Brand marketing promotion: Analysis of Marvel IP’s brand positioning strategy!

To be or not to be? That is the question. There are undercurrents behind the huge box office success of Avengers 4.

According to Maoyan data, as of 22:31 on April 21, the box office of "Avengers 4" exceeded 500 million, breaking the pre-sale box office record in Chinese film history. Some media predict that the box office of "Avengers 4" may surpass "Avatar" and break the 10 billion mark.

Behind the huge box office success of "Avengers 4" are the chaos caused by theaters maliciously raising prices and charging sky-high service fees. According to statistics, the ticket price for "Avengers 4" is as high as three or four hundred yuan, and some tickets are even hyped up to thousands of yuan. The difference between the ticket price and the actual cost is charged by the theater in the name of "service fee".

While movie fans were complaining, the People's Daily officially criticized the high ticket prices for "Avengers 4" and criticised the ugly behavior of the theaters. Since the People's Daily spoke out, relevant departments have taken quick action to cut ticket prices, and the sky-high ticket prices for "Avengers 4" have gradually returned to normal.

The sky-high ticket prices for "Avengers 4" are actually affected by market supply and demand. As of 10:00 p.m. on April 21, Maoyan Movies counted 1.461 million people who wanted to watch "Avengers 4", and Tao Piaopiao counted 2.334 million people who wanted to watch "Avengers 4", far exceeding the Spring Festival films. As the final chapter of the Avengers series, "Avengers 4" has attracted the attention of countless movie fans. After experiencing a long period of financial difficulties and deficits, major cinemas have seized this rare opportunity, raising prices arbitrarily and reaping the box office revenue like harvesting leeks. But it must be said that this incident has caused a great deal of negative impact on the big IP and brand "Avengers".

Industry insiders say that the sky-high box office of "Avengers 4" will not only lead to rampant piracy, but will also raise fans' expectations for the film itself. Be careful, because the higher it is praised, the bigger the fall. Some film management professionals also stated that malicious price hikes may cause customer resentment, leading to a lack of box office sales, which is not conducive to film profitability in the long run.

But in the long run, if theaters maliciously raise prices and charge sky-high box office fees, it will cause considerable damage to the Avengers IP and even the Marvel-related industrial chain. The internal logic of IP profitability is: attract fans through content - maintain emotional connections - build an "IP" brand - attract "passersby" groups - create economies of scale.

The malicious price hike of "Avengers 4" not only hurt the hearts of countless fans, but also filtered out countless "passers-by" who were waiting because of the high ticket prices, reducing the brand's influence. A temporary price increase can certainly bring profits for a certain period of time, but in the long run it is not conducive to the sustained and stable development of the entire ecological industrial chain.

This year marks the 80th anniversary of Marvel Comics. Since its establishment in 1939, Marvel has made its fortune with superhero comics. Through cooperation with Hollywood companies, it has brought countless movies to the screen and achieved amazing box office success.

What kind of crises and challenges will Marvel face after this incident? From comics to movies, and then from movies to the industrial chain, in the "Internet +" era, how does Marvel construct its own IP industrial chain? If we want to replicate Marvel’s success, in the “Internet +” era, how to build an IP film industry chain is a question we need to think about.

1. Choose the right IP

There is no concept of "IP" movie abroad, but there is a similar term, namely "high concept". The definition of "high concept" was proposed by Hollywood film and television mogul Barry Diller in the 1970s. The three conditions that a high-concept movie must have include: attractive visual images, ample business opportunities, and a grand and attractive plot.

The definition of "IP" comes from "high concept". "IP" refers to intellectual property. Simply put, an "IP movie" is a movie adapted from a big "IP" such as best-selling novels, comics, or even music and games.

When it comes to selecting and creating IPs, Marvel can be called the master. The creation of domestic IP movies mostly focuses on selecting "explosive" IPs with a large fan base, but Marvel has given us other inspirations.

1. Choose IP that fits a specific cultural background

    The emotional connection between users and brands comes from the "sense of identification" with the brand, and the sense of identification comes from the user's discovery of self-worth . Simply put, users can find commonalities between the brand's connotation and their own values.

       The theme of Marvel's "superheroes" is a product based on specific American values ​​and the context of the times. The War of Independence, the Declaration of Independence, and the Civil War have left indelible marks on the American land. These marks are not only reflected in America's unique "Confederate" political system, but also in the cultural connotation of the United States' advocacy of "individualism."

