Bright Era of China Entertainment

Chapter 841 Roadshow Promotion
The number of screenings a movie has at the beginning of its release determines the upper limit of the movie’s overall box office performance.

The subsequent screening schedule is based on the initial screening schedule. If the initial screening schedule is high, even if the subsequent screening schedule decreases, it will still be at a very high position relative to the market. Then, through continuous publicity, it will generate sustained popularity, so that the movie can have considerable box office revenue every day during its release, and finally end perfectly after the screening.

Therefore, the initial screening schedule is very important, and it can even be said to be the key and core element to the success of a movie.

The pre-sale box office situation before the release is a very important consideration in determining the starting screening schedule.

If a movie does not have high pre-sale box office, then the major theater chains, no matter whether it is Chenglong, Chuxuan or Liu Yifei, will schedule the screenings as high or low as necessary based on their own set of market prediction standards, completely in accordance with the commercial market. There is no point in arguing with them about anything else.

Therefore, before a movie is released, achieving high pre-sale box office is the main goal of the film company.

The key factor that determines the pre-sale box office is the market expectations brought about by the mass base.

How the mass base will be built and how the market expectations will be improved will depend on whether the publicity before the movie is released is strong enough.

As popularity and traffic gradually become the barometer of the commercial market, and with the development of the Internet, the popularity of an event can be seen more clearly, the capitalists of major theater chains have attached increasing importance to the degree of publicity and the popularity generated before the release of a movie in recent years.

Therefore, the promotion of a movie before its release is very important.

"Hello, teachers." Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei rushed to the hotel.

An Zhijie hugged Chu Xuan, then raised his hand and pinched Chu Xuan's biceps.

Chu Xuan laughed: "Why, testing your muscles when you meet, what kind of behavior is this?"

"Let's see if you can take the beating." An Zhijie joked.

He met Chu Xuan at the Cheng family team at the end of the previous year. During the one month of training before filming, he often wrestled with Chu Xuan in the ring for entertainment.

It has been more than a year since they last saw each other after the filming was completed in the Los Angeles studio. As Chu Xuan's boss, he wanted to see if he had neglected his exercise.

You don’t know until you try it. It turns out that there is something worth trying. This is rare for Boss Chu Xuan.

"You must be able to bear it. I don't have to practice every day, but I have maintained it." Chu Xuan said, and shook hands with Zou Zhaolong like arm wrestling: "Hello, Master Long."

During the filming of the movie, Zou Zhaolong taught him a lot about action scenes, and he has always called him "Master Long".

"Hello, Master Hong." Similarly, Kara Hui, who has taught Liu Yifei many action scenes, is also called "Master Hong" by Liu Yifei.

"Yuqi." Liu Yifei and Zhang Yuqi hugged each other. Zhang Yuqi was only half a month older than her, but her figure and face looked very mature. Although the two were not of the same kind, they could still chat about this movie, and they occasionally contacted each other by phone or text message.

In addition to these actors, Ti Lung, Ng Man-tat, Tsang Po-yee, Raymond Lam and William Chan were also present.

After the couple greeted everyone one by one, they heard the leader of the company's roadshow team say: "We will go in two groups. Mr. Chu, Mr. Liu, you are the male and female protagonists, one person in a team, or..."

The roadshow in mainland China is arranged by Brilliant Times, while the roadshow in Hong Kong and Formosa is arranged by Yinghuang Entertainment.

Hearing the polite question from someone from their own company, Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei looked at each other and asked for each other's opinions.

There were eleven actors present, including them. It was unnecessary for them to go on a roadshow in one place together. It was more reasonable and efficient to divide them into two groups and perform in two places at the same time.

"Hey, why are you breaking up such a happy couple? Just have one team for us and one team for you. There's nothing special about this roadshow." Zeng Baoyi said. On her side were herself, Ti Lung, Ng Man-tat, Raymond Lam, and William Chan, and opposite them were the couple, Zou Zhaolong, Kara Hui, Zhijie An, and Zhang Yuqi.

After hearing what she said, everyone had no objection.

"Okay then, let's go now?" said the leader.

After a short break, the company's roadshow team was divided into two, and together with the two teams of actors, they formed two roadshow teams.

In the underground parking lot, there were four business cars, two cars in each team, one car for the artists and one car for the team. After leaving the parking lot, they separated at the intersection and set off for their respective roadshow locations.

