Using product placement to sell can be highly successful, but it needs to be done properly

Product placement, also known as embedded advertising, has been around for more than 50 years but it is only recently that the emergence of Chinese brands in the international media and Western brands in the Chinese media has taken place.

It was only last month that Yili, one of China's leading dairy producers, appeared in a popular US television sitcom, The Big Bang Theory. Initial feedback suggests Yili's appearance has proved an extremely successful exercise.

The origins of this increasingly powerful brand building activity are thought to date back to 1951 and the film African Queen, in which Katharine Hepburn famously tosses a bottle of Gordon's gin into the sea. After that, product placement grew steadily until the 1980s, when there was a burst of activity, starting a trend that has not let up.

Recent films that have involved frequent use of product placement have included It's A Wonderful Life, Matrix Re-loaded and Transformers 3. Indeed, the last of these, an American blockbuster, included placement of not only Yili, but three other Chinese brands: Lenovo, China's largest PC producer, implanted its Edge computer into the film, which later transformed into a robot; a flatscreen TV made by TCL, one of the largest electronic corporations in China, appeared for a short time; and the T-shirt on the hero at the beginning of the film sported the brand name and log of Meters bonwe, a Chinese casual fashion brand whose target market is young people.

Product placement has also grown considerably across the Chinese media industry, and many well-known Western brands have taken advantage of it.

The Chinese romantic comedy film Color Me Love, first screened in 2010 and loosely inspired by the American film The Devil Wears Prada, tells the tale of a young woman's work at a glossy fashion magazine and the ensuing trials and tribulations. In it were a multitude of well-known Western brands, including Apple, Diesel jeans, Cartier, Versace, Hermes and, of course, Prada. Color Me Love signals not just huge product placement opportunity for Western brands in Chinese films and TV shows but also that Chinese consumers really value the brand association formed through product placement. Most notably Color Me Love exemplifies such a high degree of Chinese audience acceptability of product placement. Chinese consumers are far more accepting probably due to the relatively new consumer culture in their country. In countries where there is a longer advertising industry history consumers tend to have a fairly negative view of advertising and view product placement as insidious. However, at present Chinese consumers do not think this way, instead believing it is part of the film or show's plot, so many form a strong association between product and film or show. In China TV commercials are shown frequently on all channels, which may lead consumers to relax more when watching films or TV shows and forget about any included advertising content.

But, does product placement, either in the Western or Chinese media, really offer an easy, complete answer to most major brand building challenges? Or are there risks and possible drawbacks that should be studied carefully before embarking on any product placement initiative? And what about any timing and sequencing issues during any product placement campaign?

Compared with traditional forms of mass media advertising, especially TV commercials, product placement offers many clear advantages. Not least of these is the diminishing cost where a film or TV show enjoys extended longevity. Long-running and frequently repeated TV shows and films also provide greater potential impact with repeat exposure. Furthermore, product placement enables brand producers to "reach" current and potential consumers more effectively than with TV advertising, where viewers all too frequently avoid the advertisement break. DVRs and TIVOs also enable viewers to skip TV advertisements. However, all of these benefits only contribute to possible increased brand awareness, whereas any positive association between a TV show and/or film and product placement should also lead to the development of a far more effective brand image.

Of course all of these potential gains from product placement need to be considered alongside possible disadvantages. For example, brand producers often have no or very little influence over the precise timing and scenes in which their brand may appear in a TV show or film. Moreover, future success and longevity of a film or TV show is often very difficult to predict. Risks are also apparent if too many and/or too frequent product placements occur during a film or TV show, leading to a negative perception of the film or TV show as well as the products on display. Also, product placement invariably makes use of the most well-known stars in the global entertainment industry, and their repute and the value of their image are impossible to control and influence.

However, for lasting success product placement has to achieve real association with either the film or TV show itself and/or specific actors who feature heavily in the production. The method of "pairing" a film/TV show and/or well-known actor (unconditioned stimulus) and product placement (conditioned stimulus) is also key to any effective fit. Over the years forward conditioning has been shown to be most effective in enabling viewers to form fastest association. During forward conditioning the conditioned stimulus (in this case the brand employed under product placement) precedes the appearance of any unconditioned stimulus (for example, in this case a well-known actor). However, this is far easier during a traditional TV commercial and far more difficult to achieve during typical product placement. Film and TV producers will always be anxious for the actor and plot to dominate, with only a supporting, secondary role for any well-known brand.

Alternatively, simultaneous conditioning can also prove effective. During simultaneous conditioning both the brand and the well-known actor are presented at the same time, and appearance of both is stopped simultaneously. This is far more common in product placement.

Finally, backward conditioning, in which the brand (or conditioned stimulus) appears after the celebrity in the film or TV show (the unconditioned stimulus), is by far the most common method of product placement pairing. However, backward conditioning often proves least effective because the brand's latent appearance often serves as a signal that the unconditional stimulus (for example, a well-known actor) has ended, rather than as a signal that the unconditioned stimulus is about to appear.

All of the above methods of pairing assume that product placement involves pairing with the same unconditioned stimulus (for example, a well-known TV star) and at all times when the unconditioned stimulus appears. This is also highly unlikely in a TV show or film where a brand's appearance is usually limited to one or only a few scenes, far fewer appearances than the major stars of the production. This procedure, referred to as zero contingency in psychology literature, may also prove ineffective in creating any lasting association because the brand, or conditioned stimulus, is not perceived by the viewer as a predictor of the unconditioned stimulus (for example, a TV star) so any association may fail. Similarly, if a brand appears in a film or TV show in the absence of any suitable unconditioned stimulus such as a well-known actor, then any positive brand-building association is highly unlikely. This procedure is referred to as extinction in psychology literature.

The author is a researcher at Nottingham University's School of Contemporary Chinese Studies. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

(China Daily 06/29/2012 page9)