Product Placement

Product Placement

Product placement is commonly found in TV shows. When companies pay a channel or programme-maker to include its products or brands in a show. This can be from shots in the visual content or even if products are mentioned. For example, if someone were to offer to get someone a drink and they were to say "Let's get us some coca-cola", then that is product placement in the audio sense.

Is it allowed in the UK?

It is allowed on UK TV and has been on for so many years, as of the 28th of February, all UK show must comply with Ofcom's rules, this includes any sort of TV show assuming they have been paid to host the product on their show.

Does this mean that all products seen after this have been paid for?

Programme-makers use 'prop's and such to sometimes get around this and it has been more prominent after this change was made to the rules of product placement. Props are often used to substitute for some things like this, they are made for use in the show instead of being paid to use the actual, licensed version of the product.

Of course sometimes a company's logo or some form of their product can unintentionally be on the show by accident. If they are interviewing the general public then often, they can sometimes catch a company's logo or something of a similar nature by accident on camera.

What are the rules for product placement?

Which programmes can contain product placement?

Understanding Structure and Ownership in the Creative Media Sector

Understanding Structure and Ownership in the Creative Media Sector

There are many different sectors in media that make up the creative media sector. There are sectors such as Film, TV, Advertising and Marketing, Interactive Media, Games, Photo Imaging, Publishing and Animation.

Ownership

Many times in film, a company takes ownership of one company or a film, this means they have the rights and can decide on what happens with the product. When you own the rights however, you don't have complete control unless you also own the distribution rights. Some companies own the distribution rights instead of the rights, distribution rights are an exclusive right which belongs to a company involved in the process of the film. Distribution rights are rights that give the owner a right to distribute/circulate copies of the product and work. This can range from many different sectors, but in film it can be very specific, and can usually be owned by some other company through ownership as opposed to one company.

There are more types of ownership, though their title in the process name is actually 'integration', it can still end up in one company owning something else. Vertical Integration for example, is the process in which companies are in a chain of command. There are some companies which are higher up and need permission from the lower down companies in order to do certain things on and/or for the film.

There are also private and public kinds of ownership...

Private Ownership – Private Ownership is one of the more simple to explain kinds of ownership, which is where a company or organisation is owned by one person or a private organisation, instead of a public one. It is also primarily funded through advertisements, so they can earn more money for themselves instead of trying to appeal to the public interests. Examples of companies in Private Ownership would be: Archant Ltd, Global Radio and Guardian Media Group.

         Public Ownership – Public Ownership is basically a turn around to Private Ownership, it is a way of owning a company through multiple people or a public body. It if funded in a different method to that of Private Ownership, in that it is funded through it’s TV license, one thing the companies in this section have a trend of, is not putting advertisements in-between shows when you’re halfway through watching them. This is due to the fact most public channels are paid for by the average person buying a TV for it’s most basic channels, so there’s no breaking of immersion. Examples of Publicly owned channels are: BBC, ITV and Channel 5. A benefit to privately owned companies in media is that you can control your people, you won't have an outside force influencing decisions. A disadvantage to this can also be that while you have control, you also don't have complete control, in that you're limited in certain business decisions like selling certain aspects of your company.

Not to mention that there can be also two other kinds known as cross-media and independently owned ownership, among many others.

Cross Media – Cross Media ownership is when many businesses are owned by a person or corporation. This can be from a television station, or a radio station, to a newspaper company, it can widely vary. Cross Media is basically when many businesses are controlled through little amount of people, or just one, the power of the companies being used are usually very significant. Examples of Cross Media owned companies include: Disney, Comcast and Viacom.

Independently Owned – Independently owned media companies are usually smaller companies, smaller distributors and smaller funds. This doesn’t stop them from producing films, but they’re much less well known than other, bigger companies. Due to the lower budget, they can be referred to as ‘Indie Films’, examples of Independently Owned companies include: AMC Entertainment.


Mergers - The result of a media company buying out another media company for what they own, usually a franchise or the company as a whole. This is an advantage and can increase their income and viewership, and it has been happening for years, usually with the intent of turning a profit. It is often that very profitable companies buy out others to gain more fans and income, and there is a negative to this. One being that political views can often bash this concept, or the fact that sometimes people may lose jobs.


