Product Placement

Product placement is becoming a popular form of advertisement in movies, television shows, music videos, video games etc. whereby a product or service is featured within a programme. A study has shown that 90% of the people skip advertisements on television and less than 30% of them recall the brand being advertised. However, with product placement, the recall rate is 57.5% and around 50% of the people would buy the product being advertised.

The music video - Poker Face by Lady Gaga advertises Beats headphones and bwin.com, an online betting site. This is an example of successful product placement. One of the actors appears wearing the Beats headphones in this music video. Bwin.com is seen on the cards being used to play poker in the music video. This form of product placement is appropriate because it does not make it obvious that a product is being advertised but leaves a huge impact on the audience. The placement of bwin.com on the cards was relevant because it referenced the nature of the website and yet did not disclose its actual meaning, compelling the audience to search for it. Had this website been advertised in a 30 second advertisement as an online betting site, it would probably have attracted fewer customers.

However, product placement can go terribly wrong if it is not disguised well. For example, an episode of the drama television series, The Secret Life of the American Teenager uses product placement the wrong way. In this episode, a mother explains the benefits of a skin product to her daughter and asks her to use it twice a day. This form of advertisement proves detrimental to the popularity of the product instead of increasing it. The audience feels like it is being forced to appreciate a product while watching a programme and it also acts as a distraction from the entertainment the programme is attempting to provide.

Thus, the proper way of product placement is to present it in front of the audience, not verbally explaining its use or benefits, but letting the audience comprehend it by analysing the context and environment in which it is displayed. This makes product placement more impactful than traditional advertising as it minimizes the chances of it getting skipped by the audience. The fact that Iron Man 2 had 64 branded products proves how powerful the idea of product placement is in today’s world.