Nivea Advertisement Analysis

Advertising is a form of communication that convinces a specific group of people to take action. In advertising terms, the group of people that advertisers use as a target is called audience or consumers. While advertisements can take many forms, the desired result of an advertising campaign is often to convince an audience to either do something or to buy a product or brand by using objectives and strategies to impact consumer thoughts, feeling and actions. In 2011, a Nivea print advertisement that appeared in Septembers issue of Esquire a men's magazine that is published in the U.S. by the Hearst Corporation. The message of the ad is “Re-civilize yourself” and has and has the caption "Look like you give a damn.” The target of this advertisement

The company has been well known since the company has been created until they published the lack of diversity advertisement. Nivea has created a series of print ads for its Revitalizing line of men's skincare that feature well-groomed men tossing away masks of their un clean, pre-Nivea faces. The advertisement “Re-Civilize Yourself” features a neatly dressed, clean shaven (i. e. a preppy American-African style) black male gripping an afro-clad and heavily bearded dismembered head with an pissed off expression of his former self. The male leans back poised to throw the head, with a caption reading “Look like you give a damn…Re-Civilize Yourself”. Not surprisingly, many who saw the ad saw it as playing into the old stereotype of African American men as uncivilized and savage, and presenting Afros as inherently wild and unattractive. The advertisement indicate that this African American male was originally in a mess, uncivilized, and did not look like he care about his look so if he used the shaving-related products that are on the right side of the advertisement, the ad shows that these products are responsible into turning him into a well looking man with a new look but is this really Nivea’s

"Look Like You Give a Damn” is on the upper right hand side of left portion of the ad and its the next most noticeable text. Nivea meant that it tells the viewer that if they are not groomed, they don't "give a damn” or care about their appearance. The implicit meanings on the advertisements were the Mask's afro, it is a symbol of black pride and resistance to the beauty standards that privileged whites had. Whereas the intention of the Producer was to try and demonstrate the transformation their product can offer. Therefore; With an african american male representing their slogan “re-civilize yourself”, they are proving that even minorities can become civilized, well-groomed human beings

The advertisement was been created for every man who uses Nivea shaving products which is mostly everyone but since Nivea used a black male, African Americans became the ad's main focus. The creator of this ad used mostly the same color, shades of blue, gray, and white with minimal yellow tone