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Advertising by Association

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Advertising by Association (trope)
This book is for The Birds, by the way.

"Despite the explicit marketing tie-in ("From the studio that brought you Shrek"), both [Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas and Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron] are traditional hand-drawn cel animation with nothing to connect them to Shrek in look or in spirit."
Steven D. Greydanus, Decent Films

When a creator is maybe not prominent enough to carry a title on their own, but their work is popular and/or widely loved enough to mean something, the promoters of their latest project will highlight their track record to sell this new thing to people. Sometimes it does give the audience some clues as to what they might expect — a signature line, a Creator Cameo, other tropes said creator is known to utilize. Exceedingly common in literature, with the cover frequently advertising something akin to "from the New York Times bestselling author of Insert Book Here." Other common promotions include "by the bestselling author of the book that was made into a successful movie" or even "by the author of the bestselling franchise, of which this book is the next installment".

Can lead to Director Displacement in films and television when the "creator" is a producer — as this name immediately becomes associated with the work, people not bothered to look any further than promotional material will only know them as the creator of it and perpetuate both the displacement and the future of works being promoted by their name as they become more spoken of.

Sometimes may be used as a way to Polish the Turd.

This form of advertising can take many forms:

  • From the writer/director/creator of...
  • From the studio that brought you...
  • From the producer of... - Some people take this as a sign that they had nothing else to sell the audience on than "the guy who said Yes to this film also said Yes to this other film".
  • From the Award Winning creator of... - For when they really want to highlight the creator's prestige.
  • From the maker/s of... - They did something important on that film, had a little involvement with this one.

Compare Billed Above the Title (the creator's name is displayed more prominently than the title of the work), He Also Did (for when the work is incredibly out of genre for the Creator, but it isn't necessarily advertised), In Case You Forgot Who Wrote It (the Creator's name is part of the title or Tagline), and Preview Piggybacking (where a work advertises an included preview for a much more anticipated work).

Sub-Trope of Put a Face on the Company. Contrast Competing Product Potshot.


Examples:

    open/close all folders 

Straight Examples:

    Anime & Manga 

    Comic Books 
  • Cosmo (2018): When Archie Comics revived their long-dormant Cosmo the Merry Martian IP, early advertisements and announcements made sure to let their potential readers know that it was being handled by the same creative team as their hugely popular, then-recently cancelled Sonic the Hedgehog series.
  • Kull the Conqueror (1971): The comic was originally billed as "From the creator of Conan!" on its covers. Robert E. Howard had been dead for thirty years and had nothing to do with the adaptation of his Kull stories, though.
  • The Ultimates: In-universe, Nick Fury hired Stark for the Ultimates for his incredible Iron Man armor, but also because of his huge popularity, and how some of it could be borrowed by the Ultimates initiative.

    Films — Animation 

    Films — Live-Action 

    Food 
  • On their company-owned Facebook page, Lee's Famous Recipe Chicken every so often posts pictures of their founder, Lee Cummings, and his uncle together. Said uncle is never named in the posts, but it's clearly Col Harlan Sanders.

    Literature 

Authors whose other works are advertised:

Works by an editor/author, but another author is advertised:

    Live-Action TV 

    Music 
  • News articles about I AM I's lead singer, ZP Theart, tend to introduce him as DragonForce's ex-singer.
  • Recent no-man albums tend to include a sticker that says: "no-man are: steven wilson (porcupine tree) and tim bowness". Which is ironic considering that Wilson considers no-man his main project.
  • European copies of Bob Weir's Heaven Help The Fool initially had "ex-Grateful Dead guitarist" circled on the cover - this was unusual because 1) the text was printed on the cover art itself instead of on a removable sticker, and 2) Bob was just engaging in a Solo Side Project, and had not in fact left The Grateful Dead. Later reissues at least fixed the gaffe by airbrushing out "ex-", leaving just "Grateful Dead guitarist".

    Tabletop Games 
  • Card games published by International Games Inc. and Mattel all have the inset "From the Makers of Uno" on the game's box. While most games are unrelated to Uno, it does help distinguish Similarly Named Works, such as the game DOS (the official sequel to Uno) from DOS!: Twice the fun of UNO (a word and drawing card game).

    Theatre 

    Toys 
  • The packaging of the first wave of Hero Factory sets had a label boasting "From the makers of BIONICLE!"
  • The Grossery Gang have labels on the top of their pegs with "From the makers of The Trash Pack!" on them. Before their official release, both The Trash Pack and Shopkins YouTube channels aired crossover promotions for The Grossery Gang.

    Video Games 

    Web Original 

    Western Animation 

Parodies:

    Fan Works 
  • The first paragraph of Super Paper Mario X starts with a "Creator of" example, like a trailer for a movie, but a Record Needle Scratch occurs halfway through, with the author assuring that "this is not a movie."

    Films — Animation 
  • Parodied by the 2007 Spanish-Italian animated film Donkey Xote. The film had a lot of similarities with Shrek, bordering on plagiarism. Its creators lampshaded this, promoting the film as "From the producers who saw Shrek".

    Films — Live-Action 

    Live-Action TV 

    Video Games 
  • Spoofed in the trailer for the strategy game Space Base Defense, which is advertised as having come "from the developer who played Age of Empires".

    Web Animation 

    Web Original 

    Western Animation 
  • Futurama
    • The episode "Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love?" parodies this by having its opening caption read "From the Network that Brought You The Simpsons." (They could have made a big deal out of Matt Groening's name being on the cover of both shows, but they offer their then-shared home on Fox as the key similarity instead.)
    • "A Head in the Polls" has "From the Makers of Futurama".
  • Parodied in Family Guy, in an unaired cutaway gag from season 9, "Road to the North Pole".
    Stewie: [to Brian] You tried to trick me! Like those commercials for upcoming movies.
    [cut to Stewie watching TV in the living room]
    Announcer: This summer, from the guys who brought you Superbad comes a hilarious new comedy.
    Stewie: Uh, I hate when they do that. Which guy? You know it could be the writers or the guys in the wardrobe department, they don't specify.
    [Stewie changes the channel]
    Announcer: From the studio that brought you Wedding Crashers.
    Stewie: Uh, who cares? It's sure a broad association.
    [Stewie changes the channel]
    Announcer: From the species that brought you Talladega Nights.
    Stewie: Oh what, humans? Who else is making movies?
    Announcer: From the same molecular elements that brought you Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
    Stewie: What?
    Announcer: ...and air!
    Stewie: Fuck off!
  • Parodied in the "Uncle Grandpa Babies" segment with "From the network that brought you Adventure Time and Steven Universe."
  • Robot Chicken: A sketch from "Things Look Bad for the Streepster" features a trailer for The Smashing Games, which says it's "From the studio that brought you Mario Is Missing! and Donkey Kong Hockey.

 
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