SEM, PPC, and the Cannes Film Festival
Today is day 1 of 10 at the Cannes Films Festival, and since I'm all into video/vlogging, I thought I'd take a look into how I might be able to conduct and case study of the festival's online marketing strategy. Well, I didn't have to go very far beyond a preliminary Google search to notice that the producers and directors of films being showcased at the Cannes have all seemed to have foregone the the opportunity to ride the buzz around the festival to promote their own work on the internet.
Basically, instead of getting lost in the Cannes crowd, they could be using some pretty basic search engine marketing to raise the profile of their respective work. By bidding on certain keywords that users will be searching for and bloggers will be publishing, film makers could make sure that their films show up in the sponsored search results and in the PPC ads on Google's publishers network.
Right off the bat, if you Google the term "cannes", you'll notice two things: (1) the festival is the first result; and (2) there is only one sponsored result, and it is for hotels. If I'm Googling the town, especially this time of year, I'm likely interested in the festival, and if I'm interested in the festival, I'm likely interested in the roster of films. Since there is nothing on the SERP about listings, there is a huge opportunity for film-makers to promote their own titles buy paying to appear in the sponsored search results.
By bidding on the keyword "cannes," moreover, they can also show up on Google's publisher's network, and with all the buzz on blogs about the festival right now, that represents an additional massive opportunity. Users reading about the festival will be exposed their film titles through PPC ads, and will be more likely to remember them in the future.
If you focus your search to "cannes film festival", the results are even more disappointing. There are absolutely no sponsored search results whatsoever. It would seem that even tourist-based businesses have largely foregone this opportunity to capitalize on PPC advertising.
What can be concluded from all this is that the film industry still doesn't appreciate the most basic component of online marketing. While they no doubt put considerable resources into websites for individual titles (and possibly viral campaigns), they seem to have ignored search engine marketing altogether. More to the point, however, is that if you're going to pursue PPC advertising as an online marketing tactic, doing so when you can capitalize on seasonal trends is optimal: much of the buzz has already been generated.
At a time when bloggers and the mainstream media are going to be abuzz with gossip and news about the Cannes Film Festival, bidding on related keywords is ideal. Furthermore, many of these film-makers are hoping to attract attention so that they might secure distribution deals. Implementing some basic search engine marketing, then, couldn't hurt. By bidding on said relevant key words, not only will more users be exposed their titles, but the traffic that ensues will raise the search engine ranking of those landing pages which means that they'll gain better exposure in the organic listings -- especially if those landing pages contain keywords related to the Cannes Film Festival.