"I haven't had a road show yet, I'm so looking forward to it." Liu Yifei said in the car.

Everyone present smiled slightly, and Chu Xuan became suspicious: "Hasn't there been a road show?"

"Have you ever had a roadshow?" Liu Yifei asked.

"It seems not." Chu Xuan thought for a while and said.

There was also a roadshow for "New Police Story" back then, but because he and Liu Yifei were filming "The Legend of Sword and Fairy", they missed the roadshow with Cheng Long, Xie Tingfeng and others.

There are many ways to promote a movie, including offline promotion through roadshows, screenings, previews, premieres, newspapers and magazines, and online promotion through television, radio, the Internet, online media, program interviews, etc., and planning phased promotion plans based on the strength of the crew and the producers behind the film.

But no matter what the publicity plan is, road shows have continued for decades and are the preferred publicity method for almost every film company.

Because roadshows are low-cost and directly reach the masses, just like offline fan meetings, their sense of closeness and affinity can arouse the audience's higher expectations for the movie, and most importantly, the desire to buy tickets to watch the movie, and can expand the news and influence of the movie's release through word of mouth from the audience.

"Zhejiang, Hunan, Hong Kong and Taiwan..." Liu Yifei muttered.

"And Guangzhou." Chu Xuan added.

Roadshows are a way of promoting things region by region, basically taking the province as one big site.

The first major stop of their "Skyfall: Enemy at the Gates" roadshow was set in Zhejiang, with the starting point in present-day Hengdian and the final stop in Wuzhen, and their film would only be screened at the final stop, Wuzhen.

The two teams need to travel all the way from Hengdian, Ningbo, Hangzhou to Wuzhen, and give away free tickets along the way to attract people to watch movies in Wuzhen.

The reason why movies are only shown in one place is because of the unspoken rules of this industry.

If a movie is shown more times during the roadshow, then the number of people watching it when it is released will naturally decrease, which means that the commercial value of the movie will be reduced.

If the commercial value is reduced, it will become a factor in reducing the number of screenings when theaters consider scheduling screenings.

Since the movie is only shown in Wuzhen, why promote it in places other than Wuzhen?

This is a multi-point promotion method, which aims to make the movie as popular as possible.

Since the point is to spread it everywhere, wouldn’t it be better to use greater publicity resources and channels to reach the whole country at once?
There are still more than two months before the film is released. If we promote it heavily now, the audience will almost forget about it after more than two months, which means it will be ineffective promotion.

Moreover, explosive publicity will have to face competition from all walks of life in the marketing market, which is equivalent to investing a large amount of money to carry out a publicity that will be forgotten by many audiences. This is obviously not a correct way to open publicity.

Roadshows are low-cost and long-lasting publicity. The company has arranged nearly two months of roadshow publicity.

Although the popularity generated by a roadshow is small, through two months of continuous accumulation of heat from the roadshow, there will be a burst of heat in the public preview stage, and another burst of heat in the premiere stage. In the final pre-sale stage, the popularity and market value of the movie will completely burst out, and then the movie will be released.

By screening several movies during a roadshow, we can make a preliminary assessment of the movie audience and the mass portrait, and then draft precisely positioned copy for online promotion. With the help of a group of film critics' comments, we can create a substantial wave of movie preheating.

The reason why it is called a substantial movie warm-up is that some audiences and film critics have seen the content of the movie. Promotion with the movie content as the highlight is substantial promotion, which can arouse the audience's enthusiasm to buy tickets to watch the movie.

With the roadshow going on stop by stop and the promotion going on in such a cycle, wave after wave of preheating is accumulated, and then there is explosive publicity in the preview, premiere and final pre-sale stages, ultimately achieving the goal of high pre-sale box office.

Moreover, by observing the market trends and feedback from audiences and critics during the roadshow stage, any problems can be dealt with or public relations done in a timely manner to avoid problems arising during the film's release. If there is no proper solution, the film may face failure or even be withdrawn from theaters.

Therefore, the roadshow is a signpost and a whetstone in the film promotion stage. It plays a role in accumulating strength in the market and preventing possible problems in advance. It is a very important promotion stage.

"Are we there yet? Is this the seafood restaurant?" Liu Yifei looked out the window, then got out of the car with Chu Xuan, An Zhijie and others.

There are certain rules for choosing specific promotional locations when a roadshow arrives in a certain region, which can generally be divided into two situations.

