Finding an Audience: Distribution Notes for 7/18/08
Karina passes on competing viewpoints on how important a theatrical release is in the life of a movie, with one side calling it extraordinarily important as a legitimizing factor in the minds of the audience and the other saying that with all the new and better targeted distribution platforms out there, the idea of putting a movie in a theater is kind of out-dated. The LAT also examines the growing online market for independent films.
The ground-breaking Four-Eyed Monsters online gets celebrated by Cinematical on the verge of the movie’s release on DVD.
The conventional wisdom that high gas prices send people to the theater - a short trip as opposed to longer weekend trips - gets questioned.
US Airways will no longer show theatrical features on its flights, but studios aren’t too worried that other airlines will do likewise.
It should come as know surprise that a study funded by a company that offers DRM solutions raised a red-flag about the rise of piracy of big-name movies in both the U.S. and Great Britain. Yeah, that’s real shocking.
20th Century Fox is holding a series of screenings at stores and other locations in popular spots around the country to promote their DVD library as a way to get people excited about home video released.
The numbers on DVD aren’t dire yet, though, with 67% of those 13-29 still saying they rent or buy discs monthly. And spending on both DVD and Blu-ray discs has actually risen 1.6 percent in the first half of 2008 compared to the same period in 2007.
Blockbuster is counting on the release of a few big-name titles like Iron Man and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull to boost its fourth-quarter earnings.
Meanwhile, Disney is counting on the interactive features on its Cinderella Blu-ray will generate a new wave of interest in the format. And Warner Bros. is hoping for the same consumer interest as a result of dropping prices.
Netflix is adding its Watch Instantly download service to the Xbox 360, setting the stage for even more such services. As Matt Griswold says, the service will allow for up to eight friends to watch the same movie at once, bringing social recommendations and viewing back into the formerly solitary home video game.
Paramount has signed a deal to put current blockbusters like Beowulf and Cloverfield, among others, on the rental site Jaman.com that will make the titles available for about $3 or $4.
Viacom has worked out a deal with the Weinstein Co. that will have that studio’s films become available on the new pay-cable channel it’s starting with a couple other studios. The deal will start with movies the Weinstein Co. releases beginning in 2009 and include films from its Dimension Films division.
Lionsgate is also among the ranks of those making deals, with time with YouTube. The studio will make clips from its library of movies available officially on the site, with the two parties sharing advertising revenue from the clips that appear on Lionsgate’s channel. The deal was hashed out when Lionsgate was trying to get all their unauthorized clips off of YouTube and realized it was relatively pointless.
Movie Marketing Madness: The Dark Knight
The campaign for The Dark Knight, the second movie in the newest iteration of the Batman franchise, has a tough act to follow. As I’ve stated time and time again, the push for Batman Begins in 2005 is one of my favorite campaigns I’ve ever analyzed in my time in seriously reviewing movie marketing efforts. That’s because, as you likely know, it is so amazingly consistent from one component to the next. From the posters to the trailers to the website, everything about the campaign was done in that same sepia-toned style, with Batman looming large and mysterious in the center of the action. It created a singular public face which was reinforced time and again in the audience’s mind and created a strong brand identity in every sense of the phrase.
For that and other reasons (I’m a long time fan of the (good) Batman films, this one was shot in Chicago, including my building, etc) The Dark Knight has been something I’ve been looking forward to for quite a while and which, admittedly, I’m pre-disposed to liking. So consider that my disclaimer.
The Dark Knight picks up just shortly after we left off in Batman Begins. But with Bruce Wayne feeling like his work as the Caped Crusader is coming to a close thanks to the work of Harvey Dent and a corruption fighting District Attorney who is committed to bringing order to Gotham City things seem to be calming down, or at least coming to a point where the actual system can begin working. Into that mix comes the mysterious Joker, a “better class of criminal” that is devoted to bringing down Batman - and Dent - in his efforts to…well…enjoy himself as chaos is set free in the streets again.
And that leads us to the main issue surrounding this campaign. The early stages of the push by Warner Bros. had focused heavily, as we’ll see as we progress, on the Joker’s involvement. He was causing mischief online and his markings were seen on the first posters and other materials. The Joker was, to make it clear, being positioned as the main selling point for the movie.
But then Heath Ledger, the actor portraying him, died, with reports surrounding his death speculating either on an accidental overdose of medication or a purposeful suicide. Gone was not only a son and father of a little girl, but also the person who was going to be at the forefront of the campaign. His death threw into question just about everything. Does Warner Bros. continue to use the Joker in the campaign? Do they continue on with plans to create Joker toys and other items? Or will this all just be too ghoulish?
But now, before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s look at the way The Dark Knight was - and in some cases wasn’t sold to the movie-going public. Because of the way the campaign was structured it’s going to require a bit of deviation from the usual format.
Picking Up the Spare: 7/16/08
The Incredible Hulk
The success of the new movie version of the Hulk has been debated back and forth since its release, with the last word on the matter seeming to be that it just didn’t do well enough to warrant a franchise. Universal continues to say it’s happy with the movie’s box-office, and the lighter, more action-oriented tone of the movie makes it more open to sequels, but the lack of a sequel that’s been greenlighted already kind of speaks volumes.
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
Animation World News has some more details on unlocking the secret codes on the various sites setup for Hellboy’s second big-screen outing and goes into more of the story surrounding this aspect of the campaign.
Hancock
The site for Hancock that was developed by Trigger was tagged as one of Adobe’s Sites of the Day.
So many ways to lose
As I stall for time while prepping my MMM: The Dark Knight column, allow me to pass along David Armano’s Wheel of Marketing Misfortune, which includes many (many) sinkholes that studios often fall into online.
