Making a movie can be an extremely time-consuming and, most importantly, incredibly expensive task. Naturally, this tends to vary from one project to another, but, generally, a large amount of money is destined to the salaries of the filmmakers and actors involved, especially if they are star figures, to building sets, designing costumes…let alone if the film requires CGI or special effects. And in order to ensure that all this money spent on the production is an investment rather than squandered money, the film must do one thing: attract the interest of lots of people so that they buy tickets to watch it. Then, with a bit of luck, earnings will exceed by far the initial investment, and the film will become a box office hit.
There is only one way to do this: by having an effective marketing campaign. Nowadays, a campaign is almost as important as a movie, especially considering how powerful the internet and social media are, and how fierce the competition is within the film industry. Not all movies require such a boost to be a box-office hit, but a bit of help is essential to make people pick a movie over all the others. It is important to carefully plan the promotion of a production and how to get the audience interested in watching the film without revealing too much of it. Nowadays, thanks to all the tools and technologies out there, the sky’s the limit. A good marketing campaign not only helps a film tremendously, but it sticks in the audience’s mind forever. Here are some of the best ones in history.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
8 Deadpool
20th Century Fox
The marketing campaign for the 2016 movie Deadpool stunned audiences with its eccentricity, which was expected coming from a character like this anti-hero. They went all out, per Wired: from customized emojis with the character’s mask, to mimicking other movies in their promotional posters, as well as recreating and replacing the covers of all the movies available on Walmart’s shelves. Moreover, they exploited street billboards to promote the movie as a rom-com and even created a Tinder profile for Deadpool. All this without even mentioning the provocative posters and teasers for the movie, which of course turned out to be an absolute hit.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
7 Paranormal Activity
Paramount Pictures
The first film in the Paranormal Activity franchise was released back in 2007, and with a $15,000 initial investment, it became the most profitable film ever made. This production was conceived as an indie film, and it was initially screened only at film festivals. However, Paramount Pictures eventually acquired its rights to distribute it globally, and in order to test if the audience was interested, they came up with an idea: a website where people could vote on whether they wanted the film to be screened in their city or not. This not only aroused the public’s interest, but also got them involved in the distribution process, ensuring great sales in the cities that voted to watch the film.
6 The Simpsons Movie
The Simpsons Movie didn’t need much to turn into a box office hit: the animated series was already a classic and still remains relevant to this day. However, even though a positive performance was expected, the marketing team still decided to go the extra mile to promote the movie: they transformed a few 7-Eleven stores around the country into Kwik-E-Marts, in order to attract the show’s fans (via Access). The Simpsons Movie premiered in July 2007 in Springfield, Vermont, and a few days later, all over the United States and the world, reaching a revenue of $536 million.
5 Toy Story 3
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Toy Story 3 was also a guaranteed box office hit. Even more so after so many years with no new movies in the franchise. However, there was one important issue to keep in mind: it had been over ten years since Toy Story 2 was released, and people who were kids back then were no longer so by 2010. While there was no doubt that the movie would appeal to children, they needed to come up with a strategy to capture the adult audience. Thus, they created a YouTube channel and began to upload 80s toy commercials to spark nostalgia in people. All commercials were real, except for one, which featured Lots-O-Huggin Bear, a character created for the film. And if that wasn’t enough, the video seemed to have been uploaded by the former owner of the villainous toy bear.
4 Cloverfield
It is crucial for a movie trailer to feature exciting content without revealing too much in order to keep expectations high. But what would happen with a production that hardly reveals anything prior to its release? It turns into the topic of the moment. That was precisely Cloverfield’s marketing campaign. This 2008 production was surrounded by secrecy until its premiere, so much so that for a long time, the only information in the trailer was the release date, not even the film’s title. In the months leading up to the premiere, they leaked information about it on the Internet, which hooked fans on a quest to find out everything they could about the film.
3 The Dark Knight
Warner Bros.
The pre-release marketing campaign for The Dark Knight kept millions of fans on their toes for months. It involved an alternate reality game that engaged the audience, encouraging them to solve several riddles on websites, find codes and objects in the real world, and it even resulted in several fan meetings in New York City and Chicago. During the game, they leaked many details and images of the movie, which, of course, proved to be a box-office hit.
2 Ex Machina
Universal Pictures
The 2014 film Ex Machina was highly acclaimed upon its release, and it even won an Oscar for Best Visual Effects. Still, one other reason why this film was so memorable was its quirky marketing campaign. Capitalizing on the rise of social media and dating apps, the film’s marketing team set up a fake Tinder profile for Ava, the android played by Alicia Vikander. After exchanging a few messages, anyone who matched with her was sent a link to the Instagram account that was promoting Ex Machina. This campaign was not only unexpected, but also raised awareness of the impressive potential of Artificial Intelligence.
1 The Blair Witch Project
Summit Entertainment
The Blair Witch Project wraps up this list with the most spectacular marketing campaign of all, merging fiction with reality in order to frighten audiences. Back in 1999, at a time when the Internet had not yet established itself as what it is today, The Blair Witch Project’s marketing team stated that the film was not fictional, but rather real found footage, and they backed up this statement by creating a website with information about the alleged disappearances of Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard, the film’s actors. At screenings, they handed out flyers with the actors’ pictures on them urging for information about them. Of course, times were different back then, which is why this campaign proved to be wildly successful.
