Possible Topics for an Advertising Essay
Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010Advertising essays can be really challenging
Sooner or later, all students who are taking Advertising and Graphic Arts programmes will probably be requested to write an advertising essay as part of their coursework. Writing the essay demonstrate their examiners that they fully understand their field and they are ready to start a professional life in their career.
As advertising is omnipresent in today’s modern world. That is why writing advertising essays sounds as an easy task, until you start to think: “ok, but where shall I begin?”. There are so many possible things to say about this particular field! First of all: don’t freak out. Writing about advertising can be fun and interesting, and it won’t be difficult as long as you choose your topic right. Here are some tips.
Defining the field
First of all, are you sure you know what are you going to write about? What exactly is advertising? Advertising essays should begin with a definition of the concept, which will place the reader in the field. Lets define advertising, then, as a non-personal way of communication that has a specific purpose: to persuade the audience to take some action (whether to buy a certain product or service, or to adopt an ideal). Advertising is focused on demonstrating how the specific product, service or idea can improve the consumer’s life. The origin of modern advertising was the rise of mass production during in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and it has increased significantly with mass media (radio, television, news programs, internet, newspapers and magazines).
Not all advertising is commercial, since it can also serve to communicate an idea to a huge amount of people, try to convince them to take a specific action, such as encouraging tolerance or good manners. There are also non-commercial advertisers in politics, religion and government. All of them use rhetorical resources designed for persuading others.
Some possible topics
Since it is such a vast field, the first thing you are supposed to do is to pick a topic which is not so broad, since it will require you to deal with too much information for just one essay. The problem is, when trying to respect a certain word count, a broad topic tends to be quite superficial: you can say many things about advertising in general, but everything you write will be at a very basic level.
The answer is narrowing your topic: that is, choosing to deal with only a part of it. For example, you may write your advertising essay
focusing on the advertising industry. Did you know, for example, that in 2007, spending on advertising was estimated at more than $385 billion dollars worldwide? You can also write about how advertising rules the fashion, the decisions of consumers and their practices, even when they don’t get them to buy a specific brand or product. The influence of advertising in young children is another good idea if you are willing to write a critical essay. Finally, focusing on a specific advertising campaign (especially if it was developed in many different media) is another topic you may choose.
