What’s new at the pre-show?
Sept 22, 2009

Cliff Marks and Bill McGlamery
Leading cinema-advertising companies share their latest efforts to make the show before the main feature engaging and entertaining.
Cliff Marks
President of Sales and Marketing
National CineMedia
Tell us about your typical pre-show and what the content usually consists of.
NCM’s FirstLook is a digital entertainment and advertising pre-feature program showcasing content from some of Hollywood’s most popular entertainment companies, such as A&E Television Networks, NBC, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Turner Broadcasting System, Universal Pictures, Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures and Warner Bros. along with national, regional and local advertising seen on approximately 15,500 digital screens nationwide.
FirstLook provides both a high-quality entertainment experience for patrons and an effective marketing platform for advertisers. Designed with the audience in mind, FirstLook ends approximately at the advertised movie showtime (when the film trailers begin) and its entertainment content segments are rotated between theatres about every two weeks to help ensure that frequent moviegoers are entertained by fresh content. Multiple versions of FirstLook are presented every month throughout NCM’s media network, and each FirstLook presentation is tailored to a specific film rating category to provide age-appropriate content and advertising for the movie audience.
Who are your pre-show content providers?
A&E Television Networks, NBC, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Turner Broadcasting System, Universal Pictures, Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures and Warner Bros.
Which pre-show content has been especially successful?
Our entertainment content has been very successful, especially content which is uniquely created for FirstLook and highly relevant for the moviegoing experience. We have just renewed multi-year deals through 2011 with NCM FirstLook content partners A&E Television Networks, NBC Universal and Warner Bros.
What new forms of content have you introduced this year?
Several new clients are buying NCM’s cinema-advertising network for the first time in 2009, including clients in the packaged goods, sports apparel, import auto and telecommunications categories. We are also starting to see interest in the technology area, a whole new category for us. Earlier this year, E*Trade gave movie goers a “FirstLook” at a “Director’s Cut” featuring the outtakes from its popular “Talking Baby” Super Bowl campaign. The humorous campaign really resonated with movie audiences and elicited terrific response. Another great example was when Ford Motor Co. launched a nationwide campaign using NCM’s FirstLook pre-show to highlighting its charitable giving with a two-minute content piece shown before “G” and “PG”-rated films. The content focused on the philanthropic work of the Ford Motor Co. Fund—both its financial contributions and the thousands of hours of volunteer work performed by Ford employees. Ford, like a lot of advertisers these days, followed the people who are flocking to the movies during the downturn.
Does audience feedback or interactivity play a role in your pre-show?
Yes. NCM is taking cinema advertising beyond the big screen with a new 360° mobile, online and onscreen campaign called “r8 it” (pronounced “rate it”). It is an interactive mobile text/WAP polling program that gives moviegoers a unique way to share their thoughts immediately after enjoying a film in their local theatre. Through messaging in onscreen spots in NCM’s FirstLook pre-feature program, Lobby Entertainment Network (LEN) and box-office handouts, audiences are asked to text in the name of the movie they just saw, and will then receive a message back featuring a fun question that asks them to rate a particular element of the film. As an incentive to play, “r8 it” participants become eligible to win movie tickets for a year.
Results of the polls are showcased online at www.NCM.com/r8it and through the new “r8 it” app that is distributed over the NCM Media Network of more than 20 entertainment-related websites.
As an extension of FirstLook online, NCM.com’s “r8 it” provides a unique integrated marketing platform with multiple touch points for clients. Maintaining that connection with people when they are looking for showtimes or after they left the movie theatre was always the missing piece of the puzzle, and now we have a way for advertisers to complete the picture. Perhaps even more importantly, “r8 it” also creates fun, user-generated original content that encourages interaction with the brand and will keep audiences coming back for more.
What makes a good and effective pre-show? What kind of content works best?
A good pre-show is entertaining and relevant to the moviegoing experience, while at the same time being an effective marketing platform for brands. The entertainment content from our world-class partners works especially well, but any advertising that is high-quality, innovative and interesting can resonate on the big screen and generate high rates of recall.
What does your research show about the audience’s feelings about your pre-show?
Cinema is an engagement medium—it provides one of the most engaging ad environments of all major media, with consumers paying attention to ads at a rate of two to five times greater than television.
Research shows that consumers have become accepting of cinema advertising as part of the moviegoing experience—according to E-poll, 90 percent of audiences prefer pre-show entertainment content and advertising over a blank screen. One reason that audiences are so responsive to NCM’s cinema advertising is that our FirstLook pre-feature program is respectful of the movie theatre experience, ending at about the advertised movie showtime when the film trailers begin. As discussed previously, we also rotate entertainment segments approximately every two weeks to help ensure that frequent moviegoers are entertained by fresh pre-show content.
