Content Publishing, Mobile, Online, Social Media

A Dead Social Media Account is a Sad Thing

Luke Winkie at Daily Dot has a post up about just how sad the abandoned Twitter accounts for movies that flopped at the box-office are. I completely agree, and it’s a problem that’s not just confined to those movies that performed well below hopes and expectations. It happens to almost all movies.

abandoned building

Content marketing – of which Twitter, Facebook and other status networks and micro-blogging services are just one component – is all about, from my point of view, sustainability. It’s not just about what you’re publishing on Twitter tomorrow or next week. It’s about how you build a workflow and program that’s going to serve the needs of the program for six months or more.

Now I know that movies are unique products. They have, on average, a six month content lifecycle that runs from the first trailer through theatrical release and then more or less ending with home video. Blockbusters like The Avengers family of films, The Hunger Games franchise and so on are going to have longer periods of activity that can stretch up to a year and a half out from theatrical release, but those are still the exception and not the rule. So I get that what I would consider the basic rules of a content marketing program don’t strictly apply.

That’s why I’ve long maintained that movies and TV shows are better served by not setting up their own social media accounts, instead piggybacking on the accounts of the studios, distributors or networks.

Half the challenge of setting up a new account is sourcing the content, but let’s assume that a studio or network is going to have that down. They know where material is coming from, how it’s being approved and so on. The other half, though, is building up a critical mass of an audience. That, in my experience takes one or more of three factors: 1) Time, 2) Coordinated cross-promotion and air-support from established channels and 3) Money. Let’s address each one:

Time: You start on day one with zero and half to go from there. But it may take months to build up an audience of any notable size, meaning all that material that’s being posted in the meantime is going out to a minimal audience. Now granted, the materials that are released closer to release – presumably when there’s a decent audience built up – are more important, but it also means the ROI on the program as a whole is a sliding scale, starting off at very low to non-existent and progressing upward over time.

Air Support: This is a conversation I have all the time: I’m all for breakout accounts when there’s a unique value proposition that can be more fully delivered on outside existing channels. But if it’s being done for vanity reasons and the success of those splinter accounts is dependent on support from those existing accounts, then what’s the point of breaking that content out? That’s true for long-term accounts but it’s especially true for campaign-specific accounts, which accurately describes most every movie effort.

Money: If you don’t want to wait you can always pay to promote the account in question to increase awareness and reach. But the ROI will remain the same as in the Time equation since you’re pouring dollars not only into production and distribution but also then for promotion. In other words, you may gain an audience twice as fast, but you may be spending twice as much upfront to do so.

My recommendation is always – always – for long-term sustainability. This goes against existing models for movie campaigns, but I’m not sure existing models are still valid. And even if they are in some cases, experimentation shouldn’t be limited to those who simply don’t have the budget to follow what’s considered to be the standard playbook.