BlogOrlando 2008 includes a little Thilk-y goodness
As insane as it might sound - to me no less than you - I’ve been asked to speak at this year’s BlogOrlando event at the end of September. BlogOrlando is, of course, put on by Josh Hallett who, in addition to being an awesome photographer, is a seriously good guy and one of the brightest in the marketing field as a whole, much less the social media wing of that industry.
If you’re in the area or feel like coming you can register here, but hurry before the spots are filled. And you can check out the full (so far) list of speakers here and here.
The Avengers
Movie Marketing Madness: Hellboy 2 - The Golden Army
If last week’s Hancock was an example of trying to sell the movie of a superhero that is new, without an existing fanbase, Hellboy is an example of trying to sell comic book character that only the hardcore comics fans are likely to know about.
Hellboy is among the more obscure comics adaptations hitting theaters this summer, though unlike Hancock he does have an actual comics legacy to pull from and capitalize on. The character has been around for a number of years, after having been created by Mike Mingolla a while ago. And he’s already had one big screen outing, as well as a number of really, really cool direct-to-video features that continue the story of Hellboy and his supporting cast very well. So he’s an established movie character as well.
Still, the primary problem Universal faces this week is the fact that Hellboy is not Iron Man. He’s not the Hulk. He’s not Batman. And with so many big-time superheroes coming to the big-screen it’s going to be easy for people to forget about Hellboy, a problem that’s only accentuated by the fact that he’s a little darker and more mysterious, fighting not a bad guy per se but a whole underworld of monsters, an underworld he used to belong to and constantly has to fight the pull to rejoin.
Bringing him back to the movies is director Guillermo del Toro, the mastermind behind Pan’s Labyrinth and a number of other films that have a penchant for the supernatural, including the first Hellboy flick back in 2004, one of his first mainstream American films. The plot of Hellboy II is pretty simple - bunch of bad guys, in this case the spoiled heir to an underworld kingdom who was a preference for violence, are trying to disrupt the human world. So it’s up to Hellboy and his team to push them back where they belong, all the while throwing around one-liners and chomping cigars. Let’s dive in.
The Posters
The first poster that hit the streets was released at Comic-Con in 2007. Very much a teaser in every sense of the word, the one-sheet showed nothing from the movie other than its title. Instead it was just a bit of artwork from Mignola that depicted Hellboy in his comics form, something that was designed almost solely to elicit “OMGs” from the fans of the character, whether they were in attendance at the event or just viewing it online after the fact. There was the slightest bit of plot hinting via the huge robot something that lurks behind Hellboy but that’s about it.
After that a series of character posters were released that sought to re-introduce the cast of the first film to us. Hellboy, Liz Sherman and Abe Sapien got posters all to themselves, as well as new addition Johann Krauss. These were released over a series of weeks and definitely did a good job of getting people excited about the second theatrical entry in the franchise. Plus, they were super-cool in terms of design, showing something of the character’s powers and overall being consistent with the look and feel of things like the website, creating that all-important brand experience.
It was a little while before another poster hit, but when it did it was big. Once again debuting at a Comic-Con event, this one-sheet had not only the hardcore comics fan allure going for it but also the fact that it was designed by legendary poster artist Drew Struzan, he of the Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Harry Potter (at least the first few) franchises, as well as countless others. This one is..well…it just rocks. Hellboy, armed with his Big Baby gun, looks up at the towering hordes of robots that are coming at him out of a cloud of dust. It works well by combing great artwork with an image that captures the overall gist of the movie’s conflict in a single frame. Definitely a great effort.
The final theatrical poste r brings us back to a real image of Hellboy, who’s seen with gun in hand and with his other hand - the big stone one - smashing the ground. That part of the image is a little underwhelming, since his mighty punch seems to have disturbed barely more grass than I do when I’m walking in my yard, but that’s a minor quibble. It’s a good, fun poster that brings the character to the masses in a slick but darkly tinted way, a feeling that’s accentuated by the “Believe it or not, he’s the good guy” copy point that appears at the top.
Interestingly, this is the only poster I’ve seen that mentions the movie comes from del Toro. Actually it doesn’t tout that as much as the fact that it comes from the “visionary director of Pan’s Labyrinth” above the title. The reason I mark that as interesting is that this is a theme that will be hit upon heavily in the trailers. It almost seems to me Universal was hoping the trailers would find richer soil in art-house audiences, while the posters main audience would be comics fans who might not be as drawn to the legacy of Pan’s as they would be to art that was taken directly from the comics or which had a rich heritage in the sci-fi fantasy realm.
The Trailers
The first trailer skirted the line of being a teaser, spending a lot of the first part of its running time on setting up the mysterious world that lurks around and beneath ours, all of which is being brought to us by director Guillermo del Toro. It then gets around to showing us the main bad guy of the movie, some sort of royalty that’s going to destroy mankind. Eventually we’re shown Hellboy himself and the other good guys, with Big Red being shown as his usual heroic but slightly grumpy self. It sets up the basic story pretty well, showing how things are still the same for our band of paranormal investigators, still not existing and still scaring the regular humans as much as the baddies, despite constantly saving the day.
The second spot spent more time at first setting up the motivation for the bad guy in the movie, showing how he’s reclaiming his birthright, a process that involves him making his presence known to the upper world and causing a bit of mayhem. After that we transition to the action, with Hellboy and his crew bringing the fight to the bad guys, with gallows humor intact.
The third and final trailer is probably the most traditional one in the line-up, especially taking into account the fact that this is a sequel. It starts off by reintroducing us to the character and how we met him in the first movie, as a tiny little demon that is just so adorable and then as a big fighting machine that loves kittens. It then moves into a general plot overview of the new movie, with a general setup of the plot and the adversaries Hellboy and the other good guys will be facing. It’s a great spot that probably is going to have the most mass appeal since, by adding the setup to the character at the beginning, makes the movie just a tad more accessible than the other trailers. I’m not saying it’s the best of the batch, but it’s the most well-rounded and that’s important here.
