"Cross media convergence and synergy are vital processes in the successful marketing of media products to audiences." To what extent do you agree with this statement in relation to your media area?

To some extent I agree with this statement as cross media convergence and synergy are important processes in order for certain films to be successful. Cross media convergence is the way films and other products are produced and distributed to other marketing platforms in order to publicize the film from another aspect. An example of a global institution which does this is Walt Disney who distributed the high budget film of Star Wars: The Force Awakens which had a gross budget of $306 million and earned a box office of $2.068 billion. Disney is a conglomerate institution as it’s a company that owns large numbers of companies in various mass media such as television, movies and the internet. An example of some of the companies Disney owns is Walt Disney Studies, Pixar Animation Studios and Lucasfilm. Lucasfilm alongside Bad Robot Productions produced Star Wars: The Force Awakens which shows the effect of how Disney is a conglomerate company and owns Lucasfilm which overall earns Disney lots of profit and publicity.  An example of cross media convergence is through social media how sharing the film through Facebook can lead to the film being discussed on other media platforms such as Twitter or Instagram. This is an effective marketing method as it doesn’t cost Disney any money for this marketing as the audience are taking it upon themselves to talk about the film which overall leads to more success and profit for the film and the film products.

Ex Machina had a budget of $15 million and earned a box office of $36.9 million and it was produced by Film4 and DNA Films and it was distributed by Universal Pictures. Universal Pictures is also described as being one of Hollywood’s ‘big six’ but they weren’t as effective in their marketing campaign promoting Ex Machina. Ex Machina used guerilla marketing setting up the main character a Tinder account and matching it with numerous users. This was an effective marketing campaign as through cross media convergence the audience then took it upon themselves to discuss this publicity stunt on various social media and earned the film free publicity. But I feel that other processes of the marketing are important too as wide spread marketing is very important which is displayed in Star Wars but wasn’t in Ex Machina as the film would then introduced to many members of the audience. By not having lots of marketing with different companies, it’s possible that the marketing technique won’t appeal to all demographics. This factor isn’t present in the marketing of Star Wars as they used many techniques appealing for all age groups and both genders.

Synergy is the interaction and cooperation that two or more organizations have on certain products which means that agents can produce more effective marketing techniques in order to achieve maximum profit, publicity and success for the film and the film products. In relation to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, synergy was used to tie in different companies to release products and merchandise that would be available for the audience to buy. Disney Consumer Products and Lucasfilm announced that the 4^th of September 2015 would be called “Force Friday” and that day was the official launch of all the merchandise for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Starting at 12:01am, fans could buy various products relating to the film such as toys, books, clothing and various other products at the Disney Stores and other retailers around the world. Some merchandise that was available was the popular Lego Star Wars sets and it was the third most popular toy that was bought on Black Friday and the Star Wars Battlefront game which Sony holds the exclusive rights for. Disney also released merchandise targeted at girls including “The Dark Side” mascara by Covergirl and jewelry such as a Stormtrooper necklace at Kay Jewelers. This is an effective marketing technique as it promotes the fact the target audience is both females and males aged 12 and over which demonstrates how the film isn’t just traditionally for males. This overall benefits the marketing of the products as females will be more likely to take an interest in the film as it’s more openly accepted that the film is targeted at both genders. Ex Machina on the other hand did not use synergy to promote their film which I feel was a decision that had an impact on the success rate of the film. I feel by cooperating with other organizations the film will be available to a wide spread audience and will help achieve the maximum success and interest rate in the film.

Ex Machina did release a soundtrack including the artists Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury and it included songs that were in the film including ‘The Turing test’, ‘Watching’ and ‘Ava’ but there was also many more. This soundtrack album was released digitally on the 20^th of January 2015 with an LP AND Compact Disc UK release in February 2015 by Invada Records. This demonstrates synergy as the organizations are working together to produce this soundtrack and sell to the audience. But, apart from this soundtrack no other official merchandise was released and I feel Ex Machina should have released merchandise for the film as it’s an effective way to earn more money through the products and as members of the audience see the products they’ll be reminded about the film so will encouraged to go and watch it. This will cause an increase in the amount of interest shown for the film.

Overall, I feel that cross media convergence and synergy are vital for the film’s success but I feel the actions of the distributers promoting the film have a large effect on how successful the film will be. This is shown through Star Wars as Disney showed successful marketing over a wide spread campaign with several companies in contrast to Ex Machina which Universal Pictures did not achieve successful marketing which meant the vast majority of the target audience were unaware about the film.