Pepsi One Direction Ad
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Pepsi One Direction Ad
This paper analyses the Pepsi One Direction advertisement by the BBDO agency. The advertiser is Pepsi and the product featured in this advertisement is Pepsi Cola. The tagline for the advertisement is “Live for Now” and the music played is “Live While you are Young” by the One Direction band. The advertisement features two celebrities namely Drew Brees who is a quarterback with New Orleans Saints and the One Direction boy band. In the advertisement, Drew Brees grabs the last Pepsi Cola in the refrigerator. The advertisement shows the members of the One Direction crew attempting to persuade Brees to give Harry Styles, a member of One Direction, the soda can. There is a faceoff between the two, with the One Direction boasting of their platinum album and Drew Brees of a Super Bowl win. Behind One Direction and Brees area group of screaming girls and a group of shouting football fans respectively. The loudness of each group’s fans is also used for comparison. Brees ultimately surrenders after One Direction agrees to allow him into the band if he surrenders the Pepsi
The target audience of the advertisement consists of young viewers. Specifically, the advertisement appeals mostly to fans of the One Direction band and football fans. Fans of the One Direction boy band are mostly girls and young women and this segment consists of millions of viewers. On the other hand, football fans who are mostly attracted by the advertisement are millions of boys and young men. The target audience is not just limited to the US and UK but stretches out worldwide since the psychographic profile including the attitudes, interests, and opinions of the young audience is not geographically delimited. The youth appeal of the advertisement is manifested by the use of flashy words, use of celebrities who appeal mostly to the young, use of catchy messages, and promotion of Pepsi as a “cool” and trendy item.
The advertisement has employed the techniques of pathos, logos, and ethos to attract viewers and compel them to purchase the product being advertised. Pathos refers to emotional appeal. In advertising, pathos is used to elicit emotional responses in the audience. Emotional responses can be positive such as happiness or negative such as pain. Other emotional responses include sadness, guilt, and fear. There are numerous examples on how pathos is deployed in the advertisement (NCTE, 2009). Use of pathos in the advertisement helps to evoke an emotional appeal among the millions of football fans who adore Brees and the millions of young girls who adore the One Direction band. Specific examples of how pathos works in the advertisement relates to the concept of black and white fallacy where advertisements give the viewer only two options and in this way makes them purchase the product being advertised. The two options in the Pepsi advertisement leave the viewer having to choose either being with the One Direction band or siding with Brees. In either case, the viewer chooses to be on the side of Pepsi. Still on pathos, the advertisement uses emotional words and imagery to make the viewers have positive feelings about the brand. Such words influence strongly on the viewers, compelling them to associate with the product and purchase it. Thirdly, humor is used to elicit emotion and leave the audience with a feeling of happiness. This happens through the presentation of the advertisement in a funny way to attract viewers. The message in the Pepsi advertisement is conveyed in a light-hearted manner and this helps to appeal to the emotions of the viewers hence boosts sales.
Unlike pathos, this appeals to the emotions of the audience, logos appeals to their logical senses. It tickles the viewer’s good senses and compels the audience to apply rational thought with regard to the product and hence purchase it. Logos can be applied using statistics and evidence to help the audience to comprehend a product’s value (NCTE, 2009). There is little use of logos in the advertisement. Use of logos in the advertisement involves the bandying around of facts about the product as well as the use of statistics. For example, the two groups go on and on about who is better placed to take the last can of Pepsi and talk about Superbowls or Platinum won. Perhaps the best use of logos is illustrated by the attempt by One Direction band members to persuade Brees to give Styles the Pepsi can since logical reasoning is applied.
Ethos appeals to character or credibility in a bid to persuade the viewer to buy the product being advertised. In advertisements, use of ethos attempts to persuade the consumer that the firm is more dependable, credible, and trustworthy to make the consumer buy its products or services (NCTE, 2009). In the Pepsi One Direction advertisement, there is liberal use of ethos to appeal to the credibility and character of the Pepsi brand. This is principally done using reliable experts to endorse the brand. For instance, the endorsement by popular band One Direction of Pepsi Cola is a manifestation of ethos. The credentials of One Direction band are impressive and strong enough to enhance the credibility of the Pepsi brand. The band is an English-Irish boy pop band that has won many awards including four MTV Video Music Awards, three NME awards, four Brit Awards, and Billboards’s “Top New Artist” Award in the year. In 2013, their album “Midnight Memories” was the biggest and quickest selling album in UK. Additionally, they have used Brees, a popular footballer, to endorse their brand (Butterfly, 2012). The band and Brees are famous personalities who have a wide following and are adored by millions of fans.
Endorsement of a product by a famous personality lends it credibility and helps to sell it. There are specific examples of how the endorsement works for Pepsi. For instance, the bandwagon appeal is used to either suggest to the audience that they ought to be on the winning side by using Pepsi or join the crowd of Pepsi users. This point is well illustrated by the big crowd behind one direction, this crowd appears to be part of the glamorous lifestyle exhibited by the band, and they are all portrayed as happy users of Pepsi. Likewise, Brees has a huge crowd behind him and the audience is being exhorted to join this crowd and become part of the glamorous Pepsi lifestyle. Both crowds represent the millions of Americans who are football fans and followers of the award-winning band. There is also the use of snob appeal to elicit an emotional response from the audience. This also is illustrative of ethos and entails a subtle insinuation that using a particular product will induct the consumer into an elite club that leads an alluring and lavish lifestyle. The advertisement shows stars taking Pepsi Cola and insinuates that taking the drink will make one belong to the group of stars
Visual and Verbal Appeal to Style
Verbal style of the advertisement is manifested by repetition where the product name is repeated several times and this helps the viewers to remember the product. The viewer is bombarded with the product name (Pepsi). Use of jingles also enhances the retention of the product name in the minds of the audience. There is also the use of a tagline “Live for Now” as well as of the music “Live While you are Young” sung by the One Direction band.
Regarding visuals appeal to style, there is use of imagery, visual associations, product symbols, and corporate symbols. Advertising visuals help to capture the audience’s attention, enhance interest from the audience, describe the features of the soda, and create an impact by providing visual recall. The advertising visuals in the Pepsi advertisement are both literal and metaphorical (Rossiter & Percy, 1983). Literal visuals give information about the soda and include identification identified by use of the Pepsi Cola package, Pepsi logo, and Pepsi Cola brand. Other techniques of literal visuals such as comparison and description visuals are not used. Metaphorical visuals provide symbolic illusions to the product, connecting the product with its desired image (Moriarty, 1987). Examples of metaphorical visuals used in the advertisement include association where the product is connected to the lifestyle, situations, and typical person using Pepsi. Association using celebrities connects Pepsi use to celebrities such as Brees and the members of the One Direction band. Storytelling where drama is enacted in the advertisement is also used as are aesthetics (Moriarty, 1987).
This paper analyzed the Pepsi One Direction advertisement and found out that ethos, pathos, and logos were used throughout the advertisement. Repetition, jingles are some of the verbal styles used while visual appeal is enhanced by use of literal and metaphorical allusions.
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