Personification in Advertising: A Rhetorical Analysis of Digital Video Ads in the Insurance Industry
Degree Name
MA (Master of Arts)
Program
Brand and Media Strategy
Date of Award
5-2021
Committee Chair or Co-Chairs
Anthony Chase Mitchell
Committee Members
Robert Andrew Dunn, Susan Waters
Abstract
Major companies in the insurance industry—notably Allstate, Progressive, and Farmers—often employ personification as a creative rhetorical tool in digital video advertisements. By leveraging brand characters in various ways, these companies seek to establish trust and engender emotional impact in customers. Allstate ascribes destructive characteristics that are associated with house cats to its Mayhem character; in doing so they evoke the desired emotional responses of humor and fear. Progressive creates and deploys the Motaur character, a visual personification and play on the Centaur; in this case, the company’s rhetorical strategy is to evoke humor and nostalgia that resonate with motorcycle owners. Farmers’ strategy is to win customers by demonstrating experience and empathy; they do so with the Professor Burke character, whose professorial ethos functions to evoke feelings of trust. I employ the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) in my analysis to explore the relationships between personification, emotional appeals, and persuasion.
Document Type
Thesis - unrestricted
Recommended Citation
Kpedor, Dorm, "Personification in Advertising: A Rhetorical Analysis of Digital Video Ads in the Insurance Industry" (2021). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. Paper 3894. https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/3894
Copyright
Copyright by the authors.
Included in
Advertising and Promotion Management Commons, Marketing Commons, Other Rhetoric and Composition Commons, Rhetoric Commons, Strategic Management Policy Commons, Visual Studies Commons