The following is taken from the text Advertising and Popular Culture by Jib Fowles.


Exploring the ad's context

1. What product category does the advertised commodity fall into?
2. Which medium - magazine, newspaper, radio - did this ad appear in? What month, day, and year did it appear?
3. Judging from where the ad appeared (the kind of magazine and newspaper), what might you infer about its intended audience? (Example: ads appearing in the Ladies' Home Journal are likely aimed at women readers.) Describe this audience: who they are, what they are likely to be attracted by.

Looking at the ad

4. Consider the ad in aesthetic terms. Describe the layout: what are the different design elements and how are they placed. Why do you think these particular elements were chosen? What does the image and the typeface say to you? Do they help establish an overall mood for the ad?
5. Look at the artwork in the ad. Is it a line drawing, a painting, or a photograph? What is the lighting like? What is the angle taken on the subject? Is it a close up or a long shot? Is the focus sharp or blurred? Why do you think the agency art directors chose this particular image?
6. In the imagery, what appears in the foreground versus the background? Why do you think these choices were made?
7. Precisely what is the product being offered for sale? What do you learn about its objective qualities? (Try to distinguish here between factual versus symbolic appeal.)
8. Make a list of all the various elements in the ad that suggest its symbolic appeal; that is, what positive attributes its purchase will supposedly bring the consumer? Think of the ad as a play: what are the props and characters it employs? How is that symbolic value conveyed?
9. Go over the list from question 8 and consider each item in terms of the intended audience: what signal might that item convey regarding class status, leisure time activities, gender roles, sexual attractiveness, health and vitality, family responsibilities, and the like. Ask, "What might this item, this feature, mean to the targeted consumer?" Start with the most prominently featured items first.
10. Look at the human figures pictured in the ad. What might you infer about their states of mind from the ways they are presented? How might the intended audience have responded to those representations?
11. Look carefully at the locale of the scene. Where does it take place? What symbolic significance is the locale likely to have for the intended audience?
12. Locate the scene in time: is it in the past, the present, or the future? What does the temporal location suggest?
13. Consider the ad as a narrative, a story, or scene from a play. Can you supply the overall story? What has happened, is happening, or will happen soon? What is this narrative likely to mean to the intended audience?
14. Sometimes it is not what is in the ad that pulls the viewer in, but what is missing. Is there anything missing in this imagery that the intended audience might supply?
15. Is the symbolic message of this ad idealizing some aspect of life? If so, what is it and how is it presented?
16. To sum up: imagine a group of people totally engaged with this ad. What state of mind would they take away from it?
17. Are there any references to previous ads or other forms of popular culture in the ad - what scholars refer to as "intertexuality"?
18. Ads succeed by framing some things in and excluding the rest. What are some associations to the product and the symbolic themes suggested for it that have to be framed out by the persons making the ad? Why?

Implications of the ad

19. What might this ad be inferring about the nature of human relationships? What kind of nonverbal communication appears with the ad? Which figures dominate?
20. What messages does this ad say about what it means to be a man or a woman? About self-identity? About personal happiness, sexual attractiveness, or other forms of self-fulfilment?
21. What does the ad convey about markers of social status or class? About racial or ethnic identity?
22. What kinds of cultural beliefs are promoted in this ad? Try to imagine yourself as an outsider to this society, viewing this ad. What seem to be the values of the ad's creators and its receivers?
23. Advertising is often linked with the process of commodification: that is, taking a human value or need and equating it with the process of buying and using a product. From that standpoint, ask yourself: what human needs and values is this ad attempting to commodify?