• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, February 28, 2006

Product placement is still an emerging practice on Madison Avenue, but it's growing rapidly on prime-time network TV. Nearly 11 percent of all programming minutes now include some sort of brand reference, and some shows now have more minutes of product placement time than they do TV commercial time. Those are some of the findings of an analysis of brand appearances on network prime-time TV during the fourth quarter of 2005, released late Monday by TNS Media Intelligence.

The study found the average prime-time network TV show contained four minutes and 25 seconds of branded appearances vs. 17 minutes and 35 seconds of national and local commercial TV times. At that rate, branded references now represent about 20 percent of all brand mentions on network prime-time TV. That's a much higher rate than Nielsen Media Research found when it introduced its product placement measurement service in August. At that time, Nielsen estimated that about 15 percent of all brand mentions on network TV were product placement, the balance being conventional commercials.

Neither Nielsen nor TNS can determine whether product placements are paid for, or whether they occur organically within programming, but the trend line suggests they are growing. Not surprisingly, they are growing more in some types of TV programming than others - especially reality shows, which had an average of 11 minutes and five seconds of in-program brand exposure per hour vs. 17 minutes and 4 seconds of commercial time. Scripted series had the least amount of brand exposure - only an average of three minutes and seven seconds of product placement time.

However, some scripted series had pervasive amounts of branded content. CBS' "King of Queens" was the champ with an average of 18 minutes and 13 seconds of branded content per hour equivalent vs. only 16 minutes and 49 seconds of commercial time.

But the most egregious example of branded content was NBC's "The Apprentice: Martha Stewart," which had an average of 33 minutes and 51 seconds of branded content per hour vs. only 16 minutes and 32 seconds of commercial time.

Brand Time vs. Ad Time: Q4 2005
	Minutes:Seconds Per Hour
	Brand Appearances	Ad Messages
Network Prime-Time	4:24	17:35
Prime Reality Shows	11:05	17:04
Prime  Scripted Shows	3:07	17:41
Late Night	11:06	20:33

Source: TNS Media Intelligence

Top Shows: Branded Vs. Ad Time - Q4 2005
	Minutes:Seconds Per Hour
	Brand Appearances	Ad Messages1
Reality Shows
The Apprentice: Martha Stewart	33:51	16:32
Biggest Loser	23:08	16:14
The Apprentice (Donald Trump)	21:15	16:55
Amazing Race: Family	19:40	16:14
Fear Factor	17:11	16:46
Scripted Shows
King of Queens	18:13	16:49
NCIS	15:56	15:43
Yes, Dear	10:44	17:02
Half and Half	10:58	17:41
All of Us	8:34	17:17

Source: TNS Media Intelligence