Unlike the collection of posters, del Toro’s name is mentioned all over these trailers. Every one at some point intones that this comes from the director - often preceded by “visionary” or some other superlative - of Pan’s Labyrinth. Obviously the studio thinks this is going to bring in fans of fantasy films in addition to those that are looking for some cool sci-fi/comic-book storytelling. The cast of demons and creatures that are on display here back that theory up, making it clear Universal wants to convince Pan’s fans that this movie is the thematic, if not outright, extension of that film.
Online
The movie’s main online presence is split into two main parts: The first is the site that’s meant for general audiences and which looks very much like a movie website. The other, labeled the “Production Site” is more functional and doesn’t have a look or feel that you would instantly recognize as being attached to a major studio release. I’m not saying it’s chintzy looking or anything - it’s still very slick and well designed - but it’s definitely meant for a different audience.
The official site, the one that is geared more toward a general audience, has some above-average content. It’s arranged with a main menu of content off to the side and some location-named sections at the bottom.
Before you enter the site, though, there’s already quite a bit of good content that’s offered. The third trailer is there, along with a pop-up that allows you to share the video on your own site or post it elsewhere. There’s also a widget you can grab that includes some of the site’s standard stuff, a link to the special iPhone-optimized site and a list of the promotional Partners.
First the main menu’s content: “The Film” has a pretty good stuff in the form of Production Notes, the Cast and Crew write-ups and The Story. The sections, when put together, provide a solid picture of the movie and the journey it took to come back to the big-screen. They’re well-written and entertaining and have the same sort of sense of humor the movie itself conveys, which is a good thing.
The “Video” section does exactly what I always think such sections should do, which is act as an archive of the video segments related to the movie. All three Trailers, a handful of TV Spots and a couple of extended Clips to enjoy. 
“Gallery” is exactly what you’d think it is, though it is a tad more extensive than other site’s sections with a lot of pictures. “Downloads” has Buddy Icons, Wallpapers, a Screen Saver and all the movie’s posters, including both domestic and international varieties, a nice touch that often gets overlooked here.
The “Whack-A-Troll” game is not all that complicated but let’s face facts - punching demons with a big red rocky fist is fun under just about any circumstances.
“Explore the BPRD” is the same stuff that you’ll find at the bottom of the site. It basically provides an alternate entry point to the content, along with some new stuff, by taking you to locations from the movie. Each one features a different one of the main characters and clicking them will bring you to downloads and video clips related to that character along with some other stuff. It’s a nice navigation tool that extends the movie’s universe and brings visitors into it a little bit more.
There’s also a link there to the other, more functional Production Site I mentioned before. There you’ll find some more stuff like links to del Toro’s online presence as well as that of actor Doug Jones under “Links.” There’s also “News” that has all the major announcements regarding the movie’s production and marketing materials releases. A “Gallery” of production art and a sections of “Images” that contains posters and stills are also there. “HBTV” has all the trailers, TV spots and some Featurettes. “History of Hellboy” is a nice introduction to the characters in this universe and “Synopsis” is a good overview of the movie.
In terms of communication, Universal did a good job of putting some tools in place. There’s an old-school Webring you can join if you have a movie or Hellboy-oriented site you’d like to promote. The Message Board is pretty standard, but it’s nice to see it there. Finally, there’s an RSS feed you can subscribe to to get updates, something that, to be perfectly honest, is completely and utterly essential.
The final main portion of the online presence is del Toro’s Notebook, which contains his sketches the director made. It’s all narrated by del Toro and is great, completely relevant to his audience since this is the same sort of thing he did for Pan’s Labyrinth and very much in line with his overall reputation in general.
One thing that I didn’t think got enough play was a wiki Universal created just for the movie. The site featured information on the cast, the characters, the production and the other talent involved in the movie, all in community-editable format. I don’t see that there was a ton of participation on the entries - the ones I looked at all pretty much resemble the place-holders the studio put up there at launch, but I’d encourage Universal and other studios to keep trying this approach, especially with movies like this that are likely to have such strong online followings.
The movie also had MySpace and Facebook pages, of course. The MySpace page featured the third and final trailer, some downloads, a photo gallery and the Whack-a-Troll game. The Facebook fan page was a little more sparse, with just a couple of trailers and a photo gallery making up most of its content, as well as a contest where you could win a statue in exchange for becoming a fan of the page. 
Also appearing online was an alternate reality game that featured a bunch of microsites. Universal created a bunch of sites, beginning with Hetfet.org, a site for the ethical treatment of fairies and trolls, and continuing on through TheSecretDevice.com and other sites. With each unlocked combination and such more clues were revealed and more content uncovered, including new design videos and more. I didn’t follow it extensively but between what I did catch and the recaps on sites like Comics2Film it seems to have been pretty engaging and fun, with rewards that justified people’s interest in the game.
Finally, there’s a short animated comic prequel that tells the story of the mythology that leads into the movie’s story, essentially explaining to Hellboy what the audience needs to know going in. In addition to being almost an essential viewing item it’s quite entertaining and definitely worth checking out.
Advertising and Cross-Promotions
In a summer where advertising space for movies had to be tight, Universal seems to have gone all out. I’ve seen online ads for the movie pasted all over the Internet, and the outdoor campaign has, whatever its reach, gotten a good amount of mentions in the online press, especially when there’s something funny, like a Hellboy ad appearing on a billboard right next to a church. Hi-larious.
There have also been quite a few TV spots created, seemingly all of which can be viewed online at the production site. Player X also helped the studio out by creating, publishing and distributing clips from the movie to mobile devices. 
One of the biggest cross-promotions - at least based on the amount I read about it - is with Adidas, who created a new Hellboy-themed line of shoes that are teh awesome. I don’t usually go for this kind of thing since I’m no long eight years old, but these would make me reconsider that thinking.
