Media Maddie 

Toyota Super Bowl Commercial 2015 #OneBoldChoice 

 

The Toyota Super Bowl Commercial of 2015 really left an impression on me after viewing it. 

 

Toyota when advertising their new car used an emotional tactic on their audience to sell their product. Amy Purdy was featured in the commercial, as a female who only had one leg. She was featured with her dad learning to do new things with only one leg. The commercial spanned for one minute and fifteen seconds and showed Ms. Purdy being able to run, snowboard, walk, drive and do a multitude of adventures even with one leg. The commercial showed that there are multiple possibilities available to people even challenged with a disability. 

 

The campaign for Toyota is to promote making a "bold" choice. A bold choice to do something great in life and a bold choice in choosing a Toyota car. 

 

The audience of this commercial would obviously be geared towards people who can legally drive, and people in the market for a new car. The audience can also be parents looking to buy cars for their kids or even a younger generation of car buyers. The commercials within the campaign of “OneBoldChoice” all are friendly and family orientated. They are defiantly promoting safety and excitement with where a car can take you but keep you safe getting there. I would anticipate the commercial to air on many popular news stations and media outlets where many people can view it. Having this commercial air during the Super Bowl was also a very smart tactic on Toyota’s part, as the audience would include much of their target audience.

The commercials effectiveness of this commercial comes from the shock factor that people no matter your challenges can really strive to complete their dreams and reach their goals. The ton of the advertisement is very empowering and would steer a consumer to choose a Toyota because it is a“empowering” vehicle to own, according to the advertisement. 

 

On the contrary, there was some backlash in the media about this Toyota Commercial. Some people thought it was inconsiderate to relate a serious, and life threatening disability with something as “frivolous” as a car. After reading some of the comments and tweets, not many of the people with backlash actually had disabilities themselves. I understand where people can make the argument that have a disability should not be associated with choosing what kind of car to drive, but for myself the commercial was more so interpreted with the fact that just because you have a disability doesn’t mean it always effects your ability. Highlighting someone who was able to still be brave, adventurous, and bold added to the overall strength and emotion of the commercial.

Another empowering aspect to the commercial was the voice over, which was Mohammad Ali giving a famous inspiration talk. Similar to Amy Purdy he also used obstacles as a form of motivation and inspiration. The pair go very well together, in this moving and inspirational commercial. 

 

I chose this commercial because I too was swayed by its empowering message, and it is a commercial that left an impression on me in regards to entertaining and giving off a good message.

 

A good article to read about the inspirational characters featured in this commercial and is in favor in this commercial is listed below! Enjoy another outlook on one of my favortie SuperBowl commercials of 2015. 

 

 

 

Reflection: 

Analyzing the super bowl commercial was beneficial in the way that I learned how to look at commercials in a different way to interpret different things about them. Throughout this project in class we learned about the expense of commercials during the super bowl. This also led to the concept of how certain commercials target different audiences. This commercial in particular was targeting the age of audience that would watch the super bowl, and the type of audience that was watching. This particular commercial had a motivating message that was strong and powerful and also tied in sports and overcoming fears and challenges. This relates to the general feel of the people watching the super bowl, so that was probably worth the money that Toyota had to pay in order to have their commercial aired during the game. Another aspect of the project that I found interesting was every element of the actual commercial. They had to have a spokesperson and give off a positive message that would entice people to buy their product. Also this ad was part of a series of campaigns all under the same umbrella and hashtag of #Theboldchoice which would lead them to a series of commercials to sell Toyota cars. All and all I enjoyed this project in the way similar to creating my own ad makeover that I now see commercials differently. It was also helpful to do the analyzing project before creating my own ad campaign in order to ad elements of the Toyota commercial that I believed them to do particularly well, and I could use those ideas in my own project.