The Role of the Distributor

The distributor has a very specific role when it comes to films and media, get it noticed, get it out and get it recognised, and they do it a few different ways.

First off the distributor must identify the largest possible target audience for what they're distributing, otherwise they'd be marketing to the wrong people and that would only fail, or at least not work as well and they do this by developing a distribution plan and a marketing plan.

There is a lot of competition, and I mean  ALOT! With over 500 new films released every year and around half a dozen major distributors in the UK alone (Paramount Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Universal Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures, Columbia Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures) each specific distributor has their work cut out for them as they've got to make their films stand out and make a profit!

The distributors have a few things they need to sort out before they can get the film out into the market. These include developing a release strategy, coming up with a release date and taking delivery of a 'master print' of their finished film. After this they have to present the film to exhibitors and negotiate various bilateral agreements to be able to show it in the cinemas, and only after this can they begin to think about marketing their film

Distribution Plan

They have to take many things into consideration when working out the target audience of a film they're tasked with marketing, including:

• Age range
• Gender
• Lifestyles
• Media consumption patterns
• Social networks they're a part of. 

With this information the distributors can make descriptions as to how and where a film is promoted, and despite having a specific target audience to aim for another factor distributors have to work with is trying to attract as many people as possible whilst still hitting the target audience.

Audiences aren't the only things the distributor have to worry about when they're creating a distribution plan... Things like:

• Competition - one example would be the films "Volcano" and "Dante's Peak", both volcano-themes disaster films released in 1997 and with such a similar target audience and plot there must have been some talk regarding making each film stand out compared to the other.
• STAR POWER! If you've got famous actors, directors, producers ect then advertise this, flaunt this! If fans of Pierce Brosnan see that a film they wouldn't normally be interested in has their favourite actor they might be tempted to take a gamble and go see it which can only be beneficial.
• Timing, I'm talking about holiday periods here. Christmas film in august? Horror in spring? Put them in December and October respectively and maybe you'll catch people in the festive mood, although I don't know many that get all excited around Halloween...
• Film certificates. It's no user marketing an 18 rated film to 10 year olds or a Uc to 20 year olds, chances are they won't be interested or even be able to get into the cinema to see it!
• Does it have a chance to get a few award nominations?
• Is the film's genre very niche or should it be marketed to a much larger audience?

Marketing Plan

With the distribution plan they also have to come up with a marketing plan which is created to raise awareness and engage interest in their product, in this case a film. There are loads of different ways in which this is accomplished, arguably, one of the best is simple "word of mouth". You can show someone posters, trailers and they may not be interested but the one thing that tips the scale could be their best friends telling them "Hey, that new Pierce Brosnan flick is good, you should go see it".

Other than this posters and trailers are the only other smaller-scale things used to promote the film. By advertising big starts (Like I mentioned earlier), creating a catchy tag-line (An example would be Jeepers Creepers 2s bone-chilling tagline, "He can taste your fear!") and making an all-round good trailer by following the conventions well the distributors can hopefully get a lot of people interested. With the fantastic new web 2.0, distributors can go further to create a buzz by not only advertising using internet pop-ups, but by using very successful viral marketing campaigns that will usually spread around the internet like wildfire!