Today, February 09, 2020, I reviewed You Tube channel, “Nail Career Education”, video titled, “Raising Your Prices? Work on Others Work? … Nail Therapy with Suzie” (to view the video reviewed today please follow the link here). Using the Rhetorical Situational method, I will analyze the 3 main categories that will break down this video. First the discussion between Suzie and her two guests, Cheryl McLaughlin and Debbie Duxbury kick off with the conversation on how surprised they are to learn about a new taboo in the nail industry, which is nail technician turning away new clients because they don’t want to work on nails they didn’t due prior. This is something Suzie is absolutely against, and as they try to understand the idea behind the movement it’s still begs the question as to why? It’s how a nail tech earns a living, why would they turn away a new client just because their nails have been done elsewhere? In Suzie’s understanding it seems that the new nail tech doesn’t want to work on another nail tech’s work out of respect. The discussion goes on to examine price and the point of what is good and bad business practices. Suzie strongly believes that raising prices ties into a nail tech’s confidence, as well as knowing your worth. Nail tech’s will question their value of themselves, and the quality of their work. Suzie said that she didn’t raise her prices for 10 years. She goes on to say that was bad business practice, but as learned from it since. The quality of work goes hand in hand with price, and confidence is key to raising prices. Suzie use the analogy of fine dinning vs. eating at McDonald’s, it’s a meal, but not the same quality and experience. She explains that most likely you loose a couple of clients, but by the math, it’s worth it. A nail tech must take into account that overhead and product price increase on a yearly basis. As there is more demand from clients, there are additional expenses that come into consideration when raising prices. Another important message of this video is on “Mixing”, the veteran nail techs in this video highly recommend using the core line of a product within the same brand, as mixing brands can cause contact dermatitis. Mixing can cause serious allergic reactions, pick with one core system.
Using the Rhetorical Situation method I will break down the video in 3 categories. First, the immediate necessity of this discussion between three seasoned nail technicians is to let other nail techs, nail tech students, and the DIY nail tech group. The information given is greatly needed in the nail tech community. The second is finding the audience the video is targeting, this would be myself lumped into the DIY nail group, including people within the nail tech community. Finally the third category, what where the presenters in the video constrained to not talk about or the opportunities provided to them? This goes without saying the video is a “how to” tutorial of running one’s own nail tech career. The speakers are are willing to exploit the opportunity on Suzie’s YouTube channel, and with the best intentions. They are simply reaching out to people like myself with constructive criticism on how to operate as a nail tech.
This is a very informative piece on nail tech etiquette, pricing, mixing do’s and don’ts. Check out the video below! Thanks so much and enjoy!
Nail Career Education 
You have all three parts of the method in your analytical paragraph, and you have lots of details from the text. You’ve done well segmenting the work into paragraphs, and you’ve figured out how to embed video 🙂 Good work, all around!
I have a few suggestions:
1) Remember, the point of the rhetorical situation is to determine if it is “fitting” response. Does this video seem like a good response to this change/trend they identify in the video? If so, why? If not, why not?
2) You have a LOT of summary up front, and then a very short paragraph with one to two lines each on analysis. This should be flipped. Have MOSTLY analysis, and use the summary bits only to support your larger points. Anything that isn’t directly related to your use of the method should be removed.
3) Don’t forget you need to set up the method. Use the reading reports (in this case, Bitzer or Biesecker) to help you with this. In short: explain the rhetorical situation to your readers. Pretend they are another COMM major not in this class. What would they need to know to understand how the method works? Usually this is a paragraph on its own. Also, don’t neglect pulling the quotes and definitions out of the reading reports now. You’ll just have to do it all at the end of the semester, otherwise. Save yourself time later by doing a bit every week, instead 🙂
4) You have quite a few typos and/or grammatical errors in here. I have several suggestions to help with that. One, you could write it in Word (or another word processing program) so you have the benefit of spell-check. Second, you could install the Grammarly add-on to your browser, which checks your grammar in everything you write online. Third, you could swap your post with someone else (a classmate, a friend, someone at the Writing Center) — sometimes it’s easier to see someone else’s hiccups. Finally, you could try reading it aloud (a lot of software programs will do this for you, too!) to “hear” anywhere that seems off.
Note that revision suggestions aren’t for right now. They’re to use at the end of the semester, when we will revise and polish everything for the final post/paper. For now, they’re just in the bank of comments you can revisit later. 🙂
This is a solid first post. You’re using the method correctly, and you are on the right path. Keep up the good work!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hello, great post:
a suggestion: have someone read and or edit your blog before you submit it, that way they can find some of the typos and or misspelled words.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Your topic was interesting and explained with a great deal of detail. The insight I gained into the industry was very interesting. In my opinion, the rhetorical situation is hard to get my head around. So, I recommend providing, in the introduction, a definition of your analysis method. In addition to providing the textbook derived explanation, I recommend providing it in your own words. Rhetoric is all about persuading someone. I think the key is, to know the context and the specific audience. I recommend, considering the audience the video was trying to convince, what issue they were trying to persuade, and what was the perspective of the writer of the video. Doing the prep work in a word document, with the assistance of Grammarly, then copy and paste the finished product to your Blog, will help sort out the other issues.
LikeLiked by 1 person