The document discusses the marketing campaign for the 2008 film The Dark Knight. It summarizes that the campaign was highly effective in promoting the film through various methods, including viral marketing techniques that engaged with fans. Some key elements of the campaign included a fake newspaper called "The Gotham Times", a website called "I Believe in Harvey Dent", and the release of the first trailer in December 2007 which helped generate buzz. The viral campaign was very successful in raising awareness and anticipation for the film leading up to its July 2008 release.

1. Media Marketing: The Dark
Knight
By Clayton Milligan

2. I have chosen to base my Media campaign around the film, The Dark Knight. I have chose this film as it is evident that it was marketed in many different, effective
ways. The cast for the film was very strong, and the main characters were portrayed by actors who could play the role as if it was reality. Some of the main actors in
the film were Christian Bale as Batman, Aaron Eckhart as Twoface and Heath Ledger as Joker. These characters are some of the most recognisable in the film and the
actors were chose for a reason. Nolan chose to have Bale as Batman in the film because he decided that Batman needed to have a different voice to Bruce Wayne that
supported the visual appearance of Batman, this also explained how the other characters didn't’ recognise Batman as Bruce Wayne from his voice. There isn't a
specific reason why Eckhart was chose as Twoface however there is no doubt he was the right choice for the role, as his performance was flawless. This probably
would've been helped as he studies the character of Twoface closely before playing the role. Heath Ledger made an iconic performance as Joker and made the
character iconic when discussing the film. Simply, Ledger did not act, he became the character. Nolan chose him as he was fearless which is exactly what he wanted
the character to be. The producers of the film were Christopher Nolan, Emma Thomas and Charles Rovan. The director and screenwriter of the film being Nolan.
Nolan directed the successful films, Insomnia, Memento and The Prestige. This would make him the perfect man to direct The Dark Knight because it shows he is a
great director and he knows how to make a film successful. The fact that he wrote the film also adds to the reasons why he was the perfect man to direct it because
he knows exactly what he wanted from the characters, he restyled everything and made the character, Batman, what it is today. Nolan always relies on his Oscar-
winning visual muse, veteran visual effects supervisor Paul Franklin, who was the artistic genius behind both Dark Knight and Inception. The film was given a budget of
185 million dollars and would again be produced by the creative team behind Batman Begins. It was financed by Legendary Pictures and Warner Brothers, that later of
whom owns the exclusive rights to the Batman character. Warner Brothers has produced every Batman film since Tim Burton’s Batman in 1989 and at this point had
earned over $2billion from the film franchise that is Batman. Legendary Pictures was established by Thomas Tull in 2004. The company was responsible for co-
financing Batman Begins with Warner Bro’s in 2005 and by the end of that year they had signed a 7 year deal with Warner Bro’s to co-produce and co-finance over 40
pictures. The film runs for 2 hr 32 mins and in the opening weekend it made $158,411,483 across 4,366 theatres. The worldwide, box-office gross amounted to
$1.005billion which is ultimately already a huge profit to what was spent making the film. On top of this, there is also sales from many other things such as Blu-ray
DVDs and merchandise which can add to the profit. The film was released on 21 July 2008, there isn’t a specific reason in which it was released on this date, however
it is effective because the target demographic is aged between 12-35 and has a 12A classification. This makes the release date effective as schools are off for the
summer and therefore the target audience have the time to go and see it. The main gene of the films is obviously a superhero movie, however Nolan described it as a
“crime movie.” It also shows conventions of many other genres such as action and drama.
INTRODUCTION SLIDE

3. The purpose of a marketing campaign is to inform, raise awareness and change behaviors of target audiences. Firstly, a media campaign is used to inform people of a
film that is due to come out, this is so people know that the film is in the process of being made and can therefore decide whether they want to see the film or not. It
also has a purpose to raise awareness and increase the name recognition of the film which is being marketed. A marketing campaign is used to change the behaviors
of an audience as its goal is to motivate a specific target demographic to change their behaviors. That means you can motivate behavior change by grabbing the
attention of the individual with the most influence. A campaign is planned strategically and will use cross-media platforms to promote a film. Cross-media marketing is
a form of cross-promotion in which promotional companies commit to surpassing traditional advertisement techniques and decide to include extra appeals to the
products they offer. Traditional marketing is also commonly used to market a film. Traditional marketing is a kind of advertisement in which film makers used this
method in the early period to market their film. This type of marketing includes print advertisements such as posters, also billboards, flyers, adverts, newspaper, radio,
etc. Viral marketing is also used to promote a effectively promote a film to its target demographic. Viral marketing is a method of strategy film makers use where they
use existing social networks to promote their film. Its name refers to how consumers spread information about a product with other people in their social networks,
much in the same way that a virus spreads from one person to another.
Purpose of a marketing campaign

4. Marketing Products

8. 3 Products Linking Together
The trailer immediately shows Batman jumping of a building in New York. This suggests straight away to someone who is
unaware of the film that it is going to be an action/superhero movie due to his costume. It then goes on to show some other
main characters such as Harvey Dent and the Joker. The use of showing the Joker suggests the concept of good vs evil and further
enhances the idea that it is a superhero movie. Nearing the end of the trailer, we see the antagonist, the Joker causing danger
and destruction and we see Batman get in his car to go and stop him. The poster further symbolises the idea of good vs evil,
danger and destruction. This is shown by the fiery bat logo in the background, which contrasts with the majority dark theme of
the poster. Batman is higher than the camera which suggests he is superior and the protagonist of the film. The bat logo is
shown behind the films title and is also shown on the third image where it appeared on the side of a building in New York. It is
significant that the bat logo appeared as it links in with the setting of the film and also in the film the same logo appears when
somebody needs help from Batman.

9. Timeline
The dark knight viral marketing
campaign started in May 2007. It
began with a website called,
ibeleiveinHarveyDent.com with a
simple image of Dent’s actor Aaron
Eckhart.
2007
The first trailer for
The Dark Knight was
released on 17th
December 2007, and
was obviously the
first footage we saw
of the blockbuster
movie.
In 2007 Warner Bros set
up a fake news paper
called ‘The Gotham Times’
as part of their viral
marketing campaign, the
released articles aimed at
fans in order to promote
the film
Posters were released in 2008 ahead of the
films full release, these helped the films
promotion as they were saw by many
people.
The film was released in July 2008 and was a
massive success, partly because of its viral
marketing campaign.

10. Conclusion
The films marketing campaign was a massive success and helped the film become as successful as it was. This was due to the
way the campaign interacted with the target demographic in order to raise awareness about the release of the film. The viral
campaign for the Dark Knight captured and controlled the enormous passion of Batman fans to create a never-seen-before
level of buzz and anticipation. The campaigns success is emphasised as it won a Cannes Lions Cyber Grand Prix Award and a
Cannes Lions Silver Cyber Award and has proven to be the gold standard in immersive participation campaigns. Overall, the
award-winning campaign was dubbed “one of the most interactive campaigns ever hatched by Hollywood” by the Los
Angeles Times.