In perhaps the best movie marketing decision of the year so far, Universal tapped into the properties of a number of its sister companies to advertising Hellboy. They created a series of spots pairing Big Red with characters from shows like “Chuck,” “American Gladiators” and “Inside the Actors Studio” that had him in a variety of situations, most of which end up with him being well meaning but slightly inappropriate.
The official site also lists as promotional partners BigFix, an enterprise productivity platform company and Carl’s Jr./Hardee’s, though I couldn’t find anything on their sites or through a search on what those partnerships entail.
Overall
You know, the campaign we’ve just reviewed may not break any substantial new ground, but it does has the “fun factor” going for it in spades. The whole thing does a good job of conveying the gallows humor of Hellboy and his team and just comes across as being fast and loose, exactly the right image that needs to be portrayed.
There really aren’t any weak spots to point to. The posters are consistently slick and nicely designed, bringing a consistent brand message to audiences and definitely containing enough to appeal to the core target audience. That’s especially evidenced by the fact that two of the posters debuted at Comic-Con events, where the movie was likely to be among friends to begin with.
The trailers all contain enough stuff to appeal to a variety of niches, including the mainstream one, with messaging that is meant to get comics fans, fantasy movie fans and hopefully a few just general moviegoers into theaters. And the websites contain enough good stuff for anyone to satisfy their curiosity about the movie or the characters and leave really interested in seeing the film.
It may be the underdog comic adaptation of the summer, but Universal has put together a nice campaign for a movie that’s likely going to be a lot of fun.
Macfest 2008
The funny part about this is, Macs are the only technology around at Casa Biro. They churn their own butter, have chickens in the back room (who are really loud at night) and that’s actually two candles in the light in the background. But when it comes to home computing it’s all Apple.
Picking Up the Spare: Wanted, WALL-E, Hancock
Wanted
An MMOG (massively-multi-player-online-game) has been created that mimcs the “fraternity” idea from the movie, enlisting people who can rise through the ranks of the organization. It was actually released before the movie, according to the story, and was a component in the online buzz-building effort then.
WALL-E
Pixar has given a shout-out to a woman who created a YouTube video showing herself crying at the teaser trailer for WALL-E. The woman was given some Pixar memorabilia and invited her to the movie’s wrap party and everything. It’s a very cool story, the kind of thing that reinforces the notion that Pixar is far from a faceless corporation.
Hancock
I didn’t include this in the column despite the fact that the story was released before I published more because I couldn’t find a good fit for it more than anything else.
Sony is planning to release Hancock to owners of Sony Bravia sets via Internet download in the period after its theatrical run is finished but before the DVD is released. The download is run through Sony directly, seemingly without the participation of one of the traditional players like a cable company and is likely to honk those people off. I’m curious to see the pricing on this. It’s too limited a test - again, it’s just web-connected Bravia owners - to draw any real conclusions about the viability of breaking the window like this, but is an interesting move nonetheless.
Finding the Audience: Distribution Notes for 7/8/08
Google has begun experimenting with allowing independent filmmakers to post their entire movies to YouTube. The new deal will allow films to be posted for a small charge and ads will be placed within the movies, with revenue split between YouTube and the producer. Variety has more details.
Struggling retailer Sears is working with MTV on a back-to-schol movie dubbed The American Mall. Locations and clothes are all - or at least mostly - from Sears and the actors will appear in Sears commercials later this year, with the finished movie set for a debut on MTV this August.
This is the first “There are just too many independent movies in theaters and that’s why none of them are connecting with audiences” article I’ve seen in a while but it hits many of the same notes as previous such pieces. There’s a legitimate issue to discuss here about quality vs. quantity, but as long as everything has to be funneled through the narrow theatrical pipeline this is going to continue to be a problem.
Cinemark is working with RealID to significantly expand the reach of its 3D screens, an expansion that’s going to come in handy as more films are released - either in whole or in part - in this format. The rise of 3D, particularly in IMAX theaters and other large-screen venues, is also explored in Businessweek.
Mark Caro at The Trib discusses the dwindling instances of big-screen special screenings of old movies like WarGames, something that is caused by the “always” available culture of DVDs and such. But he also points to how companies like National CineMedia are able to offer titles for return visits more easily due to the advent of digital download to theaters.
Screenvision will be distributing a documentary on marathons to theaters with digital installations, about 170 in all, through its HD digital network. Screenvision has done this sort of thing before and I think the idea of niche films being available on this kind of basis could be a great thing for those movies that just aren’t right for mass distribution models. That’s especially true if its’ arranged by local interest groups of some sort who want to see a specific film.
Unfortunately the threat posed by digital downloads of movies and TV shows has caused a Lehman Brothers analyst to downgrade the stocks of five major entertainment companies on fears their reliance on existing business models will not be conducive to the new realities.
Marketing News You Need: 7/7/08
We all want to hang with the cool kids
Alan Wolk (Tangerine Toad to you and me) has a great piece up at Adweek about what consumers - particularly those that are super media-savvy - really think about brands and advertising. He has some interesting observations about the usage of social media tools, but the real meat of the piece comes when he makes the observation that people are naturally more inclined to be “friends” on social networks with bigger brands.
While I think he’s dead on in saying there only a dozen or so such “prom king” brands, as he calls them, I think there are a lot of things going on here.
First, as he alludes to but never outright says, most of these top-tier brands are aspirational even more than they’re functional. Like he says at the end, Starbucks is likely to evoke a much more passionate outpouring than Maxwell House. The one is a lifestyle that we want to, whether we can afford it or not, associate ourselves with. The second does the job of jolting us out of our sleepy stupor but it isn’t very sexy about it.
Second, these are the brands that have the ad budgets to position themselves as winners in the minds of the consumers. So they’re always there, top of everyone’s mind, something that has a tremendous impact on how they’re perceived. After all, if they have that much money to be spending on ads they must be doing well, which leads to the assumption that they must be popular, which leads to the assumption that they must be good and therefore I must need that brand in my shopping cart/life.
