Commentary

Truth In TV Advertising: Show Viewers Your Product Placements AND CPMs

TV product placement will be coming to your favorite shows -- complete with an explanation.

Five members of the Federal Communications Commission have approved a plan to rewrite disclosure rules for product placement on TV. What will be those rules? No one knows for sure. But consumer group pressure is hoping some message will be aired around why, say, the Starbucks store name is shown in a partial "CSI" shot.

I'm all for this, but the FCC should go deeper.

Why not offer up a crawling, lower-screen message telling viewers the Audi spot you've just seen on "Desperate Housewives" goes for $240,000 for an "A" commercial pod position, and that an AT&T commercial in the "D" commercial pod position is priced at $170,000?

You want disclosure? Then give some real disclosure.

Explain to viewers what goes into the $50 million that Ford, AT&T, and Coca-Cola each spend on their "American Idol" sponsorship. It's the public airwaves after all -- soon to be the public's digital airwaves.

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It's not surprising entertainment/TV executives are nervous when the public gets closer to seeing how they do business.

Years ago film executives got their knickers in a twist in response to consumer news media offering up those Monday morning box-office-numbers stories -- telling a ravenous entertainment-consuming public how many tens of million dollars of business "Spider-Man 3" did over one summer weekend.

What business is it of moviegoers, execs wanted to know? The answer is that few want to back a loser.

Some TV product placement identification already occurs at the end of certain game shows, explaining to viewers that promotional consideration was paid for by, say, Ford Motor Co.

Marketers shouldn't worry that their precious product placements will be devalued by any new messaging. It'll just confirm what consumers already know.

Then viewers will forget about it, watch "The Biggest Loser," eat some burgers, feel guilty, and then -- without thinking -- head to 24Hour Fitness to work off all those food and marketing calories.

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