Would Blockbuster Movies Benefit From Social Media

July 25, 2008 · Comments

After reading this review of the advertising and marketing programs for Marvel’s IRON MAN movie and Warner’s DARK KNIGHT (batman) movie, I started wondering just what a social media contingent to the program would have looked like. The article’s author, Antony Young, gave the edge (they tied at 4 stars) to the Dark Knight and cited the web presence to be one of the differences between the two efforts. But what could either side have added with social media?

Possible Movie Promotional Extensions With Social Media

  • YouTube video conversation: Why I Love Batman (or Iron Man).
  • Podcast: behind the scenes on the set of Iron Man (these seem to be getting more popular)
  • Blogger Outreach: give 5 top comics/entertainment bloggers early access for interviews, photos, etc.
  • Flickr campaign: Marvel did this with Hulk.
  • uStream chat with _____ : Wouldn’t it be cool to hang with Christian Bale for a bit?
  • Affiliate sales program: what if they gave bloggers a little button that offered movie goers a dollar off for an early ticket purchase, and gave bloggers a dollar for each sold?
  • Wiki “barn building” campaign: ask fans to find every scrap of interesting web presence for Iron Man or Batman (great for lawyers to use later for copyright infringement – ouch).

Would It Work?

I’m not so sure. Think about it. Movies are SUCH a mass medium. It’s all about bulk, and though social media tools are inexpensive and pervasive, wrangling millions of people isn’t exactly their strong suit (anybody remember Snakes on a Plane?).

But maybe it dosn’t have to work to be worth doing. As a lifetime superhero fan, I’d have really enjoyed any of those above efforts, and probably would’ve nerded out with lots of people on them. It would’ve raised my sentiment for the movies. I’m sure it would have left me with a resonating experience, and others like me.

So you tell me: should a blockbuster movie do something like that for the reason that it would improve sentiment and spread good will? Or would that even matter in the long run? Let’s be real for a moment: businesses do exist to make money, not to make me happy. But I’m not sure. What’s your take?

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  • cheapsuits
    Dark Knight had an ARG. That's kinda social...demented and sad but social(sorry ,couldn't resist the obscure reference)
  • Interesting question - would it work? I think, done right, the answer is yes.

    My reason for believing this...Blair Witch Project.

    Here's an example of a movie that positioned itself to take advantage of viral communication beautifully and, though it was a mass medium venture, it was the viral nature of the buzz that led it to pull huge numbers. And, that was before social media was around in any meaningful way.

    The challenge is to figure out what, as Seth puts it, the "story" is that you want to hit the social media airwaves.

    How do you frame it in a way that makes people want to not only talk about it, but rush to see it?
  • I don't think they really need any. Iron Man was all about Robert Downey Jr come back and Burger King. Dark Knight had a bit of help from Heath's overdose and Christina Bale getting arrested. Both blockbusters have done alright. It's perhaps smaller, independent flicks that would benefit more.
  • I thought Twitter would have been a perfect forum for Cloverfield considering the way Abrams spoon fed the public teases about the movie for months. People were googling their fingers bloody trying to find out stuff about that movie before its release.

    I think perhaps where moviemakers could get the beat bang for the Social Media buck is in targeting the second and third time moviegoer as well as the DVD release.

    The really big blockbusters, especially the superhero, horror and recurring character series, like Indiana Jones, always count on their most loyal public attending two and three times to get the big screen experience.

    Consumers like this are usually young and engaged in social media.

    A well crafted strategy could include social media presence for the characters – like a MySpace page or a Twitter account for Shia LaBeouf’s character, Mutt Williams, in the latest installment of Indiana Jones. This would allow fans to engage the character, not the actor and personalize their experience with the work.

    The producers and distributors would have a direct line to their public for providing ancillary content, running contests, and making announcements for future products.

    There are ways social media could supplant traditional Hollywood movie promotion, but not in the widespread fashion Tinseltown is accustomed to operating.
  • Hi Chris! I have to admit that I was already eager to see Dark Knight, but seeing folks in my social media community say they were going to see it did up my excitement a bit. Overall, though, while it would be interesting to see a social media campaign attached to blockbusters like these, I’m not sure about the benefit. On the other hand, for movies that are clearly headed in the direction of some sort of trilogy, I think it could be more useful.
  • I think social media is a great tool for building, cultivating, and harnession the passion of your customers (and future cutomers). So, YES! social media makes a ton of sense for superhero movies.

    Besides the ideas you mention, some simpler things might even be cool, like:
    1) A group on LinkedIn (maybe some people wuold want a batman badge on thier profile? maybe not)
    2) A virtual gift on Facebook - tons of people would want to give the Batmobile to someone
    3) Maybe you could use groups to show them a few scenes in advance and let them provide feedback on how to make those scenes better
    4) Maybe you could put a bunch of video footage online and let people mash it up to create thier own promo trailers and them share them
    5) Maybe you could use social media to elect "top fans" and then those top fans in each city get to organize special groups to go see the premier
  • McGluski
    I think movies like this can benefit from social media by focusing on different customer bases. Though it may be infeasible to cut 8 different trailers and spread them around television - it sounds completely feasible to cut 8 different trailers (each appealing to a different customer base that could enjoy the movie) and push those on the internet.

