Category: Guerrilla Marketing

Humans dressed as the demonic nun, 'Valak' at PVR Cinemas, Mumbai
‘The Nun 2’ Movie Promotions Prepare You to Be Terrified

‘The Nun 2’ Movie Promotions Prepare You to Be Terrified

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Movie promotions excite me, but what excites me, even more, is the brilliant incorporation of the unique aspects of movies into their respective promotional strategies rather than just deploying generic or conventional advertising. For instance, in my previous blog post on the promotion of the Tamil movie, ‘Maaveeran‘, I mentioned how the installation of a transparent banner, featuring the movie’s poster, on the facade of a cinema hall, made the people passing through the set-up recreate the iconic ‘overhead stare’ of Sivakarthikeyan in the film. Unless ‘Maaveeran‘ has a sequel/prequel/spin-off, this activation is certain to not be repeated for any other movie as it is closely associated with the film’s theme. In this regard, I recently came across some exciting stuff from the makers of the movie, ‘The Nun 2‘. I feel psyched about a couple of those strategies. So, lemme share them in this blog post!

“Creepy” nuns, all over the place:

As a part of the movie’s marketing campaign by ‘Warner Bros. Pictures‘, around twenty “creepy” nuns (humans dressed up as the evil entity, ‘Valak’ that features in the movies, ‘The Conjuring 2’, ‘The Nun’ and ‘The Nun 2’) have been set out in public to carry out a candlelight stroll.

The army of nuns flooded across some significant landmarks of different cities in the United States of America, like Brooklyn, New York, San Francisco, Miami, Denver, Atlanta and Washington, D.C, in Canada, like Montreal and Toronto, in England, like London and in India, like Mumbai.

Apart from swarming landmarks across different cities of various countries, the nuns made their appearance at the annual horror events, like ‘HorrorHound Weekend‘ and ‘Popcorn Frights‘ and at the movie’s exclusive screenings, like the annual speculative fiction fan convention, ‘Fan Expo Canada‘.

Below are the posts from the official X accounts of ‘The Nun‘ movie, ‘Warner Bros. UK‘ and ‘Warner Bros. India‘ on the stunt…

Across cities in the United States of America…

In London, England…

In Mumbai, India…

Throwback to a similar ‘”Creepy” nuns, all over the place’ stunt for ‘The Nun’:

Upon noticing these “creepy” nuns on the move, the excellent marketing campaign of the 2022 science fiction horror film, ‘M3gan‘ might occur to you, but I’d like to convey here that ‘The Nun‘ had similar promotions way back in 2018.

Here’s a look back at the movie’s campaign.

In Sydney, ‘Roadshow Films‘ and ‘OMD‘, in partnership with ‘Habitat‘, orchestrated a campaign, wherein unsuspecting morning commuters were in for a fright from a bevy of demonic nuns. Likewise, ‘Warner Bros. Canada‘ studio, in collaboration with the agency, ‘Rooftop‘, set out three teams of six nuns each to hit the streets, chanting in Latin and distributing double-sided prayer cards encouraging fans to share on social media using “I Hate #NUNDays” (NUNDay, a wordplay on Mondays). The activations in Canada were created to mark the studio’s partnership with ‘FanExpo‘, which has been considered a part of the Canadian strategy for the movie. Though these stunts appear to be relatively small-scale compared to that of ‘The Nun 2‘, they are equally creative.

Terror appears when you least expect it – A “creepy” newsstand:

Toward the end of ‘The Nun 2‘ trailer, you’d see the protagonist, ‘Sister Irene‘ gazing at a Valak-like artwork on a book at a newsstand. Upon hearing rapid footsteps, she gasps and then turns back only to see nothing. Again, as she turns slowly toward the newsstand, the Valak appears right in front of her from nowhere and has her in a chokehold.

The makers of ‘The Nun 2‘ kind of recreated the above scene.

A ‘The Nun 2‘ branded newsstand was placed in Venice Beach, California. Unsuspecting beachgoers felt shocked as a Valak popped out of the newsstand while they got closer to the prop and started having a look at the magazines. It’s just like how it makes an appearance in the scene from nowhere. As a result, it scares the shit out of them.

Below is the post from the official X account of ‘The Nun‘ movie on the stunt…

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So, how are these promotions gonna help the movie’s opening weekend prospects at the box office?

