Introducing Carmex Healing Lotion and Cream

When looking for an ad for this assignment, I decided to browse "Women's Health." Not only is "Women's Health" one of my favorite magazines, but also I thought that it would be relevant to the assignment. "Women's Health" is targeted to women in their twenties and older. It focuses on teaching women how to be healthy physically and mentally. There are articles on eating healthy, exercising, fashion, and romance. In fact, there were several ads that I could have picked from just the one addition of the magazine I was reading. I decided, however, to pick an ad for Carmex Healing Cream and Lotion. Something about the bright colors, butterflies, and sunflowers, made it stand out to me.

The slogan on the ad is "What keeps your lips healthy now makes your skin happy." Looking closer at the ad, it has two pictures of the bottles, and a small paragraph of more information about the benefits of the new product. At the bottom of the page, it says, "www.mycarmex.com" in a bold font, providing the viewer with a means to obtain further information.
The purpose of the ad is clearly to convince viewers to purchase Carmex Healing Lotion and Carmex Healing Cream. The main argument is that, if you have dry skin, Carmex products can significantly help, and therefore make you happy. The ad appeals to logos by making the claim that if you have dry skin, lotion and cream would help. This is very straight forward, and so it is very convincing. The ad appeals to ethos by referring to Carmex Lip Balm. It attempts to make the new Carmex products credible, since the already established products are credible. Further, the ad establishes credibility with blurbs like "Aloe," "Vitamin E," and "9 Healing Ingredients" on the lotion bottles. With information like this on the label, people are more likely to think that the product will work.

The ad appeals to pathos in many ways. Firstly, with yellow as the predominant color, it visually caught my eye more than any other ad in the magazine. Its display of butterflies and sunflowers seems to invoke feelings of happiness and warmth. The ad also uses words like "happy" and "healthy" to make it even more positive. Further, the ad mentions that the lotion is "Non-greasy" and has a "Pleasant scent." In case the ad needs more persuasion, the ad uses very convincing language. The Carmex Lotion is "developed to help heal, soothe, and moisturize your driest skin" without any "greasy feel." It ends with a very forceful rhetorical question, "What could make a body happier?"

I would argue that the ad is intended specifically for women. Since the ad was originally in "Women's Health" magazine, and it is decorated with sunflowers, it seems more likely that a woman would pick it up before a man. Regardless of being in "Women's Health," the product just seems more appealing to women than men. I would also argue that the ad does an excellent job reaching its targeted audience. Many women are sure to see it in "Women's Health" Magazine. Additionally, the bright colors are sure to grab women's attention, just as they grabbed mine.