MAM
Music labels, channels mull product placements in videos
MUMBAI: In the US, product placements in music videos seem to be the name of the game. Major music labels, grappling with piracy and recession, have been defying music channels, teaming up with advertisers willing to help finance costly videos in exchange for product visibility. Current trends indicate that music channels are relenting and using this to expand their revenue streams.
A recent example is a rap artist racing General Motor’s new automobile Hummer H2 in a music video. The vehicle Hummers seem to get as much screen time as rap artiste Jade. The cost of the product placement is estimated to be around $300,000 — more than half the expense of the video produced by Interscope Records. By doing this, the music label directly defied MTV which had banned product placements.
MTV used to blank out brand names or force labels to blur out images in order to ensure that its discerning audiences don’t rebel. But, some videos, invariably, seem to escape the alert and watchful eyes of the programming team. MTV has unknowingly aired ad-supported videos from acts such as rhythm and blues singer Tweet and dance music trio Dirty Vegas without repercussions. In 2002, the channel ordered that shots of Pepsi Blue be edited out of a video by the group Sev after Interscope notified MTV of a product placement deal, channel officials said.
MTV’s gatekeepers are now considering allowing some marketing messages in videos — but only if they decide that a product placement is discreet and fits with a clip’s theme or story line.
MTV’s executive vice president of music and talent Tom Calderone advocated the view that the channel is trying to be sensitive to music labels without risking audience trust. However, he put the onus of disclosures and trust on the record companies.
Some in the industry believe it’s just a matter of time before the music video turns into a powerful sales tool not only for musicians but for almost anything they might drive, play, wear, eat, or blow up in a clip.
Advertisers say paying for cameo roles in videos of rising music stars can be a relatively cheap way to tap the youth market.
AD Agencies
Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