Upon encountering unusual sights of nuns in public, passersby would be nudged to stop by. Capture photographs of, or probably take selfies with the nuns. In the ‘The Nun 2‘ trailer, you’ll notice the girl named ‘Sophie‘ say ‘I saw a nun‘. If you notice the copies in almost all the X posts above, you’ll see the hashtag, ‘#ISawANun‘. So, any passersby noticing the nuns could later excitedly say, “I saw a nun” to their families and friends. Also, if they share their clicks, with nuns, on social media, they could probably include the hashtag, ‘#ISawANun‘. Thereby, the film’s producers make the audience recreate a moment of the movie. This would pave the way for user-generated content, helping organically to get the word out about the movie. And thereby, evoking interest in the film.

With respect to promoting movies in the annual horror events aforesaid, there’s a key takeaway point. FIND WHO & WHERE THE AUDIENCE FOR YOUR MOVIE IS AND THEN INVENTIVELY PROMOTE IT THERE.

So, in the aforementioned way, the promotions might help the movie’s opening weekend prospects at the box office.

Hope you liked the promotions for the movie, ‘The Nun 2‘ and my take on the same. Lemme know your feedback on this blog post’s comments section.

Photo Courtesy: Warner Bros. India

P.S. ‘The Nun 2‘, which is a sequel to ‘The Nun‘ (2018) and the ninth instalment in ‘The Conjuring Universe‘ franchise, is scheduled for a theatrical release on September 7, 2023. Do watch in Cinemas!

Actor Suriya in 'Soorarai Pottru'
‘Soorarai Pottru’ goes the breathtaking ‘Red Bull’ way! (But, not exactly)

‘Soorarai Pottru’ goes the breathtaking ‘Red Bull’ way! (But, not exactly)

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Hope you remember the Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner’s breathtaking descent from over 24 miles (39km) above the earth! It was way back on October 14th, 2012 when the spellbinding feat was achieved as part of the Red Bull Stratos project, wherein the company invested 30$ million and raked in 500$ million through sales.

Whenever I think of Guerrilla Marketing stunts, this famous, record-breaking space jump instantly occurs to me.

Now, here is an instance of Guerrilla Marketing from the makers of Tamil actor Suriya starring ‘Soorarai Pottru’ along the lines of Baumgartner’s astonishing 2012 feat. But, not exactly.

To be more precise, if it was Felix Baumgartner reaching the stratosphere for Red Bull, then it is a board containing the autographs of thousands of Suriya’s fans for ‘Soorarai Pottru’.

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The makers of the movie have orchestrated with a German crew to accomplish this ‘OUT OF THE WORLD’ task by fastening the board to an unmanned high-altitude balloon.

Suriya posted a brief video on this promotional effort, dubbed ‘Tribute to my anbanafans!!’ on November 11th, 2020 to his social media profiles.

The clip provides a glimpse of the board floating across space. Also, the altitude last shown in the video appears to be 35km above the earth! ‘Soorarai Pottru’, the first big-ticket movie from Tamil Film Industry to be directly released on an OTT platform, goes for a world premiere on Amazon Prime Video on November 12th, 2020! The latest Guerrilla Marketing stunt from team ‘Soorarai Pottru’ finishes the movie’s vigorous pre-release promotions on a high note.

Featured image courtesy:

2D Entertainment and Sikhya Entertainment

4 Examples of Captivating Fusion Marketing Campaigns (And Why They’re So Great)

4 Examples of Captivating Fusion Marketing Campaigns (And Why They’re So Great)

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Main Pic 3

Recently, I have been reading the late American Business Writer Jay Conrad Levinson’s book, Guerrilla Marketing: Easy and Inexpensive Strategies for making big profits from your small business. In a chapter of the book, the author has listed down twenty ways in which guerrilla marketing differs from the old-fashioned brand of marketing. In one of the ways, the writer defines traditional marketing as an approach, which suggests a brand to observe its industrial market completely to decide which of its competitors are to be utterly defeated by it.

Conversely, he proclaims guerrilla marketing as an outlook, which advocates a brand to discover businesses that possess the same kind of potential customers/clients and standards as it does, so that the brand can collaborate with the selected businesses in their marketing endeavours.

By opting the latter, Jay Conrad Levinson asserts that a brand is expanding its marketing reach, but reducing its marketing cost as it is sharing the expenses with the fellow business. And, he puts forth the term Fusion Marketing, which guerrillas use for this viewpoint.

