VERBAL AND VISUAL MESSAGES IN COCA – COLA ADVERTISEMENT
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VERBAL AND VISUAL MESSAGES
IN COCA – COLA ADVERTISEMENT
By
WAYAN GALANG PASUPATI
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
FACULTY OF LETTERS UDAYANA UNIVERSITY
Abstrak
Iklan Coca – Cola di masyarakat maupun di kehidupan sehari – hari memiliki kalimat dan gambar yang menarik, bermakna dan tentu saja memiliki fungsi untuk mengajak calon pembeli membaca semua informasi yang ada di iklan tersebut. Berdasarkan analisis di penelitian ini kita mendapatkan beberapa fungsi dari iklan diantaranya: sebuah iklan harus memiliki kalimat dan gambar yang menarik untuk menarik minat pembaca dan menyampaikan pesan yang ada pada iklan tersebut kepada pembaca. Sebuah iklan juga harus memilih kalimat yang tepat dan gambar yg mudah diingat agar pembaca mendapatkan pesan ataupun makna dari iklan tersebut.
Kata kunci: iklan, Coca – Cola, fungsi
Generally, advertisement is a message or information that has a purpose to inform the society about the advertisers’ products and services and the advertising is an activity to market the products and services through certain media with message and information. In the printed advertisement like Coca – Cola advertisement, the advertiser attracts the costumer’s attention by the attractive messages and convinces them by the visualization of the products. In general, the characteristic of the picture in the advertisement usually uses someone and something famous to attract the attention and the characteristic of the text and language of the advertisement is clear and easier to understand by the readers because the advertisers certainly wants to introduce their product efficiently and send message to the customers to posses the product.
Coca – Cola advertisements have attractive verbal and visual signs which were chosen to be the data of this study. The readers have to know what are the meanings and functions of the
signs in the advertisement. This phenomenon makes Coca – Cola advertisement interesting to analyze because of its interesting visual signs and various set of wordings. There are a lot of Coca – Cola advertisements in our daily life. The data in this study were chosen four Coca – Cola advertisements because they are related to their verbal and visual signs that support this study.
Based on the background above, the problems formulated in this study are:
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a. What kind of the verbal and visual signs were found in each Coca – Cola advertisement?
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b. What were the meanings and functions of the verbal and visual signs in Coca – Cola advertisements?
There are also specific aims that want to be reached through this study:
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1. To analyze and describe the verbal and visual signs found in each Coca - Cola advertisement.
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2. To determine the meanings and functions of the signs in Coca – Cola advertisement.
The data were taken from Coca – Cola advertisements on the internet because it is easy to find the compatible data for this study and there are some websites that have plenty choices of attractive verbal and visual signs in Coca – Cola advertisements that support this study. Some websites used as the sources of data of this study were: http://www.mymarklab.com/home/the-hilltop-commercial/, http://stuffpoint.com/coke/image/43167/classic-coca-cola-ad-picture/, http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/coke-ads-1950s
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/copy-of-a-1925-coca-cola-ad-walter-colvin.html
The data were taken through the following steps: the advertisements were searched from some websites that supported this study. Searching the data on the internet was done by observing the verbal signs from the texts in the advertisements and observing the visual signs from the background, images, etc. Then the advertisements were accurately read to find unnecessary data for this study. The unnecessary data were eliminated and the data that filled the requirements were chosen as the data for this study.
The collected data were intensively studied and analyzed based on the theory of meaning by Leech and theory of signs by Chandler (2001).
Qualitative method is a field of inquiry that is related subject matters of the study. The analysis is focused on two basic issues, as follows:
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1. The data were analyzed and described based on the verbal and visual signs to find out the messages of the signs in the advertisements based on theory of signs proposed by Chandler (2001).
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2. The meanings and functions of the signs in each Coca – Cola advertisement were analyzed using the theory of meaning by Leech.
The advertisements were taken from the internet. This is an advertisement of Coca – Cola advertisement “I’d like to buy the world a coke”.
