Sports Illustrated publishes monthly magazines giving readers updates, interviews, and articles in the sports world. Those who subscribe to Sports Illustrated are interested in all types of sports, as well as the fitness and health scene. Their target audience lands primarily on males, in the middle to upper level of economic status. The magazine leans toward younger men, with many falling in the age range of 18-34. In the Stauer SMART watch advertisement, Stauer combines graphics with informational text to promote their product, but also give readers the idea that using their watch will lead to a healthier lifestyle.
Stauer paid for a full page advertisement in the April 2020 edition of Sports Illustrated to promote their product SMART, which was offered at a discounted price, yet still has the same features as a high end smartwatch. A little over $100,000 was spent to put their ad in Sports Illustrated, so the one question to ask is, “Why?”. Before I look at the effectiveness of Stauer’s advertisement, it’s important to analyze whether Sports Illustrated is a good magazine to place their ad. Given the healthy, fit lifestyle readers likely aspire to live by, Stauer SMART meets the needs to enhancing one’s athletic goals. As the advertisement displays, SMART can monitor heart rate, blood pressure, count your steps, and track calories burned. Stauer also heavily advertises the price of their smartwatch, which is just $99 through their discount code. Although these readers are financially stable, considering Sports Illustrated has a large number of readers who are younger, a cheaper watch will draw attention. The original price of the watch is $299, but Stauer includes a discount code on this advertisement, making readers navigate to the website or call the phone number on the page. To add another layer on this, Stauer has a satisfaction guaranteed or money back in a 30 day window after purchase, which is another incentive for readers to take a shot on their watch since it’s risk free. Taking the passion for health and well being along with the cheap price of the SMART watch, Sports Illustrated’s audience will likely be intrigued by Stauer’s watch.
The type of advertisement Stauer uses is an informational ad, and since this is in a printed magazine, much of the page is occupied by text. The phrase “Smarten up” headlines a few paragraphs of information describing the features of the SMART watch. Stauer uses multiple catchphrases on this ad that go along with their product, hoping it will grab the reader’s attention. Under these paragraphs, there is a bulleted list of features of the watch, and these are bolded to really emphasize what Stauer wants readers to see. There’s a ton of words on this page, and they know the people might not look at everything. Stauer bolds the bullet points to draw eyes, as this section provides the strongest features of the watch and intrigue readers to look deeper into the ad. Given the younger demographic of Sports Illustrated, Stauer realizes they are more tech savvy, so the ad contains bullet points mentioning the Bluetooth compatibility and receiving text and email notifications from the watch.
I was once a Sports Illustrated subscriber, and I tend to follow the patterns of the magazine’s audience. If I was flipping through this magazine and came across this ad, I have never heard of Stauer, so I would look for credibility. Stauer appeals to ethos by including their A+ rating by the Better Business Bureau as well as a Consumer Affairs Accredited graphic. In doing this, Stauer lets the readers know this watch isn’t a scam, and builds trust with the potential buyers. This advertisements relies on logistics because all the facts and features of this watch are on display. Ethos and logos go hand in hand here, because knowing Stauer is a credible company, we can assume all of the SMART watch features shown on the ad appear on the actual watch as well.
The two graphics that fill up the page are noteworthy because neither contains a model. I would be interested in seeing who Stauer would choose to model their watch, but they simply put a picture of the watch and a graphic of features instead. The first detail that caught my eye is the date on the watch – January 1, 2000. This is a standard date, as it marks the first day of the new century, but I don’t think it makes sense to be in this advertisement. First off, Stauer wasn’t even around in 2000, nor were smartwatches a thing. It is completely unrealistic that this watch could have this date on here, which raises the question, “Why would Stauer choose this day?”. One possibility could be it’s a pleasurable date to look, but if that was the case the time displayed shouldn’t be 2:49. It’s an odd time to look at, because if they were following this satisfying to the eye pattern, I would think the time should be noon or at least the top of an hour. Stauer noticed January 1, 2000 was on a Saturday, so they made the date on the watch Saturday, which at least keeps things consistent.
Another piece I looked at are the heart rates on both of the graphics. On the watch, the BPM of this person is 000, which can mean two things. Obviously having a heart rate of zero means you are dead, but maybe the watch wasn’t picking up a heart rate because no one was wearing it. This is likely the reason because we can’t see a wrist in the picture, but the other features such as number of steps are being tracked, which doesn’t make sense. If the other icons on this watch said zero, readers would be less likely to question if the owner of this watch is dead. The other, less likely possibility is Stauer is going back to the satisfying look of the watch, which would go along with the date displayed. I don’t think this is the case because the other numbers would be zeros as well. Shifting to the heart rate on the bottom graphic, this one says 069 BPM. 069 falls in the average heart rate range of 60-100 BPM, but I believe this number wasn’t chosen at random. Given the sexual meaning behind the number 69, Stauer is looking to appeal to younger readers of Sports Illustrated who find 69 to be a comedic number. They are using the pathos appeal trying to humor the audience with this graphic.
My final piece of analysis is the time this advertisement was published. This ad was featured on the April 2020 edition of Sports Illustrated, right around the start of the pandemic. During quarantine, people looked to start up or continue a fitness journey, and this smartwatch provides the needs to assist someone in their exercise. This edition was likely created around the time of the day the world shut down, and Stauer definitely benefitted from the time of publication.
Stauer placed this advertisement in a Sports Illustrated magazine to reach an audience looking to embark on a fitness journey. Although they promote all the features and low priced SMART watch, they are really saying that using this watch will lead to a healthier lifestyle, which is what any person would want. All the additional features the watch has are just add-ons, but Stauer’s main goal with this smartwatch is to help people who use their product become a more fit person, and guide the user in accomplishing the goals they set for themselves.