The Best or Nothing

The Reading Response 16 helped me to learn how to analyze the advertsing for my research paper.

The article “Visual Rhetoric: Images as Arguments” conducted by Hugo Bedau and Evan Barnets, provides amazing examples of pictures and how they can have an influence on the audience.

I decided to select one of my favorite ads which is Mercedes E class.

The advertising says that the Mercedes-benz brand is a reliable and luxury brand. The image of ad provides the most relevant brand values of safety, leadership, perfection, and innovation.

The message of this advertising is that the safety system of Mercedes is more powerful than Death itself. I can notice non-rational appeal is emotional appeals. For example, deaths on roads climb each year, and is an increasing public concern. Also, the main reason of traffic accidents is inattentiveness. These two pictures are showed in the ad, when "death" himself is sitting next to the driver, and when the driver looks at him without paying attention to the road, before noticing the road construction and coming to a sudden halt. At this moment, the brand tries to introduce the image that safety is the most important for the car, and the Mercedes E class will give you this safety.

Also, I have noticed a crude humor which was used as a message that the driver cheated death - a fate could be not so fortunate with other brands. The "sorry" line at the end makes the audience feel that the driver has a super car from the Mercedes brand, and he knows that he will be always saved. Also, humor helps with retaining information, in this case, the audience, who is the consumer, is more likely to think of the product when he is looking for a new car, or just people are speaking about car safety. The aim to use this humor is to rise the likeability of the Mercedes brand, and in my opinion, it works very well.

Overall, the advertising illustrates that nothing can be better than Mercedes. The keyword of Mercedes brand is "the best or nothing" which is the main goal of the campaign.