Anchorage in tropes of print advertisements (Case Study: Clio-award print advertisements (2007-2016))

Literary devices are widely used in advertisements. Ad designers use schemes to give external beauty to images and words, and use tropes to embellish the meanings and message of a picture or text. Based on the literary definition, tropes are more difficult to comprehend than schemes. Marketing researchers adopt this classification. According to them, tropes will lead to positive results such as ad liking, increased persuasion, and ad memorability, provided that the audience comprehends them successfully. Failure to interpret tropes results in negative attitudes towards the ad. Graphic designers, such as poets and writers who use tropes in their works, provide their audience clues to help them interpret. So, they can benefit from tropes’ positive effects on ad receivers and skip the negative effects of miscomprehension. These clues, called anchors, are classified into two general categories of written and visual without determining their subgroups. Furthermore, anchors have been studied in relation to tropes to assess the target audiences’ response. Whereas, in everyday ads, anchors are not only related to tropes. The unanswered question is, what are the subgroups of written and visual anchors? And to which ad components are they related? This study aims to identify the subgroups of written and visual anchors used in trope print advertisements and specify their relation to other advertisement components. The necessity of this research is to provide a ground for studying anchorage with more precision and attention in print advertisement tropes so that generalization will be limited in the results, and consequently designers can use the results of such research with greater assurance.      In this research, we used content analysis method through a qualitative approach. Sampling was done through a purposive or judgmental technique. The sample size includes 783 Clive Award print ads from 2007-2016, downloaded from the official Clio Award website (http://clios.com/awards). These ads were selected as samples, because participating ads in this award have an acceptable level of creativity and the application of literary devices in ads is one of their common methods. The content analysis method identified tropes of this collection and the methods to reduce their difficulty/complexity (anchors). These anchors, commonly divided into two categories of visual and written anchors, are of seven types: 1. descriptive text, 2. logo, 3. product image, 4. slogan, 5. brand name, 6. descriptive image, and 7. product description. The frequency of each seven types of anchors and the average of both written and visual categories were calculated.      Structurally, four out of the seven identified anchors were written, and three were visual. All anchors were related to the brand except descriptive text and descriptive image (related to trope). The descriptive text had the highest frequency (40.9%). After that, the logo (39.6%) and the product image (16.3%) had the highest frequency. The lowest frequency belonged to brand name (4.5%) and product image (3.3%). The average frequency of visual anchors (20.2%) was higher than that of written anchors (14.3%). The average frequency of ad component related anchors was also calculated. Anchors related to tropes (22.7%) had a higher average frequency than anchors related to the product/brand (14.5%).      To answer the question, what the subcategories of written and visual anchors are, this paper aims to identify subgroups of written and visual anchors and determines their relation to ad components. Results identified four subgroups for written anchors (descriptive text, slogan, brand name, and product description), and three subgroups for visual anchors (logo, product image, and descriptive image). Therefore, there are seven types of anchors. However, the previous research has put them into two generic categories of written and visual, without specifying them, or they only studied one subgroup of written anchors (descriptive text). The average frequency of visual anchors (%20.2) was higher than written ones (%14.3). Although the text can lead the audience to the intended meaning of an ad, ad designers have served this purpose by using visual anchors, perhaps due to their triple advantages of comprehensibility, effectiveness, and imaginativeness.      The other question was, to what ad components these anchors are related? Among all identified anchors, only descriptive text (written) and descriptive image (visual) were related to the product/brand. Although the number of product-related anchors was higher, their average frequency (14.5%) was lower than the trope-related anchors (22.7%). This indicates the designers' emphasis on making the tropes more comprehensible to avoid the adverse effects on the ad's attitudes. These ads were selected as samples, because participating ads in this award have an acceptable level of creativity and the application of literary devices in ads is one of their common methods. The content analysis method identified tropes of this collection and the methods to reduce their difficulty/complexity (anchors). These anchors, commonly divided into two categories of visual and written anchors, are of seven types: 1. descriptive text, 2. logo, 3. product image, 4. slogan, 5. brand name, 6. descriptive image, and 7. product description. The frequency of each seven types of anchors and the average of both written and visual categories were calculated.      Structurally, four out of the seven identified anchors were written, and three were visual. All anchors were related to the brand except descriptive text and descriptive image (related to trope). The descriptive text had the highest frequency (40.9%). After that, the logo (39.6%) and the product image (16.3%) had the highest frequency. The lowest frequency belonged to brand name (4.5%) and product image (3.3%). The average frequency of visual anchors (20.2%) was higher than that of written anchors (14.3%). The average frequency of ad component related anchors was also calculated. Anchors related to tropes (22.7%) had a higher average frequency than anchors related to the product/brand (14.5%).      To answer the question, what the subcategories of written and visual anchors are, this paper aims to identify subgroups of written and visual anchors and determines their relation to ad components. Results identified four subgroups for written anchors (descriptive text, slogan, brand name, and product description), and three subgroups for visual anchors (logo, product image, and descriptive image). Therefore, there are seven types of anchors. However, the previous research has put them into two generic categories of written and visual, without specifying them, or they only studied one subgroup of written anchors (descriptive text). The average frequency of visual anchors (%20.2) was higher than written ones (%14.3). Although the text can lead the audience to the intended meaning of an ad, ad designers have served this purpose by using visual anchors, perhaps due to their triple advantages of comprehensibility, effectiveness, and imaginativeness.      The other question was, to what ad components these anchors are related? Among all identified anchors, only descriptive text (written) and descriptive image (visual) were related to the product/brand. Although the number of product-related anchors was higher, their average frequency (14.5%) was lower than the trope-related anchors (22.7%). This indicates the designers' emphasis on making the tropes more comprehensible to avoid the adverse effects on the ad's attitudes.