Since, as I continue to maintain, each movie is a brand in and of itself, this sort of lesson is important for studios to pay attention to. Is No Country For Old Men better than Iron Man? An argument could certainly be made for that position, though the number of people friending Iron Man on Facebook almost certainly dwarfed those who added NCFOM’s “Coin Toss” widget to their profiles. There’s a bigger group of people who wanted to associate themselves with the Iron Man brand than NCFOM.
But therein lies the trick. Not every brand *needs* to be a “prom king.” And not only that tier should enter the social media waters. It’s all about activating the key audience, a group large enough to make the movie being marketed profitable and worth the financial risk. That’s why social networking and other online efforts can’t just be “build ‘em and leave ‘em” programs. Studios and other marketers need to be engaging with fans on the profile pages and building relationships.
It’s those relationships, which have the added benefit of often resulting in secondary evangelism by the engaged consumer, that will make or break a brand, whatever tier it might fall into.
Multi-platform campaign more effective for converting customers
According to new research from Integrated Media Measurement shows customer conversion rates can be increased by running multi-platform campaigns.
The rates of customer purchase more than doubled, for instance, when ads on any other platform were added to television spots. The coupling with TV is important since TV brings the reach and other platforms bring the targeting.
It’s maintenance that’s key
The main take-away from this Businessweek story on the various options when it comes to online communities is that there absolutely needs to be someone at the company that built it or is sponsoring it who is responsible for maintaining it. They need to get involved, get engaged and get real with the people who are there.
More than that, even, is that they need to come with a goal in mind. Too often efforts like these are undertaken without anyone in the company asking “Why?” It’s the answer to that question that will guide the company’s involvement and give the members of the community - whether it’s an existing one that the company sponsors in some way or one that’s built from scratch - some feeling of their being a point to their being there.
Cable channels advance in upfronts
This is an interesting development to watch if it becomes a trend: Cable networks are seeing the upfront dollars they’re getting grow while broadcast networks see their dollars stagnate. That’s largely due to the closing gap in the number of viewers, with cable’s programming attracting more of the audience and ratings at the broadcast networks slipping fast.
The hidden costs of widgets
An interesting thing to keep in mind when developing a widget strategy, but something that certainly shouldn’t keep you from executing it, is the fact that some developers charge each time it’s added by someone. But that doesn’t trump the notion, related in the article, that the key value in widgets is that it brings the website to the audience where they are instead of forcing them to come to the site.
Get them talking
Jackie Huba has a round of stats for you regarding word-of-mouth marketing and its effectiveness. Specifically she reinforces the point that it’s the person doing the WOMing that we trust, not the communications channel they do it over.
See your ad at the mall
Considering how important mall advertising seems to be for studios - the current releases are usually plastered all over my local one and I’m guessing it’s like that all over - this study on the reach of mall ads should be interesting. Nielsen numbers show 47 percent of shoppers see the ads, according to the study. The “information about sale items” the study cites as being welcome may not be super-relevant to movies, especially since few theaters are still attached to malls, but it’s still something that could be utilized for home video releases to promote sales at stores there.
Are you listening?
The key takeaway, I think, from the research from ExpoTV about online reputation management is that 89 percent of customers said they felt more loyal to retailer brands that they thought were listening to what was being said online. That’s transferable to just about any industry, I’d bet.
Be afraid
The FCC is looking to get into the regulation of product placement. While this seems to be focuses on the television industry for now there’s no way it ends there, so studios and advertisers should keep an eye on this.
Announcements, we got announcements
A couple things came down the pike that I thought were interesting enough to pass on here. The first is for a good cause, the second just a cool opportunity if you’re interested in the marketing industry. Since I want to make sure I don’t screw the messaging up I’m pasting them exactly as they were sent to me.
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StandUpForCancer
Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) is a newly formed national initiative to help raise awareness and accelerate science toward finding an end to cancer. After all, cancer affects all of us. SU2C is inviting emerging filmmakers across the country to join the fight against cancer by turning their cameras on this disease. Each film must focus on the subject of cancer, being affected by cancer, and/or the battle against it.
The entrants will have the privilege of being judged by some of the industry’s top filmmakers and producers, including Laura Ziskin (Producer, Spider-Man, As Good As It Gets, Pretty Woman), Robert Greenwald (Director/Producer Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism), Julie Taymour (Director Across The Universe) and Lauren Shuler Donner (X-Men 1 & 2, Secret Life of Bees, Semi Pro) and Sherry Lansing (Former CEO of Paramount Pictures).
The top three finalists will premiere on Stand Up To Cancer’s website — alongside content produced by top filmmakers, journalists and performers.
Deadline: ALL MATERIALS MUST BE RECIEVED BY August 1, 2008.
Submissions: http://www.standup2cancer.org/filmchallenge/
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Learn Word of Mouth Marketing
Our friend and WOM guru Andy Sernovitz is hosting a small-group word of mouth marketing seminar. Usually he only does private training for companies at a very large price, so this is a rare chance for 50 people to get the best introduction to word of mouth that there is.
We’ve arranged for a $250 discount for our clients. Use code “weloveblogger” when you register.
This is a very practical, hands-on course. In one intense day, you will:
- Master the five steps of word of mouth marketing
- Construct an action plan that your company can start using the very next day
- Get the same training that big corporations (Microsoft, TiVo, eBay) have received — for a fraction of what they paid
- Know how to translate word of mouth marketing into real ROI
- Participate in an active, intense day of practical brainstorming (not boring theory)
- Learn from Andy Sernovitz, the guy who literally wrote the book on word of mouth marketing
Andy promises you will learn a repeatable, proven marketing framework that is easy to execute, affordable, and provides measurable results within 60 days.
