Okay, so hopefully after my previous post on product placement, you understand, in layman terms, what it’s all about and how both companies and productions can use it to their advantage.
Now you’re probably thinking: “Well, this is all great and dandy for those production’s starring Johnny Depp, but what about the other 99.9% of productions out there?”
We’re going to level with you the way any best friend would. You’re probably not going to get Coca-Cola to work with you, especially if your production is a brand spanking new web series with no “names” attached. But you don’t need the big boys like Coca-Cola in order to make use of product placement. The one thing I have learnt about product placement is that it’s available to all forms of productions at all scales. That means you!
Think of your production as a small company. Break it down and it may look something like this:
“YOUR PRODUCTION”
Company Size: Start-Up
Customers: Small but slowly growing.
Advertising Budget: Minimal.
Perfect. Now that you’ve done this, you’re going to want to try and find companies that are similar to you, but can offer you advantages ever so slightly. An example of this with a potential company could be:
“SAM’S BURGERS”
Company: Start-Up.
Customers: Loyal few hundred.
Advertising Budget: Minimal.
Although they might not have the budget to throw the big bucks your way, they have a larger customer list than yours, meaning there’s still ways to help each other out.
You could offer them some basic product placement (such as an establishing shot of their restaurant) in exchange for your meals on set being taken care of. Or even ask them to name a “special” burger after your production for limited time. That way you’re growing your audience base at no cost to you.
Remember – companies want to get their name out there. Companies want to grow their audiences. Companies want to find new avenues to reach their potential customers. You can totally give them that! Your production is offering them entry to a new list of consumers that they otherwise might not have access to. You are helping them. So don’t worry if you can’t get the big boys to throw a wad of cash your way yet, find the smaller peeps who can subsidies your costs in other ways. Like I said before, the possibilities are endless.
Article written by Alexa Berry for The Monthly Film Festival
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