Persuasive Advertising Examples To Try for Your Brand | Brafton

One of the main roles of an advertiser is to persuade a specific audience to make a decision, whether it’s to complete a purchase, click on and watch a video or sign up for a monthly newsletter. However, persuasive advertising doesn’t work like a hypnotist trying to put their customer in a trance.

There’s no way an advertiser can talk someone into being interested in a brand just by saying “You are becoming very interested in SEO marketing services.” Marketers have to actually pay attention to their audience’s emotions and goals if they are to successfully persuade them. Additionally, this attention to consumer behavior allows advertisers to craft persuasive advertisement strategies that address a potential customer’s needs without resorting to gimmicks. By aligning an advertising campaign with emotional appeal and relatable situations, it becomes easier to develop brand loyalty and encourage satisfied customers.

But how does it actually work? Well, we’re here to solve the mystery and show you what’s behind the curtain. Want to learn the art of persuasive marketing for your next campaign? Let’s get this show on the road.

What Is Persuasive Advertising?

Persuasive advertising is a type of marketing that focuses on the target audience’s emotions, rather than specs or value propositions, to convince them to do something. It’s designed to shine a light on the benefits a brand can offer the end user rather than the actual make, model or efficiencies of the product itself. In modern advertising, many brands craft persuasive ad copy that creates deeper emotional appeal rather than solely relying on facts.

By highlighting these emotional triggers, advertisers can use a persuasive advertising technique to shape consumer behavior. Whether they leverage a Google Ad or other forms of digital advertising, the key is to address how a product or service will solve a specific problem or fulfill a particular desire in the audience’s life. This focus on the audience’s direct needs sets a successful advertising campaign apart from one that goes unnoticed.

Persuasive Advertising vs. Informative Advertising

While persuasive and informative advertising share the same goal — to get consumers to complete a desired action — they achieve that target differently. Persuasive advertising uses various techniques to convince the audience of a certain belief that leads to a purchase. Informative advertising uses facts and figures to educate consumers on why their brand is the best choice. For example, a software company may update potential users on new features and functions and how they increase efficiency and performance.

Both persuasive and informative ads create a comprehensive advertising strategy. Persuasive ads rely more on emotional appeal and storytelling, while informative advertisement initiatives can offer transparency, details and credibility. Striking the right balance between both can help build trust and encourage satisfied customers.

Benefits of Persuasive Advertising in Marketing

Do you want to make your advertising more persuasive and effective? While all types of marketing have a time and place, here are some advantages to using this approach for your brand:

• Improved brand awareness: Engaging and compelling marketing campaigns may resonate with the target audience, leaving a lasting impression and increasing brand recall.
• Enhanced customer loyalty and experience: Building strong relationships with customers by focusing on their emotions and tangible needs, can foster loyalty and repeat business. When customers have positive experiences with a brand, they’re more likely to become brand advocates. In fact, Deloitte found that customers who have a positive experience will spend 140% more than those who have a negative one.
• Competitive edge: Effective advertising that speaks to the heart of your audience differentiates a brand from competitors and positions it as a preferred choice among consumers, often leading to a successful advertising outcome.

Persuasive Advertising Techniques

Carrot and the Stick

Like a horse chasing after a carrot, people are hardwired to move toward things they desire. On the flip side, we’re also prone to move away from pain and hardship. This approach is meant to showcase your ad as the carrot, offering the prospect potential feelings of pleasure. Sticks are the possibilities of loss, which can also be used to make the prospect fearful of pain and go in the other direction. The carrot and stick approach can make potential customers feel emotions that inspire action.

When building ad copy for a modern advertising campaign, a well-executed carrot and stick model can trigger brand loyalty by emphasizing benefits the customer might gain (the carrot) alongside the setbacks they might avoid (the stick).

Bandwagon Appeal

Bandwagons are popular for a reason. Products and services are more appealing when a crowd can vouch for their advantages. I mean, would you rather go to a restaurant with a long line and great reviews or an oddly quiet establishment? Besides being extremely hungry and in need of a meal pronto, you most likely would want to go to the place everyone else is trying to eat at. Social proof — or indicating that your brand is widely liked — shows that your company is respected and can be trusted.

