The Effect of Brand Placement in TV Shows on the Viewers’ Attitude Toward the Products = A televíziós sorozatokban történő márkaelhelyezés hatása a nézők termékekhez való viszonyulására

Absztrakt (kivonat)

The aim of this thesis work was to reveal the effect of product placement in movies and TV shows on fans in order to give insight into more efficient ways of placing products and how the attitude of these viewers changes towards them. Marketing experts created a way of introducing products where the viewers no longer have a chance to avoid them, their most beloved characters use carefully selected items with the purpose that it will positively affect the brand image of the people. To achieve the best result, the paper elaborated on the variety of definitions of this phenomenon, the brief history of product placement from the early 1900s and the principles of sponsorship. Some of the already realized studies and experiments - such as Reijmersdal, Neijens and Smit’s or Ong’s - were described to understand the difficulties of measuring the effects of product placement more clearly on the attitude toward a brand and the changes in one’s shopping habits. The sources were chosen from the field of communication, psychology, and marketing to approach the subject from more angles. Human associative memory, parasocial theory and balance theory were all considered when discussing the psychological background of product placement. The research was conducted via content analysis and surveys, the main intention was to examine the brands and their placement methods in the American sitcom, The Big Bang Theory. This TV show is known for including many real-life products thus it was an intriguing research subject. The results clarified the impact of this marketing technique on the viewers and unveiled the most effective way of practicing these placements. The content analysis was done by watching the first seventeen episodes of all twelve seasons and comparing the different types of product placements based on various conditions. It was found that in general there was no increase in the number of placements, but the number of specific types of placement and product categories changed based on several factors. The survey was done via Google Forms, and was filled out by 516 respondents from 65 countries and by all age groups. Here the key findings were that today there is no difference in how product placements are perceived based on age groups, which contradicts a previous study by Ong (2004). The most memorable placements are the integrated audiovisual ones, this confirms the studies done by Law and Braun (2000), Brennan and Babin (2004). This research raises further questions about the topic, for instance if a show does not include as many placements as The Big Bang Theory, would there still be a high recall index or the reason viewers remember them is because most of them are straight forward. It would also be beneficial to observe how viewers who are not fans of the show perceive the practice compared to the fans. In addition, it would be advantageous to uncover whether there is a difference between how brand placement is perceived in other genres of television and if yes, what are the reasons.