With films skipping theatres and going for direct-to-digital release on OTT platforms, the onus of promotion of these films lies not just on the producers and actors but also on the video streaming services. And it wouldn’t be wrong to say that these guys are taking it damn seriously.
The scene of content marketing and promotion has changed quite a bit in the past few years with the advent of social media savvy generation. While earlier it was mostly the trailer that was released a few days before the film’s release, now the promotion campaign has become more layered and complicated.
There is the release of first look of the film either through a poster or motion poster, then there is release of the looks of lead actors, some snippets from the film, album/song release, some behind the scene shots, insights or facts about the film, casual interviews of the cast and crew and much more.
Other than the above, social media campaigns are conducted which might include ‘viral challenges’ with actors tagging their fellow actors, contests, quizzes, puzzles all attached with some prize, making viral memes and much more. The sole motive behind all this is to create a buzz on social media and increase the scope of reach to as many people as possible.
We had earlier seen ‘challenges’ as means of promotion for films like ‘Padman’, ‘Lipstick Under My Burkha’, ‘Beat pe Booty’ and many more. Now we find OTT platforms taking it a notch further by adding quizzes, multiple choice questions, contests alongside various challenges for promoting not only films but also web series.
Whether it’s the recent ‘Bond Of Yaara’ challenge by Zee5 for Vidyut Jammwal starrer to Yaara or quizzes and contests for shows like Mafia, or the Shakuntala Devi memes by Amazon Prime Video, or Netflix roping in web series actors like Yashaswini Damaya, Ayush Mehra, Aisha Ahmed, Danish Sait or influencers like Dolly Singh Kusha Kapila, Srishti Dixit for small video series for their YouTube and other social media accounts.
All this makes it evident that the landscape of promotion campaign has had a makeover and is evolving according to the situation. And for that, these OTT platforms have a whole team working day and night, being as innovative and creative as they can be. How things will change when the theatres reopen is not yet clear but marketing and promotions are going to be a lot more hectic and challenging than ever before.
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