If it is a roadshow by an unknown crew or a small production company, the location for promoting the film is random and has no additional nature.

On the contrary, if it is a roadshow by a famous crew or a large company, there will be a little-known trick.

There is basically a business alliance in every province and every city, for example, Internet cafes have an Internet cafe alliance, and businesses have a business alliance.

The business alliance is further divided into loose civilian organizations such as the supermarket alliance, hotel alliance, and catering alliance, which is also a business exchange circle for capital bosses.

So, when a famous film crew comes for a roadshow, a relationship of interest will be created.

For a film crew, if a group of big stars come to a store for a roadshow, it will create a star effect, attracting more people to come and check in and consume. So it’s not too much for the store owner to pay some money, right?
For the leader or person in charge of a business alliance, firstly, if spending some money can make the business better, then that's fine; secondly, if the business of friends in the local network circle needs to be improved, then the resources of a celebrity roadshow can be used as a favor to consolidate the network.

That is to say, roadshows and promotions in the film industry are normal roadshows for actors, but they are a business for the companies behind the films.

Just for this seafood restaurant in front of us, the couple and the actors came on this roadshow to promote it, and the company's team that followed them will receive more than 100,000 yuan in "sponsorship fees."

I'm just here for a roadshow, and it only takes about ten minutes at a location, and no more than an hour at most, so 100,000 is not bad.

A hundred thousand yuan may not sound like a lot, but if you think about how many roadshows there will be along the way to Wuzhen, the accumulated "sponsorship fees" will be at least a few million yuan.

This is just the case in Zhejiang. The same will be true in Hunan, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and Taiwan. The "sponsorship fee" for this roadshow will be considerable.

This "sponsorship fee" will be used as the expenses of the roadshow members along the way, and secondly, it will be used as funds for other publicity purposes to save the overall publicity and marketing expenses of the film.

This is the global convergence and also the unspoken rule in the film industry roadshows.

It can only be said that the capitalists in Hollywood once developed and utilized the star effect to the extreme, spreading it to Hong Kong, and then from Hong Kong to the mainland, forming this industrial chain that is little known to ordinary people, and is also a profit chain.

Therefore, we often see movies that have all-star casts, big-name directors, and sky-high investments, but it is impossible for them to make a profit no matter how you look at it.

Ordinary audiences know that it is impossible to make a profit, so are investors idiots? Why would they invest in something that obviously cannot make a profit?

Not to mention money laundering, there are many other ways to make money from movies. However, in the eyes of ordinary people, most of them just look at the box office. Moreover, most small crews and companies cannot make money using hidden methods and can only rely on the box office. This has led to the film trend and profit model that mainly relies on the box office for the general public.

The reason why it is called a minor method is naturally because it is a niche method. This way of making money, a roadshow method that can make a lot of money before the movie is released, is only limited to large companies and well-known large crews with multi-star lineups.

In order to make this way of making money more legal and compliant, a large amount of text such as "Thank you XXX for your friendly sponsorship" will often appear in the scrolling list after the movie is over.

Few viewers will read this kind of text, which is too dense to be seen clearly, and can generate no commercial value at all. Not to mention being worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, it is not even worth a few hundred dollars. The appearance of such text is just a commercial manifestation of showing that the money earned by the company is the sponsorship fee.

Some viewers may be curious about where so many sponsors come from when some blockbuster movies are screened. Sponsorship is like giving away money for free, so are those bosses all good people, giving away money in droves?

In fact, as early as the film roadshow stage, the stars of the crew had already promoted the stores of these bosses and completed a deal, but most people were unaware of these twists and turns.

For the crew and the company, it not only meets the plan of roadshow publicity, but also allows them to recoup their large investments. This method of reaping the double rewards is neither illegal nor unreasonable, so why not do it?
"Ah—Chu Xuan! Liu Yifei! Oh my God!"

It was lunchtime and this Zhejiang-based self-service seafood chain was doing great business. Most of the twenty or thirty tables in the lobby on the first floor were occupied. This restaurant must be a famous one in Hengdian, Dongyang.

The customers were chatting and eating in the noisy atmosphere, when suddenly a group of people walked in from the door, forcing people to look up.

You don't know until you see it. It's Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei, and there are also a group of familiar Hong Kong actors. This is incredible. A woman's surprised scream immediately caused a commotion in the audience.

