Historically, brands have been an insignia, a symbol, to signify a product’s distinction from other similar products. Advertisement and marketing were very direct and sought to showcase their product’s qualities. Although effective, and allowed consumers to have confidence in their investments and the brand associated, simple branding was very static and could not attract a large audience.
Coca-Cola uses emotional branding by associating their company with happiness.
Emotional Branding
That is until the mid 1900’s, when a man named Albert Davis Lasker and his agency, Lord and Thomas, revolutionized advertisement by associating brand and lifestyle. Thanks to him, many companies today use emotional branding to sway consumers into associating their brand with a specific lifestyle or ideal. Nike for example is the “active” brand and dominates the industry of sports and fitness. Apple manifests the ideal of “elegance” or “perfection” and dominates the electronic gadget industry.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
Even more recently, companies have started to target people’s basic psychological needs. Abraham Maslow organized these needs into categories called “Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs“. Not only are these ads and campaigns entertaining to watch, they can affect us emotionally to the extent that we subconsciously entwine that feeling to a specific brand. Aspiring athletes swell with ambition when shown their idols striving to become their best while wearing their sponsored shoe brand. Mothers soften at instinct when shown babies crawling around in their brand name diapers. If you catch my drift, all these ads assume the form of entertainment, which attacks the consumer’s psychological needs, yet subtly reinforces the brands connection to that emotional category. It’s a devious move, yet so effective.
(Here’s an example of strong use of emotional tactics in an ad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtWcE3wguKY)
In the following weeks we will analyze and explore commercials that utilize “Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs” to extend and reinforce their grounds in a particular lifestyle. All of these are very effective ads and may have even played a part in your buying tendencies. 
This is a pretty insightful post, the only thing I wish was different would be more information about Lasker and his company Lord and Thomas. After a quick Google search I found this Ad Age article http://adage.com/article/adage-encyclopedia/lord-thomas/98753/ that talks about the company and its impact on advertising. I never knew that’s where this type of advertising began. I guess you learn something new every day.
I completely agree with this. For me, the most effective of these strategies is humor. Everyone loves the Super Bowl ads because they are funny. The company with the funniest commercial is often the most discussed for the following week. And following what Hannah said, if you mix humor with adorable animals, you automatically have a winner (cue this Budweiser commercial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQB7QRyF4p4).
Very true! Sometimes we don’t even realize what advertisements are trying to do, we just fall for them. Like mothers softening upon watching diaper ads, I’m a sucker for any commercial that features animals. The ASPCA ads always appeal to my childish “I love puppies and cute kittens” soft side… Sometimes, though, these commercials go too far. There is only so much Sarah McLachlan stroking a Golden Retriever I can take before I have to shut off my TV-sometimes because it makes me too upset to watch, but a lot of times it is because the ad gets too cheesy…