Expensive jewelry is usually worn to formal events, not the beach, let alone worn in the ocean. By having this ad take place at the beach, it’s going against the social norm of wearing high end jewelry to important events. This ad is for a jewelry company called H.Stern. Katie Holmes is the main focus of the ad, you notice her before you notice the earrings. She is wearing a pair of large, dangly gold earrings. You can see that she is at the beach, her hair is wet and she probably just stepped out of the water. The ad says, “KATIE HOLMES wears H.STERN.” It’s pretty much saying that if you wear their jewelry you could be like Katie Holmes. At the bottom of the ad it tells you where you could find the jewelry stores: Fifth Avenue, New York; The Shops as Crystals, Las Vegas; Village of Merrick Park, Coral Gables. At the top of the ad in smaller print, it also has the company’s website www.hstern.net, with the smaller print it’s almost as if they didn’t want you to notice it, like they would rather have you go to the store than buy their products online. This ad is neutral colored. The background is a dull blue-gray. Katie Holmes has dark brown hair, gray-brown eye makeup, is wearing a black swimsuit and is wearing the gold earrings.

One persuasion technique used in this as is Celebrities. Katie Holmes is a famous actress and is known by many. By having Katie Holmes in this ad, it is like telling the readers that “If you buy our jewelry, you too could look like Katie Holmes.” Also, when there is a celebrity in the ad, it is showing the readers that the product must be high quality if a celebrity is wearing it. Having celebrities in ads are bad because they can be deceiving and don’t show that everyday people wear that product too. It can be deceiving because maybe that famous person doesn’t like the product, but they are getting paid for the ad so they wear it anyway. People will think, “If she wears that jewelry, she must like it.” Another technique is Beautiful People and again the beautiful person in this ad is Katie Holmes. She is gorgeous and by having her in this ad it is like telling people that if they wear H.Stern jewelry, they can be beautiful too. The beautiful people technique could be a bad because it gives buyers false hope that if they buy it, they can be beautiful too. Wearing and buying expensive jewelry doesn’t increase the buyer’s self esteem or their natural beauty.

This ad leaves out the price of the jewelry. It doesn’t even mention the cost or the name of the earrings that Katie Holmes is wearing. If you go to the website to find the earrings Katie Holmes is wearing, they aren’t even a product in the catalogue. It is bad that the catalogue doesn’t have the pair of earrings that are shown in the ad because it is gives the viewers false hope of H. Stern’s products. If someone sees that pair of gold earrings in the ad, and they want to buy them, they wouldn’t be able because they aren’t in the store’s catalogue. Then after they find out that the store doesn’t have those specific earrings, they would be disappointed with the company, and would either complain or not buy their products. Also, that person could complain and tell their friends about it, and eventually H. Stern could earn a bad name and wouldn’t have as many customers. It is important to include information about the product shown in the ad because after people see the product on Katie Holmes, they will want to go and buy or try on the earrings. However, trying to find the product will be a challenge when you don’t know the name or price of the product. This ad also doesn’t say if it has any stores outside of the USA, so again I went on the website to check and they have locations all over: Russia, Brazil, Argentina, France...etc. It is important to include this information because it shows that you can buy their product anywhere in the world. Also, typically when products are sold in countries all over the world, they are high quality, popular products.

This could be offend feminists and other women because this ad over-sexualizes Katie Holmes. She is wearing a black swimsuit and the strap that is supposed to go over her shoulder is down on her arm. Also, she has a lot of makeup on, which is supposed to make her look more attractive. This ad is oversexualized because she is in a swimsuit, at the beach, when she could have been in a formal dress, which is the usual outfit paired with high end jewelry. Women would be offended because they don’t want to be seen as ‘sexual’ as Katie Holmes in this ad, they just want to wear jewelry and look nice. Overall, this ad could offend many, and doesn’t accurately display how this jewelry should be worn.