There's No Business Like Movie Business

Every movie is different with a unique value proposition and potential audience. The success of a particular genre of films does not guarantee the success of every film in that genre. The unpredictability of the audience's tastes and preference makes the movie marketing process both fun and challenging. Since there is no fixed formula for success, movie marketers are forced to think of new ideas in every campaign, which creates massive scope for creativity and an out-of-the-box approach in the marketing process.

Unlike products or services marketing which has a longer shelf life, movie promotions build up to the release day as the success of a movie is dependent on the word-of-mouth promotions post-release. Thus, movie marketing campaigns have to grab attention early in the promotions campaign by promising a unique and unmissable experience to the viewers.

At Red Chillies Entertainment we have endeavoured to raise the marketing game with each new movie release. From experimenting with different disruptive ideas to creating a paradigm shift in the digital space, we have changed the movie promotion process in India. Earlier, movie promotions were all about lead actors appearing in multiple events across diverse locations. Now, it is about real-time engagement with millions of fans through social media where the movie receives phenomenal reach, impact, and response through a moderated chain reaction. Digital media allows movie marketers to enhance loyalty by sharing pictures, video snippets, and anecdotes of the movie shooting to involve the audience not just in the promotions but also in the movie-making process.

A typical movie marketing cycle has three stages; pre-production and shoot, pre-release campaign, and post-release campaign. The first stage is about a detailed review of the movie script to prepare a list of products and services for potential organic in-film integration. The second phase is about defining a clear position for the movie campaign and identifying the target audience, which is a long and iterative process to finalize the media mix for promotions. Marketing teams must manage the sentiments about the movie in the pre-release stage through synergies between online and offline promotions as post-release they have little control over how the audience feel about the film. The third phase (post-release campaign) includes other social media outreach to share songs or footage not included in the movie, audience reactions, and critics review.

During the ideation phase of the pre-release campaign, the marketing team at Red Chillies generates ideas for movie promotions using all the touch points of the movie. Once the strategy is well defined, the creation and execution of the plans become an easy task.

For example, during ‘Ra.One,’ we established the narrative as ‘family entertainment with the Superhero plotline’ and experimented with many innovations, which established new trends in Bollywood marketing campaigns. It was the first time a Bollywood movie associated with YouTube, which launched a special channel for ‘Ra.One’ and broadcasted promotional video content and special extras from the movie. Shah Rukh Khan was also one of the first Indian celebrities to engage with his fans on Google+. This channel also hosted games, digital comics, unique contest and other fan-engagement activities which created a massive interest in the movie in its target audience. Other collaborations such as the PlayStation game and the iOS game ‘Ra.One Genesis’ (which was a prelude to the movie’s main plot) increased the momentum of the movie leading to the release date. The multiple digital innovations in this campaign disrupted the movie marketing process in India, and the excitement worked well for the movie’s overall performance.

With Ra. One’s larger-than-life collaborations to Happy New Year’s heartfelt way of gratifying its fans through customized digital posters, we have always tried to surprise our audiences through innovation. We thrilled our fans during the promotions campaign for ‘Raees’ by collaborating with Uber to shoot a video with a female Uber partner showcasing her inspiring story as the chief wage earner of the family and highlighting the core message of the movie ‘Koi Dhandha Chota Nahi Hota Hai.’ This idea became an instant hit as the message was in sync with the central theme of the movie. Similarly, we explored an unchartered territory by partnering with Tinder during the promotions for ‘Dear Zindagi.' Our fans loved the activation of Alia Bhatt’s Tinder profile, her conversations with people and the Tinder-themed parties, and the innovation worked in favor of the movie.

Recently, during Zero’s marketing campaign, we were the first Bollywood movie to integrate a futuristic voice tech - Amazon’s Alexa in a movie campaign. Red Chillies Entertainment became the first production house in India to use three kinds of bots (text, voice, and video) to promote a movie. We also created Bauua's (the lead character played by Shah Rukh Khan) twitter handle to breathe life into a fictional movie character and designed WhatsApp stickers to enter people’s everyday conversations. The launch of ‘Bauua Ki Toli,’ a loyalty program for hardcore fans was also a first for the Bollywood industry.  Data analytics helps us sharpen our audience segmentation, basis audience behaviour, instead of demographic data.

Thus, the process of bringing a movie into people’s lives involves the creation of an ecosystem that enables the emotional engagement of the audience and drives them to buy movie tickets. Digital media has helped movie marketing to grow beyond only a few assets launches. Movie marketing teams can leverage digital technologies and out-of-the box-ideas to bring live movie entities, which engage with the audience beyond just good storytelling and entertainment.