Diversification - A controversial topic it seems, diversification often comes across others with many opinions. There are threads online explaining about violations of people and localism in media ownership, such as acts and how many stations can be owned by a company at a time. A disadvantage to this is again the political views in this topic, but an advantage to having many local companies means communication can't be overly misinterpreted.

Licenses and Franchises - Franchising is a method for a business or a series, once it has proven it has potential in it's critical response and income. A franchise is usually under a  company's name, and it is under their control, a liscense fee is often paid too. By owning a franchise and a license (ownership of an I.P (Intellectual Property/name of a series)), they have copyright and commercial use of the product. Franchising is usually in effect after an initial film or game for example, has made it's potential known, i.e, Spider-man (2002) which led to Spider-man 2 (2004) and Spider-man 3 (2007). Or another example could be Sonic The Hedgehog (1991), which led to Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (1992) and Sonic The Hedgehog 3 (1994).

A disadvantage to franchising is that it can be very, very expensive, so it's quite common that IPs are often licensed first, to see if their worth branching it out into a franchise and a series.  An advantage to this however, is that while it can be costly, if your licensed product becomes a franchise, you have some potential increase of money and viewership in whatever it is, film, tv, games etc.

Conglomerates - Media conglomerates are  when a large company, i.e, Disney, own a majority of smaller companies in the same field, like when they bought Lucasfilm, or when they bought Marvel. It is essentially a higher-up company, buying out a smaller company for their use.

  Time Warner Inc is the third biggest media conglomerate, even after losing $29 billion in 2012, it’s subsidiary companies consist of: Warner Bros. Entertainment (Big Bang Theory), HBO (Game of Thrones), Time inc (Quiz Shows), DC Entertainment (Batman) and Time Warner Cable (Rules of Engagement). All of these are owned by Time Warner Inc and have their purposes.

Walt Disney is the second biggest conglomerate, making profits over $5.5 million and having a revenues of $42 billion. It’s subsidiary companies include: Lucasfilm (Star Wars), Marvel Studios (as of recently, Fantastic Four), Disney Cruise Line (Live Shows), Disney XD (Gravity Falls), Pixar (Toy Story) and the Disney Channel.

Comcast is your top dog amongst media conglomerates in 2013, Comcast received its biggest boost in trying to rise to no. 1 in taking over NBC Universal in 2010, which also gave them a significant advantage over Disney who still have yet ascend its own cable news network (ABC News) to a level where it can compete with the likes of Comcast owned MSNBC.

A disadvantage to conglomerates are that there is a lack of competition for some companies, and it means that sometimes they sell themselves out to leave on a high-note. Also there are many criticisms on big companies doing this exact thing too. However, on the flipside, an advantage to this is that the higher-ups make more money, gain more potential viewership and also gain more franchises to make content for, which multiplies this.

Independent - Independent media is a form of media, in any sector, that is controlled by an individual or a group of people, and is not under any restrictions from the government or any corporation. It's like when you were to have proper control over your group and company. It's one draw back

Profitability of Product Range - How much profit a product from a company actually sells and makes. This is a testing procedure because if what they intend to sell, does not actually sell, then they will not have to risk losing a lot of money at all. One advantage to this is that you can use this method to be safe and know if a product will work on sale or not. A disadvantage to this is if it doesn't sell then you've gone back quite a few steps, and also you will have to go back and reevaluate your work.

Competitors - For some companies there are often competitors in the form of other companies. This means that companies can often make harsh business decisions and competitive moves in selling and advertising. An advantage to this is you could put more effort into your business decisions, or you could end up proving you're superior and destroy your competition. However of course this can also cause reckless decisions too and cost you big time, an example of competitors includes Sony and Microsoft, who have been at it for years with their console marketing for one.

Voluntary -Voluntary companies are self-explanatory in that they are non-profit companies, they rely purely on volunteers to take part and run them and make money to purely operate, no extra pay for wants, only needs. An advantage to this is you run into very little risk of coming across the bad sides of the government if you abide by the rules. A disadvantage to this could be that you may not get enough money to run your business' needs, thus, falling into partial debt.

