In today’s society, the media, advertising and digital platforms are, along with art, powerful means through which to convey the discourse of female beauty and its representation mechanisms. Specifically, commercial communication of brands and cosmetic products usually uses high-end women’s magazines to spread their messages and promises aimed at a female audience with interests in fashion and beauty topics. This research analyzes how brands in the beauty sector configure specific advertising preaching to generate connection with their target while propagating an ideal of feminine beauty. Using the content analysis technique and the development of an ad hoc template with 40 variables, the graphic advertisements in the category “Facial beauty treatments” published during the last five years in Telva magazine are explored, and 182 units of analysis.
The main findings show how the terms efficacy, anti-spotand results are at the heart of the discourse of these brands, while they promise youth as a benefit par excellence; It is joined by others such as luminosity, firmness, hydration, repair, radiant skin and smooth skin. With a prominent presence of prescribing female figures, perfection underlies the global aspiration of this typology of discourses, which contribute to the promotion of the idealization and normativity of the canon of feminine beauty.