Q3. How Do Your Products Engage With The Audience And How Would They Be Distributed As Real Media Products?
- 1. Q3. How Do Your Products Engage With The Audience And How Would They Be Distributed As Real Media Products?
- 2. How brands profile audiences?- Kiss Firstly, I researched how major brands research their audiences in preparation for creating my own audience. I saw how Bauer, NME and SKY profiled their audiences. Firstly, on Bauer Media I looked at how they feature Kiss as one of the media packs, showing who their audiences include. From this media pack there is a section titled ‘The listener’ which describes who their audience would be in terms of age and gender and also talks about what their audience likes doing.
- 3. How brands profile audiences?- Empire • Empire profiles its readers partly in a conventional way using sociographic, gender and age. In addition, they clearly recognise the key importance of social media and what Matt Smith of Lionsgate calls ‘influencers’. • Matt Smith draws attention to the difference between marketing (paid for) and publicity (free). He recognises the role that social media plays in the recommendations of films, that is, people value the opinions of their friends and those they respect. He sets aside budget to invite influencers to special occasions prior to a films release, such as visits to sets. • Our production team has made a suite of social media platforms, all live, to show how we can create buzz for our production prior to its launch.
- 4. How brands profile audiences?- Absolute Radio • What I found really interesting about Absolute Radio’s profile is their use of psychographics. • They do not define through gender, age or social class instead they recognise an attitude of mind, calling their listeners (Reluctant Adults). They see their listeners as millennials who are hungry for experience travel, new interests, challenges: everything that relieves the mediocrity of daily life. They do not want to fall in the trap of living to work. • Audience profiling like this must make it easier to create campaigns and marketing material/ events that will reach this particular audience
- 5. The role of the distributor in profiling an audience? Target Audience: The distributor needs to consider who will want to see the film and who are the film's target audience. Every single film has a target audience, such as romantic comedies, tend to be directed towards older girls and women aged between 14-30. The reason finding the target audience is so important is because they will base the marketing campaign on them. For example, for our short film, we conducted research and came to the conclusion that our target audience were 15-30 year olds Distributors usually think: - WHO will want to see the film? - WHY will they want to see the film? - HOW will they be persuaded to see the film?
- 6. Identifying my target audience One of my earliest pieces of research was identifying my target audience. Target audiences are defined by relevant factors such as age, gender, ethnicity, social class. Firstly, I researched in audience theory and how different audiences behave Secondly, I created an audience and short film questionnaire on google forms, in order to work out my target audience.
- 7. How do you products engage with the audience?- Questionnaire Results Looking at the questionnaire results is very important as they are indicators for us when looking at how to engage with our audience 1. The first set of results identifies the gender and age of our audience, showing that the majority of our audience is under 18-25. 2. The second set of results indicates their favourite genre of films which the audience prefers. From this we see that Comedy and Thriller are the two favourites. 3. The third set of results shows me how my audience finds out about films. This is very important when looking to engage our audience. From the results the main response was through social media. This meant that it was important to create social media accounts to engage with the audience. 1. 3. 2.
- 8. Audience Profile Oscar Rife- Aged 18 After researching into my target audience I have been able to create an ideal audience profile for someone that would watch my short film
- 9. How do your products engage with the audience? My products engage with audiences because of the way in which the products link together and create the sense of branding. When looking at specific products such as my film poster and film website it became obvious to me that in order to fully engage the audience I had to develop products that would link together to present the idea of branding. This is shown through the colour scheme, background images and display of characters. Firstly, I have used a colour scheme of blacks, whites and greys in order to present a mysterious feel to the products. Secondly, I have used similar photos which I have taken for the background images, in both the postcard and website. Finally, I have included the same important characters in both so that the audience can understand who is involved in the film before actually watching it.
- 10. How Social Media is used to engage audiences and how it would help distribute the products Social media can be accessed by millions and millions of people and plays a massive role is engaging audiences and would help distribute specific products. Instagram, Twitter and Facebook are the main platforms which are used by film companies in order to engage audiences and distribute films. Firstly, social media will distribute the film by marketing it on specific platforms, this can include things such as the film postcard or the trailer. As a result of the film products being distributed on social media, it will then engage audiences as they will be able to interact with the film company and will be able to find out lots about the film before they watch it. For our film we then created an Instagram, Twitter and Facebook account in order to do these things
- 11. Why is our film so good to watch? • Our film, Conned, is so good to watch as it keeps the audience engaged and interested throughout, right to the end of the film. • The use of Levi-Strauss’s theory of Binary Oppositions is a reason why our film is interesting and engaging. We use opposites of heroes and Villains within our film in terms of the Agents and the criminals. The relationship between the two allow our film to progress and the audience will be able to connect with one of these opposites and will find it so good to watch as they will want to know what happens in the end.
