Marketing of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 used multiple marketing strategies. Since this movie was a sequel to a previously successful movie, there wasn't much risk involved with the films creation, as there was with the first film in the franchise.

-Partnerships:
The most popular marketing strategy used for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 was its collaboration with Doritos, the popular chip brand. This collaboration consisted of a limited-edition series of Doritos bags with a custom design and a built-in music player inspired by a cassette tape that allowed the consumer to plug in headphones and listen to the movies soundtrack. 
The promotion was incredibly popular and the products quickly sold out due to the limited nature of the stock. Now the product sells second hand for far above its initial price of $29.99. This sort of product appealed directly to the audience of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 since Doritos are known for being a popular product to those within the community of Marvel Studios fans. Other partnerships done for this film included an ad with Geico where one of the movies main characters and Geico's mascot discussed how they both 'save' people and a sweepstakes with M&M's and Skittles that awarded winners with tickets.

-Public Appearances:
The cast of the film contributed to hyping the movie by attending San Diego Comic-Con 2016, a pop culture convention that allows fans of franchises from comic books to gaming to meet up. The cast held a panel where they introduced one of the movies new characters, showed a new trailer, and answered general questions. This gave the target audience a chance to interact directly with their favorite characters and generated more hype for the movies impending release.


The use of public appearances is something that our film could possibly take advantage of. Hype for a film can be very easily generated with this method, however this requires being invited or accepted to go to this type of convention, which is harder for a new and unknown movie, so although the strategy is very useful, it is unlikely for it to be accessible for us. This is similarly the case with the take that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 took with partnering with other brands. The use of creating a limited edition product is efficient, however requires a preexisting fanbase.

Marketing of Thor: Ragnarok

-Posters:
Large, bright, individual posters were made for the main players in the movie. The posters sold the idea of the film being about a team of heroes. The colorfulness of the posters also helped to bring out the new tone of the movie compared to previous Thor films. The more serious, dark appearance and tone of the previous film, Thor: The Dark World, hadn't succeeded with audiences, so this brighter nature was important to the new films success.


-Social Media:
The franchise created a special hashtag for fans to use on Twitter. Fans could tweet out '#WhatsRagnarok' and say what their definition of the word was. Responses were both serious and humorous, and one of the films main actors, Jeff Goldblum, was filmed responding to some of the fans responses. This helped fans feel involved before the movie was even released and helped emphasize the idea that this film would have a more comedic tone than the previous films in the franchise.

-Short Films:
Prior to Thor: Ragnarok's release, a couple of short films title Team Thor were released to show what Thor had been doing and explain why he and one of the other protagonists of Thor: Ragnarok, Bruce Banner, had not been in the most recent Avengers movie with the rest of the Avengers cast, as they had been in the previous Avengers film and are members of the group. The films director, Taika Waititi, told Den of Geek that the short films, "gave fans the opportunity to see just how irreverent we were gonna be, and just how different we were making Thor, and [Bruce Banner/The Hulk] as well."

-Competition:

A competition was held prior to the films release, titled "Marvel Studios' Thor: Ragnarok Superpower of STEM Challenge." The challenged asked girls age 15-18, currently enrolled in grades 10-12 to create a do-it-yourself project using their STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) skills. The participants would submit a video demonstrating their project and the top five finalists would be invited to the red carpet premiere of Thor:Ragnarok. The final winner would receive a three-day mentor-ship with Disney Imagineering and Disney Communications building their project an teaching others how to create the project themselves. The finalist was also featured on the new channel Good Morning America where they demonstrated their project. This competition allowed for audience participation and excitement, support of a current issue, and media coverage.

The marketing strategies we could probably pull from what Thor: Ragnarok did would be its use of social media and possibly its use of posters. Creating a personal hashtag for twitter for fans to use is a simple way to get the message out about your film and also allow the audience to feel involved in the process of the films release. Although our film doesn't have a team dynamic like Thor: Ragnarok does to play on with the creation of posters, the concept of having bright, eye-catching posters of the films leads is still an efficient way to give the idea of the film being more about having fun than a dark, sinister plot. The posters also introduce characters to the audience early so they can be excited for that characters introduction.

Marketing of Spiderman: Homecoming

Spider-man: Homecoming made an unusually large push with their marketing, spending $140 million on promotions. The promotional campaign consisted of brand partnerships, longer promotional videos, a large social media push, and interactive content.