In many persuasive advertising tactics, bandwagon appeal also works on social media, where viral content and influencer endorsements can significantly elevate an advertisement. Celebrity endorsements or the voice of everyday users can quickly build excitement and amplify your ad campaign’s reach.

The Scarcity Principle

If supply and demand principles have taught you anything, it’s most likely that rare objects and experiences are valuable. In your advertising efforts, when you use words like “exclusive” and “limited availability,” people may become more interested in what you’re selling.

In digital advertising, the scarcity principle can make an advertisement feel urgent. This sense of urgency can tap into the emotional appeal needed to prompt a swift purchase. When customers experience FOMO, they’re more likely to act immediately.

Product Comparison

As the name suggests, product comparison compares your brand and a close competitor’s head to head, focusing on a particular emotional response or benefit the user will receive.

Let’s say you’re an eReader company looking to boost sales. Using this persuasive technique, you’d compare your product with another top seller in your industry by looking at the battery life. But instead of talking about the actual battery power, you’d highlight your product’s ability to let your customers read for longer periods without needing to pause and find an outlet; whereas the other company’s product may only allow half the reading time in between charging.

This kind of persuasive advertising technique can be compelling, especially when the emphasis remains on how the consumer’s life will be better or easier. By doing so, you reinforce why they should choose your brand over others.

Humor

Almost everyone loves comedic relief, making humor a positive advertising tactic when you want to bring people joy. Often, people share funny marketing campaigns with their friends and family, boosting these ads’ popularity and views.

In an effective advertising plan, humor can create memorable associations. If the punchline aligns with your core message, it can work wonders by adding a lighthearted emotional appeal that resonates with your audience.

Second Person

Potential customers care about what you can do for them. Using pronouns like “you” and “your” can make your messaging more personable, like you’re speaking directly to them. For example, which one sounds more personable?

“Increase your user engagement with SEO content marketing solutions designed for your industry.”

Or,

“Businesses can increase their user engagement with SEO content marketing solutions designed for their industry.”

The first example can help readers insert themselves into the narrative you’re creating, making it easier for them to picture benefiting from your services.

Used in persuasive writing, second-person language can feel like a one-on-one conversation. This helps create an advertising strategy where your brand seems like a trusted guide rather than a distant corporation.

Repetition

It’s common knowledge that if you hear the same word or phrase repeatedly, you’re more likely to remember and believe it. If you read a blog that repeatedly writes about a brand’s top-notch customer service, you’ll take away that the company knows how to treat its users. Whether this is true doesn’t necessarily matter at that moment because the reader may believe it until proven otherwise.

Including repetition in your persuasive ad copy can also be helpful in nurturing brand loyalty. Consistent messaging across multiple channels — from a Google Ad to a social media post — helps reinforce the same idea, making it stick in your consumer’s mind.

Plain Folks

The plain folk advertising technique is a way for advertisers to promote products using ordinary, everyday people. This proves that the brand or product offers value to anyone who can benefit from it, whether by featuring photos of “plain” people in campaigns or sharing stories of normal people using the product.

This tactic often boosts credibility because it convinces the audience that your product isn’t exclusively for a niche group but for everyone. When combined with a well-coordinated marketing campaign, the appeal of this technique can be a major factor in creating a positive advertising moment.

Snob Appeal

On the other hand, the snob appeal technique indicates that the product makes the consumer better, smarter or richer than everyone else, drawing in a particular type of person as its audience. Take a luxury car company for example: People may be drawn to the rarity of owning this particular car because it allows them to make assumptions about them just by being associated with the brand.

Some businesses combine snob appeal with celebrity endorsement. By tying their offering to a famous figure’s perceived exclusivity, they can highlight an ethos appeal that aligns with a refined lifestyle or status.

Types of Persuasive Ads

Aristotle wasn’t a marketer by any stretch of the imagination. However, he did come up with a theory for how persuasion happens: Either through the character (ethos) of the speaker, the emotional state (pathos) of the hearer or the argument (logos) itself.