- 12. How would they be distributed as real media products? Distribution is the process in which a film reaches the hands of a theatre chain, broadcasters, video stores and video on demand (VoD) operators. The companies that do this are called distributors. In general, a producer uses a sales agent to license a film to distributors outside the producer’s own country. I looked at the FDA website as well as the Business of Film course to learn about distribution, and from these websites I learned about the role of the distributor. As well as this I looked at different independent distributors which we could use in order to distribute our film. This is important to look at as different ones specialise in different things, so finding the best one to get out to audiences is very important.
- 13. Independent distributors- Verve As we are an independent film it is important that we realised that we needed an independent distributor to distribute our film. There are three independent distributors that we could have used. One of them is Warp films, Verve and Vertigo. One distributor that we could of used is Verve. Verve specialise in the release of independent films in cinema and on DVD from the UK and all around the world. They have a track record of working with first time film makers Over 75% of their releases are from first time feature directors.
- 14. Independent distributors- Vertigo A second independent distributor that we looked into was Vertigo. Vertigo specialise in maximising the profiles and audiences for independent films. Vertigo is rapidly becoming one of the UK’s leading independent film TV production companies. Having built up one of the most successful feature film businesses in the UK encompassing production, distribution, sales and post-production. Vertigo are now concentrating on television production
- 15. My independent distribution company- Warp Films An independent distributor would distribute my film. I have decided that Warp pictures would be a good media institution to distribute my short film. I have chosen Warp because I feel that it is suitable for our genre of film, as they target independent, distinctive and thought- provoking content. When I went to a study day at the BFI, I learned all about independent distribution companies such as Warp. Warp stood out for me due to the content they look for and how they distribute the content. On the study day we had a talk by the directors of ‘Ghost Stories’ which was distributed by Warp films.
- 16. What distributors do The main job is to get the film out to a paying audience. This is done in many ways, firstly, identifying what elements make the film, such as genre, so that they can what age to target the film at. The distributors work on a territory by territory basis. This means that the distributors distribute in their territory only e.g. UK distributors such as Warp only distribute in in the UK. I went on the FDA to understand a bit more about what role the distributors play. On this Mark Batey developed the point that distribution is a whole business process, which is fast moving, highly competitive and very strategic.
- 17. Role of the distributor The Role of the distributor is to sell the film to cinemas so that the film can earn a revenue. They do this by: - Identifying its audience - Considering why they'd go see the film - Estimating the revenue - Persuading exhibitors to play the film to the public (in a cinema) - Developing plans and partnerships - Building interest and buzz about the film - Aiming to convert as much interest as possible into film visits
- 18. Role of the distributor- Role of the FDA According to the FDA’s 2017 handbook, audiences visit the cinema 2.6 times a year and Simon Duke who is the Technology Business editor for the times reports that the British box office is on course for its best year since 1971. In total it is expected that filmgoers will have clocked up 176 million visits for this year. Similarly, across the Atlantic it is the same picture as the takings are forecast to top $12 billion for the first time. However, the internet streaming giants are creating their own content such as Netflix who plan to release 90 feature length films in 2019 As a result of Web 2.0 there are now many more distribution methods for indie films such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, iTunes, Bit Torrent Bundle and Vimeo on Demand. Kickstarter is also a crowd sourced funding website which offers newer opportunities to fund and distribute film. Most of my own film viewing (and my target audience's) is done online. With Web 2.0, viewing online, piracy and the future of online distribution, the industry faces future challenges. Within the industry rapid changes are taking place from the original and traditional ways of distributing films through to the digital formats used today. Netflix and Amazon were outbidding all the major movie studios at Sundance in January 2016. Amazon outbid Hollywood heavyweights Fox and Universal for the rights to distribute Manchester by the Sea—a Sundance debut. This is because of the way online platforms are now being used to distribute and market films
- 19. Spend on digital media for distributors As Matt Smith co-head theatrical, Lionsgate UK said ‘the spend on digital has increased massively’. He also went on to talk about how that this spend consists of a large amount of the budget. An example of this is on teaser trailers, these are used to gain the attention of viewers in a short space of time as people’s attention span is a lot less than it used to be. Now when watching trailers, it often appears as an advert on platforms such as YouTube, where you have 5 seconds before the viewer can skip the advert, whereas it used to be that you had 2 and half minutes to attract the attention of viewers. Distributors also run digital and conventional screenings from which they present the film to an audience. They can bring in influencers to the screenings to raise the profile of the event and engage more people. This will raise the awareness and will increase the hype and buzz around the release of the film