Advertising/ Audience- Tide

Question 1

What is the Target Audience of the Tide Advert?

Answer 1

• 1950s American women - main image (brand ambassador).
• Increasingly affluent lower middle class - post-war consumer boom (desirable domestic technologies).
• Newly married with young families (the excitement of caring for the home and making the family/ spouse happy).
• The ‘happy house wife’ - constructed audience.
• Female ‘Aspirer’ - aspirational ‘ideal’ image of the home and the ‘perfect’ housewife.

Question 2

What Targeting Techniques does the Tide advert use?

Answer 2

• Hyped, repetitive claims.
• Weasel words (such as “helps” “fights” and “virtually” which suggest a positive outcome without actually making a guarantee.
• Imperatives.
• Aspirational housewife as domestic ‘expert’/ brand ambassador (endorsement).
• Pathos which evoke an emotional response in the consumer which is associated with buying the product (e.g. a perfect family, happiness, romance).
• Visual Solutions.
• Patriotic References- American Dream, Red, White and Blue colours.
• Informal Lexis.
• Indirect mode of address.
• Superlatives.
• Bandwagon (convinces the consumer that others are using the product, and that they will be left out or inadequate if they do not use/ buy the product). In this case they are trying to make the consumer believe that ALL women are using Tide.
• Intertextuality (glamorous dress codes) and links to the 50s idols: Rita Hayworth etc.
• Personal Pronouns e.g. ‘your wash’.
• Hyperbole.

Question 3

What are different Audience responses/ interpretations of the Tide advert?

Answer 3

Preferred Reading- Tide provides solutions to domestic chore needs and will provide social status, help you to achieve ideal femininity- it’s what ‘women’ want or should want.

Oppositional Responses/ Readings- Readers may not see the woman as a role model or do not accept the patriarchal discourse e.g. “no wonder you women…”, particularly after the changes to women’s roles during WWII.