Let’s dive into these three types of persuasion a bit deeper:

• Ethos Ads: Appeal to the credibility, authority and trustworthiness of the brand, spokesperson or endorser. These ads aim to persuade by establishing a positive perception of the company’s character or level of expertise. Celebrity endorsements can often amplify this effect, earning trust from the audience quickly.
• Pathos Ads: Focus on the emotions of the audience, aiming to make them have feelings that influence decisions. Ads of this nature will often create content that taps into happiness, fear, nostalgia or empathy.
• Logos Ads: Look at reason, logic and rational thinking as the main drive to persuade the audience. These ads often emphasize the product’s features, benefits and unique selling points. When combined with informative ads, logos-driven advertisements can give consumers a solid foundation of facts.

7 Persuasive Advertising Examples

What do these types of persuasive ads and techniques look like in practice? If you want real-world samples, you’re in luck. We have several examples of successful marketing campaigns using these methods:

1. Miller Lite

Miller Lite uses a product comparison to showcase how they offer a beer with half the carbs of Bud Light. This uses peoples’ desire to be healthier to put their product above the competition. This post got lots of attention on social platforms like X (formerly known as Twitter) from people looking for the drink they love without all the carbs.

This advertisement highlights how a simple comparison point can be enough for prospective buyers to quickly decide which product is better suited to their needs.

2. Heinz

Heinz doesn’t explicitly state if they’re a fan of Ed Sheeran, but he’s definitely a fan of Heinz. At least, that’s the approach of a hilarious commercial for the beloved ketchup brand. It used humor and the bandwagon effect to promote its product. I mean, if Ed Sheeran likes it, you’re bound to, right?

Featuring a famous musician is a direct example of celebrity endorsement that harnesses an ethos appeal to convey trustworthiness and popularity.

3. Old Spice

Old Spice tells viewers that if their partner uses their body wash, they will offer them tickets to “that thing they love,” a boat or even diamonds. Using both the snob appeal and the carrot and stick advertising technique, this campaign states Old Spice can turn anyone into “the man your man could smell like.”

By blending humor with emotional appeal, this type of persuasive advertising technique becomes iconic.

4. Airbnb

Airbnb discovered that its users want to live like locals while on vacation. They created a campaign spurring people to not just go there, but live there. The ads focus on the frustration of being a tourist and dealing with large crowds. It highlights how Airbnb is the solution for people wanting a more authentic travel experience.

This advertising strategy shows that aligning creativity with clear consumer desires can effectively differentiate your brand.

5. Wonderbox

Wonderbox is a French company that creates experiential gifts. It leveraged Spotify for an audio ad campaign focused on “out-of-the-box” gift-giving during the holiday season. The company used its marketing efforts to persuade people that presenting loved ones with special experiences is more meaningful than things that can be wrapped.

This example demonstrates how even mediums like streaming radio can showcase an effective advertising method by appealing to a powerful emotional response.

6. Budweiser

Budweiser is known for tugging at people’s heartstrings (remember the puppy and horse commercial?). Its 2017 Super Bowl Commercial focused on an emotional story of how the company’s idea came to fruition. The inspiring video ends with the line, “When nothing stops your dream, this is the beer we drink,” making even the toughest person a little teary-eyed.

Pairing an emotional appeal with a strong brand narrative allows Budweiser to stand out in a crowded digital advertising environment. Over time, these emotional connections build strong brand loyalty.

7. Clorox

Clorox understands the power of the plain folks and bandwagon techniques with an ad that simply states its product is “trusted by moms.” Whether someone is a new mom or is a pro with adult children, seeing an ad like this will feel personal and trustworthy, especially for people needing a cleaning solution ASAP.

By framing “moms” as everyday users, Clorox effectively builds credibility. This sets the stage for customers to see the product as a go-to solution, reinforcing that the brand is worthy of trust.

Put Your Persuasive Techniques to the Test

Now that you know the secrets to persuasive ad creation, there’s nothing stopping you from mesmerizing potential customers. But rather than using pendulum watches and hypnotic swirling screens, you can persuade them with content focused on their emotional wants and needs.

Editor’s Note: Updated April 2025.