Super Bowl XLIV and emotional appeal

John Legend once wrote,“One thing you can't hide - is when you're crippled inside.” In todays society we see that emotional appeal plays as a key element in regards to advertising for large corporations. This year in Super bowl XLIV, the use of emotions was conveyed in several commercials in order to reach the audience on a personal level. Each year we see that larger corporations have a tendency of trying to reach the given audience through comedy or some type of humor in order to sell or promote there company or product. However this year was different; this year almost every commercial used emotional touch points in order for the audience to relate with said commercials and corporations.

One company that used, and typically uses this method frequently is Budweiser. Being an infamous American homegrown beer company, Budweiser always tries to reach their audience through emotion. This is generally done through the use narrative story telling. These stories typically involve the notorious Budweiser Clydesdales and a golden retriever puppy that have some relational tie with Budweiser employee.  Throughout each story we that emotions such: happiness, sadness, love, despair, are all used to advertise the brand in a positive light; Budweiser does just that. As a classical American company, who’s demographic typically reaches out to most blue color Americans; they certainly do a fantastic job when it comes the use of emotional appeal, as well as advertisement.

However emotional appeal can be used in negative aspects as well. Nationwide, a highly regarded company, who developed an ad using emotional appeal, had published a commercial titles “Make Safe Happen, which illustrates the importance of keeping our children safe. Although we all know the importance of keeping children safe, I believe Nationwide took a completely wrong approach when it came to publishing their ad. In the commercial Nationwide displays the raw truth behind accidental deaths among adolescence, by showing objects and things that could potentially kill a child. This was completely the wrong approach for Nationwide when it comes to grabbing the viewer’s emotion. By illustrating death, I can understand that it may grab the viewer’s attention, but I do not see how it would attract the viewer to liking or supporting Nationwide. I believe if you want really grab the attention of a viewer, positive emotions are the best alternative.

Overall we see that the use of emotions can be a valuable and intelligent way of a grabbing a viewer’s attention in regards to commercial advertising. This year in Super Bowl XLIV, emotions were both used in positive and negative light by several corporations, but if there were one business that portrayed and used emotions in the correct manor it would have been Budweiser.