Hollywood embraces Viral Marketing

Admit it; one of the things we do when at work is check out trailers of upcoming movies. Even more so during summer time when highly anticipated movies are being released. From ‘Iron Man‘ to ‘Sex and the City‘, there is a movie for just about anyone. It is the time of the year where the majority of Hollywood’s revenue comes from. In terms of online awareness most studios do nothing beyond securing the URL of the movie and loading it up with the trailers.

However in the past couple of years, the advertising landscape for movies has made nothing short of a quantum leap. Hollywood has embraced viral marketing like a long lost son. For the uninitiated, the viral marketing involves conceiving multiple interconnected sites that advertise a movie by extending the story lines online which in turn gets social networks and blog buzzing about it in which lays the viral effect. Building the hype for movies has never been so engaging, fun and exhausting.

‘Cloverfield‘ was bombarding online video streaming portals with the footages of an elusive monster attacking NYC to the totally irrelevant site that talks about an imaginary beverage. By being totally irrelevant it has compelled the masses to pick up on it and engage themselves in trying to piece things together to find its relevance. Seriously if anyone knows if there is a connection, mail me!

 Another great example would be the soon to be released ‘Dark Knight‘ (July 18) which has brought viral marketing to a new level. The depth of the campaign extends to dozens of marginally related elements of the film having their own web sites. This includes a fictional bank, travel agency and even a deli! Some can be as simple as one pager newsletters to highly complicated sites that would require Robert Langdon’s (The Da Vinci Code) code-breaking skills to decipher.

What does all this do? It creates a compelling experience that extends beyond just sitting in a cinema and let a story unfold before you. This is getting people involved and moved to care enough for the movie that your experience is not stopped when the credits roll. So just imagine your brand but with this kind of extensive thought put into it… call us.