There are tons of great examples for Fusion Marketing out there. To show you what makes them so captivating, I have curated a list of 4 examples of interesting Fusion Marketing instances. Here we go!

1. Burger King and Budweiser

Targeting the 2018 summer, the American brands, Burger King (BK) and Budweiser partnered and launched a limited edition burger named American Brewhouse King Sandwich and a special crown referred as Freedom Crown, for fans of both brands, to celebrate the Independence Day of United States of America. The crown, which holds both an American Brewhouse King Sandwich and a Budweiser beer, was available for people aged 21 or older, for a limited time. In the process, the collaboration revived the American beer maker’s iconic campaign, Whassup. In which, the original Budweiser Whassup commercial was remade by seasoning it with a special cameo from The King himself. To top it all, the BK’s mascot, holding a set of the new burger in his hand, “spoke” for the first time, in the spot. The ad was meant for supporting the revitalized campaign, driven by the agencies MullenLowe and David.

Whassup 2018 is one among the campaigns of BK that epitomizes the fast food restaurant’s Global CMO, Fernando Machado’s regular catchphrase, Burger King team is fighting the good fight for creativity!

Watch the ad below!

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2. Uber and Mission Impossible 6: Fallout

When Tom Cruise is committed in doing all his high-risk stunts in the sixth Mission Impossible instalment, Fallout then how are the trained stunt men, hired by Paramount Pictures, occupying themselves?

You get to hear a light-hearted answer encapsulated in a video created by Uber, to promote its sponsorship of the red carpet premiere of Mission Impossible – Fallout that took place on July 12th 2018 in Paris.

In the documentary-style interview video, a fictional stunt man named Adrian Cooper talks about the ways in which he uses his plentiful downtime on the shooting spots.

One best way, in which he spends time, is to drive for Uber. Apart from enthusiastically letting his customers know about Tom’s daredevil stunts in Fallout, he conveys them on him being eager to watch the live streaming of the movie’s world premiere in Uber’s YouTube channel. The video ends with him saying, “I can’t wait to see all the stunts I didn’t do”!

Watch the hilarious video by clicking the link in the below tweet!

3. The Lego Movie and Turkish Airlines

Ahead of the upcoming release of The Lego Movie 2, Turkish Airlines partnered with The Lego Movie franchise and created an in-flight safety video, comprising the stars of The Lego Movie, driven predominantly by characters like Emmett and Wyldstyle. In the infotainment video, the cast takes passengers through the safety procedures, which are usually explained by the crew members before the flight takes off. It’s a fun way to kick-start the flight journey with a video, which brings together two brands that are well-known across the globe.

As per The Drum, 16 production specialists have toiled for 950 days to turn 2,938,840 Lego bricks into this edutainment video.

Also, the video kicks off a drive, which will encompass a global TV campaign, themed wrapped airlines, in-flight and in-airport activations and a second safety video.

Click the link in the below tweet to enjoy the Turkish Airlines Safety Video with The LEGO Movie Characters!

https://twitter.com/TurkishAirlines/status/1040989118782693377

4. Aquaman and Ocean Conservancy

Going by Jason Momoa’s comments to Comicbook.com, the threat posed by pollution in the oceans seem to factor into the Aquaman’s portrayal of the conflict between the surface and Atlantis. This major plot point of Aquaman makes sense of its pairing with the non-profit environmental advocacy group Ocean Conservancy for the organization’s 33rd annual International Coastal Cleanup event, conducted on September 15th 2018.

As a lead-up to the event, people were encouraged through the Aquaman’s social media to be an Ocean Hero by joining it, downloading the organization’s app, Clean Swell and subsequently, participating in a Cleanup event near them. Post cleanup, volunteers were asked to submit data related to the marine debris collected by them in the app. Volunteers using Cleanup data cards were provided with an option to enter the details into Ocean Conservancy’s database. Eventually, the data will be formulated to Ocean Trash Index, which will then be an information source for everyone on the impact of the ocean trashes.

Please find below the peek into the International Coastal Cleaup, which happened on September 15th 2018.

Conclusion:

In the aforementioned fusion marketing campaigns, it is evident that the brands have adopted the guerrilla marketing outlook by discovering businesses that possess the same kind of potential customers/clients and standards as they do and collaborated with the selected businesses in their marketing endeavours. These approaches would have helped the brands to get more bang for their bucks, with less work.