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Hollywood Spin
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Madison & Vine
You may not have heard of companies like Media Edge CIA and Integrated Entertainment Partners, but this elite group controls the future of film and TV related advertising.
Wednesday, October 1, 2003
By Richard Horgan
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In advertising industry parlance, the increasingly invested relationship that New York agencies are pursuing with the major TV networks and Hollywood film studios is simply known as “Madison and Vine.”
Be it the sweeping acquisition of Hollywood PR agencies PMK/HBH, Rogers & Cowan and Bragman, Nyman, Cafarelli by Interpublic Group, one of three gargantuan consortiums along with WPP Group and Omnicom that owns most of the major ad agencies around the world, or the eclipse of product placement by much more sophisticated “brand integration” campaigns, the mythical intersection of Madison and Vine is where much of the convergence action is taking place these days.
Earlier this week, the opening panel discussion of Digital Hollywood, a three-day technology conference held at the Los Angeles headquarters of the Directors Guild of America, offered a rare chance to get a close-up look at the men who are responsible for the business of interfacing creatively with advertisers. At least two of the participants, Irwin Gotlieb and Mitchell Kanner, approach matters from the same instinctual corner once inhabited by the late David Ogilvy, founder of Ogilvy & Mather.
Whereas Ogilvy’s famous Rolls Royce campaign tag line suggested that the only sound heard when driving a Rolls at 60 miles per hour was that of a dashboard clock ticking, the pronouncements of the Digital Hollywood panelists provided a comforting and fairly impressive soundtrack to the speed of light at which things are changing.
To put it in perspective, as president and CEO of Group M, a WPP holding comprised of two firms by the names of Media Edge CIA and Mindshare, Gotlieb helps ad agencies oversee $32 billion in annual spending. That’s billion, with a b.
“Advertisers are facing two key issues,” explained Gotlieb. “One is the fragmentation of the audience. For example, the audience for The Matrix films is relatively small, representing 3 to 4% of the target group and accumulating when all is said and done to perhaps 15%. In other words, advertisers are not reaching 85% of intended viewers. So you have to diversify.”
“The other factor, and biggest mitigator to success, is the incredible clutter out there with all the 15 second ads, 30 second ads, promos, content integration and so on,” Gotlieb continued. “Whereas fifteen years ago a placement of an ad was adequate, today the quality of that placement becomes paramount.”
When moderator Michael Kassan, a media and entertainment consultant, asked the audience full of journalists and technophiles to raise their hands if they owned a TIVO or other digital video recording device (DVR), almost every hand in the room shot up. This is in marked contrast to the general populace. As Gotlieb pointed out, as of April 2003, TIVO had a total U.S. penetration of less than 1%.
In other words, the entertainment media will naturally slant its coverage in favor of the perceived merits and sexiness of the latest home entertainment technology. Still, the specter of how DVRs will change the patterns of Iowa Nielsen families remains a hot topic of discussion on both coasts, based on other statistics such as the fact that 77% of all TV commercials are skipped by TIVO users and the Yankee Group’s prediction that the technology will erode 10% of the annual U.S. TV advertising expenditure of $50 billion.
“Sky Satellite put TIVO out of business in the United Kingdom last year,” observed Gotlieb. “To a large extent, the success of DVR technology will come from cable and satellite providers deciding which box they’re going to use.”
While Michael Nyman, chairman and CEO of PR firm Bragman, Nyman, Cafarelli proudly pointed to the success of their campaign this summer with NBC’s six-episode reality series The Restaurant, which showcased the Mitsubishi, Coors and the American Express Open Network brands, Kanner cautioned him about the pitfalls of such brand integration.
“In New York City, the badge of honor among chefs when they become successful is a Range Rover,” suggested Kanner. “Chefs in Manhattan don’t drive Mitsubishis. And call me crazy, but Coors, a Colorado beer in a trendy Italian restaurant? Brand integration is not right for all brands at all times.”
Kanner, whose latest venture, Integrated Entertainment Partners, teams him among others with former Walt Disney Television Chairman Rich Frank and has so far pursued only three out of 80 considered screenplays on behalf of its east coast and international agency clientele, singles out the partnership between American Idol and AT&T Wireless as the most successful brand integration of 2003.
He also points to other recent benchmarks as examples of how the convergence of Madison and Vine needs to be done. Namely, the union of Men In Black and Ray Ban sunglasses, the dramatic use of Federal Express in the plotline of the Tom Hanks blockbuster Cast Away, and Sting’s celebrated TV ad campaign for Jaguar’s S2000 series, which doubled advance orders for the car and helped the singer sell eight million additional CDs.
| Fellow panelist Devery Holmes, president of Norm Marshall Associates, the granddaddy of Hollywood production placement (a term that is now horribly out of fashion – it’s brand integration, folks), underscored just how effective the right marriage of a Hollywood movie and commercial product can be.
