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I think this is not a very effective advertisement. I was annoyed by the way it was obviously inserted into the show with no explanation and no context. There is nothing it could be but product placement. I thought it detracted from the show, and was just another reminder that I was watching TV, and that the show wasn't actually real.
I think the reason this ad failed was that it was not subtle enough. The ad execs interviewed on the Frontline episode about advertisements said that if the watcher notices that there is product placement, then it has failed. The image above only appeared for a few frames, so it is possible that the viewer might not see it, but then what is the point of the ad? There are two possible outcomes of this ad: the viewer notices, is annoyed, and dislikes the product; or the reader doesn't notice and nothing changes.
I saw this episode too! I totally agree with you about how annoying it is when TV shows try to "slyly" insert ads into them. But, when you think about, TV shows are like advertisements for companies that don't exist. For example, in How I Met Your Mother, if you replaced McClaren's with some place like Arby's, it would just be a long running ad for Arby's.
ReplyDeleteHmm this is very interesting. Personally, I haven't watched that show but I have seen many others with not-so-subtle advertisements. It is extremely annoying when I spot them. Like, I keep seeing Apple products EVERYWHERE--iPad here, iMac there, character listening to the iPod Touch with the camera zoomed into iTunes. ITS AN INVASION OF APPLE PRODUCTS. But in all seriousness, like you stated, if the ad is too obvious then it can become annoying and affect the viewer in a negative way. If the ad is too subtle, the viewer might not see it and have no affect at all.
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