• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, October 5, 2007

Why settle for having your product seen or mentioned on television, when you can have it included in the storyline?

"Storyline placements are growing as the industry becomes more sophisticated about product integration deals," says Annie Touliatos, director of product development, Nielsen Product Placement. "Meanwhile, we're seeing a steady decline in background placements."

Nielsen's first-half product placement data demonstrate these trends, at least on cable networks, which accounted for 82% of the nearly 249,000 total TV placement occurrences logged by Nielsen.

Products being incorporated in the storyline accounted for 3,500, or just 2%, of the 204,000 total placements on the five cable networks tracked (A&E, Bravo, HGTV, MTV and TLC). But that represented a leap of 143% for the period, compared to first-half 06.

Foreground placements, representing 24% of the total, jumped 29%, to 49,181. Getting a brand shown on a T-shirt or other piece of wardrobe was the most prevalent tactic, accounting for 54,973, or 27%, of occurrences (up 4%).

In contrast, background placements represented 25% of the total, but were down 34%, to 50,139. Brand mentions, accounting for 5% of placements, dropped 33%, to 10,538. Broadcast networks showed different patterns. In fact, storyline incorporation occurrences declined by 13%, to 1,004, or 2% of the 44,726 placements logged on the networks tracked (ABC, CBS, CW, Fox, MNT and NBC).

The hottest placement categories on broadcast were wardrobe (up 64%, to 8,704, representing 19% of occurrences) and foreground (up 61%, to 11,967, representing 27% of occurrences). Brand mentions, mentions within dialogue, and use as props also jumped. These accounted for 15%, 7% and 12% and of the total, respectively.

Overall, however, incidences of placements were down 7% on cable but up 40% on broadcast.