The Future of Branding

One of the biggest clichés of entertainment production is showing someone placing a grocery bag on the counter with a baguette sticking out of it. This is done for obvious reasons. It shows that the bag is full and that there’s food in the bag, but more important, the baguette doesn’t have a label on it. I have spent hours on sets hiding labels or stickers so that brands would not be seen. Not any longer. It’s a new model now.
We are entering the world of branded entertainment. In financing entertainment online, two things became evident very quickly. One is that we the paying public wouldn’t be wiling to pay for downloads. Google stopped its pay-for-download site in 2006 due to of lack of demand and because they could see we weren’t going to pay. Google only made $29 million on the downloads. That same year, the company made $402 million selling banner ads on YouTube. Google knew that using the old TV model of having viewers watch a 30-second spot in the middle of a show would last about five seconds; it wouldn’t work. They were right. No one wants the interruption.
The future of most Web advertising is in branding. This can be great freedom, or a yoke around the neck of creativity. If a program is designed around only one brand it is a yoke. However, we live in a branded culture. If creative people are allowed to interpret our branded society correctly, it could be very interesting. People like THEIR THINGS. They like their shampoo, they like their shirts, they like their toothpaste. I can’t count how many times I’ve listened to people go on about how they like what they’ve bought and how smart they were for buying it. It’s funny! Depending on the diversity of brands a creative could play with, you could get a much better, more realistic view of our world.
One the seemingly useless pieces of information that I have gleaned over the years is that President Bush, Prime Minister Blair, and Saddam Hussein have all used Colgate toothpaste. I believe that in the right hands this information could be very powerful creatively.
The branding sponsorship is becoming more evident. Product placement has been a part of motion pictures for a long time. However, it just recently started in network TV. Nissan vehicles are now included in the plot line of NBC’s “HEROES.” And any regular viewer of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” knows what type of car Larry David drives.
The real exciting stuff will happen when the branding becomes more seamless. Imagine a scene on set with the actors all costumed in different clothing lines, and the kitchen is full of real products. Or seeing the actors interact with and use different manufacturers’ products, like cell phones, gum, hairspray, etc.
Let’s say you have the freedom to download the show. You can watch the show on your timeline. Now imagine that everything in that show is tagged with embedded information. The blouse, the bottle on the table, the gum. If you like it, or want to know about it, click on it to learn what it is. Click again to learn where to get it and what it costs. Click again and it will be delivered to you tomorrow by noon. We’re not that far away. In fact, TIVO viewers can attest to that! They have plenty of viewer options to learn more about products they see in commercials just by clicking the up thumb.
This is the arena where creativity and branding can coexist. The creative can show the world as it is without brand paranoia. Brands could endlessly sell directly to consumers for as long as the program exists on consumers’ hard drives. Not only the items that you see on the show, but if your online while your watching it you could click through to the suppliers catalog site and order online anything they have to offer. If the producers got paid a small piece for every item sold they could become guzillionaires. Branding will be liberating for the creatives and the producers.
Oh, yeah, and about that baguette. You’ll be able to click on it to find out where it is baked fresh twice daily, and get GPS directions to the store nearest you. Click!

Craig “Burnie” Burns – In the video production industry for 20+ years, Burns has watched it evolve. With keen insights, Burns is imprinting his own vision, creating companies that will be a part of the new model. His understanding of branding positions him as a leader in the industry. Send him your questions.