In the end, any discussion that includes a mention of Roadhouse on DVD is a good one.

Happy football day.

I would have so seen the film if I could.

The marketers at New Line put together a marketing plan– or at least bent their plan once the Internet hype took hold– and executed it.

Marketing plans, by their nature, are executed in order to generate “X” sales. Hitting “X” results in “making plan,” greater than X equals a fantastic success, while less than X is a failure. It may be me, but I believe that’s a pretty universal world-view amongst marketers.

In the case of Snakes on a Plane, the marketing plan was, by all reasonable reckoning, to reach out to bloggers in hopes the ensuing buzz would generate the numbers they were after at the box office– the “X.” The final results, by their own admission, were “disappointing,” or, in other words, “less than X.”

They didn’t “make plan,” and none of the marketing bloggers were willing (or able?) to discuss the ramifications.

Theo, I think we’re banging our heads against a Mack Collier wall on this one.

Cheers,

–M.

I left a lengthy run-down of the evidence on your site - pre-release research on purchase intent, comparisons to non-hyped genre films and the studio’s own comments stating this was a failure in business terms.

I have nothing against this film. Nor do others here, from what I read. This is a marketing discussion, not a debate on whether the movie was good or bad. I don’t see how you can make the argument blogging produced noticeable increases in ticket sales. You’ve offered no proof of such, while others have provided much backup to support the opposite point of view.

Slamming? I’m just not tripping over myself with joy because a blog started by a non-professional ‘citizen’ marketer caught a studio off-guard and now the same studio is heralded as embracing new media? Not buying it because they reacted, they didn’t create this.

They responded to comments about the movie, which is the equivalent of a DVD with alternate endings so you can have the happy ending you want.

Not the same thing.

Your argument doesn’t consider a third option: maybe people don’t like that kind of movie. But to imply in some of your posts on your blog that the reason the ones who didn’t like it aren’t the target and aren’t ‘new media/internet savvy’ is a very narrow view.

And the studio is heralded as embracing new media? They got caught looking and had nothing to do with the start of it. That’s a lesson all studios should learn.

The fact that most new-media Web 2.0-speak media bloggers raved about the using a blog in this way set the movie up for those comparisons, whether you agree or not. Who hyped and who was realistic? Only those bloggers can answer honestly for themselves.

And, again: how is it a B-movie like Red Eye was so much better than SoaP without any of the blog hoopla to support it?

Both B-movies, but which had to work harder once it was released? Time will tell after Labor Day if SoaP has legs or not.

The best “new media” folks will tell you there are too many ways for such efforts to stumble. Bad product…too much talk…poor timing…using the wrong tonality…suddenly emerging news draws attention elsewhere…the list goes on.

The good (and, for marketers, bad) thing about the internet is the fact it can’t be controlled. Having bloggers move product is nice when it happens, but there’s no way you can rely on it - no matter how much buzz they may generate.

The problem is, the only people saying this was a ‘bad product’, are the MSM, and bloggers that never saw it. The bloggers that DID see it, absolutely LOVED it! I have yet to see the FIRST blogger claim that they went to this movie and did NOT have a blast.

The bottom line here is that the MSM didn’t break this story, and really had squat to do with the hype that built around the movie, and they were none too happy about that. It’s no coincidence that they did a complete 180 on the film in less than 48 hours. When reports started coming in VERY early Friday morning that the reviews from movie goers were overwhelmingly positive, MSM said it was a ’summer sleeper’. Then on Sunday morning when New Line annoinced that sales would likely be 15.3 mil for the opening weekend, they slammed it unmercifully.

A B-Movie opens at #1, and yet some say that is a sign of failure. I have yet to see ONE person say they saw this movie, and did NOT have a blast, and yet it’s a failure.

Slamming this movie because you don’t think the promotion was effective is one thing, slamming this movie’s promotion simply because you never liked the idea of the film when you first heard about it months ago, is quite another.

Make a better movie.

Long-winded:

jamesh-h - you had me at “Deluxe Edition of Roadhouse”

Geez, I stop blogging for a day and look what you kids get into.

Two words: Blair Witch. Still the standard for this ‘new whacky internet buzz’ sensation thing.

Made with nothing more than three actors and a video camera in a forest one weekend for 60K. And went on to gross how much? 248 mill worldwide. And promoted how?

A fake website. That’s buzz building.

El Mariachi, by a rebel without a crew and made for 7K and grossed 2 mil domestic. Cut in Robert Rodriguez’s living room with two crappy beta decks and audio cassettes. Picked-up for distribution, yatta, yatta, and the rest is history.

Make - a - good - movie.