Verbal and Visual Signs Presented in Advertisement 1
Verbal Sign
The verbal signs and the component of the advertisement can be seen through the table below:
|
COMPONENTS |
SIGNS | |
|
SIGNIFIER |
SIGNIFIED CONCEPTS | |
|
HEADLINE |
I’d like to buy the world a coke |
The advertiser persuades the entire of society in the world to buy and enjoy coke together. |
|
BODY COPY |
I’d like to teach the world to sing (in perfect harmony) |
This sentence shares the happiness to everyone in the world by owning the Coca – Cola as one of the most perfect products in the market area. |
|
What have they done to my song, ma? Nickel song |
Giving a question that emphasizes the competitor to perpetrate bad thing to Coca – Cola product | |
|
The new seekers |
The latest people who felt fanfare by enjoying coke and the customers who felt sophisticated with this product. This product is suitable for everyone | |
|
SIGNATURE LINE (Logo) |
Coca – Cola |
The brand name of the product in the advertisement |
|
Philips |
The other brand of a company that supports this advertisement | |
|
Fanfare |
It represents the slogan of the product and describes the sensational feeling of the people who have enjoyed coke. This slogan also has function to shout the product to the prospective customer to buy and feel the sensation by possess the product | |
Discussion
The relationship of the signifier and the signified in the verbal signs of the advertisement 1 can be seen through the explanation below:
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1. There is a sentence in the headline of the advertisement 1. The sentence “I’d like to buy the world a coke”. This sentence is placed on the top with white color. It signifies through this sentence the advertiser wants to invite the whole of society in the world
to buy and posses Coca – Cola product. The advertiser assumes the people who bought the product and spent togetherness with family or somebody who would be complete and enjoyable by drinking coke together. It means the product can increase the people’s feeling of togetherness each other, there is no diversification about youth or old, man or woman, all of the people feel the same of togetherness when use the product.
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2. The body copy in the advertisement 1 consists of several sentences. It is placed in the middle of the advertisement. The sentences are: “I’d like to teach the world to sing (in perfect harmony). What have done to my song, ma? Nickel song. The new seekers”. The sentences explain about promotional of Coca – Cola which promote and introduce the product of Coca - Cola and share the happiness to everyone in the world through this product. Those sentences above also invite and suggest the people to buy the product because the product as one of the perfect products in the market area. The people who will buy the product are convinced by the advertiser that they will feel sophisticated with the product because suitable for everyone in the entire of world. The advertiser also asks why the competitor have done bad thing to Cola – Cola product.
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3. Signature Line (logo) “Coca – Cola” is placed on the bottom of the advertisement and the words are written with white color and red background. Coca – Cola refers the brand name of the product in the advertisement, through this brand name the product is increasing tremendously. Nowadays, it becomes one of the most famous brands in the world. The logo “Philips” is placed on the right top of the advertisement. It shows there is brand of other company supporting the product of Coca – Cola in this advertisement. Word “Fanfare” is placed on the bottom of advertisement beside the logo of Coca – Cola. It represents the slogan of the product. In this advertisement, the slogan invites the prospective customers to feel the sensation of the product. The word “Fanfare” above is creative word choice from this Coca – Cola advertisement because this word can deliver directly sensational feeling when using the product to heart and mind of the readers and influence the readers’ desire to buy and use the product.
Visual sign in this advertisement is quite simple only which consists of a group of people that appear in the advertisement. The visual sign in the advertisement can be seen through the table below:
|
COMPONENTS |
SIGNS | |
|
SIGNIFIER |
SIGNIFIED CONCEPTS | |
|
ILLUSTRATION |
A group of people who smile and share happiness |
Representing the people who have enjoyed Coca – Cola in reality. The people shares refreshes and happiness to the reader through this advertisement. |
Discussion
In advertisement 1, there is a group of people who embraced each other and shared happiness. The group of people is a British-based pop group formed in 1969 called “The New Seekers” as model in this advertisement. There are three men and two women in the advertisement, the men and women at left side and right side embraced each other then the man in the middle just smiled and shared agreeable expression. In advertisement 1, the image of the models show smile in togetherness and share happiness to the reader of this advertisement. The customer who bought Coca – Cola will feel freshness and happiness as the same as the models’. Coca – Cola campaign through the models also tried to persuade the reader to possess the product of Coca – Cola and give influence to market area by offering freshness and happiness showing in the advertisement 1. There is simple background found with red color that represents the main and primary color of Coca – Cola advertisement.
The kind of verbal and visual signs in Coca – Cola advertisements was similar to commercial advertisement because the purpose were the same to influence the readers to buy the product. The words in the advertisement such as get, try, serve were used to persuade the readers to buy the product of Coca – Cola. There were also the meaning and function of the verbal and visual signs in Coca – Cola advertisements drag the readers to understand the advertiser’s aim in each verbal and visual sign is delivered by the advertiser to the readers. The main aim of the
meaning and function of Coca – Cola advertisement was to attract the readers’ desire to use the product and influence their mind and behavior to buy and posses the product.
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