Nike tops list of brands paying for movie and TV product placements

A detailed breakdown of the brands most likely to embrace product placement in their marketing strategies has shown Nike, MacBook and iPhone to be the runaway leaders.

Leonardo DiCaprio wearing Nike sneaks in an infamous scene / Wolf of Wall St

The place to be

• Research by Sortlist found that Nike featured in no less than 3,134 product placements across movies and TV, with actors ever ready to don some stylish treads when on screen.

• The sportswear brand weighed in ahead of the Apple MacBook and iPhone brands, which had 2,145 and 1,626 placements respectively – the tech giant would have claimed the top spot on 5,293 if all its sub-brands were counted as one.

• Rounding out the top five with regular supporting roles of their own were Coca-Cola (1,570) and Dell (1,494), providing a degree of prop consistency for directors.

Big screen breakdown

• Analysis of 1,954 films led Sortlist to count 24,635 individual product placements, equating to an average of 12.61 product placements per film.

• Leading the celluloid pack was 2011 comedy musical Josie and the Pussycats with 109 individual placements, far ahead of Sex and the City and Talladega Nights on 89 placements apiece.

Small screen synopsis

• TV remains the primary battleground for brands competing for the subliminal attention of audiences, with The Office exceeding all others with a staggering 1,448 different products competing for screen time.

• This dwarfed both Seinfeld (867) and Sex and the City (806) – the latter of which had the distinction of topping the charts in both categories, although its placements haven’t always gone to plan (see Peloton).

Nicolas Finet, co-founder and CMO at Sortlist, said: “Studies have shown that product placement has the ability to increase the viewer’s awareness around the product and create a more positive stance towards the brand. It also makes the consumer more likely to discuss the brand and products and search them online, showing just how powerful this form of advertising can be.

“Research has suggested that during the course of our lifetime, we spend over 78,000 hours in front of a TV screen and with this in mind, brands will see the big and small screen as a way to advertise their products right in front of your eyes without you even knowing and in a more relaxed way compared to a TV advert or a city center billboard.”

Sortlist has previously revealed that fast food brands have the dubious distinction of containing the highest number of fake Instagram followers.