‘Cross media convergence and synergy are vital processes in the successful marketing of media to audiences’ to what extent do you agree with this statement? (50 marks)

                 In this essay I will express my opinion on whether convergence and synergy across media is actually vital and not just important. Convergence describes two phenomena, firstly involves technologies coming together for example, mobile devices having the internet installed, and also media industries diversifying, for example adverts or trailers for movies appearing on social media websites such as Facebook. Synergy is the promotion or sale of a product or media text via various subsidiaries, also how a company advertises and commonly in film includes two major companies coming together to create a high budget, prone to succeed, film.

                    Cross media convergence and synergy are important marketing practice for frontloading the films marketing campaign, as seen with Harry Potter produced by Warner brothers which has played a huge part to children’s lives, and have shown highly successful strategies of synergy, for example, play figures and a whole section of Universal studios theme park in Florida called ‘The Wizarding World of Harry Potter’, this shows that if done well cross convergence and synergy can be a key role in profitability of a film.

                      Two contrasting films I have studied are ’12 years a slave’ produced by a number of individuals and has small production companies, and ‘The Hobbit: The desolation of Smaug’ produced by Peter Jackson. There are clear differences between both, for example, 12 years a slaves budget was $22 million whereas The Hobbit was budgeted to $250 million, which is classic of a production from one of ‘the big six’, in this case once again Warner brothers with many subsidiaries such as warner bros studios. The convergence of subsidiaries and companies allows them to set high budgets and use a larger range of methods of synergy such as video games and soundtracks. The hobbit was always deemed to be successful due to its links with ‘The lord of the rings’ and therefore its cemented pre-existing fan base, let alone the fact it was part of a trilogy and had fans of the book prepared to see the movie also.

                     Warner brothers (produced the hobbit) holds the largest market share in the production industry with 19.7%, which is higher than any of the remaining ‘big six’ e.g Disney and Paramount. On the other hand, 12 years a slave was produced by small;l companies such as regency enterprises and was in association with film 4, non of which are in the big six. This meant they had a lower budget and probably let synergy strategies, especially seen as the movie was firstly only marketed as an art house theatre production, which ended up being hugely successful, grossing up to $56 million.

                     Synergy worked well for both films but The hobbit was more on a mass scale of public marketing. 12 years a slave was firstly released in cinemas producing business for companies such as Odeon and Vue and and food concession companies. After this stage the book was once again released to show links with the film, then the audio books on software such as audible and iTunes. The novel was republished with a cover taken from the movie. This is a clever strategy for synergy as fans would be prompted to buy both versions, maybe for collecting reasons or just because they want everything to do with the movie. A DVD was released along with a soundtrack and then the rights were given to Amazon prime to showcase the movie to membership holders, all increasing the movies profitability and range of marketing methods. In this case it seems that synergy and convergence really may of played a huge part to 12 years a slave’s success as it slowly built up larger concepts of synergy which unexpectedly saw the movie turn-over and gross basically double their starting budget.

                     In contrast, the hobbit’s release was major, everywhere you went you’d see advertisements, trailers, posters, radio adverts etc. They used traditional advertising such as billboards and using Warner brothers other movies to attract them to the hobbit which was at that point ‘coming soon’. The movie followed a number of the same steps as 12 years a slave, although before release it already had a huge expected success due to its pre-existing fan base and hugely successful novel. When released at the cinema queues flooded all cinemas and in the first weekend it grossed $73.5 million, almost a third of its budget therefore was paid back in the first weekend of release. When the film was released in December 2013, the book was also released with a number of different covers attracting top fans to buy them all therefore improving marketing of the movie and also book, example of synergy and also convergence. The hobbit also released soundtracks and eventually gave rights to Netflix , which is a huge movie showcasing website/app in comparison to amazon prime, which also represents the contrasts between the two movies’ production, marketing and distribution. As the production was underway, the movie was still making money via other methods such as play figures and costumes, being sold in outlets such as ‘toys r us’ and ‘wal-mart/asda’ and other merchandise such as clothing sold in outlets such as HMV, these are methods of cross media synergy which 12 years a slave never used, The hobbit gained interest of the public also by using different medias, such as their Facebook page, where all you needed to do was like the page and that gave you access to all the sneak peeks, behind the scenes and pre-release information about the exciting release.

                     The use of social media is an example of a pull media strategy, letting the ‘active’ audience view and like what they wish and take from the media what they would want instead of getting choices and ideas pushed at them , such as the hypodermic needle model which indicates audiences get injected with the medias ideas for example, Katy Perry’s- part of me video, about female marines.

                      Marketing of a movie is very important in comparison with success. There’s free marketing techniques such as networking, community work, social media and email and also paid marketing such as advertising on billboards and sponsorships. Depending on how high the budget is or how successful initiates how many different marketing techniques are used. The hobbit pulled out all the stocks with marketing in every way possible because simply, warner brothers have the resources and money to do so, whereas 12 years a slave particularly stuck to in cinema advertisements or online, without the help of outlet stores selling merchandise for the upcoming film, like the hobbit.

                            In conclusion I do believe that synergy and convergence is highly important to success of a films marketing although I don’t believe it is essentially vital, although it does have a huge impact on profit for a film, in this case, 12 years a slave turned over $53 million and the hobbit made $960.5 million clearly showing that large marketing techniques via synergy and convergence improves the chances of a films income increasing, although it’s not actually vital for the success of a film and its marketing.