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“Heineken wanted to reposition their brand to the younger age group of 21 to 29-year-olds,” she explained. “By bringing them together with Austin Powers and using the punch line ‘Get your hand off my heine, baby,’ we were able to lower the average drinking age of Heineken consumers in the U.S. from 45 to 32.”
But it all hinges on being able to convince the creative forces behind a film that the inclusion of a brand integration campaign will not diminish the artistic integrity of their vision. Although Heineken and Samsung are prominently featured in The Matrix series, directors Andy and Larry Wachowski drew the line with Norm Marshall Associates when it came to the co-opting of The Matrix Reloaded’s celebrated chase scene.
| While millions of dollars worth of Cadillac vehicles were provided for the filming of the freeway mayhem in Alameda, California, the Wachowskis were not comfortable with the idea of footage from the film subsequently being featured in Cadillac commercials. As Holmes put it, “There was a lot of learning surviving The Matrix.” Despite teasing from the moderator, Holmes wisely refused to elaborate on this pronouncement with any stories about producer Joel Silver.
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Meanwhile, when one of Detroit’s Big Three automakers landed a major integrated placement with a new network TV show, another became so angry at this development that they withdrew all advertising from the network in question for a period of three months, based on the feeling that they shouldn’t have to advertise on a show promoting their competitor. Gotlieb wouldn’t specify which network or carmaker were involved.
Kanner is definitely the pied piper of this power corridor. Somewhat legendary within the industry for everything from his guidance of Spike Lee’s commercial career to his ability to anticipate convergence issues, Kanner allowed his colorful personality to surface more than once during the Monday morning discussion.
| For example, at one point, he joked that when TV producer John Wells took out an ad in the Hollywood trades protesting the fact that Procter & Gamble wanted to pull two episodes of Family Law from syndication because of objections related to subject matter, Kanner says he came close to responding to Wells' published plea of “Who are they?” with a letter answering, “They are the people who paid for your plane, car and house.”
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Panelist Sandy Climan, whose own dealings with the marriage of Hollywood and Madison Avenue date back to Creative Artists Agency groundbreaking representation of Coca-Cola, highlighted another layer of the inherent complications in trying to broker this type of activity.
“We got a major Hollywood star to agree to allow himself to be used in a commercial for a big soft drink company, because the movie they were involved with at the time needed help and was over budget,” recalled Climan, who currently oversees the funding of other companies through his firm Entertainment Media Ventures.”
“As part of his contract, this A-list star had the right to disapprove the campaign,” Climan continued. “Despite our best efforts, the ad agency and client came back with everything we told them they couldn’t do. Although the film wound up doing OK, it was a tremendous missed opportunity because the star refused ito do the commercial.”
| Even the U.S. Treasury is jumping into the Madison and Vine breach through its efforts to market its new peach colored $20 bill. WPP Group has hired William Morris and Omnicom’s Davie Brown Entertainment to undoubtedly paper the trail of countless Hollywood action movies and TV shows with prominently featured currency.
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This can be an extremely effective strategy. Climan remembered that even though the Ferrari featured in the opening credits of Miami Vice was never specifically mentioned by name, the Italian company suddenly vaulted out of nowhere to the level of third most recognized car brand in the United States.
While the king of all co-branded entertainment, James Bond, can apparently survive the blatant transparency of his latest collusion with over a hundred brands ranging from Omega watches to Finlandia vodka, Kanner cautions that he and his colleagues may be inadvertently tampering with the all important ability of being able to measure the effectiveness of their elaborate campaigns.
| “We’re all so horny to talk about this stuff, when what we really need to do is covertly speak to the consumer in the context of content,” said Kanner. “Anyone who reads the Hollywood or advertising trades knew for example all about the Nokia phone. The whole notion of measuring it will become difficult if we continue to breach it.”
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Kanner is right. It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Post-Modern World and just as the obsession with opening weekend box office figures has turned into a pejorative and influential factor among film going audiences, the seamless magic of successful brand integration disappears if its inner workings are revealed to the same public that gobbled up Fox’s infamous Secrets Of Magic Revealed TV special.
[Every Wednesday, Hollywood Spin takes a look at Hollywood PR and media related matters. To reach the author, please email rhorgan@filmstew.com. Meanwhile, to comment on this week’s topic, please go to our Hollywood Spin Discussion Board.]
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