Marketing
We often think
of mass media marketing as a new phenomenon. Charles Dickens,
however, is in some ways a very modern character as he was
a tireless self-publicist. He even went on reading tours
to the USA where his work was very popular.
The following quote demonstrates this:
Dickens has a great following in the United States of America too. His influence there is illustrated by an incident when he was writing the Old Curiosity Shop. A sizeable crowd had gathered on the New York pier as the ship carrying the latest instalment of the novel, pulled into the wharf. At this time Little Nell was very sick and was the cause of much concern to Dickens' followers. A man in the crowd shouted up to the bridge, "Did she die?". The captain of the ship replied sadly that she had died. At once a solemn hush fell over the crowd.
(p 6 - The Works of Charles Dickens & His Influence On His Times With Particular Reference to Three of His Books. Sean T. McManus (1970))
This was not the first time that Dickens had generated such a popular interest in his characters. His earlier work The Pickwick Papers was very popular.
Dickens was a figure very much in the public eye and his image also appears in advertising campaigns of the time. The biggest differences between the publicity surrounding Dickens then and publicity now are:
- technology
- scale
- mass literacy.
In many companies, there are whole departments that are dedicated to marketing.
Marketing for a film can include a number of elements
Internet
pop ups
Posters
TV trailers
Cinema trailers (both teaser and main campaign
trailers)
Merchandise (this is a HUGE area)
Premieres
The marketing department will be trying to create as much interest in the film as possible. As well as paying for advertising, they will also try to generate publicity, which can't be directly paid for. For example, if a number of well know stars attend a premier they could appear on newspaper front pages and the local and national TV news. So creating these kinds of events is important to the film companies as it helps to increase the public interest in the film.
Look again at the quotes and sequences above: can you think of any recent examples of films where these kinds of strategies have been employed?