12. Product Placement and Celebrity Endorsement

     Product placement is the art of placing your product or service where people are most likely to see it (or hear it mentioned) in a favorable way. It’s not the same as an advertisement, but it has the same effect. In this lesson, we’ll talk about two forms of product placement. One is the way it’s presented or placed at the point of purchase. The other is known as a product placement ad—although, as I just said, it isn’t really an advertisement. A product placement ad is sometimes called a “hidden advertisement.”

     We’ve all seen these hidden advertisements whether we realize it or not. In fact, these ads are effective simply because we don’t recognize them as ads.

First, let’s discuss something we’ve all noticed: packaging.

     Have you ever noticed that small products, such as a bottle of eye drops, or USB’s (memory sticks), are packaged on cards? The cards are several times as large as the product. It would cost the company much less if the package were no larger than the product.


Question: Why do they do this?

Suggested answers:

1. So they’ll have a place to put the instructions? (Hmm, do you really need instructions on using a memory stick?)

2. To reduce the chances of shoplifting? (They have security tags for high-risk items.)

3. To have a place to put the hole so that they can hang it on a peg in the store? (Wrong again. I’m sure you’ve seen lots of things hanging on pegs without being attached to cards.

Correct answer: So that people are more likely to notice it. People don’t buy products unless they notice them.

Colors:

     We’ve discussed colors in another lesson. In this lesson, we’ll go a little deeper.

     The colors used in product packaging have a bearing on whether the customer will buy the product, but so do colors and lighting in the store. The makers of a product should pay attention to the appearance of the store because that’s usually the point at which the customer decides to buy or not to buy.

     If you were marketing meat or fish products, you wouldn’t want the walls or containers to be green. When meat and the color green are seen together, people unconsciously connect the two and think the meat looks spoiled. Light blue is better for fish, and orange is better for meat.

     Likewise, the color scheme (the way the different colors work together) of the packages should attract attention, but it should be favorable attention. Yellow is the most attention-getting color in the spectrum, but what if everyone used yellow? Your product would be harder to notice. Red is considered the most exciting color in the spectrum, but, if everyone used red in their color schemes, it would lose excitement.

     Your best bet for favorable attention would be a unique combination of colors and patterns (like the Nike swoosh or the Coca Cola red-and-white pattern). You should also be aware of the psychological impact of the colors you use so that your color scheme will fit both your product and your customers.

     In different cultures, colors suggest different things. Not only that, but different colors associated with different products suggest different things. For those reasons, I won’t tell you that certain colors always suggest the same things.

     Green, as I said, it lousy for fish. Certain shades of green, however, are excellent for vegetable products. In this one course, it isn’t possible to cover all the bases. If you want to know more, you’ll have to research it on your own.

End Caps and Free-standing Displays

     When a product is displayed in stores, there are six places it may be displayed:

1. On shelves

2. In display cases

3. Behind counters

4. At end caps

5. At free-standing displays

6. Point-of-purchase displays.

      An end cap is that section at the end of the shelves. End cap displays are noticed more than any other kind of display.    In the photo to the right, you see a woman standing at an end-cap display.

     Actually, the display you see here is both a free-standing display and an end-cap display. A true end-cap display would be on shelves at the end of a row of shelves. Since the end-cap shelves are covered by the display in this picture, we can also call this display an end-cap display.

Below are two types of free-standing displays:

     A manned free-standing display (left) and an unmanned free-standing display (right.)

     You’ve probably noticed something that the manned free-standing display has in common with the manned end-cap display. They’re both manned by attractive young women. In the field of advertising, attractive young women are called a “primary advertising symbol.” (No offense is intended here.) Let’s face it: Both men and women would rather look at attractive young women than any other demographic group of people. But don’t overdo it; it can lose you customers.

Point-of-purchase Displays:

     Point-of-purchase displays are displays at the checkout counter. The purpose of these displays is to encourage impulse buying. While you were making out your shopping list, you probably didn’t write down that you needed the most recent copy of Next magazine, a soft drink, or a candy bar, did you?