"Wow - Chu Xuan, Liu Yifei, and Zou Zhaolong, Hui Yinghong, Zhang Yuqi..." Some customers didn't know what to say for a moment, and they slammed the table and stamped their feet, their faces full of excitement and speechlessness.

"Hello everyone, can I take up a moment of your time?" Zhang Yuqi was graceful and graceful, and at first glance she looked like a veteran of performances, commercial shows and roadshows, but she was only 21 years old, the same age as Liu Yifei. It seemed that the entertainment industry in Hong Kong had allowed her to experience a lot.

"Sure, sure, sure." Some customers actively cooperated with Zhang Yuqi, while more customers just smiled and faced it with curiosity.

Seeing Zhang Yuqi taking the initiative to act as the host, Chu Xuan, Liu Yifei, Zou Zhaolong, An Zhijie and Hui Yinghong were too free to compete for anything. Facing a large number of passers-by was a common occurrence for them, but a situation like this of disturbing others' meals would still be a bit embarrassing no matter how many times they had experienced it.

Since we have Zhang Yuqi, a social star, here, let's leave such occasions to her.

"It's like this, 'Skyfall: Enemy at the Gates', do you know this movie?" Zhang Yuqi went straight to the point.

"I know!" A customer responded quickly and answered cheerfully: "A movie starring Chenglong, Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei, and you guys!"

Zhang Yuqi nodded repeatedly: "Yes, this time we are here to promote the movie, and we are also here to sincerely invite friends who like movies to watch our movie for free."

"Is your movie going to be released?" This was the first reaction of one customer, who was either a movie fan or a fan of an actor in the movie, and looked very excited.

What more customers are concerned about is that it is free.

The company decided to offer the audience a free viewing experience during the roadshow. Firstly, this would be more attractive and provide more publicity for the roadshow. Secondly, films without screening licenses cannot be charged.

A screening license is equivalent to a commodity's qualified product barcode. Without this barcode, the commodity cannot be circulated and traded, otherwise it is illegal.

It’s the same if a movie doesn’t have a screening license. It can be screened privately in one or two theaters as a roadshow, but it must be free of charge. Charging for it is illegal.

Currently, "Enemy at the Gates" is discussing distribution and other matters. It will take some time to obtain the screening license, so naturally tickets cannot be sold and can only be given away.

"It will be soon. There should be news on the release date in a while." Liu Yifei said, "What Zhang Yuqi just mentioned was mainly the roadshow screening, which is an activity related to the film during the roadshow. Our film will be shown at the Brilliant Times Cinema at the east gate of Wuzhen."

"July 7th and 25th," Zhang Yuqi added.

"Yes!" Liu Yifei forgot to mention the time, and followed Zhang Yuqi's words to add in detail: "It will be Saturday, July 7th, and Sunday, July 25th, which is also the weekend. It will be at the Brilliant Times Cinema in Wuzhen East Gate. Do you have time to go?"

Wuzhen? Wuzhen in Jiaxing is located at the border of Zhejiang and Shenghai, 300 kilometers away from Dongyang where Hengdian is located. There is no high-speed rail yet, and even the green-skinned express train takes four or five hours to go back and forth, which has discouraged some local customers. Even if they want to watch this domestic science fiction movie that has been circulating since 07, the distance is a bit far and they are too lazy to go.

However, as Hengdian is a major tourist destination, there are countless tourists coming and going during the summer vacation. Local tourists are too lazy to travel, but tourists come here to travel around, and Wuzhen is also one of the major tourist destinations in Zhejiang, so there is no need to worry about this for tourists.

"Have!"

"I go!"

"I am coming too!"

"I'm going with my boyfriend!"

"..."

A group of customers were in high spirits and expressed their willingness to go to the cinema.

"Thank you all for your love and enjoyment of our movie. How about this, those who are willing to go answer me a simple question. If you answer it correctly, I will give you movie tickets." Zhang Yuqi is very good at interacting with the audience and is prepared to give out tickets in the form of answers.

Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei didn't expect Zhang Yuqi to do this, and they didn't expect the smiling shop owner next to them to be so good at doing business: "Friends who have movie tickets, the current meal is free. We also welcome our celebrity friends to come to the store for promotion. What do you think?"

Free of charge? Who can say no to this?
"Great! The boss is awesome!" All the customers were excited.

