Ambient Marketing (Ambiguity & Recognition)
Ambient marketing is the strategy where when you advertise something it doesn't necessarily hit the consumer straight away, but the more they see it, the more they recognise it. This is the marketing tool that utilises ambiguity and recognition when promoting a product/project. For example, 'The Dark Knight Rises' which was released on July 20th 2012 promoted itself through the use of ambiguous trailers and posters that hinted nothing untoward the actual story or plot, all it revolved around was a date; a single date that would be assumed by the consumer to be the release date (see right). |  |
This poster is a powerful promotional tool, it leaves so much ambiguity as it reveals nothing toward the film, not even the film title! But the marketing team behind Christopher Nolan's trilogy are well aware how large a film 'The Dark Knight' was. So taking this into account they expect the audience to recognise what the film is just by involving the logo and a matching genre style. So they rely on the symbol to be recognised and the audience can suspect that they are advertising the final film of the trilogy. Yet, the ambiguity is what creates the interest in the product, only a release date creates a self awareness on how big the film actually is and people will not want to miss the release date. As Batman has such a vast and varied fan base we cannot assume we can generate the same publicity that these posters and trailers did. But using the least amount of information creates suspicion and interest which is how we will convince people to watch our documentary. So taking from this we will use posters and flyers to advertise the project but keep it very ambiguous much like 'The Dark Knight Rises' and then we will promote it in a bigger venue like the universities SU when there is a big event and have our advertisement on a big screen so that everyone can see it. Then due to ambient marketing people will recognise it from the flyers and the posters and will take more of an interest in what it is about.
This television advert for The Dark Knight Rises is the perfect example of ambient marketing, it is ambiguous as you are not shared any information about the film, the more this advert was shown the more intrigue was built up. There were other versions of this trailer adapted for more variety but the essential use is to capture the interest of the audience.
QR Codes & Mobile Websites
We will be creating our own mobile site that has all our interesting facts and short clips that are not part of the documentary that can keep consumers interested and always updated on our project. It will allow 'behind-the-scenes' areas to people and benefit the users who visit our mobile site. We will make it as interactive as possible, getting people to send in their own superhero designs, who's their favourite superhero and why. This will keep people connected and interacting on our site whilst promoting our own project further. The use of QR codes will be to connect people directly to our mobile site through scanning on their smart phones making it easier to access and appeal to a wider audience, especially a younger more technologically capable audience who make up a large majority of our target market.
QR Codes QR CODES stands for 'Quick Response code'. Trademark for a type of matrix barcode. This has become a very effective and powerful tool in marketing companies products. Companies have stated placing their own QR codes on their posters and other promotional synergy so that consumers can scan through their smart phones and access additional products and services. The attractiveness in incorporating he codes lie in the speed of its readability and its large storage space. A good example in using these codes for its speed is pictured on the right, the code is designed in the picture of the game and when it is scanned it takes the consumer directly to the download page, giving the consumer more purchasing power as they can buy the product as soon as they are enticed by the advert. We will be creating our own code to place on our posters to allow access more in our project (behind the scenes, stills, fun facts). Using this site: http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ - John Bird (New Media Application) |  Above is the code created which takes you straight to our Yola site. We want to develop this tool and create a mobile website which has all of our backstage and behind the scenes information and interesting facts and clips which adds depth to our project and site. The QR codes can be placed on our posters and flyers so people who have the "Scan" app on their smart phones can scan the code and be directly taken to our mobile site (explained below). |
Mobile Website Having mobile version of your website immediately creates a better user experience and satisfaction as they are designed for handheld services, which makes a positive impression when it counts. As they are designed for mobile standards and decisive download speed allows more browsing and less waiting around. This allows you to immediately engage users with mobile specific aspects of your site, therefore if you are a local business more and more users will be able to access the site through location aware technology that will connect each user when they are in geographic proximity. |  http://mobile.dudamobile.com/site/jmukstudios_yolasite Above is the QR code that when scanned through a smart phone directs you straight to our designed mobile site (and a link). |
In terms of an improved search a mobile website improves the ranking within mobile friendly search engines such as Google and Yahoo and therefore will allow the mobile site to have a placement in a larger number of mobile and local directories. Everybody has heard of the expression actions speak louder than words and that is exactly what a mobile site will prove. It will immediately help us stand out and will present a positive and modern brand identity, a mobile website will make a positive statement before anything has been said. They can be accessed anywhere at anytime this creates a better opportunity to connect with users in new and inventive ways wherever they may be. When speaking about having a competitive advantage a mobile website will definitely provide this as it will put you in a position to stand out from your competitors, however just having the mobile site isn’t enough if it does not look good on a smart phone or tablet then the user will move onto a site that does. Therefore making your site appealing to the consumer is very important in terms of capturing the visitor’s attention whilst you have it.
The mobile web is no longer a concept, it is widespread reality that will impact anyone hoping to connect with their target audience online.
- Michael Dunningham
Here is a screenshot of our mobile website from a smartphone.
Social Networking
Our YouTube channel has been up and running for a while now, it used to go under the name of BigBirdProductions which reached just under 2000 views before JMUK Studios took over and has quickly reached 800 views. YouTube is now essential for media companies to have and utilise by uploading all their new videos. |  |
It is a fantastic tool to gain publicity and probably the most influential to getting promotion. We upload all our videos created from the past 3/4 years, all motion graphics and educational projects. It instantly creates an online portfolio for companies to show off their work.
