With a record £50 million spent on product placement in the latest James Bond film Quantum of Solace, i-level's social media unit Jam investigates whether it's been worth the investment. Have brands such as Coke and Ford created buzz and will consumers now forever make the connection between these new piggy back brands and Ian Fleming's iconic 007 character? Or is it all just getting a bit unbelievable?
Share of Buzz for Brands associated with James Bond (Source: Onalytica)
When we look at the share of James Bond buzz on the web in the build up to the launch of Quantum of Solace (between August and October) it seems to be telling a great story for advertisers, on the surface the investment seems to be paying off for brands such as Sony, Coke and Ford. All three brands have created a very strong association with James Bond and have been talked about more in the last couple of months than some of the more traditional Bond brands. For example, Coke has achieved a 16% share of buzz in comparison to Dom Perignon which only generated 1% of James Bond brand buzz. And Ford almost received the same amount of James Bond related mentions as the original Bond car Aston Martin!
This all seems quite worrying from an old-school-Bond fan's point of view. Surely Ford and Coke can't be out-doing Aston Martin and Dom Perignon? Does this mean the next generation of Bond fans will be aspiring to drive a Ford Ka and be ordering Martini and Coke Zero at the bar?
When we look a little closer into what people are actually saying about these brands we get a very different story. We can see that although product placement and advertising has people talking, the tone of many of these conversations is a million miles away from the adoration and reverence enjoyed by the more traditional Bond brands. Bond brands in the original Fleming novels were carefully selected and weaved into the storyline and as a result they were worshipped by fans. The sometimes clumsy appearance of new brands in the Bond films and the piggyback advertising prior to launch have created some resentment and disapproving debate amongst fans.
Forums, blogs and the social networks are scattered with negative comments about these brands, such as:
"James Bond Drinks Coke Zero instead of Martin now, how pathetic. It's almost enough to make me not want to see the new movie now."
"Oh joy, another ford ad in the middle of a Bond..."
The graph below illustrates the effect these types of comments are having on the sentiment of these brands buzz. The graph is adjusted for influence, which means discussions appearing on very influential James Bond stakeholders, such as IMDb, BBC and Guardian Blogs, carry more weight. We can see that the discussions around Coke, Ford and even Sony are overwhelmingly negative. However, traditional Bond brand Bentley continues to be talked about positively.
Aggregated sentiment (positive and negative) of Buzz for brands/James Bond; weighted against influential stakeholders (Source: Onalytica)
Below is a list of the 20 most influential James Bond stakeholders. These are the places that people are getting their fix of Bond content and keeping up to date in the run up to the launch of Quantum of Solace. We can see that the only brand website to appear in the top 20 is Sony Ericsson, and it's obvious why. Sony have cleverly built excitement on their site with press releases about the launch of "James Bond's latest phone, a limited edition Titanium silver C902 Cyber-shot phone" Sony tell us "the new mobile phone will make sure you are ready for any challenge, immersing you into the world of a secret agent with interactive 007 content and a spy-style game". This is more like it, a product that is relevant and unique to Bond rather than a big brand forcing Daniel Craig to drive or drink something unbelievable.
Table of 20 most influential James Bond stakeholders (Source: Onalytica)
So is it just hardcore fans and influential stakeholders that are talking negatively about these new Bond brands? Surprisingly we can see from the chart below that the majority of mainstream comments about Sony and Coke are in fact positive when we take the influence weighting off. Showing us that even though the hardcore Bond fans don't appreciate the appearance of these brands there is a new Bond audience that do. Mainstream audiences are even talking more positively about Sony than traditional Bond brand Bentley. However, even mainstream audiences aren't convinced by Bond driving a Ford Ka; the overwhelming sentiment of conversation about Ford and James Bond is very negative.
Aggregated sentiment (positive and negative) of Buzz for brands/James Bond; not weighted against influential stakeholders (Source: Onalytica)
So the next generation of Bond fans are likely to associate 007 with a whole new set of brands. The diehard purest fans will do their best to discredit them but are they fighting a losing battle?
Relevance of the product is still a critical factor in making mainstream audiences believe in its relationship with Bond. Clearly more thought is required than simply shoehorning the product into the film with a few ads on TV.
Unique product tailoring has perhaps ensured that the next generation of Bond fans are more likely to own a Titanium Sony Ericsson than drive a Ford Ka but I'd still prefer a Savile Row suit and a vintage Aston Martin.
METHODOLOGY: Jam uses data from buzz analytics firm Onalytica to track conversations across the web. Influence is a weight, which is calculated by analysing the structure of references between all participants in the debate.
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