Nielsen PreView, a Nielsen service has presented its latest research reports about the US Box Office. The report says that the more the buzz generated by a film online, the more is its box office gross.
The report, released Tuesday, takes into account some 400 films which grossed greater than $100 million in box office sales. Neilsen noted that these films were more likely to have and elevated level of attention on blogs.
Is this true in the Indian context as well? Well, I would say yes.
People on the blogs, in India, are increasingly discussing movies. Films are popular among Indians and one can find a lot of blogs about films. Over the years, some of the films have managed to get a lot of hype online. Prominent among them were biggies like Don, Dhoom:2 etc. Although both of these were average, content-wise, they went on to become superhits with Dhoom:2 shattering some records. Pre-release hype for both the films was very high.
Dhoom:2 got talked about a lot in the online media, creating curiosity. There were speculation about the story, character, even actors. People were already discussing a guest
appearance by John Abraham in Dhoom:2. Multiple theories were being discussed in the online world to justify John’s probable appearance in Dhoom:2. Some said, John Abraham will be doing a guest appearance. Some said, Hrithik is John Abraham, albeit post plastic surgery. Others wrote Hrithik is John with a mask (like in Mission Impossible). And while some wrote that Hrithik is John’s brother out to avenge his brother’s death, still others wrote how Aishwarya is John’s sister who hires Hrithik to do the robberies. For the movie buffs, like me, here is a link to all those theories.
All these discussions fuelled audience interest and Dhoom:2 ended up being one of the all time top grosser in India.
And as soon as I was out of the theatre, I wanted to know about Dhoom:3. And so did many, I believe. Again, there were still speculations. Primarily, about the star cast. Hrithik is too big. Dhoom:3 has to be bigger than this. So there are rumours about Shah Rukh Khan starring in. Still many believed Yashraj will go as far as to cast even Aamir Khan in the project. I am putting a video, made by a fan. It’s a trailer for Dhoom:3. Ofcourse, it is a fake, made from the scenes from the existing movies. However, it still garnered more than one million views. Clearly audience interest is very high for the next installment of Dhoom series.Dhoom:3, whenever it comes can be assured at least of a mega opening. This is viral marketing. And the better part is, it’s all without the studio’s intervention.
[youtube width="425" height="335"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkMN-iq13B0[/youtube]
Film production houses are now waking up to the facts that online is now an important media. Aamir Khan already maintains a blog that he himself writes. One look at the unstructured posts and it becomes evident that there is no PR agency doing the job for him. Just see the number of comments at his posts. 2000 comments are a common thing there.
There is still a lot of potential for the buzz marketing of Indian films through the online medium. And I guess, some studios are at it already. Entering “Tashan” in Google gives around 6 lakh results. Now, starring Akshay Kumar, the current box office hot favourite, this film is genuinely a hot cake. But 6 lakh results ? Even Dhoom:2 has 4.7 lakh results, after around one and a half year. We cannot deny the possibility that Yashraj is actively involved in creating buzz online about the film. With corporatizing of the film industry we can expect more studios to follow the suite soon.
As long as I get my share of stars with popcorn, nobody’s complaining.
Great post ankit. Though I might be surprised if Yashraj is behind any online buzz creation. I think its the opportunistic bloggers and forum creators who have understood the search trends for a soon to be released movies that might be populating the search results. Was there any tashan official website launched yet?
right..
also another fact can be that a whole lot more bloggers are getting into the picture.. and most of them do inevitably say something about the film industry.. am sure at least 7 in every 10 personal blogs must have at least 1 films review..
another aspect is producers getting behind the net.. I read an interview about akki’s new movie on msn today.. and the interview was of the producer sajid nadiadwala and the about the the film mroe than the actors in it.. I quickly went over to their (nadiadwala’s) website and saw a whole bunchof press releases about this movie “kambakht ishq”.. and for a movie buff like me that was quite a surprise considering i hadn’t heard of the flick before..
the whole point of that long para.. that perhaps you are right.. it might be more to do with production houses getting serious about the net… which is good
Yes, the online presence and info of indian movies will create that much needed hype for the movie which is about to be released. In my opinion blogs, especially entertainment and society blogs can be a relevant medium to advertise.
regards
simple way of life
@Rajiv
Yashraj is serious about business.Last heard, they were recruiting people from IIMs. There is a high probability that a lot of online stuff that we keep seeing about their movies is actually injected by them. Its foolish to think they will ignore such a marketing opportunity.
@Maneesh
Exactly
Interesting Reading. I was surprised to see 2000+ comments in Aamir Khan’s blog. Good work
Yeah Its true….Aamir Khan has created a blog of his own….which clearly signifies tha need of the film industry to make online marketing for the success of their films….and as far as the Yash Raj banner is concerned their movie does well in India aswell as abroad and the success for their movie abroad depends largely on anline mareting…be it the likes of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jaenge(i loved the movie) or DHOOM:2….they are on for it….
Yashraj has indeed taken internet seriously for tashan promotions.
They have launched official Facebook and Orkut communities… links below
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10506249063
http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=47375752
Users are discussing all sorts of stuff…. they also have some exclusive All the best video clips by the stars…..
An insider told me that they will be posting some very very exclusive content shot only for the net soon on these communities.
Way to go Yashraj !