the PoweR of PeRsuasion
Within the field of public relations, the power to persuade is a skill that either becomes acquired or natural. PR Departments within organizations and companies issue out either PSAs or commercials to get their message across to their audience. Some will use celebrities, humor, real life stories or even real hard facts and statistics. Whatever tools you have, use them and to the best of your advantage.
The Entertainment Industry Foundation’s philanthropy, Stand Up to Cancer (SU2C) raises awareness about the disease that everyone can relate to. SU2C has a channel on YouTube where they issue out videos that usually involve well known celebrities voicing their cause. Personalities such as Ray Romano and Jon Stewart have already come out with videos telling the public facts about cancer and what people should know. In this clip, celebrities such as Zac Efron, Dakota Fanning, Kristen Bell, Vanessa Hudgens, Andrew Garfield, Jon Heder, Naya Rivera and more are featured to give interesting statistics.
The video was effective because it first pulled in the audience’s attention with well known celebrities from movies and shows. The actors were featured in each statistic such as the odds of being trapped in an elevator with Zac Efron and catching the ball at a baseball game when you’re Dakota Fanning. The PSA also kept the audience’s attention through humor such as a guy making a bunch of bikes fall down and the lightning striking a golfer.
After all the inspirational and humorous statistics were over, the celebrities started to represent the numbers dealing with having cancer such as one in two men and one in three women. After I saw the celebrities representing the cancer victim numbers, it really gave me chills because it got to a serious moment and the music went from being cheerful to melodramatic. The actors then called the audience to action by donating to the organization’s cause by saying “It’s up to us, to change the odds, for our generation, for the ones we love, for our future. If you don’t like the odds, stand up…stand up to cancer.”
The next screen then shows SU2C’s logo and website above the words “100% of your donations go to cancer research”. This insures the audience that their call standing up to cancer would be to donate and that their full donation will go toward the benefits of stopping cancer and help fund cancer research. The power of persuasion was effective because it caught and held the audience’s attention through humor and included actors the audience recognized and could relate to. Logic was featured through interesting statistics that were illustrated through various situations and scenarios. The shock value was also introduced at the end with the cancer statistic involving men and women.
This was over all a good example of persuasion, that gave good credibility, shared interesting logic, showed powerful emotion through actors and stated a clear call to action.
To view more PSAs from SU2C, here’s the link to their YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/SU2C#p/f/7/z-nybSklJWk
This commercial is VERY useful. The commercial was very simple on the odds against events, people, and situations. I’m also thrilled that celebrities are in this commercial, not because of the notoriety, but they do care to help fight off cancer for the victims. This gives the audience a positive message on how they can help others and prevent themselves from cancer. I, for one, say that this commercial is beneficial for those who are in need of the cure for cancer.
TJ,
This is a really great PSA! I like that you mentioned that the video provided credibility to back up the cause. I do think that people respond to a cause related video better when they can relate to the people who are in it. They chose a wide range of actors to use, which helps too, because it allows for more than just one group of people to relate. Thanks for sharing this!
-Lindsey M. Griffith
I enjoyed watching your persuasive video. Celebrities who team up to support causes always stimulate an effective word of mouth response. The video did a good job of stimulation an emotional response. By placing statistics of odds in positive scenarios and then depicting the cancer outcome statistic, it will catch the viewers attention. By showing people how something could potentially affect them, responses will be greater.
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