Have Reality, Need Product

The protracted writers strike is resulting in an abundance of product placement in reality TV, and the engine isn’t slowing down anytime soon.

Since November networks have relied on an accelerated production of unscripted shows ripe for integration to help defray production costs.

“My experience is that content integration deals are easier to do in non-scripted shows than scripted shows,” says Guy McCarter, managing director of Green Room Entertainment, part of the Omnicom Group. “And since there are going to be more unscripted shows, I think there are going to be more product integration deals.”

The signs are already on the small screen. When NBC’s “American Gladiators” recently made the Sunday night lineup, it was a harbinger of more prime-time reality to come.

“The strike may help push brands into trying other forms of engagement,” says Tom Valdiserri, senior vice president of entertainment and alliances for The Marketing Store.

It’s a situation in flux, according to Dan Longest, senior vice president for integrated marketing and promotion at ABC. “We’re in a bit of holding pattern. There obviously is a bit of uncertainty about how things are going to play out [with the strike],” he says.

Longest says ABC isn’t seeing a flood of more reality programming in the pipeline yet. But he acknowledges that a rush to reality would portend more openings to plug in branded content. “If we tend to develop more reality shows, there will be more opportunities for product integration.”

That’s because product placement in reality shows appears to be natural, less obtrusive and much more likely to make an impression on viewers. “I think you have more opportunities because you’re taking a real world brand and putting in an environment that’s real,” says Longest.

ABC has struck the right balance with Sears and Tyson Foods for its current “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” series, which presents compelling stories about people in dire straits with homes in desperate need of repair. The sagas of reconstruction put Sears appliances in starring roles in an integration deal that Longest calls “the gold standard” for ABC.

The perceived branding bonanza in “Extreme Makeover,” NBC’s “The Apprentice” and a host of other shows are making placement more enticing to advertisers.

“Those kind of pro-social programs that are changing people’s lives have an effect on the brand opinion of products in those programs,” says Rachel Mueller-Lust, executive vice president of networks at IAG Research.

IAG consistently sees measurable “multiplier effect” for ads run in conjunction with product placements, according to Mueller-Lust. She adds that reality continues to be TV’s “most placement-dense genre.”

McCarter observes that there’s been markedly more branding demand. “What you’re seeing is fewer inconsequential placements and a focus on the deeper integration.”

An integral presence on a popular series can translate into an immediate payoff for product profiles, as Coca-Cola and Ford have found through their connections with Fox’s “American Idol.”

“Being involved in such a popular show helps to build the equity of the brand,” says Greg Downey, Coca-Cola group director of entertainment marketing.

Coke also reaped benefits for its Avian brand by placing it on Bravo’s “Top Chef” series. “The platform is conducive to allowing us to talk about our product,” Downey says.

“Top Chef” has been one of several Bravo reality hits that has transformed the market from a time when the cable network was trying to convince brands that buzz would follow branding. Bravo’s creativity in conceiving integrations, from competing chefs cooking on Kenmore ranges to wannabe fashionistas ferried around Manhattan in Mercedes-Benzes on “Make Me A Supermodel,” has helped tip the scales.

“It’s a dramatically different discussion today than it was five years ago,” says Kevin McAuliffe, Bravo vice president of branded entertainment. “Today there literally is a branded entertainment marketplace that’s fairly pervasive in every category we’re dealing with.”

Bravo is cooking up more inventive reality integrations for the current season. Next up is “Real Housewives of New York City” with a disparate cast of characters likely to yield a corresponding crop of placements.

Consumers are drawn to less “canned” brand integration in reality series as their imaginations are engaged by the story lines — and extensions spawned in other media, according to Mark McIntire, VH1 senior vice president of integrated marketing. In VH1’s “America’s Most Smartest Model” series, Alberto VO5 played a personalize role through a hairdresser provided by the sponsor to help the contestants.

VO5 eventually created an online ad featuring V.J., the series winner, and viewers would also see outtakes from the series online, where there were links to VO5’s site. “There was an ongoing presence of VO5 that made sense in the show, so we had this loop of communication with the audience,” says McIntire.

Brands are exploring multimedia variations on the theme of integration. TNT aired a mini-drama series produced with Chase Card Services during a special presentation of the film “Castaway” that drew viewers online to TNT.tv for the final installment.

Whatever the vehicle, the key is making an appropriate fit, says Linda Yaccarino, Turner Entertainment executive vice president for ad sales and marketing. “The network’s brand comes first. In terms of product integration, the overarching goal is to just make sure it makes sense for the story line.”

Brands are also building their own platforms, on-air and online. Coca-Cola recently struck a deal to co-produce shows with on-demand network Exercise TV, integrating Enviga and other brands in shows to be aired on cable TV and segments to be screened on mycokerewards.com.

Reebok produced “Framed,” a series of 30-minute athlete profiles with branding that’s been airing on the IFC.

Ford recently produced “Kim and Seana,” a short-form reality series on MySpaceTV.com about two aspiring musicians. It featured Ford’s Sync wireless access technology during an extended road trip in their Ford Focus.

The medium may still be the message. But in reality, branding is playing a broader role as unscripted programming proliferates at a breakneck pace.

For more articles on entertainment marketing go to www.promomagazine.com/entertainment