Persuasion-Product Placement.html

Persuasion-Product Placement

One of the subtlest issues in persuasion is related to product placement. Currently, most movies are involved in product endorsement. For instance, the movie Transformers (2007 release) endorsed General Motors (GM)—throughout the movie, the autobots transformed from GM vehicles. Similarly, the movie Back to the Future endorsed Pepsi, and Demolition Man endorsed Taco Bell as being the only fast-food restaurant to survive the restaurant war.

Product placement works primarily on the premise that a person's memory of a product is reinforced by exhibiting the product in a scene in a movie, television program, or news program that is, hopefully, associated with a positive memory. However, several people consider product placement in a movie, television program, or news program a distraction from entertainment.

Cowley and Barron (2009) described the objective of product placement as “the process to generate positive associations toward the placed brand, resulting in a positive shift in brand attitude” (p. 89).

Does product placement always have a positive persuasive effect?

Expert’s Opinion

The study conducted by Cowley and Baron examined different levels of product placement and the attitudes of viewers with regard to those placements.  The results revealed that too much product placement seemed to send a message of overt persuasion, causing the viewers to actually have a negative view of the product.  Future studies of this phenomenon may also reveal an influence of the potential overuse of product placement and its perceived negative connotation on the quality of a movie.

Cowley, E., & Barron, C. (2008). When product placement goes wrong. Journal of Advertising, 37(1), 89–98.