The ad I am analyzing today is for the weight loss supplement, Lipozene.  It features actress Holly Robinson Peete and her husband Rodney Peete, a former NFL quarterback.  The ad opens up with Rodney at a doctor’s appointment, where he is told he needs to lose weight before knee surgery.  Thus, the couple turns to the weight loss supplement Lipozene, and our story begins.

Throughout the ad, they are very adamant about the fact that the supplement will help you lose 4x more weight.  Big bars of text pop up on the screen, highlighting that you will lose “4x more weight,” and it is certainly visually stimulating.  However, I’m left wondering what you would lose 4x more weight than.  Is there an alternative supplement that you could take that would result in 4x less weight loss?  Is there an alternative diet plan or cleanse that they are comparing their statistic to?  We are left with these questions after watching the ad and thus don’t exactly know what outcome using the supplement will have.  

They really do appeal to your emotions, however, in this ad, promising that you don’t need to change your lifestyle at all while using this supplement.  There are “no cleanses” and “no bootcamps,” just the supplement.  Holly tells us that she has already lost 10 lbs and has “more stamina” and “more energy,” while Rodney continues to make it seem desirable saying he has already lost 30 lbs and dropped 4 pants sizes.  If we overlook the fact that they don’t tell us what they are comparing the supplement to, it may seem tempting to use.  However, looking at the logical side of things reveals that they don’t give enough information to truly understand the effects of this supplement.  We would need to do more research on the supplement in order to understand its effects, and thus the ad doesn’t really succeed in selling the product.

Finally, they give off the false impression of appealing to logic by having Dr. Julius Woythaler, MD come in and speak about the supplement.  He talks about a clinical study where people were asked to not change their lifestyle and just add Lipozene.  He really drives home the buzz phrase by saying, “as a result they lost not just twice the weight, not three times, but 4x more weight just by adding Lipozene!” Again, I was left wondering, 4x more weight than what?