I hate TV; I only own one to have something to watch movies on. But the marketer in me has to give it up for the guys at the TNT cable channel.
On Monday, Trust Me debuts, the product of former advertising men Hunt Baldwin and John Coveny. No doubt cashing in on the success of Mad Men, the Trust Me series (previously called Truth in Advertising) is a TV show about a fake advertising agency.
But the beauty? All of the products and campaigns in the series are real. For plot purposes, they're throwing in some fake ones. But no doubt you can hear on-message references to the brand efforts of Apple, Green Giant, Hallmark, Frosted Flakes, Starbucks and more.
As Stuart Elliott explains in his NY Times article In 'Trust Me,' a Fake Agency Really Promotes, the show "offers another example of a growing trend known as branded entertainment, as marketers seek to insinuate themselves into programming to counter the growing ability of viewers to avoid or ignore traditional commercials. For some, it will be a meta moment to watch a TV show about the ad business that is taking care of business while seeking to garner ratings."