Twitter is more useful to update quickly and inform your followers new information. It is ideal for a company of our stature to use to update on when we a re filming, keeping online records of our ideas. Our Twitter account has been running since June, when we uploaded our Facebook page. It will be really useful to upload production stills whilst we are filming to keep our followers up to date and help promote our products. |
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JMUK Studios Facebook page has been running since June 2012 when the business was established. Incorporating Facebook is now a necessity for promotion nowadays. It helps connect your friends with your page and constantly updates their news feed with information. Exploiting this to advertise yourself is a very powerful tool. We have used this Facebook page to upload images, videos and other mediums we have created for education and for our clients. |
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Using Adobe Dreamweaver John and Matt started creating JMUK's own website, the domain name jmukstudios.co.uk has been purchased and this holding page has been uploaded, the full website is still in creation but this website will be the HUB of the business. It will contain everything that the social network sites contain, from updates, to all forms of media projects and a list of all employees and contact details and an online portfolio. |  |
Forums, Blogs and Pitching
Forums
JMUK Studios are now signed up and registered to a massive forum called SuperHeroHype, with dozens of different discussions between thousands of users. We can promote our project through this forum to thousands of already dedicated superhero fans, we can inform them of our documentary, apply for funding (if anyone was willing to donate), spread awareness, get people to visit our site and our mobile site, send in their own superhero designs. We can literally create a massive interactive base through posting frequently on this forum to initially get as many people logging on to watch our final product when it is streamed live at the festival.
 Home site for SuperHeroHype. |  Forum lists for SuperHeroHype. |
Blogs and groups JMUK Studios are also signed up to the website www.reallifesuperheroes.org this is a site where, once you have signed up, you can contact hundreds of members directly who are part of the real life superheroes community and people who are fans of it. This is going to be a very useful tool into getting other primaries for our documentary. You can post messages on forums, you can start blogs, you can contact the website owner directly or even message individuals directly who are members of this group. |
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Pitching to companies We have applied to different companies to pitch our idea : BBC, Channel 4, UK Film Council. We have also sought into trying to get some funding from the UK Film council as well. We are yet to hear from the media companies as of yet. |
Primary/Offline Promotion
T-Shirt Designs We will be designing T-Shirts to hand out to people on campus and off campus so that people start to recognise the promotion is not just on posters and online. All the shirts will have on will be the date and an interesting style that matches our documentary style, but nothing more, we do not want to let on what it is that is happening on the date. The more people that wear these T-shirt it will boost recognition and our ambient marketing. Even if people do not take notice of it straight away, in their subconscious they will be making connections between all the posters and flyers. This will create a large amount of interest and intrigue into what is happening on the date that is shown on all of our advertising. As stated above in the ambient marketing section, the more ambiguous we make our advertising and the less we give away the more likely people will want to find out what it is. |  |
Posters & Flyers The posters we are going to design will be based around the promotional campaign that the 'Dark Knight Rises' uses. The use of ambiguity creates more interest and intrigue from the consumer as stated above in the ambient marketing section. On our posters we intend to keep it as minimalistic as possible, the idea is to put the date of the screening and the website in which it can be viewed, so hopefully it gets people talking "what is this date about? whats happening on this website at this date?". We hope this will get more people logging on to find out what it is they may be missing if they do not log in to watch. We may have a tag line along the lines of "Don't miss out" or something similar to insinuate that it is a screening of a film. |
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We will be putting these posters up around the university campus, but not just Winchester, we have contact with marketing students in Plymouth who are happy to help promote our campaign in the South West. We intend to branch far out of Winchester as we can. We will be creating flyers as well as posters so that they can be handed out to people on the street as well as posted through their letterboxes. The earlier we start this promotion campaign, the more frequently we can spread these posters and flyers around. The more we post the more people are going to recognise the scale of the advertising, if we were to just do one set of posting flyers then people may forget but if we frequently do it over gaps of time people then will remember it. If they see it on T-Shirts and posters as well they will start to gain an interest in the project.
Sex Sells It is a widely known factor that sex sells in advertising. As shown in the Deisel advert to the right it is self aware of the well known advertising campaign that centres itself around selling the lifestyle not the product. Common examples of this are in fragrance, cloths and car adverts, they always make it seem that if they buy the advertised product that they will follow suit to the lifestyle that is advertised with the product. A good example for this advertising campaign is the 'Lynx Effect' it states that if you use Lynx you will instantly become a sexual attraction to any woman as shown to the right. This advertising campaign has gained the product a lot of publicity good and bad, but the well known phrase "any publicity is good publicity" stands strong with this one. As people have complained about it being sexist it still gained a lot of publicity and is a successful brand. |   |
This is an idea we may think of adopting by having a scantily-clad dressed woman dressed like a superhero on our posters advertising our campaign. It would increase our viewers of the male population as they would be more intrigued into finding out what this woman is advertising. It can also be a risky move as people found selling sex in advertising limits your audience to, age-wise and gender-wise. Women are probably less likely to watch a film that seems to be advertised towards men and it also limits the age range as it would make it appear its for more of a mature audience. But it is an idea we are discussing and developing as we develop our posters and flyers.
We will also put up dates and whereabouts to where you can catch the superhero in Winchester as we send him out onto the streets, award prizes for the people who find him first. This creates a sense of competition which is what people thrive on and it makes the whole project more interactive with it's audience. People will be more likely to follow us on Twitter or Facebook to keep updated on the latest thing that is happening with our Superhero.
Publicity Stunts We will be creating our own superhero as stated in John's documentary ideas to promote ourselves to the public with a more personal approach. Dressed up as our own superhero that we will create we will go to the public and ask them to create a name for him. We will be getting involved with the audience which will boost our awareness and we can tell them first hand to get involved on our mobile website to send in their own superhero designs and ideas. We can get our superhero to give out leaflets, flyers and posters to people so that it creates a more memorable moment to the individuals we meet so they will be more likely to go onto our site and watch our project. |  |
