Twenty years ago, the major Quebec television networks launched into a new genre that was both loved and despised: reality TV. Since then, the shows have multiplied, breaking ratings records and gaining little by little the heart and the respect of both the public and traditional media. But between the failures, the controversies and the loss of speed of the small screen, can we always predict such a bright future? Fourth text in our series.
According to a shock formula from the late Patrick Le Lay, former CEO of TF1 Group, in France, TV sells advertisers “available human brain time”. This summit of cynicism (or cold frankness) dates from 2004. Reality TV, born at about the same time, has since continued to improve the discoveries to reach the heads, the hearts and especially the pockets of the viewers.
With product microplacements, the genre has opened up TV (and therefore brains) to brands that did not necessarily have access to it, due to a lack of budget. Reality TV has also made it possible to reach a younger segment of the public, less sensitive to traditional advertising, more receptive to allegedly more subtle forms of commercial propaganda.
M. Le Lay also understood this well. In 2001, the master of the slogan described loft story and other shows of the new genre of “pornographic by-products”. A few months later, the big boss of the main Franco-French channel signed a contract with the Endemol empire, then at the start of its global expansion, to produce Nice People, a Big Brother European modeled after the film The Spanish inn.
loft story had a Quebec version in 2003. Double occupation (OD), a national megahit, has been flourishing since the same year. Then Big Brother set up here in 2010. And the commercial galley is in vogue.
Here too, partnerships, sponsorships and investments are exploited to the maximum with more or less success. From candidate clothing to detention house furniture, food to cars, beauty products to travel, anything can be used to promote a particular good or service.
Everything, everywhere, all at once
“We don’t want our candidates to be ‘branded’ endlessly, but we assume the fact that, all the same, yes, we have sponsors and we see the brand of the fridge”, summarizes Karine Pelletier, Marketing Director and sponsorships from Productions J, the box that produces Double occupation. How many, by the way? “Up to thirty”, answers the one who manages the agreements.
Mme Pelletier started working on OD Bali in 2017, the year of the show’s marketing overhaul. She is now working with two colleagues and pros from Bell Media, owner of the Noovo channel, to find integration strategies by negotiating in detail the visibility procedures to match the script. Nothing is ever innocent. Even a pizzeria in Quebec (and not Bali) was able to pay for the display of its pizza boxes on screen.
“We put the sponsors in touch with what is being done on the show, sums up the director. We want it to be done organically, otherwise it won’t work, neither for the show nor for the sponsor. »
Hence the crisis that followed the scenes of intimidation and then the sidelining of three candidates deemed harassing, last fall, at OD Martinique. At least a dozen advertising partners slammed the door and put the show in danger of survival. OD survived and will return this year.
We want it to be done organically, otherwise it won’t work, neither for the show nor for the sponsor.
Viewers then passed the hammer on the production — and this explains it. On the other hand, followers remain indulgent with regard to integrated advertising. Mme Pelletier has heard no complaints about the virtually transparent placements.
She gives the concrete example of the Guru beverage brand. “We took full responsibility,” said the director. Sometimes the brand was shown in a very obvious way, with a big truck for example. We totally assumed it. I think it was going very well. »
Some partners support OD for years, like the sparkling Night Bubbles. “They stay because it works well,” says M.me Pelletier, noting that the daily presence culminating in the Sunday show multiplies the possibilities of inserting products almost everywhere. “The more you see things, the more you want to consume them. »
Inside/outside, before/after
Ophelia-Anna Nagar knows something about it. Hairdresser, owner of two Menz Club barbershops in Quebec City, she began by advertising her businesses during the broadcasts ofOD on Sundays in the Capitale-Nationale region with classic 15-second commercials. This advertising cost him between $15,000 and $20,000 a year. As this marketing had had “a very good impact”, after two years she said to herself that she could well promote herself by registering herself for OD.
The charismatic young woman, accustomed to stage presentations at hairdressing congresses, was selected for the adventure in South Africa in 2019, just before the pandemic. The risky game required him to leave the management of his salons for weeks for a salary of a few hundred dollars a month.
“I do not regret my experience at all, said the one who had also received a publicity stunt by showing up on the show In the eye of the dragon. I participated in OD especially for the visibility offered to my salons. I told myself that at the price that the pubs were costing me, it was worth being on the show. It was a risk, of course. A bad image of me, if people hadn’t liked me, could have had a negative impact on my businesses. »
Here as elsewhere, ex-candidates take advantage of their instant fame to inflate their subscribers on social networks, an advantage immediately monetized with product placements. Everything from dog leashes to teeth whitening kits. Claudie Mercier, also a formerOD South Africanow has over 1.2 million followers on TikTok.
“On TV, people recognize advertising,” notes lawyer Clarisse N’Kaa, who co-directed the study. Influencer Marketing. Advertising in the Age of Social Media (2021) for the organization Option Consommateurs. On the Internet too, when there is an ad before the broadcast of a video. Influencer marketing, the advertising made by influencers, is more difficult to detect. »
The study showed the receptivity of children to this practice even if in Quebec, that intended for children under 13 remains prohibited. Canadian laws do not force the clear identification of online ads (for example with a hashtag like #pub).
After her participation in reality TV, Mme Nagar, more famous than ever, has changed its marketing plans in the difficult context where the pandemic forced the intermittent closure of its salons and the cessation of hairdressing conventions. “Everything closed and all my plans ‘crashed’,” she says. I rebounded differently than a participant in a more normal context. »
She uses social media to promote her Menz Club line of men’s beauty products, which she launched after OD, but not to market other companies, products or services. “Some make a living from influencer marketing,” she says. It’s not my case. I don’t consider myself an influencer, but an entrepreneur who uses her platforms for marketing. »