Mack C, here’s how I gauge success: how much a movie makes in relation to how much it costs, and to a degree, in what category it comes out, and, for who. A success in Hollywood terms is $$$. A success for consumers is seeing a good movie. We know those two aren’t always the same thing.

Now 15 mil ain’t chump change, granted, but you can’t discount the effect of past performance of other movies in the same genre either. SoaP just appears weaker given that criteria, plus, the high cost of its production. If it taps out at $30-35 mil, I would have to say if it had a major star like Jackson, and that’s the best it could do…?

Over six weeks, here is RE’s, then Flightplan’s, then Soap’s six consecutive weekend grosses (in millions approx.):

16-10-7-9-4-2

24-14-10-6-4-2

15-6 - - - -

I also gauge a potential bust based on the amount of hype surrounding it ahead of time, like we had with SoaP. Pro sports is full of players that never made it or performed as advertised. Why? They couldn’t play. They weren’t as good as advertised. They crumbled. Name your poison.

The height of the fall is always proportional to the height of the pedestal we build for them.

Bottom line is: still gotta be able to play though.

And as mentioned for consumers, it still has to be a good movie.

I had the opportunity, (or misfortune), to help out an agency in the final days of pitching the marketing for Burger King on arguably one of the worst movies AND box-office bombs at the time, Ah-nold’s Last Action Hero. Classic promotional machine into high gear: They had tie-ins set-up for every Burger King from here to China, promotions up the wazoo, sweepstakes, etc.

Then I saw the movie. It sucked to the nth power. Forget all the tie-ins. At the end of the day, nothing would save it. (Watching the movie and his subsequent follow-up hit True Lies, it was eerie how much he learned by correcting scenes from LAH in True Lies that I felt were the original problem. Mostly, Ah-nold’s fans don’t want to see him fail to save kids or be the hero.)

So this week as a marketer, I’m asking myself what is more cost effective: a blog, or a traditional print/TV/radio campaign with promotional tie-ins at retail? Old-school peeps will say gimmee butts in seats and I don’t care how you do it. My hunch though says blogs will become part of their strategy from here out, not an ‘either or’ deal.

(But now, every movie campaign will include a blog for opening weekend, bet. Because you know studios are thinking if a blog can help a movie like SoaP, imagine what it can do for Water World III.)

The support and blog love leading up the release was typically along these lines though: “lessons for marketers…” and so on. It may not be predictions of box office glory, but you have to admit the blog tactic was getting heavy coverage as the ‘new wave.’

What lessons though?

A ‘civilian’ named Brian Finkelstein started this. Nobody else. (Unless someone from New Line wants to come clean right here and confirm my suspicions that this was a plant by their marketing department the whole time.) What could anyone other than Brian do but sit back and watch this unfold? It was his effort, not their’s.

If the SoaP blog campaign was as effective as is being touted, I would’ve hated to see the opening numbers for the movie without the blog. (theo kie’s last point).

I suppose when they tested it, they polled audiences with a basic “How did you hear about the movie?” or asked if it “had an influence on their decision to see it” on their response cards.

The lesson for marketers should be this:

Don’t just start throwing up blogs in hopes of discovering gold. Only thing worse than a movie that sucks would be a blog that tries to convince you otherwise.

While it was a cool concept to get behind, the idea of a whacky blog was more intriguing than the movie it was supposed to be for.

But doesn’t this just reinforce the old adage that, great advertising can’t save a bad product? Want the blog efforts to truly kick ass? Make a better movie.

Stop using marketing efforts to salvage mediocrity, and start using them to enhance an already good product.

No, what I am saying is, “I work for a living, have someplace to be early in the morning and enjoy my sleep.”

Ad hominem will get you nowhere, especially in defense of JD’s comments.

Good night. ”

Again with the incorrect assumptions! Wasn’t defending JD’s comments, I was pointing out how ironic it was for you to bash JD for ‘not elevating the conversation’, then you turn around and grab your ball and go home when asked to actually defend your off-the-wall claims.

“A truly enlightening piece of information to know would be this: what does the studio believe opening weekend sales would have been without the last-minute television and print push?”

I think the right question to ask is “What would SoaP’s opening weekend have been if New Line had sent lawyers after Brian Finklestein back in January and attempted to close down Snakes on a Blog?’.

Hint: Much less than 15.3 million. That’s why it is simply amazing to me to see some bloggers claiming that this movie’s promotion was a ‘failure’. Of course, the ones that I am seeing doing this, are like Mack here, they had no opinion about the film’s promotion prior to Aug. 17th, but after the MSM decided that the promotion was a failure (again, for sending a B-Movie to the top of the box-office), then they decided that they agreed.

So the lesson to be learned here is…..what a B-Movie actually MAKES at the box-office doesn’t define it’s success, it’s what the critics say. Gotcha.