Analysis Of Facebook Fan Page Of Burger King Using Three Types Of Signs

In the last century, shops or famous brand can do advertisement on the television. Facebook was not appeared at that period. Nowadays, Facebook is invented and it is widely used all over the world. Therefore, many brands or shops will set up a fan page of the brand. They will do promotions of the new products on the fan page or communicate with the customers to collect their suggestions on the products or their services. Burger King is a multinational corporation. It also uses the Facebook fan page to promote the new products or share any news of Burger King such as the employment. This essay will conduct an analysis over the profile picture and the cover photo of Burger King’s Facebook fan page. The analysis will include three types of signs, these signs are symbolic sign, iconic sign, indexical sign.

According to Lanir (2019), she suggested that the symbolic sign is accepted as the rules that we follow every day. That means we do not require to any thinking about these rules. Also it is assigned arbitrarily. Therefore, we have to learn the = actual meaning of the symbolic signs before we understand the signs. The example of symbolic signs can be English letter, numbers, traffic lights, flags of different countries etc. For instance, white background with a red circle in the middle is the nation flag of Japan. However, we have to learn that it is the flag of Japan before we know it stands for Japan by looking at it. The symbolic sign of the profile picture of the fan page is ‘Burger King’ these characters. As I mentioned before, alphabets is a example of symbolic sign. By looking at these English characters, we can know this brand is a brand that related to burger. The will provide burger to the customers. Since we know the meaning of ‘burger’. Also we can know that this brand is good at making burger by looking at ‘king” these characters. King can describe a person that he is the best at doing something. Therefore, Burger King’ these characters give us the meaning is that this brand can provide the customers with the most delicious burger compare to other brands also provide hamburger to customers. That’s the reason why the brand called Burger King. It is the brand that is the best at doing hamburgers.

According to Lanir (2019), she suggested that the iconic signs demonstrate some characteristics or iconic signs will have a physical similarity to the objects that the sign want to represent. It is not necessary for us to learn the signs before we understand the objects that will be represented. It is shown clearly. Iconic signs include sounds, pictures, statue, photographs etc. The iconic sign of the profile picture is the picture reminds people as the shape of a hamburger. The profile picture is form by two yellow semi-circle and the English characters. The two yellow semi circles represent the bread. Only two semi circles are not enough to represent the bread. The colour of the semicircle is important too. Is is because yellow is similar to the actual colour of bread. If the semi circles are blue in colour, people will not think the semi circles as bread easily. It is because the bread we eat in real life sometimes similar to yellow especially when it is just baked. We never see the bread in blue or red in real life. Therefore, the colour of the semi-circle also important to let people imagine the semi circles stand for bread. At the same time, the English characters refer to the stuffing of a hamburger. Because the location of the characters is between the two semi circles. Therefore, the characters represent the ingredients of a hamburger. The profile picture is showing the shape of a burger.

According to Bradley (2016), the indexical sign shows the relationship between the sign and the objects. We can know that there was car passed through the road by looking at the tire track on the road. One more example is that we will know it will rain soon if we see some dark clouds on the sky. An indexical sign does not represent the objects directly. Oppositely, indexical signs stand for something that will give a hint to the people to relate the signs and the object together. The cover photo of the fan page is a crown. Crown is an accessory of the royal members such as king, queen, prince, princess. Therefore, the crown here relates to a king. And king relates to Burger King because it contains the word ‘king’. This reminds people the crown is representing the Burger King. This is a indexical sign because the crown does not make people link the crown with Burger KIng directly. The crown makes people link it with a king, and the king implies the Burger King. Moreover, a small size of the logo is added on the crown to make sure people who saw it can relate the crown to Burger King.

In conclusion, there are three types of signs. These signs are symbolic signs, iconic signs and indexical signs respectively. The signs that found on the fan page are analyzed. The profile picture of the fan page consists of two signs, symbolic sign and iconic sign. And the cover photo contains indexical sign. Sign is important because it will affect people on the understanding of the presentation. If the sign is not suitable, people cannot get the actual meaning of the sign. Therefore, the brand need to pay attention to use the signs that can show the meaning to people easily and correctly.