    Mostly, I'm thinking along the lines of appealing to male/female, comic fans/action fans, older/younger audiences...
  • How about forgetting about the cinema release and focusing on increasing the life-cycle of the film? A social media presence can gradually increase, especially with the cinema release, DVD release, (bittorrent release) and television showings.

    Why not create a place to host fan fiction, tag reviews of the film, encourage debate and follow what the stars of the film are up to. Even have a 'spotted' section i.e. "Just spotted [actor] in Starbucks".

    Another option is to extend the borders of the product. It's not a film, it's part of a broader entertainment experience. So the story continues on Twitter, on podcasts, on blogs etc. Add more backstory. The final two parts of the Matrix tried this, I think they were a little before their time.
  • @Mike Volpe - great suggestions. Sony did a good job with the Facebook strategy, taking over the vampires game for 30 Days of Night, for instance.

    Lots of good ideas here, gang. Thanks!
  • cliff wildman
    Though executed extremely poorly there was a very interesting social media campaign for "The Hulk."

    I saw it on metacafe (not sure where else.)

    The core of it was allowing you to cut your OWN trailer - they gave you clips of the movie to choose from and sets of music to piece it together. Some of them were horrid and a few were pretty good.

    Point being - thousands played with actual footage from the movie. Many of those sent their cuts to friends via sharing.

    It's still live if anyone wants to see it - http://www.metacafe.com/hulk/

    I'm not sure with a huge mass market movie that cutting different versions of a trailer are going to help - it's a superhero movie... what are you going to do, cut a trailer of the Hulk/Iron Man of only stuff in a lab and push that to scientists? There are common threads that tie most of us together and that's what these movies are going for.

    I think it would have been much more interesting to tie in extra social media aspects to something like the trailer creation - give the winners 10 free e-tickets that they can pass out to friends - do art contests for screen-savers, e-cards, etc. Activities like these can go viral and help to increase your WOM - with mainstream movies paying $1.00 in marketing for a $.70 return, they should be as creative as possible to make their marketing more efficient and more interactive.

    I do agree with Zuzanna; many of the social media ideas listed here would be more beneficial to indie filmmakers working at targeting a smaller audience.
  • It wouldn't work for all film, of course, but there's no doubt that within a few years we'll see a large percentage of them trying. Not all will find success, but many will. Everything is evolving, and quickly. Cloverfield was one of the biggest successes of the year, thus far, and that mostly had to do with the viral marketing aspect rather than the actual movie.
  • cliff wildman
    Writer Dad - agreed completely. I think that large brands that are trying to create mass appeal can be much more effective by creating social networks around their brands rather than individual movies (what's the long-term good of having groups for "The Punisher" if the movie comes out and they don't make another one for a long time?) I think Marvel, for example, should create groups on sites and promote ALL of their products with widgets, mashables, giveaways, viral oriented content, etc. This way they can build strong opinion leaders in the genre and maintain long term relationships. Eventually, these folks would help drive the what and hows of story telling, etc. as well as greatly minimizing marketing costs.
  • First, I wanted to thank all of you for posting your thoughts, especially @Don Lafferty, @ Mike Volpe - HubSpot for their creative input!

    I also agree that creating buzz for long tail success of movies will especially help none-blockbuster movies. They should definitely look into the benefits of social media when promoting their "products". Movies beeing such a wonderful medium, I think the ways of spreading the love are endless, only limited by the content and target group of the movie.

    Cu
  • I thought they were already using the social media sites a lot.

    I check out just about any movie that looks interesting on YouTube.
  • @janeth - most of those YouTube videos are posted by fans, not by the companies or agencies representing them.
  • I think social media can make "blockbuster" movies a little more money, good quality movies a lot more money, and bad movies... well I'm not sure. I think a case can be made that social media could be counterproductive for bad movies... when you engage more deeply with something that's obviously a crappy film, it will likely only solidify your opinion.

    It's unfortunate that when people think 'social media' and 'movies' at the same time, the first thing they jump to is Snakes on a Plane. Since they were so effective in generating "buzz", and the box office sales were so poor, the conclusion everyone seems to have drawn is that 'social media' is a failure in terms of putting butts in seats.

    I wonder if there's an alternative perspective - such as Snakes on a Plane was a bad movie, and while all the viral stuff might have been fun for people to play around in, they could still tell it would be a bad movie - so they didn't go. Another might be that it was so bad, only a Herculian social media effort enabled it to grab $15 M in the opening weekend (it is notable that they declined to screen the film for critics before opening).

    Anyways, I'd love to see a broader range of films - particularly better ones - test out similar social media approaches to what Snakes on a Plane in order to help figure it out...
  • Taking Iron Man as an example, each Marvel character should have its own bio complete with a history as it relates to the role in the story and perhaps background gleaned from the actual comic book back issues.

    Each profile widget could include video trailer from the film, a slideshow, bio, background (villains could be dossier style), images from the comic books, maybe some outakes from the movie, interviews, etc, etc.

