When Disney first dropped the full trailer to the next instalment of the Star Wars franchise, The Force Awakens, there was still months to go before the film would roll out in cinemas.
Globally, the Disney brand only had this three minutes of content to keep audiences excited in the lead up to the film, however recently installed ANZ CMO for Disney, Gavin Ashcroft explained that instead of relying on content, the brand used partnerships to keep the force alive.
Speaking at the Forrester CX Marketing event held in Sydney today (5 April), Ashcroft says that Disney inked local partnerships with the Holden Racing Team, Covergirl and Optus in order to create experiences that a wide range of fans, new and old, could get invoved with in the run up to the film's premiere.
“The strategic use of partnerships through this journey, especially in the context of the scarcity of content, was absolutely a strategic decision that we made to navigate us through to the premiere,” he says.
Another event Disney tapped into was the world's first live-stream unboxing event, which saw merchandise from the new films unveiled over 18 hours, in 15 cities and 12 countries. The event also saw six Target Stores and 16 Toys R Us stores in Australia opening to fans at midnight so they could get their hands on the merchandise the second it went on sale.
There's years between each movie roll out but The Star Wars franchise is an “evergreen” franchise, says Ashcroft, adding the brand also holds events to ensure that Star Wars is front of mind all year round. Some of the events Ashcroft highlighted were 'May the 4th' and 'I’m Your Fathers' Day'.
“We have to have a calendar that’s designed around what happens between movies,” Ashcroft says.
Another important aspect is the authenticity to both the Disney brand and Star Wars, and the connection between the two.
“There needs to be a continuity to these stories, they’re not islands, they are connected ... there’s a progression to the story as well,” he added.
Ashcroft joined Disney from Carat (the brand's media agency) in June last year, where he was formerly chief strategy officer for Australia and New Zealand.
Managing director of Disney locally, Catherine Powell, previously told AdNews that the brand's marketing is constantly evolving with Ashcroft joining to bolster the brands partnerships.
“Gavin has come on board to focus on integrated marketing and franchise planning, media strategy, partnerships and our social media strategy,” Powell said.
“Disney is in a very, very strong position at the moment. We have such incredible content across our brands so that dialogue for the partnerships is very easy,” she added.
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