outube, aseverybody knows, isa platform that offerscommercials beforeor during the

visualisation of a video,whether it’s a video aboutmusic, makeup, fashion,sports… It also offers thepossibility of skipping theadvertisement depending onthe duration of it or theconditions of the advertiser.If we search on the internet,we can find many articlesabout the subject. Forinstance, there is a reportmaned ‘Youtube plans onbombarding you withadvertisements to see if youare willing to pay for music’.This report informs theplatform users that there willbe more screening time forcommercials during musicvideos.YouTube has made thisdecision in response tomusic record companiescomplaining about people

preferring to listen to musicon this platform rather thanpaying for it.

With all of this said, we mustadd that the user thatuploads videos to theplatform also receivesbenefit from theadvertisements on theirvideos.Youtube has been offering apaying service to enjoyvideos withoutadvertisements for a whilenow, benefiting record labelsand the own platform.

Another article we can find is‘Advertisers run fromYoutube because ofcommercials of triggeringsubjects’. That’s the reasonfor many important brandslike Nike, Acer or ParamountNetwork removing theiradvertisements, since theyare not the values they wantto send to the Youtubecommunity.

This is because there ismuch more interest for thenumber of views a video hasrather than the content it ispresenting. This issue hasmade Youtube invest in afilter program to check inwhich videos should acommercial appear and inwhich shouldn’t. This isreported in the article‘Youtube will be a betterplace to promote a brand’.This project is based on thehiring of 10.000 people tosearch for and deleteinappropriate videos andtrain computers to do it bythemselves.

After reading these threearticles we present somequestions: is it really safeand appropiate to promote abrand in such a massive wayin platforms like Youtube? Orthere should be a limit not tooverwhelm the audience?

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Singers promoting more thanmusic

he world of music and artistsis based on “show and sell”,singers make video clips that

can be defined as marketing toolsto promote the new record jobsthey create. A video clip is aproduct created for the diffusion invideo, television and throughportals in Internet, that offers arepresentation or visualinterpretation of a song.

In this way, if the video clip appealsto consumers: the singer, the songand the possible brands thatsponsor the video and come out inthis one, will like the consumers.It’s simple. Through the constantcreation of more creative videoclips, music videos have becomeeye­catching, spectacular andcoveted advertising displays.

So, why do brands decideto trust famous singersand artists to promoteproducts?

The marketing campaigns focusedon the brand with famous people

seek to associate the values of thebrand with the values or qualities ofthe character with which theassociation is to be established, sothat the understanding by the clientor potential client is easier andfaster. In this way the potentialclient will associate a brand to afamous singer, or the values of afamous singer to the values of thebrand. Trying to humanize thebrand!

This type of campaign focuses itssuccess on the realinterpenetration of the values of thebrand with the real values of thefamous person, that is, in which analmost perfect association takesplace.

When planning this type ofmarketing strategies, it is intendedto generate the followingadvantages:

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1. Position a Brand

Some small companies use celebrities inadvertising to position their brands. Productpositioning is placing a company’s productsin the best possible light in the minds of atarget group. For example, a smallinvestment firm may use a well­respectedand retired local disc jockey to market aretirement plan for people ages 50 and over.The fact that the disc jockey falls in theconsumers’ age group and has agood reputation in thecommunity makes thecompany’s product andmessage more believable.

2. Attract New Users

One challenge smallcompanies face isfinding new users fortheir products. Localcelebrities in advertisingappeal to customers as well asthose who have never tried thebrand. The latter may be users ofcompetitive brands. However, those whocontinually see the local celebrity in acommercial for a certain product may beconvinced to try the product.

3. Breathe Life Into

Failing BrandThe use of a celebrity in an advertisementmay also help to breathe life into a failingbrand. For example, a small soapmanufacturer might think about dropping abrand or product, especially if productionand overhead costs are leaving little or noprofit. However, the use of a celebrity to toutthe benefits of the brand could help createnew interest and excitement in consumers.

4. Influence Consumer Purchases

The affinity consumers have for certaincelebrities can greatly influence theirpurchases. People may have the attitude, “Ifthe product is good enough for her, it’s goodenough for me.” This philosophy is often theimpetus behind advertisements for makeup,skin creams, hair products and attire.Consumers want the wavy hair of a local

celebrity, for example. Hence, theypurchase the brand that the

celebrity uses to achieve herhair’s fullness and bounce.

Local consumers may alsodesire the same soft drinkas their team’s bestbaseball player.Essentially, the testimonialof the local celebrity addsinstant credibility to a small

company’s product.

5. Build Awareness

Celebrities in advertising build brandawareness, according to “SupermarketNews,” a publication covering the fooddistribution industry. And they build it muchmore quickly than traditional types ofadvertising. Brand awareness measures thepercentage of people who are familiar with aparticular brand. Small businesses spendlots of money and time for exposure toincrementally increase brand awarenessamong consumers. The use of a localcelebrity can do much to enhanceconsumers’ awareness and understandingof what a small business offers.

owadays, music videos are a veryuseful tool to make people knowabout a product, although it is usuallyin a way that goes unnoticed.

Music videos aren’t only seen in channelssuch as MTV, VH1 or Sol music, as ithappened in the past, but thanks to theinternet and sites like YouTube, artists havebetter connection with the fans creating abigger audience for their videos.

On the other hand, piracy has caused a dropin sales of physical copies of musicworldwide, so record companies have beendesperately looking for another way ofmaking money in the music industry.Advertising products in videos has turned outto be a very positive income.

