You may have a great idea for a television advertisement to market your business’s product or service. But you may believe that utilizing a specific trending, popular, or otherwise fitting song to play in the background will add an edge to your commercial. Subsequently, it may create greater buzz, recognition, or overall a strong emotional response from your prospective consumers. Well, before you get too ahead of yourself, you must understand that buying and downloading the song through iTunes, purchasing a Spotify subscription to access it, or crediting the artist at the end of your video may not be considered enough effort on your end. With that in mind, please read on to discover how to license music for legal use in a TV commercial and how a seasoned New Jersey licensing agreement lawyer at The Ingber Law Firm can help you navigate the strict parameters of such usage.
Why do I need permission to use a song in a TV commercial?
First things first, you must understand that using a song in a TV commercial is considered legally distinct from adding it or having it playing incidentally in the background of your personal social media post, for example. This is because your broadcast advertisement is directly meant to generate profits for your business. And this interferes with the original copyright owner’s (i.e., a songwriter or record label) exclusive right to profit from their protected musical work. What’s more, by doing so, you also infringe upon their rights to control how their song is reproduced, performed, distributed, remixed, etc.
With that being said, a copyright holder will likely be unhappy about your unauthorized utilization of their music. This may be especially true if you are marketing something that they do not necessarily want to be associated with, such as an alcoholic beverage, or otherwise a direct competitor of a brand they own or invest in. When this happens, you can expect them to demand that you take down your commercial effective immediately, with an intense lawsuit following soon after.
What licenses do I need to use music in a television advertisement?
Of note, you may need to acquire multiple kinds of permissions from a given copyright owner before finally utilizing a certain musical work. For one, there is the synchronization license, which may allow you to synchronize a specific audio with moving images, ultimately producing an audiovisual work, for an agreed-upon fee. It is worth mentioning that you would be expected to seek the same license if you were creating a film, TV show, video game, or any other form of digital content for revenue.
Secondly, it may be necessary to get a master use license, as well. This is if you wish to use a specific recording of the song, like a modern or more recognizable version. Here, permission will likely be granted by a record label or recording owner. So, you must understand that even if you obtain licensing rights to the general composition itself, you must confirm that you have the legal right to use the specific recorded performance. One way of sidestepping this added licensure is to hire another musician to sing what is known as a “cover” of the song, for instance.
To conclude, please prioritize scheduling an initial consultation with a competent Essex County, New Jersey intellectual property lawyer from The Ingber Law Firm. We would be honored to represent you in your legal case.