Advertisement Redesign Reflection

Going into the assignment, I thought that it might be a little difficult to analyze an advertisement and redesign it so thoroughly. Although I thought it may be a challenge, I knew that once I found a good advertisement to analyze I would be able to tackle the assignment. I chose this ad because I knew that it would be very easy to redesign for a new audience. I started off looking in Seventeen Magazine for advertisements and found myself having a difficult time thinking about who my new intended audience would be because all of the ads were very generic and girly. So I found an advertisement in Food Network Magazine for trips to Puerto Rico that would be easy to completely transform. 

For the redesign, I started off with a picture in my head of what the new advertisement would kind of look like. Then, I took apart the original ad and decided what I wanted to keep the same and what I would what to do differently for the new intended audience. I kept the format and color scheme the same. Since the original intended audience for my ad was couples in their 30’s I switched up the pictures to be off families. I also reworded the description of the ad that was below the pictures to be geared more towards families with young children. Overall, the actual redesign for a new audience came along pretty easily.

While writing the essay, I came across a few challenges. I had a little trouble expanding my essay when I tried making it a little longer so I added more detail to the redesign and also went into more depth of the analysis. Adding more details to each aspect of the paper helped a lot. I also had a little trouble citing my paper, so I went to the OWL site and it helped me a lot. For this essay, I went to the writing center for the first time. Everyone there was so nice and helpful. I sat down with Ashley, one of the students that help, and she read my paper aloud and she helped me to make any necessary changes that I missed. After that my paper sounded ten times better; this was especially beneficial to me because I didn’t have my draft for the peer review. I would definitely recommend this to anyone, even if you’re a good writer. Going to the writing center generally helped me with any challenges I had. 

I really enjoyed doing the actual redesign. Being able to actually transform and express my ideas into a new real ad was very cool. The fact that it was extra credit was just a plus. Once I actually redesigned the ad physically, I was able to add more detail to the paper because I could see everything that I had done differently. I also liked that we got to choose our own ad and the new audience. Being able to choose what I was going to redesign made it more comfortable and easier for me rather than picking from a couple.

I definitely have a better understanding of the media and how they use rhetorical appeals to target a specific audience after writing this essay. Knowing this will help me as a consumer and as a writer in how I can appeal more to a specific intended audience and write with a purpose, which are the two most important things to consider.

Honestly, I wouldn’t change a thing if I got to do this assignment again. I put 110% into it and I don’t think I could make it any better.