Product Placement in Movies: The Effect of Prominence and Mode on Audience Recall

TLDR

Product placement in movies is a growing promotional strategy. The study compared recall of common product‑placement strategies and advertising in an experiment. Prominent placements produced higher recall than advertisements, which in turn outperformed subtle placements, and audio mention without visual reinforcement improved recall over subtle visual placement, but adding audio to prominent visual placement did not further enhance recall.

Abstract

Abstract A promotional strategy of growing interest is the placement of branded products in movies. An experiment compared the recall effectiveness of common product-placement strategies with each other and with advertising. Prominent placements elicited higher recall than did advertisements, which, in turn, outperformed subtle placements. The explicit mention of a product in the audio script (without a visual depiction) led to better recall than a subtle visual placement (without audio reinforcement). However, the addition of a complementary audio message did not significantly enhance the recall of a product that already enjoyed prominent visual display.