Gender plays a vital role in the representation of the familiar, the desirable and the “real” in popular media culture. As an integral part of this culture, the world of advertising plugs into gender representations in particular and often very interesting ways in order to locate its products within the world as perceived by its intended viewers.
Several famous Hollywood actresses and performers have been seen on many magazine covers displaying their nipples and cleavages. Breast exposures by famous women have been used to get people's attention and ultimately, to persuade them to buy their product.
The breast is by far the most predominant sales tool, and everyone from men's magazines to women's magazines to ad agencies and clothes manufacturers are trying to sell their products using cleavage, referring to a woman's breast.
In the magazine advertisements in which I carried out a content analysis research study, seventeen out of twenty males had there feet firmly planted on the ground as compared to women who only registered eight out of twenty. Females tend to show approximately 40% more of their bodies excluding their face, hands and neck. The results in which I found not very surprising, men approximately expose 8.45% of their bodies and women approximately expose 42.25% of their bodies. These typical ads get, you might say, right to the point. The ads in which I gathered my information from portrayed women’s bodies exclusively as ‘slimmed down’. Men’s bodies tended to lean more towards the ‘bulked-up’ appearance but there were a lot of ‘slimmed down’ shapes as well.
Note that in all the ads described, there is no indication that the women are anything but beautiful (i.e., sexually desirable) and become receptive because the men are drinking a particular beer. They don't speak, nor show any particular signs of money, position, power or intellect -- they are simply beautiful.
The sexual connection is much easier to set up for men than for women. Men seem to have always had minimal criteria for sexual desire; basically, they are concerned with a woman's anatomy – so, as long as a woman looks young enough and healthy, she is deemed desirable.
To conclude, if you give your customers relevant information, ideas that inspire them and solutions to their problems, you will empower them and help them to determine their choice of products and services. This also provides compelling reasons for them to value their relationship with you. Relevance is vital. To be relevant we have to understand customers' needs and communicate in a way that is appropriate for the marketing-literate consumer. Changes in advertising are, of course, always changing as society changes.
