Summary of the range of marketing techniques available to media producers

1. Unit 6: Critical Approaches
Summary of the range of marketing techniques available to media producers.
Lauren Allard
Summary of the range of marketing techniques available to media producers.
In this report I will be talking about the range of marketing techniques that media producers
have used to advertise the films Blair Witch and Bridget Jones’ Baby. I will be look into the
different marketing techniques that the producers used and whether these techniques were
affective for the target audience.
Both films being completely different on plots, narrative and genre. But they do market the
films with similar techniques. The media producers’ goal is to attract the target audience to
the film, they want people to see the film and to enjoy what they have created, but the only
way that this would be possible is to market their product. Show it off and bring the
audience in.
There are different Marketing Technique that could be used, such as:
 Film Posters
o The posters get used differently, meaning they get placed differently. The
posters could be used on the side of buses, which would capture the
attention of people walking or driving past. Bulletin Boards, held high up
available for everyone to see, and big eye catching posters like Blair Witch
would catch a lot of people’s attention.
 Trailer/Teasers
o Trailers would be the main reason for the target audience being attracted to
the film, with the most popular and exciting clips from the filmbeing
included in a minute-long video. The trailers would be played in between TV
shows, YouTube and also on Social Media.
 Social Media
o Media Producers would want to share their project with a wide range of
people. One easy way of doing so is by Social Media, either by sharing the
poster or the trailer/teaser to the film. Or even a link to a positive film review
to the film. To make sure that as many people get attracted to the film, the
media producers would make sure that no negative reviews would in
included when it comes to marketing.
Blair Witch
Despite my negative view and opinions of the film Blair Witch, before watching the filmI did
want to see this film and was excepting it to be a good movie. Some parts were good but
some were disappointing. But despite the filmitself, the main reason I became attracted to
the film and made me want to see it, was due to watching the trailer. The trailer included
the most shocking and scariest moments, also some shocking moments that made the film
look like it had a bit of mystery included.
“That’s not your sister. That can’t be her!” – one of the main character’s half way through
the trailer. Moments like this made the film look a lot more jaw dropping and exciting.
In the trailer was Nick Lacey’s genre theory, all of the elements Nick Lacey has mentioned
before was included in the film trailer for Blair Witch making the genre obvious to the
audience.
 Setting – Dark spooky forest, that is known to be haunted.
 Character – A group of young adults, staying a few nights in the forest.

2. Unit 6: Critical Approaches
Summary of the range of marketing techniques available to media producers.
Lauren Allard
 Narrative – The story was very obvious and clear; the trailer shows the main
question that is asked in the film. “What happened to his sister?” the question is
asked by one of the main characters, that is the plot.
 Iconography – Stereotypical locations: Dark haunted forest.
The music in the trailer brings you in, how it fades out and becomes a lot more intense
when the sun goes out over the forest.
The trailer is what normally catches the audience’s attention, what brings them in. The
media producers know this.
Posters
The posters are what makes the audience think, unlike trailers posters aren’t that easy to
read you can’t look at a poster and the narrative, setting and genre are thrown at you with
obvious content. They have different parts of them that you have to really look at, the
colours, the main subject, if any text is used.
The poster on the side of a bus was what told me about this film, before watching the trailer
I first saw the poster for the film before that I didn’t even know that there was another Blair
Witch film being released.
The poster for Blair Witch is very different to most, it doesn’t contain any of the main
characters or even the main part of movie, all it includes is a symbol which looks like
somebody attached to a tree, strapped down which is connected to the plot/story of the
film. The colours being black and red, both colours can mean danger, death and blood.
Overall for Blair Witch the
marketing techniques are
very successful, they do
bring an audience in and
from my exit poll results, I
can see that a lot of people
got attracted to the filmvia
the trailer. But the form of
social media is very affective
for the media producers,
they can share about the
film as many times as they
like making the filma lot
more know and putting the
film straight into the target
audience’s face and showing
off the film.
- The audience got more
46% of the audience was
attracted to the
trailer/trailer over the other
marketing techniques.