Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer
Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 15 · 2026-09-16
IELTS Writing Task 2 question
Some people say that advertising is extremely successful at persuading us to buy things. Other people think that advertising is so common that we no longer pay attention to it. Discuss both views and give your own opinion.
Student answer (Band 5.5)
Some people argue that advertising is extremely successful at persuading us to purchase things. However, other argue that it is common that no body pay attention to advertising. This essay will discuss both views before explaining why I believe that advertising is important to get more sales.
On the one hand, advertising has greater impact on the persons decision, whether to buy product or not. Advertising help the company to get more sales. For example, A person is passing through the road he see the ad of something that he will be planning to buy, if the product attracts him then there will be greater chance that person will buy that product. Moreover, online advertising help the company to advertise their product throughout the country with less amount of spending.
On the other hand, sometimes people do not pay attention to the advertising. There are many reasons of this such as people may be much busy in their daily lives or people are not much interested in seeing the ads. For instance, people who travel by vehicles mostly ignore the advertising on the roadside through billboards. Bikers mostly see the ads clearly. Some people also ignore the online ads on the mobile phone because they are not interested in buying the online products. Hence, some people even do not see the ads for a second.
In conclusion, I believe that advertising is very important for the company to more and more sales. Some people ignore the ads but i think mostly people see the ads. Online advertising these days is very useful method to sale more products.
AI examiner evaluation
| Criterion | Band |
|---|---|
| Task Achievement / Task Response | 5.5 |
| Coherence and Cohesion | 5.5 |
| Lexical Resource | 5.5 |
| Grammatical Range and Accuracy | 5.5 |
| Overall | 5.5 |
Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5
The response addresses all parts of the task by discussing both views on advertising and providing a personal opinion in the introduction and conclusion. However, the ideas are somewhat limited and lack full development. For instance, the discussion on why people ignore advertisements is rather basic, relying on simple examples like people being busy or travelling in vehicles. Similarly, the reasoning regarding persuasion is repetitive and under-developed. While a clear position is maintained throughout, the supporting arguments would benefit from greater depth and extension to reach a higher band. Overall, it satisfies the basic requirements of Task Achievement, earning a solid Band 6.0.
Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5
The essay is coherent overall with a clear logical arrangement divided into four paragraphs: an introduction, two body paragraphs discussing opposing views, and a conclusion. Cohesive devices are used, such as 'On the one hand', 'On the other hand', and 'For instance', to signal transitions between ideas. However, paragraphing and referencing occasionally feel a bit mechanical, and some sentences lack smooth inter-sentential links. For example, the sentence 'Bikers mostly see the ads clearly' abruptly follows a point about vehicle travel without a clear cohesive tie. Referencing is also slightly unclear in places. This demonstrates features of Band 6 performance.
Lexical Resource — Band 5.5
The student uses an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, attempting some less common words and phrases such as 'persuading', 'substantially', and 'online advertising'. However, there are noticeable limitations and inaccuracies in word choice and collocation. For example, the phrase 'no body pay attention' contains a grammatical and lexical error ('nobody pays attention'), and the conclusion uses the awkward phrasing 'to more and more sales' and 'to sale more products' (instead of 'to sell'). Spelling and word-form errors are present, but they do not severely impede communication. These characteristics align closely with Band 5.5.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.5
The response features a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, such as 'This essay will discuss both views before explaining why I believe that advertising is important to get more sales.' However, there are frequent grammatical errors, particularly with subject-verb agreement ('no body pay', 'person is passing... he see'), article usage ('the persons decision', 'with less amount of spending'), and pluralisation ('purchase things'). While complex structures are attempted, they are often accompanied by errors that occasionally cause the reader hesitation, though communication remains clear overall. This sits comfortably at a Band 5.5 level.
See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.
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