Evaluation Question 2 - How effective is the combination of my main product and ancillary texts?

The role of a film distributor is to launch and sustain films in the marketplace. They do this by identifying the audience, considering their reasons for going to see it, estimating potential of revenue, developing plans and partnerships to help build awareness, attempting to convert most of the interest into cinema visits and persuading cinema operators to play the film.
The platforms for advertising that are used include outdoor posters (in bus shelters, on billboards etc), TV and cinema adverts, adverts on websites, radio adverts, merchandise and exclusive articles in various magazines and on websites.

Marketing differs depending on the film and the demographics of the audience. For example, The Woman in Black had a massive campaign due to the hype around Daniel Radcliffe being a staring figure and trying to get away from the Harry Potter persona. An independent film may not have a massive campaign, due to a niche audience or because of funding available. This means that they may have to rely on more word of mouth coverage which may be on more 'underground' forums.

Audience feedback is very important because without it, you could be producing something that is totally uninteresting to the type of people you are trying to attract. From their audience research they also decide the marketability of the film and how best it would be to advertise it.

As an example of how different films would be advertised differently, I have included the film poster of Digimon which is a PG-rated film aimed at children, and Excision which is an unrated drama/horror. As you can already see, these look a lot different in terms of colour and typography used. The main image is also pretty different, with 'Digimon: The Movie' having an array of different characters on the front, and Excision having focus on one character/person.

As I have mentioned earlier, 'The Woman in Black' had a massive advertising campaign which would be considered as viral. The campaign included a teaser campaign which consisted of a poster, a short trailer, a Halloween competition and Daniel Radcliffe making pod casts on YouTube where he did readings from the book that the film was based on and other various things that viewers could 'interact' with. These were all done before the release of the film, and the main campaign came after. This included a poster with more detail(rather than half of Radcliffe's head and a face coming through the wall), a longer trailer, radio adverts, social media campaigns, advertising in magazines and on websites. It also had pages on social media sites, such as Facebook and twitter, and Radcliffe was involved in a number of interviews for magazines and websites that stretched over a large variety of genres. These types of campaigns appeal to the target audience as it gives them something to interact with and makes them feel 'closer' to the film and the actors than they would if it were just a couple of trailers and posters.

There is a need for a unified identity throughout the campaign to the posters to the DVD cover. This is needed as it helps build up a brand image that people can easily recognise and associate with certain connotations. It helps people become 'friendly' with the film and allows for successful merchandising and promotion, which will ultimately lead to more profit overall.