Tie-In Promotions in the Motion Picture Industry: An Empirical Study
Motion picture studios spend substantial budgets to promote the release of new movies. While advertising represents a significant part of the movies’ marketing campaign, it is very expensive and studios are using other promotional tools like product place
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brand in the tie-in is mainly the similarity of the jointly promoted brands in terms of the product usage occasion and target segments. Since the movie's plot is regarded as the most important determinant of viewers’ attendance decision (Eliashberg et al. 2000), similarities between the plot (main characters, settings, storyline, etc.), and the product category of the partnering brand promoted in the tie-in can reinforce positive attitude transfer from the partnering brand. This, in turn, creates positive brand associations for the movie. Therefore, a strong fit can enhance the impact of the tie-in promotion by effectively reaching the target audience, building awareness for the movie and ultimately inciting viewers' visits to theatres. For brand alliances, Simonin and Ruth (1998) found that for unknown brands, consumers did not develop an extended network of brand associations, and thereby have difficulty forming judgments about the fit of the allying brands. The results of their experimental studies showed that brand fit has a stronger impact on the brand attitude towards the brand and the alliance in conditions of high brand familiarity. This means that for movies that are unknown to the audiences, the fit with the allying brands will play a less important role in generating movie revenues than for movies that are known to the audiences and for which a fit judgment can be easily done by viewers. Finally, research in the motion picture industry suggests that drivers of a movie’s success differ in the periods preceding and following its release (Elberse and Eliashberg 2003). Before the film’s release, moviegoers rely on limited external information available to them to form expectations about the movie's quality such as genre and MPAA ratings, and promotions and advertising for the movie are important information sources to infer the movie’s quality. However, in the post-release period, viewers' word-of-mouth is the main influencer for moviegoers (Yong 2006). This suggests that tie-in promotions that are launched before the release of the movie will be more effective than tie-ins implemented after the movie release. METHODOLOGY We collected secondary data about U.S. total box office revenues and opening weekend revenues using the-numbers.com and IMDB.com for a two year period. We obtained information about tie-in announcements for each movie – number of tie-ins for each movie, the names of the partnering firms, the tie-in timing, fit, duration of the tie-in, and whether the tie-in was launched before or after the movie release – from the comprehensive Promotion Tracking Database of a marketing research firm. We used sales in US dollars in the year preceding the release of the movie to estimate the brand familiarity of each partnering firm. We also collected data about the movie characteristics to control for differences across factors that can influence the movie's success at the box office (genre, rating, star power, advertising budget, etc.). We used a cross sectional analysis to test our research hypotheses. We
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