Americans who rose in the war and gained freedom in the war admire heroes, need heroes, and hope to become heroes. This is the origin of Marvel's "superheroes". The character setting of "superheroes" adapts to the psychological state of Americans who need heroes.

Secondly, Marvel's strategy also adapted to the specific historical context at the time. Marvel Comics was founded in 1939. At that time, the United States was in the midst of an economic crisis. The United States is experiencing unprecedented despair. Unemployment and bankruptcy have cast a shadow over the hearts of the American people. The American people have never needed a hero so much to lead them out of suffering. At this time, "superheroes" came into being. Joe Simon and Jack Kirby created the specific character of "Captain America" ​​for Marvel, creating Marvel's first "superhero".

Marvel first opened up the American market with the concept of "superhero" and won the hearts of the American people. It then entered the world with its accumulated influence and became an international "big IP." Specific cultural imprints can enable "IP" to win the hearts of users more quickly and gain recognition from consumers. This is something the Chinese film industry needs to learn from.

2. Scalable IP content

Scalable IP content gives the film industry chain the possibility to expand its boundaries. The richer the content of the IP and the larger the worldview, the more it can operate continuously around a theme, build related sub-brands and industrial chains, and attract a larger fan base through cross-media narratives.

Marvel's success is a great example of this. As of 2014, Marvel has more than 8,000 heroes including Spider-Man, Captain America, Iron Man, and more than 1,000 parallel universes. The grand worldview, complex characters, and identical themes have created the core concept and brand connotation of the "Marvel Universe," and also given Marvel Movies the possibility to continuously create sub-stories and sub-brands and extend the industrial chain.

In Marvel's comic book series, all heroes live in the same world view, each story is connected to other stories, and each character is both independent of and has common characteristics with other characters. The audience can learn the complete story of the hero from each movie, TV series or game, but they can only understand part of the story of the "Marvel" universe. To understand Marvel's entire worldview, the audience is required to watch other stories in the Marvel series. This makes the Marvel brand continue to appeal to audiences.

2. Building IP Brands

The essence of Marvel's success lies in building the Marvel series into a brand and operating related cultural industries with the concept of brand operation.

1. Transmedia narrative: breaking the boundaries of media

"Cross-media narrative" is a brand-new operational concept. Simply put, it is to narrate a story system that is interrelated in content but independent in plot on different media platforms , so that the characters are related to each other, the story content is fuller and more three-dimensional, and the user audience is wider. Under the operational concept of cross-media narrative, the boundaries of IP are infinitely extended. Users gathered in one media may be attracted to another platform, giving IP a lasting influence and forming a brand effect.

All Marvel superheroes live in the same worldview, and the theme of all stories emphasizes "resistance", emphasizing the unyielding struggle between people and society. Under the same world view, Marvel has created a series of related cultural products. These include: movies - "Captain Marvel", "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse", "Deadpool", etc.; comics - "Ant-Man", "Captain America", etc.; TV series - "Daredevil", "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.", etc. Within the same worldview and theme, stories are both independent and interconnected, prompting users to constantly dig out related stories through various media, which can maximize user stickiness and expand the brand's audience.

2. Extending the IP industry chain - building derivative products

Justin Lamberth, general manager of Marvel Studios, said this when talking about the Iron Man 2 series of games. "The creativity of the movie played a leading role. We first made the movie famous, and then took some content from the comics and licensed it for use in the game, separating it from the movie content."

Marvel's related derivative products are divided into two parts: online products and offline products. Online products are represented by games adapted from Marvel movies such as "The Amazing Spider-Man" and "Iron Man". Offline products are mainly movie-related peripheral products. For example, in the movie "Iron Man 2", Tony Stark is a famous inventor. Many of the products he uses or invents can be made into related derivative products, and the Iron Man series helmets are one of them. Related posters, mouse pads and mobile phone cases are the most basic and lowest-end derivative products in the derivative hierarchy.

Marvel is not the first, nor the last, to build IP into an industrial chain.

