The PR Playbook for the 98th Academy Awards
By Sanjeev Wignarajah
The 98th Academy Award nominations were announced a week ago and Sinners leads the all-time record with 16 nominations. Last year’s Oscars was one of the strongest. We need to look at how studios leverage marketing campaigns for their respective films to be nominated from the film festival circuit to awards season and what PR firms can learn from them to create campaigns that are unique in their own right.
PESO Model
The PESO Model® is a communications framework created by Gini Dietrich and shared with the industry via Creative Commons. Learn more about the model on the Spin Sucks blog: https://spinsucks.com/communication/peso-model/.
Earned Media – Festival Buzz
Much of the 10 nominated films for Best Picture at the 98th Academy Awards received Oscar buzz thanks to the press and the Academy Motion Picture of Arts and Sciences voting committee. These reviews perk up interest for Film Twitter, film insiders, and movie goers that see the film at a film festival. Both Letterboxd and Film Twitter go hand in hand as each film gets glowing reviews from the community, which translates to word of mouth and a reason to go see it on the big screen. The same can be said for independent journalists who cover movies.
Shared Media – Social Media Reactions
Long before social media when a movie was great, people would tell their friends and family about it. Flash forward to now, a review can be in the form of a tweet or a YouTube video. Platforms like Letterboxd have changed the way the film industry used to be, not just a digital film diary but as a way to connect with other cinephiles while logging their film reviews. Independent content creators and podcasters specializing in movies would gain access to red carpet interviews and press junkets to interview the cast and crew about the movie.
The key takeaway…social media clippings and online news articles are your new best friend.
Spotlight Strategy
Studios go into the drawing board on how they will campaign a few of their films once the festival circuit is over. Instead of the traditional billboard campaign of years past and somewhat of a full on magazine spread. Studios would allocate a certain budget to spend on the Oscar campaign through different platforms.
The key takeaway is to utilize social media platforms and analytics to track the progression of the campaign from paid media to shared media.
And The Oscar Goes To…
What PR agencies and firms can learn from this is to craft a campaign that is unique and meaningful that ties into their client and to form a story around the message. As social media evolves into content driven with influencers collaborating with brands forming a story around a particular product. Agencies are going through the social media route not only to share their campaign with their respective client. In the post-strike Oscar era where small, independent studios like A24 and NEON Rated are thriving in their filmography winning awards as well as Netflix making ground and big studios like Warner Bros. That is absolute cinema.
Sanjeev Wignarajah is a freelance writer and photographer working with select clients and publications. He has a background in journalism and public relations from Centennial College.