Cooperation strategy is immature, domestic product placement advertising will explode

Not long ago, Paramount announced a statement that filming of "Transformers 3", which was suspended due to an accident, would resume. On September 3, local time, an extra actor was severely injured during a filming and the filming had to be stopped.

"Transformers 3", which is being filmed in Chicago, has become a topic of communication. This movie is not only the expectation of film fans around the world, but also the expectation of car fans around the world. From the perspective of the integration of films and cars, the "Transformers" series has undoubtedly reached a new level.

The explosion of product placement

Car fans are very concerned about what new models will appear in "Transformers 3", so car manufacturers are eager to do so.

Recall that in "Transformers 1", the Ford Mustang model served as a Decepticons and was killed by the Hornet, which was a Chevrolet Camaro; and in the second episode, the Audi R8 sports car also chose the Decepticons camp and was killed by the Autobots as soon as it appeared. The righteous autobots are all served by GM brands.

The brief appearance was very successful. In a survey of "Change 2" placement ads, the Audi R8's recognition rating actually reached 92.1%, exceeding the 87.8% recognition rating created by Chevrolet.

Perhaps influenced by the above cases, in "Transformation 3", which will be released next year, the producers will add two non-universal brands, Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari.

The implantation of 68 brands in the movie "Transformers" brought in more than $40 million in revenue. At the same time, product placement is becoming a tool for marketing. The market size of product placement in the United States reached nearly US$7 billion in 2009, and 90% of products appearing on TV in the United States are due to product placement. Globally, product placement advertising revenue exceeded US$12 billion in 2009, and China's RMB 2 billion in 2009 accounted for only a very small share.

However, with large-scale advertising placement such as the 2010 Spring Festival Gala and movies, 2010 may become the dividing line, and domestic product placement advertising will experience explosive growth thereafter.

If you look at the current popular movies, you will more or less find the situation of car implantation. In "Du Lala's Promotion", after her promotion, Du Lala's anger was to buy a Mazda convertible sports car; in "Tangshan Earthquake", the BMW X5 team assisted the Wenchuan disaster area; in "West Wind" broadcast at the end of September, the Jeep Wrangler and Cherokee staged a chase on behalf of both good and evil parties respectively; and in "If You Are the One 2" at the end of the year, in addition to Ge You and Shu chatting about love, there is no doubt that they have to ride in Subaru Qi for a ride.

China's revenue dilemma

2010 became a year when China's film market sought implant implants. Why did so many cars choose to implant films for marketing? The first cause of this phenomenon is the sharing system of my country's movie box office.

In 1994, as Hollywood blockbusters entered China, the film market began to implement a split account system; in 2002,"Hero" became the first domestic film to adopt a split account model. Compared with the original distribution method of unified purchase and reimbursement, the split account model takes into account the sharing of benefits and risks in all links of the entire film industry chain, which has achieved the development of China's film industry.

But this move is destined to be more and more dependent on product placement throughout the industry, as studios 'share of box office revenue has increased from the earliest 30% to nearly half now.

Currently, 46% to 50% of a movie's revenue goes to the studio;10% to 12% goes to the distributor; and the rest goes to the producer. ldquo; Now that film producers can account for 40% of a movie's revenue, it is already a good achievement." rdquo; An industry insider engaged in film distribution told reporters.

Take the movie "Founding of a People's Republic" as an example, with an investment of 30 million yuan and a box office of 415 million yuan, which was divided into 178 million yuan, accounting for 43%. "Ciling" invested more than 90 million yuan, box office 67 million yuan, divided into 28.81 million yuan, accounting for 43%, and a net loss of 61.19 million yuan.

For a movie with a box office of 100 million yuan, producers can only make money by limiting the investment to 30 million yuan, otherwise they will have to face the embarrassing situation of losing money.

For this reason, before a movie starts, advertisements do not equalize the production cost, and it can be said that it is doomed to lose money. At this time, it is very likely that the investor will simply decide not to bid." rdquo; The above-mentioned person said. In the circle, it is common for movies with books and investors but difficult to start filming because of the lack of advertising.

In 2008, data reported by 51 film and television production organizations showed that 40% of the production organizations were profitable, 44% were marginally profitable or flat, 13% suffered losses, and 3% suffered serious losses. This is just the tip of the iceberg. There are 2500 institutions in China engaged in the creation of film and television dramas.

Saving small productions”

Due to the existence of the domestic debt-sharing mechanism, the situation that 1% of films are making money will not change in the short term. Commercial investment and commercial sponsorship, as well as various commercial advertisements such as plot placement and patch advertising, have always been the main way to raise funds for the domestic film and television industry. rdquo; Director Bai Lusong said.

However, the effectiveness of product placement advertising is being criticized as it emerges on a large scale. Many product placement ads in "If You Are the One" are considered to be too obvious, while the Spring Festival Gala's "Donation" and the TV series "Let's Watch the Meteor Shower" have attracted more controversy.

The most important thing is movies. Audiences watch the movies for fun. Without a good story, no one wants to watch your movie, and it's useless to place more advertisements." rdquo;DMG Media CEO Dan Mitz said.

Under the above circumstances, some producers began to consciously look for long-term partners to provide commercial sponsorship. At the 2009 Guangzhou Auto Show, China Film Group announced that it has established a strategic partnership with Shanghai GM. Shanghai GM's brand Cadillac will sponsor the filming of 20 works of China Film Group, including this year's "Confucius" and next year's "Founding the Party".

In addition, in April this year, China Film Group and Shanghai General Motors announced the implementation of the Young Directors Program to support young directors in filming. Big productions do not lack money, and small productions do not need money; famous directors do not lack money, and young directors lack money has become a rule in the industry.

Judging from the small-budget films released in 2010, almost all of them lost money;"Ocean Paradise" had a box office of 10.4 million yuan, which made it difficult to recover the production cost of 8 million yuan;"Decisive Battle in Shama Town" had a production cost of 16 million yuan plus 8 million yuan to operate, and the total box office would have to reach 60 million yuan to make a profit, but judging from the current box office, it is doomed to lose money.

Han Sanping, chairman of China Film Corporation, has repeatedly stated that supporting young directors will be one of the important contents of cooperation with Cadillac.

In addition, this cooperation did not choose immature cooperation methods such as simple implantation and commercial sponsorship. An industry insider engaged in film implantation told reporters that judging from the current situation of car advertising embedding films in China, most cars and the themes of movies are not related to the content, and movies that achieve the matching level of "Transformers" are rare. ldquo; Instead of creating some weak advertising images or promoting yourself counterproductive, it is better to adopt other cooperation strategies." rdquo;