The Future Of Advertising

Dyer (2009) defines the characteristic of communication as "its diversity - it ranges from the mass media and pop-culture, through language to individual and social behaviour". Advertisements influence our thoughts, feelings and lives. 

Controversial Advertising - Overstepping The Mark?

Controversial advertising - a controversial topic. When done for good, it's perfectly acceptable but sometimes it's done purely to make a scene. Take United Colors of Benetton  and in particular, the image above - this may cause offence to those still stuck in the dark ages but it certainly makes you sit up and pay attention, right?

Stereotypes In Advertising - Where Is The Line?

A little while back PepsiCo came under some fire in regards to an advert they released for Mountain Dew. This didn't make the rounds on social media as I expected it to. I only found out about it through my mother as evidently it did make some waves in Bermuda. 

The Proper Use of the Infamous Hashtag

Welcome to 2013, or rather, welcome to Generation Y territory. We don't use digital to aid our lives - we LIVE by digital. I'm the worst culprit - I can't sit for two minutes without my FOMO (fear of missing out) kicking in and then I go through my cycle: instagram, twitter, tumblr, facebook and finally, blog stats. I repeat this until there is literally nothing to update myself on. When I wake up in the morning - phone. When I'm going to sleep at night - phone. During the adverts - phone. Honestly, I'm obsessed and I don't know what to do about it.

Anyway, this isn't a therapy session. My point of all that was to preface this post with the statement that in my view, when it comes to social media, I know my stuff. I have also had the pleasure displeasure of noticing some certain behaviours when it comes to the ol' hashtag. 

Photoshopping in Advertising

You may want to grab a cup of tea before reading this because it's a long one with a lot of background issues. 

As a young female who has been through the absolute mill when it comes to self-hatred and body issues this is a subject close to my heart. I've never been naive and always knew the pictures in the magazines are not a true

Tesco Turning Horse Meat Scandal into Lesson - Yay or NEIGH?

Yeah I'm pretty proud of that title so let's just all take a minute to appreciate it...

Appreciated it enough? Good. Let's crack on with the mane point (I can't stop, I'm sorry) of this post. 

So I was in Tesco avoiding talking to humans by using the self-service machines (our generation just do NOT like to interact personally do we...) and I spotted this huge cardboard stand with leaflets:

Excuse the image quality - snapped it quickly and didn't want to look odd taking photos in Tesco. 

Semiotics in Advertising

I will start with the definition of semiotics, though it is not actually a defined system. In simple terms, it is the analysis of meanings and signs within our culture. In the role of advertising, it is more specifically the analysis of meanings in advertisements. 

Beasley and Danesi describe the goal of semiotics in the study of advertising is to unmask the arrays of hidden meanings in the underlying level" (2002). 

Iain McRury defines semiotics as "the attempt to offer insights not just to what ads mean, but proposing how they mean" (2009). 


Umberto Eco (1976) views semiotics as a science in the traditional sense of the word for five reasons:

• it has an autonomous discipline 
• it has a set of standardised methodological tools 
• it has the capability of producing hypotheses
• it affords the possibility of making predictions
• its findings may lead to the modification of the actual state of the objective world.

In advertising, semiotics allow advertisers to identify the target market - it mostly plays on common references and cultural knowledge etc. 

Let's take a look at the latest advert from Flash celebrating their fifty years: