Initial Research (Methods Of Promotion): What different techniques or forms of marketing do we see?

Techniques of film promotion and marketing

In theatres:

• Trailers -  a main way of promotion a film as they are directed specifically to people who watch TV and are movie-goers. They screen in theatres before the showing of the movie.
• Film posters
• Cardboard 3D displays
• Standees - Life size cut outs of characters within the film, gaining attention from people in the theatre.

In print

• Paid advertisement in newspapers, magazines and sometimes in books - gaining attention through people who like to read.
• Cross promotion of novel to books.
• Comic special editions of episodes.

Television and radio

• 30 second commercials on TV - Hollywood movie distributors spend about $4 billion a year to buy advertisement on Television. This is affective as it is the same medium as film.
• Product placement - Paid active or passive insertion of film brand in drama or sitcom shows, or as passing mentions in dialogue.
• Longer advanced commercials - Behind the scenes footage, gives audience a better understanding of the film.
• Extended placement - revealing the film on talkshows (Ellen) to show clips, actors and interviews with the actors that are in it.

Internet

• Viral marketing - Free distribution of trailers on movie-oriented websites. Offering articles about the film for interest of others.
• Virtual relationship hyperlink marketing - A popular search engine (Yahoo) presents relating articles to your film, gaining attention from internet viewers on your film.

Merchandise

• Merchandise giveaways - This involves toys for example within fast food meals. For example McDonalds, in happy meals providing toys to promote a film.
• Paid co-branding or co-advertising of a film.

Initial Research (Methods Of Promotion): What is film promotion?

Why do distributors feel promotion is necessary in their film?

Distributors spend a big sum of money on the promotion of their film, as this is the main part of securing a target audience for their film and to gain revenue. As using promotion gains audience awareness of the film, either through trailers, franchising, merchandising and more.

Marketing an upcoming film will create a 'hype' within a target audience on the run up to the theatrical release of a film. 

By doing this they will increase the overall amount of revenue that the particular product will make during the exhibition stage which will in turn create the biggest profit that they can use to reinvest into future projects. Furthermore, this causes the distribution company to grow in terms of finance and popularity which is the ultimate goal for the company. Promotion and marketing are such key components of Hollywood films that their expenditures can equal or even exceed the cost of production. On the other hand, much smaller, independent distributors may spend very little on the marketing of their film due to having much smaller budgets to cover the costs. 
With revenue, film promotion is an important part of any film release because of the inherent high financial risk; film studios will invest in expensive marketing campaigns to maximise revenue early in the release cycle; the marketing budgets tend to equal half the production budget. On the other hand, smaller film companies may have smaller marketing and promotion on their films as they have little budgets to cover, so are in less need of more money within marketing compared to bigger films eg. Star Wars.

Introduction for A2

My name is Jonathan Randall studying A2 Media at Chenderit School in Year 13. I am passionate to study this subject as I enjoy completing a project I am proud of, and enjoy the process in making the products. Studying Media will help me in the future with my choice in Geography for University because I have a larger insight in how films and the media can effect the World we live in massively. I find it a very interesting and an enjoyable subject. It will give me the skills I need through the ability to create something I'm proud of, and to successfully produce a film which creates aspects to the audience I want it to. Therefore I am looking forward in creating a product to the highest standard I can for this year and enjoying myself while also working hard; improving myself greatly from last year, learning from my mistakes.