Linaugo 1

Jullian Linaugo

Hatfield

ENGL-1301-SCHS3

November 11, 2019

Visual Rhetorical Analysis

The way that advertisers get people to purchase their items are incredible. They

go to many lengths to get an edge over their competitors. From things like making their

audience laugh from a funny joke or make them feel a bit shameful when calling out

their choice in a category to giving “benefits.” Things like common sense or appealing to

the logical side of a person, or the emotional side to a person, these advertisers know

how to get to their audience. The video ad that uses these techniques is the Dr. Squatch

company. Their video that used those rhetorical elements is titled ​Dr. Squatch - Natural

Soap for Men. They list out reasons on why their soap is better and give multiple

examples of why their brand of soap is better. They do this through a video

advertisement that can be seen on the site of YouTube. This video is not their only one,

they have done this more than once, which means they probably know what they are

doing.

Dr. Squatch appeals to the ethos rhetorical element. Ethos is a rhetorical element

that appeals to the ethics of a person. Some examples of this in the world is the save the
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turtles campaign in a way to reduce the amount of plastic used since the use of plastic

hurts sea creatures. Their goal is to reduce the amount of plastic use to stop the sea

creatures from getting hurt. Dr. Squatch use ethos by pointing out how other soap

brands use chemicals and how they do not use natural ingredients. Soap producers

started doing this during the first World War. They had started to remove the natural

ingredients to make production both cheaper and faster, replacing them with chemicals.

These chemicals, such as “sodium lauryl sulfate, parabens and dioxin” (the video) can

cause things like “depression, liver damage, cancer and low sperm count. Then worst of

all, dry skin” (the YouTube video). The Squatch soap uses natural ingredients, which is

much healthier than the chemicals. Their ingredients are plants, oils, goat’s milk, Greek

yogurt, oatmeal, shea butter and citrus. The natural ingredients can prevent all the

damages from using bad bars of soap.

The Dr. Squatch also appeals to the pathos rhetorical element. Pathos is a

rhetorical element that uses the emotion of a person. Another way of appealing pathos is

also to shame the audience. They do this a few times in the Dr. Squatch ad video. The

one of the times was in the very beginning. The video says, “Listen up, the soap you

shower with. It’s sh*t” (YouTube video). They say that the audience’s soap is not good

enough. There are other ways that they advertise their product with pathos. They use

pathos in a way to suggest that whoever uses their product would be manlier by giving

some examples of manliness. “I’m talking about natural, nourishing … hand cut soap for

men. Men who use their hands. Men who build things. Men who open the pickle jar on

the first try” (YouTube video). Their example appealing to pathos both boosting
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confidence and comedy.​ “​More specifically, it’s for the manly chops-his-own-firewood

male, who wants natural soaps but doesn’t want to smell like lavender and patchouli.”

(Meiling n.p.)​ Another moment of when they suggest pathos is when they use humor in

their advertisement. In the advertisement, they bring a customer reviewer who

describes the soap “…like it was handcrafted in the northwest forest by beautiful tiny

elves” (YouTube video) and how the soap “makes you feel like you just stepped out of a

mountain stream, and squatch was there to hand you the towel” (YouTube video). These

quotes use mythical creatures as a metaphor of some sorts. This has a somewhat

humorous effect since the advertisement puts the mythical creatures in an odd,

humorous position

Another example of a rhetorical element being appealed to in the Dr. Squatch

soap advertisement is the appealing of logos. Logos is when the presenter appeals to the

audience by way of facts, with data or with statistics. These can be used in combination

to prove why, logically, the item being presented is good or better. An example of the use

of logos is when they start to talk about the composition of their soap bar. When the

advertisers started to explain the composition, they make a point when they say that

their soap is made up of natural ingredients, not chemicals like other soap brands​.​ “It’s

important to note that all the ingredients that go into the Dr. Squatch soaps are natural.

No hard to pronounce scientific names here.” (Dan n.p.)​ ​They are proud to say that the

bar of soap is all natural. Another time logos is appealed to is when they explain how the

soap is brought to the customer. They explain how they ship it to the customer and boast

about their one hundred percent satisfaction guarantee, saying that if it is not the best
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bar of soap the customer has had, the price is all on the company. They talk about how

there are already tens of thousands of people that are in their subscription already. They

make all these logical points, which may convince the audience to buy the product.

The advertisements have gotten very creative in their way of selling their

products. They use many different techniques, from making their audience laugh to

making them feel ashamed of what choices they made. Emotions are a big factor in

swaying potential customers to buying their product. The company also makes people

see the ethical side of their decisions. The decisions being using natural ingredients

instead of chemicals. The advertisers even manage to use logic and data to their

advantage, talking about their customers and how they are satisfied. The Dr. Squatch

company uses all these techniques to sell their bar of soap to whoever is convinced. They

use all these techniques in tandem to make a good advertisement video. The rhetorical

techniques are done to be able to relate or convince their audience. The audience is

more on the male side. This is because the platform they chose to spread their product

on is YouTube. The YouTube demographics show that there are a lot of adults that are

male. The Dr. Squatch company may have tried to make their advertisement for the

male demographic. Knowing the target audience can help a lot when trying to convince

that audience. Once the target audience is known, the company can then specialize or

focus on subjects that the audience can relate to. Dr. Squatch knows their target

audience and uses the proper rhetorical techniques to reach them.

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Meiling, Brittany. “How This 31-Year-Old Makes Millions Selling Soap Online.”

Tribune,​ San Diego Union-Tribune, 21 Sept. 2018,

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/business/technology/sd-fi-drsquatch-201809

21-story.html​.

Dan. “Dr Squatch Soap Review Promo Code: -.” ​Dr Squatch Soap Review Promo Code |

-,​ 16 Oct. 2018,​ ​https://honebodymind.com/dr-squatch-soap-review​.