Ryan's Marketing Blog

Kristel recently discussed in her blog, Fear Appeals -scaring you to action, about the power of fear appeals to advertising. As I read through her blog, I would say that I strongly agree to the influences of fear appeals to advertising. Every day on my way to school, I run into countless fear appeal advertising in the bus, the train, the train station. Most of which are about cigarette smoking, gambling, sex, and drugs. One particular advertisement that came to mind is a Zazoo condom commerical I saw on Youtube.

This commercial, even though inappropriate, delivers the message well and make viewers think and reflect about the future consequences of not implementing safe sex practices. Its a funny and convincing commercial at the same time. It allows viewers to picture themselves on the character’s shoes and how they would react to such situation. I would therefore agree to Kristel’s point that fear appeals are a great tool to let the audience be aware of certain issues. Despite all the debates about the effectiveness of fear appeal advertising, To design a successful and convincing fear appeal ad, it will all depend on the creativity and the effective use of exaggeration of marketers that will attract and capture the viewers’ attention.