ad it Up - music firms advertise brand name products

Brandweek, May 24, 1999 by Davin Seay

"Traditionally, publishing has been a pennies business," explains Nicholas Firth, president of BMG Music Publishing. "You earn a few cents off copyrights on each unit sold. It added up, but it took time. Selling music for commercials is what I call a folding-money business. You get it up front, and you get a lot of it. I think the publishing business as a whole is experiencing double-digit growth worldwide because of the growth in commercial song placement. I know we are. Here at BMG, this kind of activity is accounting for upwards of 10% of our total revenue worldwide."

GLOBAL DIMENSIONS

For Firth, as with other key publishing executives, the emphasis these days is on the global dimensions of commercial placements. "The U.S. generally has been more conscious of the possibilities in this business than the rest of the world," Firth asserts. "Elsewhere, there seemed to be a more passive licensing function. That's no longer true. We're all realizing the value of a positive, proactive marketing approach on a global basis. For example, we licensed Bobby McFerrin's 'Don't Worry' in more than 10 countries worldwide. It's a song that will earn more in commercials than it ever did on its own.

A key element in the global perspective of this fast-expanding arena is the recent merger mania that has resulted in the largest consolidation in music-business history--the marriage of the PolyGram and MCA/Universal music powerhouses.

"We've made significant progress in integrating the companies and their assets," remarks David Renzer; worldwide president of Universal Music's publishing operations. "One of the first things we did was establish a committee to fully explore every aspect of our combined resources, and what we discovered is that we have an incredible upside, in terms of catalogs complementing each other. We're dedicated to being both user-friendly and service-oriented and offering our writers and artists the fullest opportunities that exist within a broad-based entertainment conglomerate."

One way in which the new Universal Music Publishing operation is fulfilling its mandate is through the exploration of new and unique copyright uses. Says Scott James, senior VP of film and TV music for the company, "We have gone after the use of music in video slot machines, interactive storybooks, gaming tables and even automatronic dolls. Our U.K. office has a full-time staffer; Lawrence Kaye, dedicated solely to licensing songs for new technologies, and we've also hired Ed Razzano, a former music director at [ad agency D'Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles], to work exclusively with major advertising agencies."

"Of course, we have created more opportunities for ourselves with a larger creative and marketing team," says Bruce Resnikoff, president of Universal Music Special Markets. "But the real advantage for the customer is that we can offer one-stop shopping. PolyGram has great strength in classical music. MCA and Universal have deep pop and country catalogs. With Verve and GRP, we have enormous resources in jazz. Now, as one entity, we can bring it all to our corporate clients without having to go outside our own shop as much. Of course, we'll do whatever it takes to get the right song, but, more and more, we're able to draw on our own resources.