The IP transformation of the "Ghost Blows Out the Light" series is a typical example. Every sub-story of "Ghost Blows Out the Light" has either been put on the big screen or made into related TV series and games, forming a complete ecological industrial chain. Taking the movie "Mojin: The Lost Legend" as an example, "Mojin: The Lost Legend" produced related variety shows, music products, and "Mojin: The Lost Legend" special key chains based on the movie, forming a series of online and offline industrial chains, creating a certain economic effect while promoting the movie.

But compared with the Marvel series, the world view of the "Ghost Blows Out the Light" series is far less vast, the plot is not complicated enough, and the content is not as rich. To create a series of industrial chains with "high concept" characteristics, "Ghost Blows Out the Light" still has a long way to go.

3. Marketing strategies based on the “Internet +” era

1. Precision marketing using big data technology

Marvel has a stable cooperation with big data marketing companies such as AIO. Through big data technology, Marvel can accurately capture relevant content, draw user portraits, place relevant creative advertisements and make box office predictions, avoid potential competitors, and choose appropriate screening times.

Marvel's marketing methods have always been talked about with relish, from releasing some related plots and content from time to time to whet the audience's appetite, to the recent Shanghai "Avengers 4" festival, every marketing campaign has captured the hearts of consumers. Big data technology plays an indispensable role in Marvel's marketing.

2. Online cross-platform promotion

In addition to bringing prosperity to technology, the "Internet +" era has also brought prosperity to media. Online cross-platform linkage marketing is the product of media prosperity. Through cross-platform marketing, Marvel has maximized its marketing reach, allowing advertisements to reach audiences of different classes and age groups to the greatest extent.

Media such as WeChat Moments, Weibo, public accounts, and websites are all products of the Internet age. The "Happy Girls' Day" campaign launched during the marketing of "Captain Marvel" and the ticket-grabbing campaign launched at the Shanghai Festival of "Avengers 4" both used different online platforms to maximize their marketing influence.

4. The Crisis of the Marvel Brand

The People's Daily commented on the high ticket prices of "Avengers 4" and criticized the theater owners of "Avengers 4" for "being too greedy", which can be regarded as a brand crisis encountered by the Marvel brand. Although the sky-high ticket prices were not Marvel's original intention, it was rather a manifestation of the theater's "raising prices arbitrarily." But it has to be said that this incident caused considerable damage to the Marvel IP series.

The value of a brand comes from user recognition. In the era of "user first", the value of a brand is even created by users. The cinema's malicious act of raising the ticket prices of "Avengers 4" has greatly hurt the hearts of fans. Firstly, the extremely high ticket prices ignore market rules and far exceed the value of the movie itself; secondly, the sky-high ticket prices will raise the expectations of movie fans, which will inevitably make them feel disappointed after watching the movie. Most importantly, the extremely high ticket price of "Avengers 4" has kept some cash-strapped moviegoers out of the movie theater, and has also discouraged potential consumers from watching the movie, which is not conducive to the brand's long-term influence.

Some fans have even complained about the ticket prices for "Avengers 4," claiming that the high ticket prices "are like watching it while sitting on Captain America's lap." Indeed, due to the high demand, people will pay for the ticket price even if it is high, but movies are not a one-time business. When comments about "not worth the price of the ticket" spread online and when consumers form a bad impression of the Marvel IP, how far can the Marvel IP go?

The People's Daily harshly criticized "Avengers 4" for dealing a heavy blow to the Marvel IP. Although this was the fault of the cinema, the subsequent chain reactions still need to be resolved by Marvel. In this incident, how Marvel responds will determine whether it can win back Chinese consumers who are gradually leaving and restore its brand image.

"Timely" and "sincerity" are the two key words that helped Marvel get out of the shadow of the incident in a timely manner. You know, it is difficult to establish an IP brand, but it is even more difficult to maintain the brand value.

5. Some suggestions on the construction of IP industry chain in the "Internet +" era

Based on the above, the author summarizes several suggestions for building an IP industry chain in the "Internet +" era:

1. Select the appropriate IP.

2. Build an IP brand.

3. Extend the relevant IP industry chain.

4. Formulate relevant marketing strategies based on the "Internet +" era.

5. Maintain brand value through timely public relations.

We look forward to the day when China will have a cultural industry giant like Marvel, and we also hope that China will be able to create an international IP brand as influential as the "Marvel Universe." The author believes that this day is not far away.

Author: Fang Yun

Source: PR Home