Star Wars

[Mr. GOH!]

I think you're right that no money exchanged hands, if it's true that it's difficult to pay to promote Instagram clips in people's instagram/FB feeds. 

 

But I think there are reasons it was not put on YouTube yet, including: Disney wants this to feel like a leak/sneak preview rather than a full roll-out of a trailer; Disney may want the Star Wars YouTube account to be for full trailers; to make folks accessing it on instagram feel like they're getting a special sneak-preview; and to allow it to propagate into more social media feeds (including pushing phone notifications when friends share or comment on the post, which I'm not sure YouTube even has). 

 

Also, Dean, the thing about lawyers is that we're not just experts on the law, but experts on everything. At least that's what we tell ourselves.

[TCP]

CowboyPoet always get it.

[Mr. GOH!]

Because this was bothering me, I checked with some friends who work with Instagram and do these sorts of promotional campaigns professionally, and they all told me that it is very likely Facebook and Disney have a done a deal such that Disney will promote video snippets on instagram in exchange for prominent placement in FB feeds, among other things. They all also said it is almost certainly the case that if anyone got dollars out of the deal, it would be Facebook and not Disney, but that it is most likely a low dollar-deal and more about using popular disney brands to help drive Facebook and instagram's video platform because Facebook is aggressively promoting video posts in people's feeds. One of them also said that YouTube is not nearly as useful for brands trying to go viral or propogate video into people's Facebook feeds as Instagram is. She reminded me that Facebook recently had 1 billion simultaneous users all looking at their feeds for the first time, so the value of a Facebook partnership is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay higher than a partnership with YouTube.

[deanb]

As I said, I would understand Facebook doing a deal for promotion, but for Facebook, not for Instagram. Facebook already provide favourable algorithmic placement for videos in an effort to help push it. 

 

Anyway we'll see the full trailer up on Youtube by end of this week (Instagram doesn't support full trailers, their limit is 15 seconds making it highly limited/useless).

[TCP]

Uhm, you guys are missing the obvious thing, right when this trailer hit, Instagram 7.5 was released which allowed support for landscape and portrait pictures and video. Showing a 15 second minitrailer, in the new landscape format, for the highest profile movie of the year was clearly part of a deal, which for Instagram would have been a great way to show off the new format. I would imagine Instagram paid for it, but there could have been other workings we're not aware of.... who knows maybe R2D2 will post an Instagram of a Hoth sunset in The Force Awakens. 

[Thursday Next]

Dean's probably right. A lot less thought went into this than most give credit for. Likely:

 

- What social media are we on?

- YouTube, Twitter, G+.

- Do we have anything on Instagram?

- Nope.

- Chuck a 15s trailer up there then.

[deanb]

So boss is a huge fan of Star Wars. Watched the originals in cinema n what not (I think he's said from some comp he did as a kid he got to see them early). Anywho, we're having a bit of back n forth on Friday about prequels, sequels, etc, n Indian colleague is just completely clueless to what's being said. So boss n I turned to him and have sorted out getting him the films, currently sat on his desk, with a suggestion of machete order. Now I knew he'd not seen the films, but he's completely clueless. This is gonna be great.

So far quick queries have been

- Is Jedi the green guy (explained that Jedi are a religion/warriors. Green guy is Yoda, head of the jedis)

- Is Darth Vader the hero (explained he's the villain, he can see why)

- Is it britsh or american film (explained it's a bit of both, even the new one is filmed in England, and a lot of the actors are british...though bad guys in the first films)

 

Kinda explained it's a bit like Lord of the Rings in space, you've got Jedi are like wizards, you've got special swords, and princesses n such. Seemed he liked that explanation. Been talking about how in the west even if you've not seen it almost everyone is familiar with it. Everyone knows who Darth Vader is and generally considered the best bad guy in films n such. Heck, nearly everyone knows "I am your father". Star Wars isn't the worlds greatest film by far, but it's huge culturally in the west. To go in knowing nothing is night impossible in the west. I envy him.

[deanb]

 We get it early. We get it early. We get it early.

 

In yo face rest of world. The empire strikes back!

[TheMightyEthan]

You always get movies early.  That'd be like me bragging about us getting a game before you.

