BEATS IN MUSIC VIDEOS: THE ULTIMATE SELLOUT

BEATS IN MUSIC VIDEOS: THE ULTIMATE SELLOUT

Circa 2014-15 Beats by Dre were quite possible the coolest headphones to have and still are still widely considered the "best" headphones today.  I always remember going to the technology section at Target to try them on at the station they had set up to promote the headphones, always wanting a pair.  The hype surrounding a product hasn't rivaled the excitement around the headphone by Dr. Dre  since in my opinion, but when I had saved up the ridiculous 300 dollars for my first pair of beats the elementary school version of me made the smart decision to return them a week later for a full refund.  I had bought into the idea of beats rather than the quality of the product itself.

The first time I realized how much influence advertising had over my role as a consumer was ironically with the same company. The company managed to shove one of their products into every nook and cranny of some of the biggest musicians music videos for about a year, it was the single way I learned what product placement was.  If you need to teach someone what product placement is, Beats will help....

These are just a few images from the countless music videos that major artists produced that very obviously were sponsored by Beats.  At first a viewer may have thought they outsmarted beats by recognizing that they're sponsoring the video, however after a while the headphones and pill-shaped speakers blend into the background of nearly all music videos.  Soon we associate Beats with our favorite artists and music.  We accept Beats as the best way to listen to our favorite music at the same level of style and quality as our favorite musicians.

In conclusion, Beats became a headphone giant because of its simple, yet effective advertisement to create the idea in our minds that Beats is the best way to listen to music.  And I, a victim of this clever product placement have three pairs of beats are either broken or never used.