Marketing Trend Adds up to Even More Ads

Review by Mike Gange

Madison &Vine: Why the Entertainment and Advertising Industries Must Converge to Survive

by Scott Donaton

McGraw Hill Press, $22.95, 202 pages

Hold on to your hat! We are at the beginning of a marketing trend that will add up to way more ads than ever before. Consumers are going to be ambushed by advertisements embedded in the content of entertainment, in ways no one would have dreamed possible only a decade ago. For example, well known Hollywood directors are making 10 minute action-oriented movies, and the star is the German-made automobile BMW. Comedian Jerry Seinfeld is returning to television with his offbeat social views which he shares with an animated Superman in what is really an elongated ad for American Express.

Further examples from television demonstrate how the trend is growing: on ABC TV’s "Who Wants to be a Millionaire," contestants are given three lifelines, one of which is a telephone call sponsored by AT&T; and on NBC TV’s "The Restaurant" blatantly embedded product placements for Mitsubishi cars, Coors beer and American Express credit cards take away from the already weak story line. Pop singer Sting’s music video "Desert Rose" featured as many camera shots of a sleek Jaguar car as it did of Sting. Although car maker Jaguar did not pay for that particular product placement, Sting’s music company, Ark 21, encouraged the use of the video as a promotional tool for car sales in show rooms and on television because it helped propel Sting’s album to become a top seller.

In Madison & Vine, writer Scott Donaton says the once clear line between commerce and creativity is becoming increasingly blurred. We are in the midst of a marketing revolution that is changing the way business and artistic organizations reach out to consumers. As the editor of AdvertisingAge, Donaton has witnessed and written about this trend for the past few years. The title of his book suggests the overlapping cultures of the business world, represented by New York City’s Madison Avenue, home to many of the largest and most powerful ad agencies, and the entertainment field, dominated by Hollywood’s Vine Street, where many movie, television and recording studio executives have their offices.

Donaton points out that in many cases this trend is a result of changing technologies that are forcing business models to evolve. Televison was once seen as the "massiest of the mass media." Advertisers bought access to a specific type of audience by purchasing ads during a network TV show that guaranteed to deliver millions of similar viewers. Thanks to the increasing numbers of specialty cable TV channels, broadcasting has really become narrow casting, aimed at a very precise segment of the audience.

Donaton shows through out the book that he is not only a keen observer of the trends happening in the ad world, but he is an analytical thinker, making connections about how these ads relate to our changing entertainment culture and then explaining clearly why it is happening.

He says technological innovations, such as TiVo, those personal digital recorders (PDR’s) that work like a VCR on steroids, are a double edged sword for advertisers. On the one side, a PDR lets the audience skip over unwanted commercials and return to the program. On the other, a PDR helps the audience find out more information about the products they are really interested in, by providing speedy Internet searches listing reviews, prices and availability.

In the music business, digital technology and home computers have allowed consumers to download single songs, often at no cost at all, rather than purchasing CD’s. This piracy, combined with escalating costs, has forced recording executives to find innovative ways to ensure their return on investment. Just like McDonald’s, then, even groups such as The Rolling Stones have become a marketing brand, seeking out concert tour sponsorships.

Scott Donaton touches on all the major entertainment media – magazines, movies, television and music -- in Madison & Vine, and the result is a thoroughly engrossing book. Donaton is such a smooth writer that this book could be read at one sitting; still, his use of astounding facts and figures make this a volume to be read repeatedly. The interviews with the key players in the entertainment field illustrate Donaton’s argument that not only is this convergence of business and art going to continue, but what we have seen so far is only the tip of the iceberg.

Hang on to your hats, for sure. And maybe your wallets, too.

Mike Gange teaches media studies and journalism at Fredericton High.