[deanb]

They've specifically announced today they're bringing the UK date forward:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/34183688/uk-star-wars-release-date-brought-forward

 

(Also I'm pretty sure there's confirmation bias at play for yourselves, pretty sure it's infrequent to get films notably early and there's plenty we get months later)

[TheMightyEthan]

Maybe it's just the ones I care about that you get early (Marvel movies specifically come to mind).

[Mr. GOH!]

A whole day. Big whoop. But bully for the UK and France and UAE for getting Star Wars slightly early to goose its opening weekend box office numbers.

Edited September 8, 2015 by Mr. GOH!

[Thursday Next]

You say that now, but wait till some massive arsehole in the UK tweets a bunch of spoilers "for a laugh".

[Mr. GOH!]

I can handle that. I will probably not have a problem avoiding spoilers, since I'll be busy with family holiday stuff around the 18th and will avoid the greater Internet until the New Year (aside from posting for the X-Talk gift exchange, of course, but I trust you folks not to spoil the movie).

[TCP]

I can't guarantee I won't post a major spoiler in a status update on here. I'm just a douchebag like that.

[deanb]

https://imgur.com/a/ikGmU

 

Album of a lot of the models made for the original trilogy (and maybe the prequels, I've not gotten that far yet). RotJ Death Star always looks great.

[TheMightyEthan]

Silly dean, they didn't use props in the prequels.  It was just a bunch of naked actors on a green screen.

[TheRevanchist]

Oh, this is classic!

 

http://falcontoys.storenvy.com/products/14248473-pop-art-frosted-han-solo

 

I might have to get one and keep it in the pantry.

[deanb]

In another episode of "Facebook likely paying to promote Star Wars on their new platforms", this time actually having it on Facebook to promote the new VR player* (similar to last time: Youtube does VR and has for a fair while so yeah leaning much more to FB paying Disney for this).

Speeding along Jakku alongside the Star Destroyer from the trailers.

https://www.facebook.com/StarWars/videos/1030579940326940/?fref=nf

 

*Though weird they're doing it through Facebook and not something for Oculus Rift. But same with the "weird they're doing this through Instagram and not Facebook" thoughts last time.

[Mr. GOH!]

And I'll say it again: the people I spoke with who actually do these sorts of deals and who work daily with social media campaigns with Facebook and Google told me that it is highly unlikely Facebook paid Disney directly for the placement in a "Facebook will pay Disney $[number] to be exclusive." It's more likely Facebook gave Disney preferable terms for the ads and may have even co-produced the video for no fee. In fact, as a product manager for who is in charge of promoting her company's media offerings on social media told me, Disney may even have agreed to Facebook demanding exclusivity based on the vastly improved visibility of a Facebook post compared to a YouTube post. She told me the idea of Facebook approaching Disney to offer cash in exchange for publicity would be like the channel that shows the Super Bowl (or, for you non-USAns, the World Cup) approaching an advertiser and offering it money to only advertise during the Superbowl. 

 

Then again, none of these folks work for Disney or Facebook, so maybe they're wrong. 

[deanb]

Given CowboyPoet pointed out that the Star Wars trailer thing coincided with a Instagram update to add landscape video, and this coincided with Facebook supporting 360 video (which even got a bit of news coverage too: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34344431)I'd go with the theory it's Facebook approaching Disney for working on content to push their new services rather than Disney feeling it's a more favourable service for hosting videos. We'll likely still see their main trailers posted on Youtube, cos that's where they do best.
 
And yes normally if you're a bog standard company you'd be at Facebooks whim, but when you're the largest media franchise, and have ILM as your content production division to provide shiny VR video then they're going to work with you to help push that and their service. There's not really any shiny tech Superbowl would be looking to push. It's closer to say...Amazon financing Top Gear crew to push their video service.
 
Also as with last time I'll point out it's not entirely favourable given it doesn't properly work:

[Mr. GOH!]

Facebook definitely has an aggressive sales strategy. But it's not the general practice of ad sales folks to pay the advertiser anything. Disney may have gotten a deal, including significant low-cost-to-free technical assistance for making the 3D video, but there's very little chance Facebook straight-up cut Disney a check. 

 

I thought the video was cool, though; I noticed it on FB while I was still half asleep and that it adjusted to how I was holding my phone startled me to be more fully awake.

Edited September 24, 2015 by Mr. GOH!

[deanb]

Disney may have gotten a deal, including significant low-cost-to-free technical assistance for making the 3D video

 

The sequence, created by Lucasfilm's special effects team ILMxLAB, allows users to look in all directions as the camera whizzes through the sci-fi scene.

