The good news for those wishing to get their products out before big TV audiences is that a lot of the prime-time series are doing well again. But sadly, some of these shows peskily offer limited brand integration opps.
Advertisers have been taking matters into their own hands with entries such as the Colgate Country Showdown, or P&G’s Home Made Simple, the first online loyalty program to morph into a series. But not every brand wants to be a showrunner. So we thought it would be helpful to encourage some of Canada’s ad creatives to work on network show pitches, to make sure there’s a starring role/close-up opp for every brand.
Memo
To: Network programming execs
From: Ad agency execs
Re: Deplorable lack of starring roles for brands in fall TV series
Dear networks:
An industry-wide coalition appointed a select think tank to brainstorm Ad-Friendly Programming solutions to rectify the appalling lack of brand visibility equality in prime time. Below please find our recommendations.
Sin
The Concept in a Nutshell: How corrupt can you become in 24 hours?
Imagine a man on the street is stopped and given a briefcase and 24 hours to book a one-way ticket to the seedy underbelly of hell. And we get to watch.
The goal? To commit as many sins as possible in 24 hours using the contents of a briefcase as inspiration, fuel and challenge.
What’s inside the briefcase is unknown to them until they accept the challenge. Once they do, the only rule is that they have to use everything in the briefcase in 24 hours. The branded contents of the briefcase include items from our sponsors such as a credit card with $50,000 on it, keys to a pimped-out car, a bottle of booze that they must consume themselves, condoms, Escort Service cards, casino chips, cigarettes, a gift certificate from a tattoo parlor, Red Bull, a cellphone with three pre-programmed numbers they must call and involve (we’re thinking Dennis Rodman, Jenna Jameson and Verne Troyer for the pilot), lingerie, handcuffs, the business card of a bail bondsman and a lawyer on retainer.
The top three sinners compete at the end of the year in the ultimate sin-off in Sin City, Las Vegas, for a $1 million prize.
It’s a day they, nor the audience, will ever forget. Better still, it’s a day in which many advertisers can showcase their products that may not normally be able to do so. And other advertisers, looking for some edgy ‘cool factor’ can inject life back into sagging brands. Soon it’ll be the coolest hour on TV.
Andrew Shortt, CD; Chris Pastirik, strategic catalyst;
Glen Hunt, creative catalyst, Dentsu Canada, Toronto
The Interns
Take 14 young creative wannabes – seven males, seven females – put them in a house where they will live, sleep and eat together, and pit them against each other at a high-powered ad agency where they will work like dogs. The competition: Develop the best ad campaigns for three youth-oriented national brands, and do it in three weeks. The winning creative team produces its campaigns and wins an internship at the agency.
It’s Big Brother meets The Apprentice. Each episode follows the creatives as they race against the clock and each other to impress their Hotshot Creative Director, and their Tough But Fair Clients. We’ll watch the young creatives as they live and breathe the culture of each brand, and strive for ways to express it. We’ll see them struggle with their own limitations, and the realization that their dream of working at an ad agency may have become a nightmare. Will there be politicking, backstabbing and sexual intrigue? We can only hope.
Peter Gardiner, CD, Venture Communications, Toronto
Budding reDocumentarian seeks archives
I’m a bit like Bobby Kennedy, minus the good looks, idealism and personal charisma. Some people look at product placements that already exist and ask ‘Why?’ I dream of product placements that never were and ask ‘Why not?’
The future of ad-friendly brand integration lies in the past, my friends. I’m talking TVO, PBS, and the History Channel; I’m talking Ken Burns meets Forrest Gump, and I’m talking big dollars. To quote Oscar Goldman: ‘We have the technology.’ A bit of Photoshop here, a touch of CGI there, and ‘his story’ takes on a whole new meaning.
Did valour and skill alone win the Battle of Britain, or was it the Red Bull that the pilots quaffed before going up? (Wink, wink.) Say, what brand of sledgehammer is Donald Alexander Smith using to drive the famous ‘Last Spike’ in 1885? Canadian Tire, anyone? Or would Rona like to step up?
The branding possibilities are as endless as our capacity to play fast and loose with history, coupled with the credulity of the viewing public, will allow. And if the success of The Da Vinci Code is anything to go by, the sky may be the limit where those matters are concerned.
Call me.
Joe O’Neill, copywriter, Due North Communications, Toronto
