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The Kluger Agency (TKA) is an advertising agency with a focus on strategic partnerships and product placement within the music industry. The agency represents both corporations and artists in house. The agency represents over fifty-five brands, partnering them with artists in the music industry.

Company Description

The agency was founded in late 2007 or early 2008 by (then 22-year-old) Adam Kluger.

While the concept of advertising in popular music is not new (Steve Stoute had placed Motorola in Jay-Z’s “I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)" in 2001), Kluger has specialised in the aggressive promotion of this form of placement.

An advertisement for Plenty of Fish in 2010 Lady Gaga/Beyoncé Knowles video "Telephone" yielded a 20% increase in traffic to the site in the month following the song's release. Plenty of Fish has also placed paid promotions in Jason Derulo’s “Ridin' Solo” and Akon/Flo Rida’s “Available”, according to a Forbes magazine blog which estimates placement deals bring in $10 million a year for Kluger as its cut of revenue from "roughly 100 videos and five or six songs per year". BusinessWeek estimates advertisers pay $40,000 to $250,000 per placement, of which Kluger retains up to 23%. Placing a brand into the song's lyrics may cost a half-million dollars or more.

Kluger claims product placements allow performers to monetise the ongoing copyright infringement of their works as "obviously if the song is pirated, the lyrics aren’t going to change” and provide musicians with a larger budget to produce music videos.

“ an artist like T-Pain wants to shoot a $300,000 video with explosions and people jumping off buildings … but the label only budgeted $50,000, he’s going to be open to a few placements if the money attached offsets the costs for his video concept."

— Adam Kluger

Adam Kluger established the agency in 2008 by making over 400 telephone calls, claiming to vendors that he could get their brands into popular songs, then claiming to record labels that he could get brands to pay for promotions. In Kluger's words, "there's a bit of bullsh-----g you have to do to get in the door". He eventually got through to Steve Berman, head of marketing for Interscope Records, a label promoting bands such as The Pussycat Dolls. His first product placement was for Vixen's Visions, a lingerie manufacturer whose branding is displayed on a shopping bag of cash in a one-second appearance in Lady Gaga's music video "Beautiful, Dirty, Rich".

The Kluger Agency has worked with a range of stars including Akon, Jason Derulo, Drake, Lady Gaga, Keri Hilson, Beyoncé Knowles, Jennifer Lopez, Flo Rida, Britney Spears, LMFAO, Kesha, Uncle Kracker, Rick Ross, T-Pain, Timbaland and Lil Wayne. Its competitors include The Marketing Arm, an agency that deals in endorsements.

Reaction and Reviews

In 2008, the agency was criticized by Wired magazine after it was alleged that they had sent an unsolicited email offering to place advertising for Double Happiness Jeans in a Pussycat Dolls tune. The company was virtual and not intended to represent a viable commercial product; the project was a collaboration between Jeff Crouse of the Anti-Advertising Agency and Stephanie Rothenberg, and was intended to be a critical piece.

Britney Spears's music video for "Hold It Against Me", which incorporates placements by The Kluger Agency, has been criticised for excessiveproduct placement advertisements;, however the brands involved in the video reported that the advertisment was a success according to interviews on TMZ.com and various other major media outlets;, Pop star Katy Perry came to the agencies defense on Perez Hilton.com claiming that she also uses product placement to offset production costs and believes in doing so tastefully within the storyline of the video.

Reference:

References

1. "Agency cues lyricists to name-drop brands". LA Business Journal. Retrieved 2012-08-07. {{cite magazine}}: Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)(registration required)
2. ^ "The Recording Industry's Piracy-Proof Business Plan". Forbes. 2012-04-18. Retrieved 2012-08-07. {{cite magazine}}: Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)
3. ^ "He Puts the Soda in Pop Songs". Businessweek. 2010-12-02. Retrieved 2012-08-07. {{cite magazine}}: Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)
4. "BLOG: "Don't cha wish your website was hot like this?"". MusicRadar. 2008-09-23. Retrieved 2012-08-07.
5. Van, Eliot (2008-09-19). "Products Placed: How Companies Pay Artists to Include Brands in Lyrics | Listening Post". Wired.com. Retrieved 2012-08-07.
6. Weiner, Juli. "PlentyOfFish.com, Get Out of Music Videos and Get Back to the Internet". Vanity Fair. Retrieved 2012-08-07. {{cite magazine}}: Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)
7. >tmz, tmz. "Britney Spears scores". TMZ. Retrieved 2012-08. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)

• Advertising agencies of the United States
• Companies established in 2008
• Privately held companies based in California