More information: http://events.gaspedal.com
Chicago: July 30 and September 4
Movie Marketing Madness: Hancock
Will Smith had a lot of good will built up after last year’s action/drama I Am Legend. He earned rave reviews for his performance as the sole survivor of a virus that had wiped out almost the entirety of humanity, leaving most dead and the others turned into nocturnal zombies. Since the movie was mostly Smith all by himself it was his to carry and he did so admirably, getting praise from audiences and critics.
For his follow-up, Smith picked Hancock. In it he plays the title character, a super-powered individual who is kind of a dick. He’s homeless, sleeping on park benches and such, and completely inconsiderate about how much damage he causes in his mis-guided attempts to save the day. He smashes into street signs and breaks up streets and everything else as he flies about and insults people and while he’s on the ground.
It is, to say the least, a risky move for Smith to take and it’s going to be a tough movie to sell. After all, this isn’t just an anti- or reluctant hero we’re talking about. Hancock is almost set up as the bad guy in his own story, someone with no public support and a bad attitude. The trick for Sony is to sell this as an interesting bit of entertainment in a summer that’s already seen Iron Man become a massive, shiny hit and is soon to see The Dark Knight appear as a dark hero to be sure, but still a no-doubt-about-it hero.
The Posters
Really there was only one poster released by Sony for the movie, one that showed Smith as Hancock in extreme close-up, with his full nasty looking outfit of dirty ski cap and big sunglasses on. In the glasses you can see the reflection of Los Angeles, something that is a pretty typical superhero pose, that of the hero looking out over the city he protects. But Hancock being in such filthy clothes is meant to contrast against that, creating a stark - and hopefully memorable - image in the mind of the audience as being more “unconventional” than anything else. Sony is obviously hoping that this is then interesting enough to the public to make it their movie of choice this weekend.
The Trailers
The teaser trailer starts off in much the same way you would expect any sort of superhero movie to, with a camera sweeping through the clouds with bold text coming at the viewer. It then sets up Hancock as a very different hero, sleeping on a sidewalk bench before being awaken by a small boy, who Hancock then yells at. After making an inappropriate grab for a hot woman walking by him he blasts off, destroying the bench, almost hitting a jet plane and crashing through highway signs as he misguidedly tries to save the day.
At that point the action shifts to reveal that Hancock is not well loved, a situation that is obviously setup to provide most of the comedy in the film. We see him destroying streets and ultimately throwing a beached whale back into the sea. The last bit comes with commentary from Jason Bateman, playing a publicity agent of some sort who’s determined to help Hancock clean up his image a bit.
It’s a good trailer that does quite a bit to setup the story and the characters (at least most of them) and provides a very solid introduction to Hancock himself. It’s played for laughs almost exclusively, as is much of the campaign.
The first theatrical trailer starts off with an extended version of the highway chase scene, with Hancock this time being introduced while flying and drinking before moving to more of Bateman’s PR guy and his attempts to improve the hero’s image. It then moves into less comedic territory, with lots of scenes of the character struggling with his identity and his public persona and how to reconcile the two. We even get a few brief shots of Theron, though not enough to really pin-down who her character is or what she’s all about.
At the time it debuted - and I still feel this way now - I thought this more heroic tone was a response to the fact that all of a sudden Sony found itself in the middle of what, at the time, was the full-court press that was the Iron Man campaign. The studio all of a sudden needed to market it as a superhero movie and not so much as a comedy. So while there were still some comedic elements in this and the second theatrical spot that was largely the same the focus was coming around to the saving the day parts of the movie more and more.
Online
The movie’s official website is a litlte disappointing, at least by the standards of a major tentpole release from a big studio. It’s well designed - I love the tile look to the navigation and how the sections keep rearranging themselves every time you come back to the main page - but the content is just a tad light.
Before you enter the site there are a couple of contests you can enter. The first is the Cover to Cover Comic Book Sweepstakes, which is giving away some original artwork that is meant to be the covers to some fictional Hancock comic books. The second is a contest to have your mortgage paid off. The contest uses the idea that Hancock has destroyed your home and it’s Bateman’s PR guy that’s coordinating this in order to boost Hancock’s public image.
Upon entering the site we’ll start off at “Trailers,” where you’ll find both the teaser and the theatrical trailers. Next up are the only eight pictures that are housed in the “Gallery,” officially making it weaker than the selection you can find somewhere like Yahoo Movies. “Downloads” has just a Screensaver, some Buddy Icons and a few Wallpapers.
“About the Film” has a decent, if not spectacular, Story synopsis as well as sections on the Cast and Filmmakers that contains some pretty standard write-ups on their history in the film and entertainment business.
Most of the rest of the site’s content is meant to be more interactive and entertaining in nature. We’ll first look at HancockWasHere.com, a site that’s meant to be a blog by a bystander in Hancock’s area that chronicles his actions. So it’s filled with videos of him swooping down and destroying things and reports from people on the ground when he mishandles an attempt at saving the day. I’m not a fan of fake blogs like this, but it’s not completely offensive so it’s not worth quibbling over. It’s pretty obvious - by the huge tower ad for the movie if nothing else - that it’s a promotional effort so I’ll give it a pass here.
There are also some games under the “Hancock’s So-Called Heroics,” most of which focus on having Hancock save the a citizen from some sort of problem, with his efforts being measured against the financial costs of his actions. That’s also the main point of “Guess the Financial Toll,” which takes you through a scenario from the movie - for instance him throwing the whale back into the ocean - and then you have to guess how much that’s going to cost the city.
Finally there’s a bit of promotion for the movie’s mobile game, which it says is available on some carriers but doesn’t go into which ones.
Advertising and Cross-Promotions
There’s been quite a bit of advertising done for the movie, including numerous TV spots that you can view on the official YouTube channel setup by the studio.
