Major Hollywood studios and cable companies have joined forces for a significant push to expand consumer awareness of the value offered by Movies On Demand, a service that provides a convenient way to rent top-grossing box office hits on cable. The $30 million TV, print and online effort, “The Video Store Just Moved In” illustrates in a fun way how easy it is for digital cable customers to view movies in their homes with a click of the remote.
The initiative is made possible by the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing Co-op. Cable partners include Armstrong, Bend Broadband, Bright House Networks, iO TV, Comcast, Cox, Insight and Time Warner Cable. Studio partners include 20th Century Fox, Focus Features, Lionsgate, Rogue, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Summit Entertainment, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros Entertainment, Inc.
During the next 12 weeks, the advertising will feature a wide variety of recent release titles, some of which are being offered on Movies On Demand the same day as the DVD is available in stores (Day-and-Date). Marketing vehicles include TV spots, print ads and interactive media, and a dedicated website (www.cablevideostore.com).
The campaign also introduces a universal logo for Movies On Demand that will be used by all the participating cable companies and studios. Concept and execution for the campaign was handled by Berlin Cameron United. Media was planned and bought by OMD.
Allison Tierney, OMD’s Associate Director of Strategy, tells RBR-TVBR that the effort will specifically run on major broadcast networks (Fox, ABC, CBS) and nearly 20 cable networks. Program integrations are with ET and Access Hollywood; and 10 online sites will get the buy, including Fandango, Rotten Tomatoes, IMDb and TVGuide.com. Print will run on such as publications as Entertainment Weekly and US Weekly.
She gave us the full list:
TV (Paid Primetime, Syndication and Cable)
ABC
Adult Swim
AMC
Bravo
CBS
Comedy Central
CMT
CBS Television Distribution
Discovery
E!
FOX
FX
ION
MTV
Nick at Nite
Syfy
Spike
TBS
TNT
TRU
TV Guide Channel
NBC Universal
USA
VH1
Warner Brothers
PROGRAM INTEGRATIONS
Access Hollywood
Entertainment Tonight
ONLINE
Facebook
Rotten Tomatoes
Crave
Yelp
TVGuide.com
Menupages
Yahoo! Movies
IMDb
Fandango
MAGAZINE
Entertainment Weekly
OK! Magazine
US Weekly
Leading Movies On Demand distributor iN DEMAND reports that in two years there has been more than a seven-fold increase in the number of Day-and-Date titles offered to digital cable customers nationally. Furthermore, according to Rentrak, in 2009 eight of the top 10 performing Movies On Demand were released Day-and-Date with DVD, including “Bride Wars,” “Gran Torino,” “He’s Just Not That Into You” and “Twilight,” showing the power of such an offering.
RBR-TVBR observation: Needless to say, the initiative is set against iPTV downloads from NetFlix, Blockbuster OnDemand and the like (not to mention their via mail services). As well, the ubiquitous Red Box machines in convenience stores, grocery and department stores are putting a dent into VOD movies from traditional cable. Brick and Mortar movie rental stores are gone, but quickly advancing technology is making everybody scramble for those dollars. Convenience is the biggest selling point, right near price. We also should note that the reason the movie studios are behind this to is they likely make more money off of each VOD movie sale than from a Netflix online download, for example.