Multinationals -These are companies that work in outside countries, they are very wealthy as they are spread in many locations and have a lot of profits to make in varied areas. An advantage of this is you have spread far and can have some decent income as a result. A disadvantage of this is that communication can be flawed and could lead to some problems, also if one part of your business was to go down, then more could go with it like a chain of events.

Share of Ownership - This is when ownership is divided into many sections and cuts, divisions known as shares which are owned by different people. These are shareholders, and they are the ones in charge of this share, they then pay their part of a share and will gain the profits from their section of the company. This is an advantage for some bigger companies that make a lot of money as they can give others a bit of money for a slight fee, as they can easily make up for it in profits. However, a disadvantage to this is if there is if something critical happened, then you'd be in a tough state and lose the shareholders and more money.

Product Diversity - Having product diversity is one of the key assets to making sure your business stays afloat, by doing unpredictable things and making products some may not see coming, you could seem like an interesting business. That and it can make it so that you can make a decent amount of profit with a wide range of products. An advantage to this is just as above, you have a wide range of products and you can earn a decent amount of money from them. However, you can get the EXACT opposite from this, and get little money, most of which is spent on making what you wanted to sell and having a high stock count of your product.

Performance Against Financial Concerns - Financial concerns can strike any company or business as any moment, including recessions. To get around this the business must focus on keeping costs and risks low, they must make sure that they live through it. An advantage to this is that you can learn how to make very decisive cuts and plan ahead strategically in your business, however a disadvantage is you would be limited in certain actions due to a lack of funds.

Organisational Objectives - These are objectives that a company has as to where it wants to be in the distant future. These are often placed by the higher ups such as owners or even CEOs in the business, to which people have to meet them. Things that these tend to cover are things like sales, profits and value of the business.

TV

A significant part of the creative media sector, TV is one of the sectors of media that grew as the years passed and time went on. In it's infancy, it was nowhere near as popular as it was today. TV was originally a concept back in the 1900s, and was brought into homes in the 1920's but it was still only an idea.

The sector has grown internationally and has grossed so much money it's hard to keep track of, the services cost quite a bit as do the employees. Not only that, but the sector has become such a success and it hosts so many programs and shows created by people and third-party companies that they profit exponentially. There are companies involved in this sector like ITV and the BBC, throughout the first half of 2015, ITV claimed tax profits increased by 30%.

America is one of the most successful countries for it's broadcasting in television, in fact it's possibly the most successful, there are many advertisements for shows in America plastered in areas in America and even England. Often American shows are advertised on TV in the breaks between shows, they are one of the most common types of advertisement because they collect so much attention and publicity.

Television shows have become so popular they're now in coalition with movies inside on demand applications, such as Netflix. These services are subscriptions to unlimited TV and movie access, since television is a major source of entertainment, it's not a surprise they're now being placed in this deals.

It is a billion dollar industry with gross amounts of money. Depending on the area of industry it can vary highly. It is said by the Screen Actors Guild that the typical rate for an actor is $600-$1,700 a day.

Film

 One of the most expensive sectors of media right now, originating in the 1920's, this sector of media has grown hugely and it's something that millions of people see weekly. They are one of the most enthralling and interesting sectors ever. Movies used to be silent and were filmed with olden cameras that could only capture colours black and white.

Sometimes there was little to no voice acting, and if there was, it'd be in subtitle cards shown in-between clips to show what the character(s) just said. There would be sound effects, but they would be scarce and far between, if not, they would be shown when voice acting wasn't needed.

The industry is worth billions and is known for being one of the most advertised sectors of media ever, only for it's power and chances that their movies will sell. Film companies like Universal Studios grossed over $2,444,868,557 last year with 23 of their best movies.

Radio

Next up is radio, radio may not be the biggest or the highest grossing currently, but it's without a doubt one of the most well known, mostly because of it's origins. Radio over the air was invented in 1921, and since then has been one of the easiest ways to learn about the world or receive the news.

Many years ago, the radio was the only other source of news other than newspapers, radio were vital in 1935, when the second world war was announced. It was used to give the public help and morale, a less grim fact about radio, is that it has a sense of convenience that television wishes it could have.

That fact is, it's practicality, certain stations are easily found by radios, and radios can be taken anywhere, including when they're built in cars. They are handy to have in case of news, weather and music, you can't pull that stuff off on television.

