When Fred Joyal was looking to build brand awareness for his company, 1-800-DENTIST, he knew he needed more than the usual 30-second TV spot. “I didn’t want it to be about me serving as a spokesperson in a commercial and saying, ‘You really need to go to the dentist,’” he says. “We wanted to have a whole different impact on how the consumer perceives us.”

Joyal turned to Bill Barnett, president of Los Angeles–based Inside Entertainment Ventures, to get his company’s services integrated directly into a syndicated TV show — in this case 15 “extreme makeover” segments on The Tony Danza Show. “Tony Danza would say, ‘Thanks to our friends at 1-800-DENTIST, we’re going to give somebody a new smile and a new style,’” Joyal recalls. “They would shoot the person before visiting the dentist and then during the visit. This gave the public the chance to see our dentists, and they would show the profound impact they had on that person’s life.”

Some may consider this kind of integrated marketing communications effort simply a new twist on product placement. But for Barnett and others, branded entertainment — the convergence of the advertising and entertainment industries — is one of today’s top consumer marketing trends. Consumer brands not only are seen in a TV show or a movie, they often play a major role.

In a survey conducted by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), 42 percent of senior marketers named the capacity to make a stronger emotional connection with the consumer as the No. 1 benefit of branded entertainment. “Product managers no longer want to pay just to get their products placed on a set,” Barnett explains. “If I were a brand manager, I wouldn’t want that either. I want a dialogue about the product. I want some information. And I want some comments to be made.”

Of course, branded entertainment isn’t cheap. Seventy-nine percent of marketers felt they were overpaying for this medium, the ANA survey found. Barnett says the cost depends on which TV show is being used, how extensive the integration is, and whether the marketer is buying additional ads to supplement the branded entertainment. “In general, it’s more expensive than traditional advertising, but it’s got a lot more kick to it,” he says, “because it elevates your brand and ends up giving you a lot of mileage in terms of credibility.”

The Oprah Effect
Thanks to the unlikely combination of digital video recorders, reality TV, and talk shows like The Oprah Winfrey Show, branded entertainment is quickly gaining traction with a wider variety of advertisers. Who can forget Oprah surprising 276 members of her audience by presenting them with free Pontiac G6s? The Detroit Free Press called the giveaway “the best advertising an estimated $8 million could buy” for the launch of a new product. Now, major brands like Burger King are paying big bucks to be worked into episodes of The Apprentice, and automakers, which have long directed their ad dollars at prime-time shows, realize there are huge opportunities to be part of entertainment content throughout the day.

“Marketers are aware that because consumers have a lot more devices and access to entertainment, it’s easier for them to turn their backs on commercial advertising,” says David Caruso, vice president and managing director of the entertainment marketing firm Alliance in New York. “So they need to find ways to embed their products into consumer lifestyles.”

Glenn Golder, senior vice president of promotions for Los Angeles–based Pic-TV, says entertainment producers and creators are also jumping on the bandwagon. “You have some shows that have been around for some time that consider branded entertainment a bit more clutter than it’s worth,” notes Golder, who specializes in helping clients get their products featured on talk and game shows. “But for the most part, the producers are becoming more and more open to these types of integrated opportunities.”

Part of what’s driving the TV industry’s interest in branded entertainment is the potential revenue stream, though Melanie Marsh, president of Hollowell Advertising & Promotions in Jacksonville, Fla., says that may eventually price some potential marketers out of the arena. Marsh worked with Delta Air Lines on a special weeklong promotion on the popular game show Wheel of Fortune. “In that case, it was a regular trade — we provide the trips. It can be very costly, but we thought it was well worth it,” she says. “But we later found out that the show’s producers had started asking people to pay cash. We don’t want to do anything that’s way above the dollars we normally spend.”

Barnett contends that branded entertainment often requires a leap of faith since, like traditional advertising, it cannot always provide a quantifiable return on investment. “It’s not even as simple as coming up with measurable ROI because different companies are looking for different kinds of measurements,” he explains. “Some companies may be looking at branded entertainment to drive calls or visits to a Web site, and then seeing how many of those lead to sales, while others may want to do it strictly for branding. So we’re still learning what will work and what won’t work and how not to waste your dollars.”

Though it is possible for growing businesses to get their feet wet with limited participation in one or two episodes of a show, Pic-TV’s Golder stresses that in most cases branded entertainment should be included in a company’s overall integrated marketing communications mix. “You’re seeing major advertisers like Procter & Gamble integrating products into soap operas with the addition of a home viewer sweepstakes,” he says. “With a program like that you can cross-promote the TV show in print ads that drive readers to watch the show for a chance to win.”

As for any potential downside to branded entertainment, Caruso says it may eventually become too popular. “It’s already starting to get cluttered by brands doing it as one-offs and not as part of a strategic initiative,” he says.

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