MARKETINGThe success of a movie hinges on its marketing, as examplified by My Fat Greek Wedding that its original distributor Lion's Gate fumbled, yet, went on to gross $241 million in its domestic U.S. theatrical release, and more than half a billion dollars over all thanks to an ingenious marketing campaign created for the film by its new distributor Gold Circle Films. It takes great personal passion, commitment, faith, and a willingness to take risks, sometimes going against "expert" opinions, resorting to the "unconventional," as also examplified by the marketing campaigns of: 1) The Blair Witch Project which was rejected by all the mainstream distributors but went on to become a huge box office hit grossing over half a billion dollars over all, and 2) The clever animated mega-hits Robots and Chicken Little campaigns. Discussing what made My Fat Greek Wedding popular with audiences, its director Edward Zwick is quoted in a Martin Grove Hollywood Reporter, August 20, 2002 article: "This is an American family - Greek-American, in this case. They have their crazies, but in the final analysis family wins. And family is positive. Everyone in America has a family. That's a common ground we all understand." Herein, in this powerful statement lies the success of marketing Irish Whiskey. While as a comedy-drama Irish Whiskey deals more seriously with family dysfunctions and overcoming bigotry, the movie nonetheless shares identical elements that made My Fat Greek Wedding a hit. And therefore, focusing on the positive elements of family love overcoming, the U.S. billboard marketing campaign concepts targeting its 3 primary audiences, are designed to be simple, direct, and powerful in order to connect with ordinary people on an emotional heart to heart level. These concepts will be professionally reproduced, and adjustments will be made subject to marketing research, and perfromance. To view the marketing concepts, click here:
Please be aware that the billboards advertising is only a part of the overall strategic IRISH WHISKEY distribution marketing/publicity campaign that will utilize conventional and "unconventional" methods to create an urge for an audience to see this film in their local theaters. Publicity hook for the film will focus on the Rocky saga of its filmmaker Jon Stevens, who braved the brutality of knocking on over 30,000 residential doors in the greater Los Angeles area, selling over 7,100 VHS or DVD copies of the movie directly to the consumer to prove that despite "expert" opinions that the Irish Whiskey film was "dead on arrival without sex, violence, special effects, production values, and movie stars," Irish Whiskey does have an audience - something no other filmmaker in American history has ever dared to do before. What is even more incredible about this story is that of the over 30,000 doors Jon Stevens had knocked on, 60% of the people were not at home. It's out of the 40% of the people Jon did find at home, 60% of the consumers bought for $20.00 each copy, which is astounding considering he had to overcome fear, suspicion, iron gates, biting dogs, and stiff competition, i.e., Netflix, Blockbuster, Circuit City, Hollywood Video, 20-20 DVD, Wal-Mart, Circuit City, and other giant retail outlets selling DVDs of major studio movies for $4.99 to $9.99, (4 major studio DVDs can currently be purchased at Blockbuster for $20.00). Americans love the underdog fighting for a cause, and the story of filmmaker Jon Stevens' unwillingness to give up on the dream of seeing his movie distributed in U.S. theaters is what America stands for. And this inspirational "overcoming the odds" personal story of courage, passion, commitment, and a willingness to fight on regardless of the challenges, never giving up on the goal will be exploited in all media to reach regular American folks who - as Jon's hard evidence proves, will respond to the film. Read The Random Times web article about Jon's amazing story... |
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Category 1 - Marketing |
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