However, this was originally a buffet, and one could not eat much even if one ate as much as one could, and whether one got it for free or not was still going to pay. But seeing the large crowds of people coming to the store door to watch and take pictures of Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei, a large number of people rushed in when they heard the store owner say that the bill was free.

It seems that the store owner is at a disadvantage, but as the saying goes, first visit brings second visit, and second visit brings third visit. Considering that the store already has good business and the taste and reputation are good, this is equivalent to attracting a new group of long-term customers, and these customers have relatives and friends, so the business will probably be even more prosperous in the future. This owner is smart and knows how to do business.

"Boss Cai is so generous!" Zhang Yuqi gave the store owner a thumbs up. The free meal offer created such a warm atmosphere and brought a new group of people to the store. This will make the publicity effect of their roadshow more effective, which can be called a great assist.

Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei couldn't help laughing. The roadshow started off so well. It was a happy and fun thing. So they mingled with An Zhijie, Zou Zhaolong, and Kara Hui and followed Zhang Yuqi at the hot scene.

"Hello beautiful lady, can you go on July 7th and 25th?"

"Can, can, can!"

Faced with Zhang Yuqi's question, the young lady was very excited.

"Let me ask you a question. What was the name of the first TV series in which Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei appeared together?"

"The Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils!"

The couple didn't know whether to laugh or cry. They didn't expect Zhang Yuqi to ask this, nor did they expect the young lady to answer so quickly. She must be their fan.

"You answered correctly. I'll give you a movie ticket. With the ticket, you can go to the Brilliant Times Cinema at the east gate of Wuzhen on the 25th and 26th. You can enter any show in the morning, afternoon, or evening. But after the 26th, the ticket will be invalid. You must go within the time limit. Don't lie to me." Zhang Yuqi took out a movie ticket from a bundle and gave it to the young lady.

The movie tickets are specially made for roadshow activities. Movies without screening licenses cannot issue normal movie tickets with theater code registration, so homemade movie tickets are used instead of admission credentials.

"Don't worry! I'll definitely go!" The young lady was very excited. After seeing them leave, she couldn't wait to take pictures with her mobile phone and post them in the QQ group to show off.

A voucher for free movie viewing has no practical significance, but it can make passers-by and fans who get the ticket excited, thereby triggering word of mouth and spontaneous publicity on the Internet. This is the purpose of the movie ticket.

Therefore, those who engage in marketing and promotion must understand a little bit of psychology. As long as they understand the psychology of the audience, any kind of marketing and promotion will be easy.

"Excuse me, what is Chu Xuan and Liu Yifei's first urban drama?"

""struggle"!"

"Excuse me, what is the name of Mr. Zou Zhaolong's world-famous Hollywood movie?"

""The Matrix"!"

"..."

Zhang Yuqi interacted with the audience all the way. If she asked a question and the audience couldn't answer it, she would change to a simpler question. Asking questions is fake, but the interaction is real, and she would not give the tickets until the audience got the correct answer. This made the customers present feel at ease and actively interact, and they also had a better impression of them and their movies.

Chu Xuan found it interesting. All the questions Zhang Yuqi asked included all the actors present, except herself. She was probably afraid that it would be embarrassing if no one could answer her questions because she was not famous.

Since she is not popular, but she still actively interacts with others and asks questions about them. This makes her look like she is trying to ride on their popularity. She uses their popularity to attract passers-by to answer questions and lets passers-by focus on her. This Zhang Yuqi is a bit scheming.

However, they are trying to take advantage of the popularity, but the questions are all about them, which can be regarded as publicity for them. This undoubtedly shows that Zhang Yuqi has good emotional intelligence, or perhaps she had thought of such a way of interaction in advance for this roadshow.

He saw through it, and Liu Yifei and An Zhijie also saw through it later. Zou Zhaolong and Kara Hui, two senior people, saw through it long ago, but they didn't say anything and didn't have any strange ideas. It is normal for people in this industry to want to be famous and popular, and it is Zhang Yuqi's ability to find a suitable way to make this happen.

Since Zhang Yuqi has this intention, they are also happy and relaxed. In the following roadshow promotions, they just let Zhang Yuqi show her social skills in the interactive sessions. They just walk around, stroll around, and look around, using her familiar face as a background to attract traffic.

During the intensive roadshows of the two teams, the film publicity effect triggered by locals, tourists and fans gradually began to gain momentum in Zhejiang and on the Internet...

(End of this chapter)