Radio has been known to be more relaxing to TV, often hosting talk shows for certain topics, it can range from politics to gossip, it's done very often and is one of the most common things in radio. People often have their radios playing in the mornings where chat shows air and it provides a lax atmosphere and it still goes on today. Popular radio stations like BBC radio 2 have been around for years and make a decent amount, there are also local stations such as Teeside FM.

Animation

Originating many years ago, animation is one of the many forms of entertainment that has started decades ago and still thrives to this day. Originally made years ago, animation was often played in theaters before TV was invented, they were mainly cartoons that kids and adults could enjoy.

Animation has also had it's uses of spreading morale years ago as well, coming up with slogans and catchy cartoon characters, animation is now constantly on television what with our advancement in technology and is now very common.

A key example of animation is the Godfather of animation, Disney, creating hand-drawn films such as 'Treasure Planet' (2002), Snow White and 'The Seven Dwarfs' (1937) and 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)'.

Publishing

Publishing is sector of media, and it entails someone producing, editing, creating magazines and books that can be diverse, not only in content but in genre, this can include lifestyle magazines or novels, all of which have their own unique style of addressing the public.

Originating many years ago, publishing can be seen and is most likely seen as a way to get news out to the public, spreading the word of many topics or just advising people on certain topics in general, from living to news about famous people.

In growth it's fair to say it's rather large, there are so many companies in the industry making money off of their ideas and it's advertisements that are connected, it's also a profitable sector because the public find interest in reading and learning something new from publishers and their words.

Publishing has created so many common items in the world it's almost like we don't notice it, people take magazines to loads of places, home, work, holidays, and they can vary on what they cover.

Games

Currently one of the most popular sectors of media, computer games have skyrocketed in the past few decades, changing from something relatively simple, to a diverse and engaging topic with all sorts of products and franchises.

Games have been made since around the 1980's, and used to be limited, in the sense that they were strictly in arcades before home consoles were released. But when they were they excelled in popularity, games have become one of the most common sources of advertising, due to how much they cost to make, and how much they can potentially sell. Companies that are significant in this sector can include Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, SEGA, ATLUS, Capcom and Valve.
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Photography

A sector that too originates decades ago, photography or taking photographs entails using a camera to capture the scene in a still image, which results in a photograph. It is a profession that requires patience and a keen eye for visuals in order to get the best result.

Sites such as Indeed.co.uk and Prospects.ac.uk offer jobs that are found in this sector and many others, newspaper ads are also a great place to find a possible part-time job in media. The sites are probably more trustworthy however and are the better option.

An example of a photographer is a freelancer photgographer that I have personally worked with called Cal Carey, a link to his site is here: http://www.calcarey.co.uk/

Interactive Media

Interactive media is simply media that is created and produce to be used on digital computer-based systems and are responsive to actions performed on them. For example, video games are interactive media, yet are separately catagorised in this document but have the same premise. Sites that are social media such as Facebook have the same premise also and have the same build, and perform actions based on what has been performed on them, such as text, animation, audio, video.

Youtube is a keen aspect in this sector of media, Youtube is a site where anyone, anywhere can upload nearly any video (depending on copyright) and people can share their opinions, create a series and make a living depending on the view count.

Advertising & Marketing

Advertising & Marketing is probably the one that we are aware of, but don't pay much attention to how common it really is, advertising and marketing is practically the reason that the other sectors make their money, by spreading around the products and catching the attention of nearly everyone to purchase them.

An example of a company that fits into this is 'Amaze', the link is here to the site www.amaze.com.  "With clients like Lexus (Toyota), Unilever and ASICS, it's no wonder that we are amazed by this award winning full service marketing and technology agency. Yes digital is the mainstay of their DNA but they do offer a comprehensive range of services beyond digital strategy and communications, like traditional marketing and public relations. Also of interest on their site is the study of 10-15 year olds which they call the 'amaze generation' – a generation who will be tomorrow's consumer (one that is shaped by the changing digital world), you can download their results, it can be found at: www.amaze.com/news/2015/october/whitepaper-data-intelligence
Its an incredibly insightful read" - Taken from a list of 50 top award winning companies in advertising and marketing.