 

I'm not sure they need advice from Facebook on how to make fancy videos. Just a thought

 

I'm honestly not sure why you're still so focused on this being through their ad platform too. Facebook if anything are the ones promoting. Given Youtube, a competitor to Facebooks fledgling video service, has had VR video for a while (and Google even have VR cameras and such too) Facebook will be wanting to show their feature off (and their entire Oculus wing). Facebooks advertising platform division are likely nowhere near this, they'll be dealing with small fry business owners wanting to get 100K impressions for £20. This'll be much higher than that, especially working with a big client like Disney and a content house like ILM.

 

What's more news worthy for a relatively minor feature on FB; some short video of say...the Facebook offices or something like that, or getting content right from the Star Wars studio? That's how content marketing works: have content people want to put on your site and share and spread, then you don't need to pay for advertising. It's Star Wars.

 

Your friend would be spot on assuming it was a smaller business, i.e your work or something, but when it comes to it being a property like Star Wars and the oh so oddly coincidental timing of not just one but two new pieces of Star Wars content popping up on not just one but two of Facebooks properties on not just one but two feature updates it looks highly unlikely it's anything to do with their ad platform (especially when not two, but just one of the two services has an ad platform). Lest ye forget I do digital marketing for businesses too.

 

edit: not that any of this matters really cos end of day whether it's on Vimeo, Youtube or Funnyjunk it's still all

[Mr. GOH!]

Well, I asked my friends (and one colleague) about this directly regarding Disney/Star Wars and Facebook and two have direct experience with these sorts of deals between Facebook/Google and a large media company. I asked them about this directly after reading after my first post because the idea that Facebook would pay Disney to advertise for Disney made me think I was taking crazy pills both as someone who spent years working on developing marketing campaigns and as someone who has significant experience working with business-to-business negotiations.

 

I do think there's a deal between FB and Disney. But I don't think it involves FB directly paying for the opportunity to host Disney's ads. It may include a friendly rate for Disney and most likely includes exclusivity language, but, at base, Disney is almost certainly paying FB to promote the ads and not the other way around.

[deanb]

It's not Disney that's being advertised it's Facebook, using Disneys content. It's a mutually beneficial arrangement (though given it means Disney lose out on exposure for content limiting to one services instead of Youtube as well it's more beneficial to FB at the moment).

 

Also this isn't "ads" in so far as Facebook works, it's "content". As far as how Facebook works there's no difference between the video posted on Star Wars page than a video posted on my mums page. Disney do not need to pay Facebook to host this on their, and since they're the debut content it is highly highly highly likely that (given the Instagram thing as well) Facebook have approached Disney to produce exclusive content to promote new FB & Instagram features. It's highly highly unlikely that Disney went to Facebook and said "We are making a film in a super popular franchise and need to advertise it to get the word out, and we want to pay you money to host our trailers, despite it being free, and hey we'll maybe even put in the extra effort of cropping down a trailer to 15 seconds and keeping it landscape despite your app not supporting that until we posted our video, and we'll also spend time making a 3D set and a VR fly through at our R&D department despite your service not supporting VR video playback until the day our trailer is up". I mean maybe Disney was "yo we want to put a trailer on Instagram but cba to crop it can you code your app to do widescreen, chop chop". "Yo guys sorry to be a pain but we really want to do a mini VR trailer and stick it on your site, Youtube does VR already, you don't. Can you recode your video player to support that pls" Though a bit less likely.

 

As mentioned, it being Star Wars there's likely no need to even use Facebooks Ad Manager since it is popular content, would get spread around rather naturally. It has 72K Shares already. I have however seen adverts for their Star Wars Uprising, but that's a different product and company, and app adverts are a Facebook speciality. You've probably seen a fair bunch of them already.

 

http://marketingland.com/youtube-vs-facebook-video-two-titans-face-off-123419

Facebook wants you to stay on Facebook, if it has content right there for you to digest, such as an exclusive Star Wars trailer, you're more likely to stay on the site, and from there digest adverts (actual adverts, not content like a trailer) rather than click a link and vanish to Youtube to watch a trailer and their adverts. I imagine no one has failed to note that for months you now get curated news articles on the sidebar. Hey look, more content. As article notes they've already made deals with other content creators too.

 

As saying goes: "Content is King, Distribution is Queen and she wears the crown".