Madison & Vine: Mixing entertainment and advertising

Kotler describes Madison & Vine Advertising as “a term that has come to represent the merging of advertising and entertainment in an effort to break through the clutter and create new avenues for reaching consumers with more engaging messages” (Kotler 363).

With the mass quantity of advertising consumers are inundated with on a daily basis, marketing professionals are beginning to get creative in their methods. By integrating marketing and entertainment consumers feel less directly pursued and are generally more open to advertising; they are less likely to tune out advertising that is secondary to the entertainment value provided by whatever they are watching than they are to change the channel or ignore a direct advertisement.

Sex and the City provides a great example of Madison & Vine Advertising. While designers are not directly marketing their products to consumers, they promote their brand name and the couture lifestyle through the characters in the show/movie. As the video clip shows, the introductory song is called “labels or love”, which musically implies that high-fashion labels are more important to the artist than love (or anything else, for that matter), suggesting the same thing to the viewers. Time and time again the show reinforces the positive influence of couture on the characters from various designers. By Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte, or Miranda wearing a designer’s clothing or accessories they are advertising to the consumer on a deeper level than just a commercial; women identify with these characters, and if high-fashion designers advertise through the characters, selling a lifestyle, thus they reach the consumer on a less biased and more influential level.