We can watch videos where artists aretalking on the phone, using a tablet, driving ashiny new car or simply drinking beer orsome special soda. In any of these scenarios,they make sure to show off the brand of theproduct they are using.

This kind of advertising exists since quite along time already. Before advertisers weretrying to make seem that it was an accidentand the product was in the film or musicvideo, but nowadays the products areexposed carelessly to make sure theaudience sees them.

This strategy is very interesting and has agreat impact on the audience, because itimplies relating a product to an influentialperson, making people want what they have.

On YouTube we can find innumerablemusic videos with product placement. We aregoing to talk about some examples fromDavid Guetta and Eminem, known worldwide,that use this technique on some of theirvideos.

Brands have reached out to David Guetta toinclude their products on his music videos

many times, but we can stand out the songDangerous with Sam Martin. This musicvideo is set in the theme of Formula 1, wherewe can watch differents brands like Renault,energetic drink like Burn, sunglasses Carrera,watches like Lotus or Richard Mille, tiresPirelli and Vodafone, the property companyof Dubai, EMMAR, and oil companies likeRepsol, Total and PDVSA

This videohas135.643.456 visits,that’s theamount ofpeople thathas seen

these brandos on their screen.

Another example, a song called “Rap god”(2013) from Eminem, where he talks aboutthe conflicts of being a rapper and how manyfriends he won and lost. In this video we cansee Eminem wearing sunglasses from Ray­ban, a worldwide sunglass brand.

This videobecame viraland has673.055.580visits andthis songwon a record

guiness for being the song with more words(1560). That year, Ray­ban won a 10% morein sales, thanks for the video.

In conclusion, we can assure that musicvideos are full of advertising and brands (aswe have seen in the examples), in smalldoses it doesn’t hurt anyone, but we have tobe responsible and not overuse thistechnique.

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roduct placement isthe opportunity thatcompanies use toadvertise their

products in certainaudiovisual media. In thiscase, we see how musicvideos have become anexceptional opportunity forthese brands.

Currently, the mostimportant companies thatcollaborate with artists toadvertise their products invideo clips are: the sportsbrand Adidas, Beats by Dr.Dre and Apple. Thesecompanies are followed byseveral automobile brandssuch as Volkswagen, BMW…

In the case of Adidas, thebrand appears in more thanforty videoclips, having in2016 a total screen time ofalmost nine minutes. Thevideo clip where the brandcan be appreciated themost is ‘I Do not F ** KWith You’ by Big Sean . Wecan see the logothroughout the entire videoprinted on the shoes and T­shirts of the characters. Itis characterized by a subtleand discreet appearance.

Beats has a lower totalscreen time, skimming theseven minutes. The videothat shows this brand themost is ‘Bang Bang’ byJessie J, Ariana Grandeand Nicki Minaj. The mainproducts are speakers andheadphones, being aproduct very easy torecognize by its logo. Itsappearance on the screenis discreet. The companyinvests in this type ofadvertising in order to berelated to a brand “ofclass”, since only famouspeople or with a highsocioeconomic level canhave access. In addition tothis, its use is associatedwith fun, since in all thevideo clips you can enjoythese specific speakers orheadphones.

On third place, Apple ischaracterized for providingequipment for theproduction of video clips,despite its low visibility ofthe logo. However, it is aproduct that is very easy torecognize. The video whereyou can see the productthe most is ‘#Selfie’ by TheChainsmokers, where

phones are the mainproduct advertised.

Regarding the automobilebrands, we can see in avideo clip of Morat, `Comote atreves´ whereVolkswagen is theprotagonist and theclassics like the Beetle orits vans predominate in thevideo clip. This musicvideo reached to benumber 1 in iTunes.

BMW also stars in somevideo clips, with lowvisibility but veryrecognized. This is becausethe brand models are easyto recognize without hardlyseeing the logo. During thefirst 25 seconds of the `Onthe floor´ video, BMW ispresent in that car thatdeposits J LO at the backdoor of the disco. Thisbrand of automobiles takesadvantage of the firstseconds of any video,those in which the rhythmand choreography do notdistract us, maybe the bestmoment to show a brand.

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hen watching music videos, wealways find ourselves obvservingsome kind of publicity whether wenotice it or not. This is known as

product placement, where bands sponsor amusic video in exchange of appearing in itwhether it’s the name of the brand, the logoor in a sentence of the song.

Nowadays is very easy to identify when asinger is promoting a brand, since theydon’t try to hide it as they did in the past.One example of obvious product placementwould be by G­shock watches by CASIO inBebe Rexha’s music video for ‘Meant to be’,where the artist wears one in most part ofthe video and the watch has its own detailshot to make sure the audience sees thebrand clearly.

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Another example, but more subtle this time,is the video ‘Side to side’ by Ariana Grandewhere we can see a bottle with the GUESSlogo ‘casually’ behind her at all times.

In past years, product placement was verycriticized and it was considered a signthat the artist that made use of thistechnique was in the music industry formoney and not for the love of art. But thisdidn’t stop artists of doing it. Forinstance, we can easily recognise NIKE’sand ADIDA’s logos on some sneakers thatare worn in the ‘Footloose’ music video,that was aired in 1984. Since the wholevideo is showing shoes so showing someNIKE sneakers is understandable and itdoesn’t seem like they are trying to sell usa product.

This is a great way to make use of thetechnique of product placement, makingthe brand part of the story that is beingtold so the audience don’t feel attacked bythe consumer society.

This can be observed in Katy Perry’s ‘LastFriday Night’ music video, where they areat a party playing the video game JustDance but since it’s part of the narrative itlooks more natural.