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After exposing McDonald’s back in 2004 with ‘Super Size Me’, Spurlock has now entered the product placement realm of the film industry with his newest feature, “The Greatest Movie Ever Sold”.
The film is about product placement, marketing and advertising, and also fully funded by product placement, marketing and advertising (Screenrant).
Spurlock managed to convince 17 willing companies, such as Hyatt, jetBlue and Old Navy, to participate in his latest ‘docbuster.’ In exchange for sponsorship funds, each of these brands received some sort of placement or promotion within the film.
Hyatt, for instance, is the film’s feature hotel partner. Everywhere Spurlock travels throughout taping, he stays in a Hyatt hotel. He not only shows off Hyatt’s services, but he raves about his stay in various Hyatt franchises.
In the video below, Stacey Snyder, marketing director at Hyatt, tells us about the decision her team made to participate in Spurlock’s project. Because Hyatt “is all about authentic hospitality” it made sense to jump at the opportunity to work with Spurlock, says Snyder — despite that it was a journey that they had “no idea where it was going to take us.”
Since the premiere of his latest ‘docbuster’ Spurlock has been spreading his take on brand transparency everywhere. He even presented a TED Talk (video below) entitled “Embrace Transparency” — brought to you by EMC. EMC actually purchased the naming rights to his talk on eBay for $7,100, which Spurlock has donated to the TED Conference to “go towards his attendance for next year,” he jokes.
More importantly than receiving any sort of product placement, the film’s corporate sponsors gained some brand humility and transparency by participating in the movie. Working with Spurlock meant literally handing over their brand assets, stories and select employees to expose on camera. These organizations allowed Spurlock to take complete control of the marketing message. But in doing so, they just might gain a little respect from Spurlock’s cynical, sophisticated audience members.
A New York-based spa deals site, @SpaSally, gained 60 new followers and increased sales by a third when it offered a $25 spa deal to the @bronxzooscobra on Twitter.
@HiltonNewYork received a retweet and response from the Egyptian cobra after tweeting: “@bronxzooscobra Do you have a place to stay in NYC tonight? We can offer you the Penthouse ssssuite #snakeonthetown.”
After Charlie Sheen created his own hotdog concoction at Infield Hot Dog Stand in California, tweeting a photo of it, Infield sales tripled, says stand owner Robert Davition (FOX Small Business).
Recently, businesses have made quite a push to tack their brands onto trending Twitter accounts and hashtags. It’s not only a great way to gain millions of brand impressions and grow Twitter followers, but if brands can jump on a trending Twitter topic in an authentic way, it may even increase credibility and sales.
So how do brands align with pop culture phenomena like Charlie Sheen, Rebecca Black and the assortment of animals taking over Twitter (see @RoyalPony @BronxZoosCobra @BronxZooKeeper)? The same way consumers do. Simply tag the trending account in a retweet, reply or hashtagged post. If the tweet is clever enough, it could get picked up by the intended Twitter handle, retweeted, and seen by millions in just minutes.
It’s not surprising that smaller, localized businesses have successfully tied themselves to trending accounts. Notice Spa Sally, Hilton New York and Infield Hot Dog Stand are all small-scale, local businesses or franchises. The Hilton New York account most likely needs far fewer post approvals than the Hilton Worldwide account does. With the ability to tweet more freely, smaller brands can write quick, clever, authentic posts that are more likely to be retweeted by the current ‘it’ Twitter account.
In a few short words, the key to tying a brand to Twitter trends: keep posts simple, funny and organic.
I recently spent time in Upstate New York with my four-year-old cousin. Enthusiastic and curious, he grilled me for days with one question: “why?”
“Why is this grass so yellow?”
“Well, because without rain showers grass loses its green color.”
“But why?”
“Because grass needs water to make its own food.”
“But why?”
“Because grass doesn’t walk around to find food like we do.”
“But why?”
Though exhausted and speechless after my 30 minutes of answers, what a useful exercise it was. Continually answering “why” keeps us constantly thinking — the most important task in information jobs.
Ask any marketing specialist about a campaign or program, and she’ll tell you the who, what, where, when and how. Better yet, she probably has a deck on the entire project. But too often we fail to question (and answer) the ‘why?’ in marketing.
Why target metropolitan 18- to 34-year-olds? Why loop in celebrity talent? Why promote through SEM in addition to optimizing organic search? Why distribute through Facebook, Twitter, Stumble Upon, PicPlz, AND Foursquare?
Creative minds tend to reel through top line planning (writing goals and answering ‘why’) to rush into the fun “how” tactics. By wrapping ourselves up in gritty tactical details, we forget our initial campaign intentions, leading to a mediocre campaign outcome.
Take a look at these 10 famous product failures. Most resulted from creative people thinking outside-the-box, but neglecting to ask, “why the need to innovate?”
Coke, for instance, launched “New Coke,” with the help of spokesperson Bill Cosby. “New Coke” failed because there was no need to innovate—consumers enjoyed old Coke just fine.
McDonald’s had a similar downfall with the “Arch Deluxe Burger,” a high-end, more expensive burger for the adult demographic. Why would adults be interested in paying more for a variation of McDonald’s burgers? There is no reason, and the product was removed from the menu shortly after its release.
We not only need to ask ‘why’ when launching a new product, but when selecting marketing vehicles as well. A telecomm company might use Facebook as a customer service platform. A media company might use Twitter as a headline distribution platform. But why might a brand like Preparation H create a Facebook page or a Twitter handle? Do consumers want an open discussion with this brand? Probably not. Therefore, a brand like Prep H might utilize other marketing vehicles to create a positive ROI.
Most importantly, we’ve got to be transparent with ourselves and our colleagues when we answer, ‘why?’ We can’t answer to merely justify our tactics. We need answers that align with the organization’s goals, objectives and audience metrics.
So why don’t we revert back to four-years-old again and question “why” a little more often?
