Transcript Product Placement on Television

Product Placement on
Television

Commercial
Alert’s Request
to the FTC and
FCC for
Guidelines to
Require
Disclosure of TV
Product
Placement

“…keep the commercial culture
within its proper sphere, and prevent
it from exploiting children and
subverting the higher values of
family, community, environmental
integrity and democracy.”

“Put simply, TV networks and
stations are shifting advertising from
commercial breaks to programming
itself. They are inserting branded
products directly into programs, in
exchange for substantial fees or
other consideration.”


Remote controls and TiVo enable
viewers to avoid ads
A substantial majority of viewers are
• fed up with advertising generally and on
television in particular
• Looking for ways to avoid ads

Advertisers find embedded ads
effective because viewers are caught
off guard

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Some programs so packed with
placements they resemble infomercials
But lack disclosure requirements of
infomercials
Particularly problematic where children are
involved
• Children more vulnerable to this
influence
• Are they “program length commercials”?
Product integration

“a presence woven into the plotline—
often across multiple episodes—
accompanied at the very least by a
supporting medial buy and, at best,
by an integrated marketing and
public relations campaign replete
with a sweepstakes overlay and
other consumer touchpoints”
Examples

CBS: Survivor
• GM, Reebok, Target

Fox: American Idol
• Ford, Coca Cola

ABC: Who Wants to be a Millionaire
• AT&T

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CSI Miami
Extreme Makeover
Home Edition
The Apprentice
Oprah Winfrey
Product placement is growing

Nielsen Media Research and
Advertising age track placements
• Approaching $1 billion in revenue


Survey by Association of National
Advertisers indicated 63% took part
in “branded entertainment”
Networks planning shows that
eliminate traditional commercials
altogether
Product placement works

Reece’s Pieces/ET
• 65%

RayBan/Risky Business
• Tripled in one month

“Successful product placements are more
effective than ads at generating recall,
promoting brand awareness and
ultimately, increasing sales at a fraction of
the cost of traditional advertising.”

“When somebody is jumping up and
down because they have a beer as a
reward, and they make it seem like
it’s the greatest liquid they ever
drank in their lives and they’re real
people—that probably is more
effective than having some model
saying ‘Hey, drink Budweiser.’ It can
be very effective.”
Evidence suggests product placement may
be implicated in epidemic of marketingrelated diseases in children
 Obesity
 Type-2 diabetes
 Alcoholism
 Smoking-related health problems
 gambling

“Is it totally coincidental that the
products associated with the
epidemic of marketing-related
diseases are the very ones that the
marketing industry has been pushing
through stealth ads—junk food, soda
pop, beer, alcohol, and gambling?”
Examples

Soda
• Coke in American Idol and Young
Americans
• Pepsi in Pepsi Smash and The Runner

Fast Food
• McDonald’s in Beg, Borrow and Deal,
Nashville Star, Big Brother and
Baywatch

Beer
• Anheuser-Busch in Survivor I and II
• Rolling Rock, Labatt Blue and Dos Equis
in The Best Damn Sports Show Period
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Tobacco
Gambling
• Casinos in Fear Factor and Las Vegas

20% of adolescents have gambling problem
CA’s request to the FTC

“Investigate current TV advertising
practices regarding product
placement and other embedded ads,
and take the steps necessary to
restore some honesty and fair
dealing to the presentation of these
ads, by requiring concurrent
disclosure that the ads are, in fact,
ads.”
CA’s request to the FCC

“Product placements should be
identified when they occur. This
should be in addition to disclosure at
the outset of a program. Disclosure
should be large enough, and kept on
the screen long enough, so that it
can be read and understood.”

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Concurrent disclosure should read
‘Advertisement’ when the product
placement is on the TV screen
Disclosure at the outset of the
program should be in plain English,
such as
• ‘This program contains paid advertising
for…’
Freedom to Advertise Coalition

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Interrupting television programs with
‘pop up’ disclosures is ‘impractical
and border on the ludicrous’
Pose a threat to artistic freedom
Noted that FTC rejected similar
proposal in 1992 from Center for the
Study of Commercialism regarding
placement in movies
FTC’s response
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Principal reason for identifying an
advertisement is that consumers give
more credence to objective claims
from third parties than from
advertiser itself
Cited case involving infomercial for
BluBlocker sunglasses
• represented as investigative report
• implied reporting objective product data
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CA’s complaint does not suggest product
placement results in consumers giving
more credence to objective claims about
product attributes
In product placement few objective claims
appear to be made about performance or
attributes
Thus no rationale for requiring disclosure
that advertiser paid for placement