Two complaints that streamed in about the campaign from those that were seeing the movie early were that 1) Sony was selling it as a flat-out comedy while the actual movie was quite dark and 2) That co-star Charlize Theron was completely missing from the marketing.
One of the final TV spots sought to address both of those concerns, eliminating almost all the comedy and instead presenting the movie as a pretty dark action movie. The shift in tone was drastic and, let’s be honest, had to be more than a little jarring to the public at large.
I also saw a lot of bus-side ads around Chicago’s Loop and I’m ssuming this was replicated in other major cities as well.
Overall
As the movie’s campaign progressed over the course of the last several months it kept getting hammered by early reviews and leaks about how the film was darker than the marketing was making it out to be. That was usually coupled with predictions of the movie’s eventual box-office demise as audiences found it wasn’t the laught riot the trailers and commercials seemed to be selling to the public.
But it’s a good campaign that hits a lot of the right notes. Yeah, it mostly emphasizes the funny parts, but that’s alright since, according to an informal review I got from Tom yesterday, it actually is pretty funny.
Whatever the case might be, the campaign is consistent in how it sells the movie, at least for the most part. It presents a very solid image of the character of Hancock and how things are going to wind up going for him. The trailers create a nice arc from the teaser to the theatrical and are probably the strongest part of the campaign. I’m a little disappointed there was only one poster and, as I said, the website is a bit weaker than I would expect from a summer tentpole like this.
But despite those problems don’t derail this from being a strong campaign that Sony has put together. Now it just has to be strong enough to convince audiences to see it and not WALL-E or Wanted, whichever one they didn’t see last weekend.
Social Media Yellow Card
If you work in social media at all, you might want to have these ready for when you’re in meetings with folks who don’t get it just yet.
Movie Marketing Madness: Wanted
In the fifth season of “Angel” there’s a scene that was Wesley delivering some mystical weapons to seemingly bad people. Helping him with this is Fred, and when she brings one of the guns out the bad guy remarks on how hot he is. In retort she says something along the lines of “Wow, a man turned on by a woman holding a big gun. How unusual.”
I bring this up because it’s exactly this..let’s say tendency…that Universal is more or less counting on with Wanted.
The movie tells the story a slightly loser-ish cubicle monkey played by James McAvoy who has his life turned upside down when an assassin played by Angelina Jolie tells him that his father used to also be an assassin and that he’s meant to be one as well. This leads to an adventure that has him discovering his destiny as Jolie shows off just how well she can handle a big gun and just how flexible she is as she contorts her body to avoid oncoming traffic and other problems.
The movie is actually based on a graphic novel but, to my understanding, it excises a big chunk of the source material’s story. In the movie these assassins are simply keeping the balance of power in check or something, but in the comic the group wiped out super-powered individuals, creating a world without heroes but, in their mind, a world without the threat those super-powered people would turn bad one day.
The Posters
The first teaser poster Universal released definitely played into the “chicks with guns are hot” idea by showing Angelina Jolie, in very artistic black-and-white with her tattoos on full display, brandishing her very large sidearm. Her pose seems to be contemplative and dark and all the weird symbols, from the tatoo patterns on her arms to the engraving on the grip of the gun, all allude to their being some sort of secret society at work here. Since Jolie is one of - if not the - main selling point in the movie the use of her on the poster makes the most sense, though I’ll admit I was a little disappointed a whole series of character posters - each with more mysterious symbols - weren’t created. That could have created a whole set that created a larger sense of atmosphere.
The theatrical poster again puts Jolie and her arm-art and big-honkin gun at the forefront. This time, though, her pose is more ready-for-action than deep in thought and we see a little bit more of her. McAvoy joins her this time, with dual guns ready for action. Both of them appear before a high view of a city, giving the impression that their reach is far and wide.
One thing about the poster is the fact that McAvoy gets listed first, but on the poster he’s the smaller of the two people. Jolie is last in the above-the-title credits but she’s the focal point of both posters. And Morgan Freeman, who’s listed second here, isn’t even given a big floating head.
An alternate version of this poster was actually given away at one of the Comic-Con gatherings, at which time I said it likely would not be the same design that wound up being used on the theatrical poster. This should prove that I am often very, very wrong since that’s exactly what wound up happening.
The Trailers
The teaser trailer gets right to the point. McAvoy ambles up to a drugstore counter and is approached by Jolie, who promptly shoots someone who appears to be targeting them. She then grabs him and takes him to meet Freeman and the rest of the fraternity, where he learns how to do that cool bullet stuff and break out of his nothing life. It’s heavy on Freeman’s narration on how important that group is and on showing off a number of the movie’s action set-pieces and does a good job of setting the tone for the rest of the campaign.
The theatrical trailer started off with much more action, showing McAvoy running around a parking lot with Jolie in her hot red car, eventually leading to a chase that shows her performing that cool flexible thing out the car window to avoid a truck. That moves into him being indoctrinated into the fraternity and a montage of many of the same scenes we’ve seen before. There is a little bit of dialogue that alludes to the problems McAvoy’s character has with what he’s being asked to do but that’s it. The rest is all guns and adrenaline and Jolie looking hot.
There was then a third and final trailer. This starts off with the same tone the first one did, showing the pointlessness of McAvoy’s life before bumping into Jolie. Then it’s more training with guns and such and then the same sort of set-piece showing off that has dominated all the trailers. This one will show up just about everywhere else and is obviously the one most favored by Universal.
There’s also a redband trailer that more or less looks and feels like the initial spot that was released. The main difference, beyond the addition of a few bits of new scenes showing some violence and one clip of Freeman saying someone should “shoot this MFer,” is that all the bullets we see loosed in the first trailer we now see connecting with their targets. That’s often accompanied by a bit of blood, including when the one goes through the guy’s head in dramatic fashion.
Online
When you pull up the official website you’re a good amount of options right there on the main page.