-Brand Partnerships:
Sony partnered with 30 different brands to promote Spider-man: Homecoming, taking up most of the marketing budget. Such brands include Audi, M&M's, and Dunkin' Donuts. This even included a partnership with Pizza Hut where Spider-man's face appeared on their pizza boxes. The campaign also extended across multiple countries.


-Promotional Videos:
While most films in the genre would make marketing videos lasting around 30 seconds, Sony decided to extend that to around 2-3 minutes, such as a video produced out of their partnership with Audi titled, "Driver's Test," which was two and a half minutes long. This longer format of video promotion allows the viewers to become more attached to the characters before the movie even comes out.

 -Social Media:
Spider-man: Homecoming has both a Twitter and Instagram account which isn't uncommon for a modern franchise, however what stands out is the frequency of the accounts posts and the content being posted. The accounts post much more frequently than other social media accounts of a similar idea. The accounts also post content such as GIFs, images, and videos that have been shown to analytically make a post more popular. The videos have even been put into a format that is optimized for social media, with a specific square layout and subtitles so viewers can more easily watch the content.

-Interactive Content:
Spider-man: Homecoming had a companion app. Simply titled 'Spider-Man,' has custom filters, AR, and a virtual version of Peter Parker's phone. The app could also help people find tickets and the filters offered were blatantly designed to share on social media, allowing for free advertisement. There was also a virtually reality game released on Playstation VR called 'Spider-Man: Homecoming Reality Experience.' The game was free and allowed the player to become Spider-Man.

Although our film has a much more limited budget than Spider-Man: Homecoming, some techniques used for promotion of the film are still useful to us. The use of social media is a quick and cheaper way to market a product that also offers direct interaction with the audience. With Twitter, you can post information for others to see very quickly due to the short format and you can retweet content, acknowledging your fanbase and pulling in viewers who might not know about your content.

Feedback/Revisions

My group has decided to refilm the entirety of our film. The biggest revisions we would like to make are:

-Fixing lighting (filming at an earlier time)
- fixing transitions or shots that extend too long or aren't portrayed well, such as at 0:41 where the actor appears to be starting walking father than having it continuous and at 0:49 where the transition needs to be cropped more.
- At 0:47, the actor can be seen turning around twice. We need to change this to have it be only once.
-We weren't satisfied with our actor portraying the victim and would like to have new actor for the part.
- The shot of the agent in the background at 1:00 was unsatisfactory to us. We would rather the agent be within a crowd or just in general blending i better to the scene.
- The protagonists faking of being hurt at 1:09 isn't as comedic as we want it to be and takes up more time than we would like.
- We would like to switch the timing of the protagonist feigning being hurt and the victim asking if they're okay so that the victim asks if they are okay, then the protagonist realizes they should be hurt, and then acts like they are.
- We want a true high angle shot of the beginning of the chase scene at 1:26, along with lengthening it into a true chase scene and having the protagonist running and weaving through crowds.
- The delivery of the final line wasn't satisfactory. I would prefer the line "I know what you are," and, "and I have a job for you," to be seperated into different shots, with a pause in between showing the protagonists scared reaction to the first time. We are also planning to have the agent not just hold out their hand, but also a business card with a fox logo on it, allowing for a justification of the films title.
- Some sort of shift with the title. Typically, a placement of a title at the end of a scene gives a finalization to the scene, making it feel like a short film rather than in opening. In pulling from the genre of film that we are using, the title is often placed after an opening sequence. A possible meld of the shot and the title rather than a cut to black would help this, such as panning the camera up and presenting the title over a shot of the sky or tops of buildings.
-We are also thinking it might be best to change locations to downtown. This would provide a less busy background (as in less obvious shop logos and more nameless big buildings) and back alleys that our protagonist can be cornered in during a chase scene.

Conventions/Social Groups

Our film uses a mix of some basic concepts of our genre of film along with some fresher ideas. The power of super strength is one that is used frequently in the super hero genre, however our film takes a slightly comedic tone to it with the idea of being unable to control said strength and having to pretend it doesn't exist. Secret agents are also an existing idea that is used in super hero stories. The suspense of a chase scene is a common concept as well. The films originality lies in the hero, which ties into the social groups the film plays into. The hero is meant to be humorous in nature, with a naivety not often seen in film heroes. This idea has been used in Spiderman: Homecoming, however this idea is not usually used with female superheroes.

Our film has a socially beneficial message in the idea of our female superhero having super strength. This concept challenges the stereotype of female superheroes having to have graceful and delicate super powers. Our hero is rough around the edges and an amateur at what she does. She is funny and harsh, rather than the fragility expected of female super heroes.