Have you gone to see the animated feature, Coraline yet? I finally did. Admittedly, I’m a little late on the bandwagon but it was still great. While the charming 3D animation is fantastic, it’s not the only innovation that should be celebrated. The film’s mash up of traditional Hollywood movie promotion and some very smart “pinwheel” marketing concepted by Wieden+Kennedy, proved to be very successful in more than just the kiddie market. With Phil Knight, founder of Nike, heading up the film’s promotion and pushing the distribution company, Focus Features, to launch the campaign a little differently, Coraline was able to bring in $7 million more than was originally projected. If you’re interested in finding out how a 70-yr-old billionaire founder of a shoe company got involved, click here. What particularly caught my eye was the innovative marketing tactics that I started following on the web about a month ago. Wieden+Kennedy has the uncanny ability to be able to get the consumer engaged and people talking. The campaign for Coraline was no different. They understood the fact that this movie could appeal to an older generation with it’s emotional core and used this to reach out directly to niche markets that included toy makers and design geeks. The agency sent 5o of their favorite blogs a handcrafted box filled with original pieces from the production(such as Coraline’s wigs or her hand knitted sweaters). Each box was individually unique and brought great curiosity about the film to their recipients. Many of them can be seen here. What a clever way to get influencers to talk about a mainstream children’s movie. It’s good to see the importance of design culture recognized and the power of word of mouth in action.

Have you gone to see the animated feature, Coraline yet? I finally did. Admittedly, I’m a little late on the bandwagon but it was still great. While the charming 3D animation is fantastic, it’s not the only innovation that should be celebrated. The film’s mash up of traditional Hollywood movie promotion and some very smart “pinwheel” marketing concepted by Wieden+Kennedy, proved to be very successful in more than just the kiddie market.

With Phil Knight, founder of Nike, heading up the film’s promotion and pushing the distribution company, Focus Features, to launch the campaign a little differently, Coraline was able to bring in $7 million more than was originally projected. If you’re interested in finding out how a 70-yr-old billionaire founder of a shoe company got involved, click here.

What particularly caught my eye was the innovative marketing tactics that I started following on the web about a month ago. Wieden+Kennedy has the uncanny ability to be able to get the consumer engaged and people talking. The campaign for Coraline was no different. They understood the fact that this movie could appeal to an older generation with it’s emotional core and used this to reach out directly to niche markets that included toy makers and design geeks. The agency sent 5o of their favorite blogs a handcrafted box filled with original pieces from the production(such as Coraline’s wigs or her hand knitted sweaters). Each box was individually unique and brought great curiosity about the film to their recipients. Many of them can be seen here.

What a clever way to get influencers to talk about a mainstream children’s movie. It’s good to see the importance of design culture recognized and the power of word of mouth in action.