Before entering the main site - which there are two ways to do - you can watch the first trailer, which is also available to share via code for either a blog or a social network page. 
After that is how you can access most of the site’s age-restricted content, including the redband trailer. There’s also a pretty cool “From Comic Book to Screen” featurette that compares the source material to the movie. It’s the sort of thing that you would expect to see on the DVD. Finally there’s a selection of Russian promotional material in the form of a handful of trailers.
Next down the line is a link to the Fraternity of Assassins Facebook application/game. It pits you against other friends on the site that have installed the app in shootout-type contests. The app also has the Curve the Bullet and Panic Attack games that are available on…
…the widget you can grab that not only contains the games but also trailers and a story synopsis.
Finally at the bottom there’s a number to text in order to enter a contest awarding video game goodies and movie-branded swag on the mobile social network Zannel and a link to publisher TopCow’s page on the original graphic novel, which is heavy with movie news.
So let’s go ahead and enter the site.
The first thing you see is a bunch of small pictures of the main characters. Mouse over the one you want to choose and you’ll see it expand for that character. Clicking the link takes you to a full biography of them, including information on things like weapon of choice, parts of the mythology that apply to them and more. It’s one of cooler features I’ve seen like this and provides a good background foundation for those in the audience who might feel weighted down by what’s going on in the movie’s story.
Most of the site’s content, though, is housed under that little bug in the upper-right-hand corner. Click that and a menu expands with the usual content sections listed.
“Story” is actually a pretty cool description of the movie’s plot. That’s because it sticks to describing said story and doesn’t devolve into becoming just a credit block. It lays out who everyone is and what happens to them on the way very nicely, providing a good starting point for people to familiar with the movie before deciding to see it.
Not much to say about “Cast & Crew” - it’s pretty much the standard stuff about the major players in the movie.
Far cooler is “About the Film” which contains extensive information on how the movie traveled through production, including sections on the design of the Loom of Fate to the story’s translation from it’s comics origin to the special effects and more. All well-written and engaging and most of the sections actually contribute to the reader’s appreciation for the movie, which is a bit unusual.
Unfortunately “Video” is a bit disappointing, containing just one trailer, the same one that’s on the front page of the site. There are 20 still photos from both the film itself and some behind-the-scenes shots within “Gallery.”
You’ll find four Desktops, an AIM Expression and eight Buddy Icons you can grab and use under “Downloads.”
Finally, “Training” contains both the Bullet Curve and Panic Attack games, both of which are a lot of fun.
A short while before the movie’s release, portions of the Internet went crazy for what was being called a viral video of some random office worker completely wigging out and trashing his office. It was later revealed to be a stunt from director Timur Bekmambetov and developed by him as an effort to highlight the movie’s message of breaking out from the drudgery of office life. I’m not sure I completely get the connection, but it seems to have worked to some extent by simply getting people talking.
There was also a site created that played into the a couple of the key themes of the movie. The Fraternity of Weavers (also found at FraternityofAssassins.com) site explored the history of weaving and its cultural significance. It’s actually kind of neat in execution, including links to Wikipedia entries and other pages that provide background on the ideas the site forwards, namely that we can link weaving and civilization in general together, an idea that is deeply engrained in the movie.
The movie’s MySpace page recreates a lot of the content from the official site. You’ll find there the trailer, some photos and a handful of downloads. Likewise the Facebook fan page doesn’t have a whole lot more than that same stuff, but does add a promotion for the Facebook game into the mix. There was also a MySpace for the movie’s soundtrack.
Advertising and Cross-Promotions
One of the biggest shots in the paid media campaign was a Super Bowl spot that aired this past February. The spot’s footage draws largely from the trailer that had been released at this time. But the audience targeting - a movie about big guns, both of the metal and Jolie variety - and with lots of cool special effects is a perfect fit for the Super Bowl audience.
Universal also partnered with online music service Rhapsody on a contest that let people create a video featuring their own remix one of composer Danny Elfman’s tracks from the soundtrack. The winner will have his video included on the DVD release of the film.
There’s a “Most Wanted Videos” section on video site Break.com that’s sponsored by the movie. Again, that fits with the target audience since Break is commonly known as a guy-oriented site.
Media
Much like many of this summer’s other biggest releases, Universal has used a series of extended clips from Wanted as part of the publicity campaign, something that is lapped up by bloggers like they’re kittens with warm milk. 
There are quite a few such clips that can be found around and about online. Universal also used the MTV Movie Awards last month to premiere a new one, which seems a bit odd considering I don’t know how far MTV’s audience these days includes the over 17 set, which is the only group that’s getting in to this R-rated flick.
The last such clip was released just a few days before the movie hit theaters and was age-restricted, something designed to convert any last minute stragglers that yes, the flick was that hard-core and that they should go see it after they drop their kids off at WALL-E.
In a major coup, at least if you’re hip to the online scene, the studio lined up TechCrunch to host an exclusive preview of the movie, something that resulted in a number of posts about Wanted in general and the event in particular appearing on theuber-popular online technology site.
Overall
At first I was a bit tempted to call the campaign “one-note” because of the constant use of the same clips and images from the movie, but I’ve decided it’s “consistent” instead. It’s a lot of fun and certainly makes a strong case for being an entertaining action film if not something that’s going to require a lot of deep concentration or anything. But it knows what it’s selling - Angelina Jolie and a lot of special-effect-laden gun-play - and it makes sure the audience knows that those two things are prominent throughout the flick.
While there are things I can identify as missing from the campaign - more character posters and a little bit more backstory in the trailers - I can’t count any of them as actual flaws because of that singular focus. It hit its key points over and over again, knowing just where to find the target audience and how to make the movie appealing to them. It’s certainly a strong option for action-seeking adults who feel inundated by WALL-E buzz this weekend.
And that makes the campaign a success.