    There should be a widget for Iron Man/Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, Jeff Bridges-villain character, etc. This would also be a great way to introduce new characters that may show up in sequels as well as provide depth and updates on existing characters. Imagine releasing fictitious Press Releases for Stark Technology as RSS feeds or podcasts within the widget.
  • Blockbusters are going to be big - but the impression I've always gotten is that it is all about opening weekend.

    For example, everyone knew that The Dark Knight would make significant money, but it was newsworthy that it broke a previous record for weekend sales. How much free publicity did the film get because of the effort put into achieving that big first weekend? Lots!

    There has been massive interest in this film already, obviously, but what sort of campaign could be implemented to capture those who haven't yet seen it along with everyone who saw it and loved it?
  • cliff wildman
    I think one thing that needs to be thought about inside this conversation is that social media, etc. don't necessarily need to increase the audience to theaters, but the deeper engagement you can create long-term with an audience could help lower marketing costs for a sequel, increase sales of DVDs and other media, as well as help traffic ALL the merchandising these vehicles create. Engaging the consumer with the content and allowing them to play with and share with friends can help create long term loyalty to a brand like Marvel or DC as well as each individual franchise.
  • cliff wildman
    I just checked the marvel site because they are lauching a vid-comic to support Stephen King's new Dark Tower book (that's an interesting topic on a whole other level), but they DON'T have any social networking elements to their site. Shame on them! Of course, you need to build those elements out on pre-existing soc. nets, but no reason not to build something up around their brand where consumers can interact more deeply with the company. They are one of the few companies that make movies where people might remember who created it.
  • I think it could, but it would have to be a bit deeper than the traditional "door prize" tactics like groups, profiles, and widgets for the social media platforms.

    People are so entertained and passionate about movies the most successful way to make it all work is to simply give people a place to talk. Why start and end the conversation with a widget you can install on facebook?

    Rather a place where movie goers could talk about the topics surrounding videos, rating videos, and commenting on videos would make blockbuster an online film destination rather than just a netflix rival.

    Hell create some "Dark Knight" mad libs and post the top 10 funniest ones and promote the creators. There are tons of ways to have UGC and Social Media mixed in that engages people more than joining another group.
  • For once, I think that here is where a good social strategy is actually not about the money it may make for the production company.

    Create and engage a community of movie-goers with behind-the-scenes experiences, facts and data (and there must be a veritable wash of this in the industry!) and you potentially have a group you can product test, trial movie ideas and really create long term value for the company, stakeholders and, the actors potentially.

    It would take a fairly long term view of the industry to put into place, but would likely cost a fraction of what any new movie costs to advertise and promote through "traditional" advertising and, longer term, could create a valuable platform where push advertising is no longer needed, the pull and interaction of an engaged audience helps shape and create the movies they demand.

    Rather than "if you build, they will come", "if you find out what they want you to build, then more will come"
  • As an avid movie fan any way I can interact with the process of film making the better. The more engaged I am with a movie the more interest I'll have to see it. The Dark Knight didn't really need a viral marketing campaign to have a successful opening but its certainly helped.

    WB knew fans would be scouring the net looking for any bit of news or information about the movie. Why not give them what they want and at the same time give them some things to do – because the movie isn’t coming out for another 16 months!! It worked and Nolan and company are reaping the benefits.

    Throwing some ideas out there – what about a Twebinar Sneak Preview of a film. Fans are selected to see a screening of a film and are asked to Tweet about it. Fans can follow the twitter stream to see what its all about?

    Or what about having inspiring screen writers to write a film – using Plurk, Twitter or any of the microblogging applications available.

    How cool would it be to have a studio ask fans to make their own trailers that would be shown and used to promote a film!!?? I mean Juno was written by a blogger.

    Social Media and Movies can play well together and I’m excited to see what develops!!
  • Slater
    Would have been totally extraneous for these movies considering everything else they poured into their marketing. Particularly in Batman's case; that extensive site campaign (impressive) provided plenty of online red meat for geeks to gnaw on. And blogger price breaks? Come on. I think affiliate programs are great where they make sense, but did the people surfin' the sites that would have been offering discounts really need more incentive to see these movies. Um, no. Always love your thoughts though, Chris. Keep em coming.
  • Social Media is a great tool for word of mouth - If you put out a great product and people start talking about it, you do not have to lead the charge, others will do it for you.

    Creating a facebook batman account probably would not do much to help ticket sales. But the fact that people talk about it with these tools, organize groups to go see the movie, etc. does have an impact.

    Maybe that is the beauty of it. It is hard to game the system, but easy for people to influence their small sphere.
  • stevenimmons
    Social Media would also be interesting at much earlier stages than 'post-production' marketing. How about social scripting, think tanks, review panels? I hear the unions screaming in pain! Point is, why wait until final cut to involve the consumer.
  • Chris -

    (Public) Companies exist to make their shareholders happy. Whichever marketing tactic is chosen, online or offline, they need to executed properly with the proper ROI structure in place.

    Someone earlier make a good point about these tactics helping the indie film scene more than the major releases.
  • I think the blogger outreach would be a great platform, as bloggers often have such a wide audience and would probably trigger such a widespread word of mouth.
    Thanks Chris,
    JR
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