Interactive Demand Determines Film Distribution

Utilizing a tool that is normally used to plan touring schedules for the concert industry, Paramount allowed their potential audience to determine how widely the low-budget horror film “Paranormal Activity” would be distributed, by clicking a “Demand” button on their site.  It started with a strictly limited release, then demand led them to open in select cities, and then they promised that if they got up to 1,000,000 demands, the film would get a nationwide release (and it has gone past that number now).

While this seems pretty cut-and-dry — increased demand is met by increased distribution — this was also part of the marketing campaign.  It got people excited, and the site helps people get what they want.

One of the co-presidents of marketing at Paramount summed up why they took this route to market the movie:

“Traditionally, when you cut TV spots or a trailer, you show the scariest parts of the movie, you build suspense, and then you actually have visuals from the movie to support it,” he said. “But because the movie works so well as a truly slow build into terror, we didn’t want to show your usual kind of scenes and cutting-style horror movies have been using. We wanted to use an experiential sell to help dictate how and where it rolled out to the consumer.”

Read the Ad Age article here.

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