Revising to Appeal to Readers

You can't convince people to buy your product by showing how it will help you. You must convince them by showing how your product helps them. To do so effectively, you need to think about the needs of your audience.

The American psychologist Abraham Maslow created a pyramid that showed different levels of human need. At the bottom, you'll find basic needs: air, water, food, and so on. On the next level, you'll find needs that build on those, and so on, going up to morality, creativity, and problem solving at the top. You can use this pyramid to connect your product to the needs of your readers.

1. How does your product connect with readers' basic needs (bottom-level)?
2. How does your product connect with readers' intermediate needs (middle three levels)?
3. How does your product connect with readers' upper-level needs (top triangle)?
4. Choose three needs from the list above. For each one, write a sentence that appeals to your reader, showing how the person benefits from the product.

Writing the Beginning Paragraph

The first sentence is the lead. It should capture your reader’s interest, getting people interested in your product.

1. Ask the reader a question.

   What weighs less than a pound and could save your life?

2. Start with a story.

   After school, you walk out the door and throw on your backpack. You unlock your bike from the bike rack. Then you hop on and ride off. What’s missing from this picture?

3. Begin with an important quotation.

   "Wear a helmet now. Finish living later." That's just one slogan of many submitted to the recent Bicycle Helmet Safety Slogan Contest.

4. Make a surprising statement.

   When bike fatalaties occur, 97 percent of the time, the rider had no helmet.

Lead Sentence

Detail Sentences

Opinion Statement

Prewriting to Select a Topic

The topic of your advertisement essay should be a product that you want to promote. For example, imagine that a malware-fighting program helped clean up your computer, and you want others to know about it.

Reading an Advertisement Poster and Essay

Before you create your own advertisement for a product, you should see how other writers persuaded their audiences to buy. Study the poster and essay below and think about how the writer convinced others to purchase the product.

Reading an Advertisement Poster

A persuasive poster uses visuals and words to connect a product to the needs of the audience. The graphics on the poster should not only grab the attention of the reader but also begin persuading the person. The slogan continues convincing readers by connecting to their desires. The call to action completes the persuasive pitch, asking the viewer to do something specific (buy the product!).

Sample Poster

1. How does the slogan get your attention?
2. How does the image help to persuade?
3. What action does the poster call you to do? What reason does it give you to take that action?

Reading an Advertisement Essay

A persuasive essay has three main parts. The beginning paragraph starts with a lead that grabs the reader's attention and ends with an opinion statement. The middle paragraphs give reasons to support the opinion. The ending paragraph restates the opinion and provides an important final thought or a call to action.

Warm-Up for Advertising a Product

The world around you is filled with advertisements, from click-bait on Web sites to com