What new content will you be introducing?
We are working with more and more brands to create long-form content so that in the future, audiences might enjoy an entertaining content segment from a consumer brand, as well as from our current group of movie studio or television network content partners.
Screenvision
Screenvision’s digital pre-show aims to revive the great tradition of pre-feature entertainment programming. Their host-format magazine-style show—the only hosted show in the industry—is designed to entertain moviegoers while sparking interest in advertiser messaging. Host Bradford How guides moviegoers through the pre-show experience, introducing advertiser and entertainment content segments that run alongside exhibitor messaging and entertaining trivia, all supported by a contemporary music soundtrack.
Content segments consist of a variety of behind-the-scenes looks at film and TV programming, world-premiere music-videos and branded entertainment pieces. Advertisers and content partners provide this entertainment-driven material, which is seamlessly blended with Screenvision-produced content to create an attractive 20-minute show that’s become part of the moviegoing experience.
Advertisers have included HBO, the E! cable network, Verizon, Daimler Chrysler and the National Guard.
Screenvision’s digital pre-show offers a variety of brand-building opportunities for advertisers: Long-form content segments give more time to reach and engage consumers with messaging. Product integration through content or hosted segments enables advertisers to creatively highlight key product/brand attributes.
Sponsorship of show segments, music, trivia or the entire pre-show provides valuable brand presence in front of an attentive audience. And traditional slide and spot advertising allows advertisers to run existing creative on the big screen.
Screenvision’s high-definition digital pre-show plays on 7,000 screens nationwide, with the majority deployed in the top 50 DMAs across 25 key exhibitor partners, including some of the nation’s most luxurious theatres. Participating circuits include Carmike, Clearview, Coming Attractions, Consolidated, Dickinson, Great Escape, Harkins, Loeks, Malco, Mann, Marcus, Muvico, National Amusements, Pacific, Premiere, Rave, UltraStar and Wehrenberg Theatres.
Consumers give Screenvision’s digital pre-show high marks, achieving 94% receptivity levels, with even higher praise from young adults and teens.
(adapted from pre-show information at www.screenvision.com)
Bill McGlamery, President
UniqueScreen Media
A Cinedigm company
Tell us about your typical pre-show and what the content usually consists of.
The preshow program is a hosted voice-over package made up of local advertisers utilizing both motion graphic ads and video spots along with PSAs for our exhibitor partners and Preflix-branded entertainment content. The entertainment content includes music-videos, behind-the-scenes interviews and commentary and movie trivia.
Who are your pre-show content providers?
The entertainment content is all developed in house utilizing materials provided by the studios and Cinedigm’s Entertainment Group.
Who are your leading theatre customers?
We represent over 50 exhibitor partners and all are an important part of our footprint. Some of our largest exhibitor partners include Marquee, MJR, Jack Loeks, Santikos and Carmike, Alliance, Allen, B&B, Cinema West and Neighborhood.
Which pre-show content has been especially successful?
The music-videos and interviews have been particularly successful, as they offer more audience interaction and are often content that isn’t readily available to the public.
What new forms of content have you introduced this year?
We have added text-messaging features and song download options to some of the content.
Does audience feedback or interactivity play a role in your pre-show?
Yes, on a small scale today. We are currently working toward more audience interaction with the program.
What makes a good and effective pre-show? What kind of content works best?
We believe an effective pre-show maintains a balance of unique, entertaining content and well-crafted, targeted advertising which captures audience members’ attention and slowly draws them into the overall moviegoing experience.
What new content will you be introducing?
We are working on several things, from increased audience interaction with both the entertainment and advertising content to a new content provider that would bring current Hollywood news and movie entertainment to our program.
http://www.filmjournal.com/filmjournal/content_display/news-and-features/features/cinemas/e3i2abb9d0f8f4b8fdcbedead32044fde4d?pn=1

Hollywood Branding, started in 2001, works with 30 marketing companies to provide a simple, stress-free avenue to research and run ad campaigns on movie theaters nationwide.
Our database includes every cinema in the U.S. that offers any kind of advertising opportunity on-screen or in the lobby. We offer free planning, rates, research, and media buying expertise.
Some of our clients include Disney, US Army, the Food & Drug Administration, the state of VA, the city of Los Angeles, the FL Health Department, the state of OR, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, eBay, and the National Crime Commission.
or call: 314-776-1018
Like this:
Like Loading...