     If your product is small, inexpensive, subject to impulse buying, and completely unnecessary, that’s the place for the supermarket to display it. The woman in this picture may be tempted to put a candy bar on the checkout counter without even realizing it. The other woman may be reading a copy of Next.

Hidden Advertisements:

     Let's suppose you’re watching a car chase in an action movie. The hero of the movie is driving an exciting car, while the bad guys are driving cars manufactured by other car makers. The hero’s car handles so beautifully that it doesn’t crash even once. The bad guys’ cars—the ones made by other automakers—are crashing all over the place. Even if you’re dirt poor or don’t have a driver’s license, you’re thinking, I’d like to have a car like that.

     That’s what you’re supposed to be thinking because the scene you were just watching was sponsored by an automaker. It takes money to make a movie or television series, right? Now you know where the producer of the movie got the money to make that scene.

     How many times have you seen a movie or television series—such as JAG—in which a fleet of navy ships are doing things that make a career in the U.S. Navy sound glamorous? I hope you don’t think that Hollywood has that kind of money to throw around, especially for an empty-headed television series that was never all that popular anyway.

     That’s Americans' tax dollars at work. An all-volunteer military depends on capable people wanting to join. Hollywood and the military-industrial complex have been in cahoots at least as early as World War II.

     When people watch an obvious advertisement, their defensive filters are up. If they think it’s just a show, they’re more likely to buy the product—in this case, they’re more likely to enlist. That’s why the JAG TV series never showed anyone sweating it out in a ship’s boiler room or dying of a Gulf War illness.  Television shows about life in the military are always more glamorous than the truth.

A few other product placement ads:

1. In the 1980’s Spielberg movie E T, a little boy used a candy called Reese’s Pieces to lure a space alien into his closet. In two scenes, the front of the package was clearly shown. This was enough to tremendously boost sales of Reese’s Pieces.

2. In a 1990’s movie, the main character (Tom Hanks) went a little overboard in praising the Starbucks “experience.” That was too obvious.

3. In a more recent police show, some policemen tease a cop about drinking a domestic beer—clearly shown to be Budweiser—instead of a fancy European beer. When the cop is shown to be more intelligent than the other cops, they also order “what he’s having” (meaning Budweiser.)

4. At major events such as the Academy Awards and presidential inaugurations, fashion designers usually provide the gowns that famous women wear.

     Note: Product placement ads don’t have to be as expensive as the ones mentioned in this lesson. For example, many fashion ideas have been tried out by hiring ordinary people to wear them in natural settings.

     Remember, also, that there must be a fit between the “ordinary” person who is wearing the clothing and the “ordinary” people who are your target consumers. You wouldn’t want to hire someone your teacher’s age to be seen wearing something that you hope to market to college students.

Celebrity endorsements

There’s little to be said about celebrity endorsements that you don’t already know. There are three ways to go about it:

1. Pay the celebrity to say good things about your product in an advertisement, or to appear in an advertisement for your product.

2. Pay the celebrity to use your product in public.

3. Both.

     This works if everything fits. A famous baseball player can be a celebrity endorser (or celebrity spokesman) for athletic equipment, but it would be a poor fit for him to endorse Burger King. It also helps if the celebrity actually likes the product.

Warning! Warning! Warning!

     An alliance between a brand and a celebrity is always a risk for both. Either the brand or the celebrity may be caught in a scandal that destroys the fit between them. Here are two memorable examples:

1. In 1955, James Dean was the idol of teenagers all over America. He was hired to do public service announcements urging teenagers to drive safely. In September 1955, he was killed while driving recklessly on a mountain road.

2. During the 1990’s, actor Stacy Keach was hired to make public service announcements against smoking. This ad campaign abruptly ended when he was arrested for possession of marijuana.

3. For many years, a famous golfer named Tiger Woods was celebrity spokesman for a slew of products.  It was more than just his golfing skills that made him attractive as a celebrity spokesmen.  It was his wholesome, clean image.  When his wholesome, clean image went down the tubes, so did his contract with several companies. 

Now it’s your turn!

     You and your team will design a product placement campaign for your product or service.