in order to become a happy person.

This specific ad is taken from the magazine Psychology Today, a magazine with articles that appeal to try to understand the way of thinking of people and the motives of human reactions. Therefore it is a magazine that appeals to adult people intersted in profesional areas of study like psychology, sociology, among others. The ad shows the happy face of a woman probably in her fifties, judging by the notorious wrinkles of her face. She is a beatiful woman with a radiant smile and shinny eyes. She is obviously a mature woman that is proud and happy. Althought the image only shows her face and part of her neck and shoulders, it is enough to give the sensation of vibrant energy judged by the white dress she is wearing and the shining of her eyes and lips without excesive make up that can defer the attention of the public.
Right next to her face stand the letters forming the word Ageless in a set of changing colors from purple to yellow like a rainbow. Right under the image of the woman there is a container with a visible title that says Cellfood, which is the name of the product they are trying to sell. Just by taking a glance to the most visible elements, readers of the ad would be able to tell they are trying to sell some type of product that prevents the aging on people while making them happier. When reading the name of the product (Cellfood) readers realize it is strategically located four times in the middle of the page like forming a square in a Golden color that is not used anywhere else. The ad is divided in two columns because they are actually trying to sell two different products with the same name but one appears to be some type of drops (dietary suplement) while the other one is a cream judging by the type of container. There is a lot of text in the ad that can be analyzed in many forms and where some argumentative appeals can be determined. It is not common to see that much text in regular ads, but taking in consideration the type of magazine it is expected to think that the people who read this type of magazine don’t mind to read more than usual in an ad, and actually when loking