Film partnership marketing lasts forever.....

When the UK Government decided in their infinite wisdom to close the UK Film Council and restrict the BBC’s budget they clearly were only thinking small short term rather than long term and holistically.

Anyone who doubts this should go and watch a charming UK Film Council/BBC funded film called “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen”.

A film has the power to keep on marketing a product forever through a symbiotic partnership. Partnership marketing effectively.  This can be both great if you’re brand that doesn’t change (Visit Scotland’s Scottish Highlands for example) and disastrous if your product is second rate or is being constantly redesigned or improved (any technology brand….).

The film shows some amazing shots of the Scottish Highlands which will inspire people across the world, (and bear in mind that I watched this to a packed house in Singapore), therefore marketing Scotland (if not London or Surrey as visiting suburbia and the Ministry of Fisheries probably isn’t top of people’s list….) as well as parts of Morocco  (as it wasn’t filmed in the Yemen bizarrely….they surely could have called the film Salmon Fishing in Morocco…..?) as they appear stunningly in the film for many minutes at a time with some breathtaking views of lochs and countryside.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSYuTFK8Eas&ob=av3e

The beauty of film partnership marketing  is that it is a partnership that keeps on giving! Every time someone sees the film via DVD, streaming, pirate copy, TV, ipad…wherever they will see the great Scottish countryside and admire it…and maybe wish to visit. There is nothing quite as a powerful as a editorial advert for a tourist destination in a film where people are engaged and focused on the  happenings within the film and, in this example, laughing at the majority of the film and therefore connecting happiness with the delights of the Scottish Highlands…..(and not forgetting Morocco….).

One of the most cost effective partnership/sponsorship deals I ever did was between what was at the time the UK’s No.1  sports website, Rivals.net (see Rivals.com for what it looked like but with a UK sports slant) and the English football film Mike Bassett – England Manager.

To this day that film is still used to criticize English managers! My deal means that whenever the film is shown on Channel 4 or watched on DVD or on line the Rivals.net brand still appears and it still being promoted to a targeted football audience. The brand, long dead since Sky bought it and killed it off, features on the football perimeter boards and background press conference boards featured in the film quite prominently to this day and forever!