Today, with the development of the technology and the diversity of the mass media, advertising has influenced us pervasively in our daily life. However, whatever the promotive strategies advertising takes, language is the main carrier of message all along, as The Language of Advertising, by Vestergaard & Schroder, says, “Advertising takes many forms, but in most of them language is of crucial importance.” Advertising language is a style of immediate impact and rapid persuasion. The point of an advertisement is to persuade you of the merits of a particular product or service, in order that you will take out some of your money.
Advertising Information
Advertising information is the principal contents an advertisement wants to disseminate. Advertising is a serious of planning action, so the information of advertising should be aimed at the certain target market and consumers, and should avoid aimlessness. The dissemination of information should be accurate, definite, recognizable and moderate in length. An effective advertisement involves not only “what to say”, but also ‘how to say”.
Advertising Media
Media are the means of the dissemination of advertising, including newspaper, magazine, broadcast, TV program, billboard and mail. The newspaper, magazine, broadcast and TV are called the four main media of advertising. Moreover, any kind of objects or tools can be a medium for the advertisement, such as airplane, train, bus, building, neon light, movie, package, exhibition, and etc. Different kinds of media have different features, disseminating area, target audience and speed.
Nonpersonal
Advertising is not aimed at any individual, or by any individual. It’s a nonpersonal transmission of information aiming at the public or a certain group of people. Because of the nonpersonal features of advertising, the dissemination and operation of it should be restricted by the law of a country, the moral standards, psychology, zoology, and environment protection. The information, methods, media, and other components of advertising should abide by the advertising laws, policies and rules, and should be under the supervision of the public.
All of these components are mutual features and essential elements of every advertisement.
The wide use of advertising has created a special style of English—advertising English. Its unique features, simple language and immense attraction separate it from other kind of language. In the development of advertising English, this kind of language has formed its own features in several aspects.
English Morphology in Advertising
As a means to disseminate information, advertising English must be compact, vivid, visual, emotional and attractive. Therefore, morphology in advertising is quite different from common English.
The function of advertising is to provide information, attract consumer, exploit market, and promise the quality. Therefore, advertisement must pay attention to its impelling language, and the first step is to use popular and oral language to make it easy to understand and memorize.
For example:
“I couldn’t believe it, until I tried it!”
“I’m impressed! I’m really impressed!”
“You’ve gotta try it!”
“I love it!”
This is an advertisement of a microwave oven. The words in it are very simple and oral. It uses the slang “gotta”, which means “got to” in American English, to give an impression that this advertisement comes from the real life.
Misspelling and Coinage
In some of advertisements, the advertising copywriter misspells some words on purpose, or adds some suffix or prefix to the common words. Although the new words still keep the original meanings, they are quite different from the original words in spelling, which will make the advertisement more vivid, interesting and attractive.
e.g. We know eggsactly How to sell eggs.
In this advertisement, “eggsactly” is the variation of “exactly”, and echo the word “eggs” at the end of the sentence.
The Orangemostest Drink in the world.
In this drink advertisement, the word “orangemostest” actually is “orange+most+est”. It uses this word to express the high quality and purity of the drink.
The coinage and misspelling are also representing in some phrases, such as:
First of all, because now Yoplait is thicker.
Second of all, because it’s creamier.
Third of all, because it’s still 100% natural and really very good for you.
Fourth of all, because to me Yoplait tastes better than all the other Yoyurts.
And fifth of all, because…well, just because
In this advertisement, the copywriter imitate the phrase “first of all” to create “second of all, third of all, fourth of all…”, which will inspire consumers’ imagination.
In addition, some prefixes or suffixes like “super-”, “ex-”, “-er”, “-est” …etc, are often used to stress the high quality of the product.
Loanwords
The most frequently used loanwords are French and Spanish. For example:
Order it in bottles or in cans.
Perrier…with added je ne sais quoi.
The meaning of “je ne sais quoi” is “I don’t know what”. The purpose to use this simple French is to show the French flavor of this drink. The loanwords in some advertisement are good methods to express the exoticism of the products.
(4). Contraction
Because the advertisement fees are so high that it’s essential to use some contraction to cut short the length, and reduce the cost.
To Let or For Sale
Furnished Edinburgh Court, 426 Argyly st, 2nd floor, 1,630 sqft4 bedrooms with dining and living room, prive garage. Sale at 130,000. Rent 1,400. Tel, 38954 office time or 823748.
This is an advertisement to rent or sell a house. There are many contractions, such as: st=street, sq=square, ft=foot, Tel=telephone.
Use of verbs
Although the ultimate purpose of advertising is to persuade consumers to buy its products, advertisements seldom use the word “buy” in it. Statistics show only two out of ten advertisements use the verb “buy” directly. On one hand, the advertisers try their best to promote their product; on the other hand, they don’t want to give the consumers a feeling of spending their money. Therefore, the choice of verbs is very careful in advertising.
The most frequently used 20 verbs and phrasal verbs are:
Try, ask, get, take, let, send for, use, call, make, come on, hurry, see, give, come, remember, discover, serve, introduce, choose, and look for.
Examples:
Getting places in the business world is easier if your banker is there to meet you.
--Security Pacific Asian Bank.
We can give you a better view of investment opportunities from both sides of the Pacific.
--City Bank.
Use of Adjectives
The most frequently used adjectives are:
1.new 2. crisp 3. good/better/best 4. fine 5. free 6. big 7. fresh 8. great
9. delicious 10. real 11. full, sure 12. easy, bright 13. clean 14. extra, safe 15.special 16. rich
Use of Compound words
There are lots of compound words in advertisement mainly because the element of compound words could be any part of speech, and has few limits in grammar and word order.
There are many ways to write a headline, and 5 types often appear in written advertisement:
(1). Straightforward headlines
This kind of headlines usually uses interrogative sentences and imperative sentences to arouse readers’ interest.
Ever wander why most guys in pants ads are standing up?
Discover the wonder of your first Dash wash!
(2). News headlines
Pursuing new things is the nature of human beings. People are always interested in finding some new products or improvement of old products. Therefore, news headlines could attract consumers’ attention better.
Introducing Renunt Freshell, The New wave in Air Fresheners.
(3). Information headlines
Example: Datsun saves about a gallon of gasoline a day.
(4). Emotional headlines
Example: Soft shoes for hard world.
(5). Curiosity headlines
Example: Saturday night On Sunday Morning.