Business screen magazine (1946)

Evaluating the Film Medium As A Communications Tool By WILLIAM TERRELL Public Relations Dept. American Oil Company After anafys/s of severol crliical studies of audience inieresf and reaction to several of i.'s films distributed and shown on o closely guided plan, American Oil concludes, "We believe fhot films are fully capable now of taking their place alongside newspapers, magazines, radio and television as the fifth business communications medium." Computer-produced report on survey of 1,000 theatre audience members in 35 cities showed that American Oil film was accomplishing its specific marketing objectives in addition to establishing brand identification for the company. .\l sSaQ' •yHE MOTION' PICTURE -* film medium today is as susceptible to scientific planning and control as any other business communications tool. And 1 included in this consideration, advertising and publicity in newspapers, magazines, radio, and television. Consider our own case at American Oil. Our general marketing strategy is directed, of course, towards increasing the consumption of gasoline. We do this by promoting the concept of driving more, particularly in areas where we have a good representation of service stations. Since the early Si.xties, we have produced 1 1 motion pictures — eight travel films and three carcarc films — to implement this overall marketing strategy. For each film production it has been possible to be ever more precise in terms of determining marketing objectives, pinpointing film distribution, and measuring promotional results. A recent film on family camping in the Smoky Mountains is a case in point. It has been a goal of ours for some time to do a film about family camping in an area with very large market representation. North Carolina, in which much of the Smoky range is located, is just such an area. It has the third largest number of .American Oil outlets of any state in the Union. Basically, our film story is that family camping is an excellent way to travel. In addition, the story line takes particular pains to assure "Mom" that family campina can be a vacation for her. too. That is. it doesn"t have to be all cooking and housekeeping. In this instance, we co-sponsored the film with the Recreational Vehicles Division of Ford Motor Company. This was a natural and compatible lie-in uhich had a most beneficial result on overall cost for both .American Oil and Ford. Our goal was to achieve as wide and economical distribution as possible for the final film produet. For this reason, we produced not one, but three different sound-and-color films from original footage shot by our pnxiuccr, Mattco Associates, Inc.. Mcllcnry. Illinois. These three film productions are: >■ Smoky Moiinlain Ma^ic — A 17-niinute 35mni theatrical "short" produced for release by Paramount Pictures in motion picture theatres around the countrv. >■ Happy HoliJays — Camp-ing in the Smokies — One hundred twenty prints of this 28 '/2 -minute film were produced in two 16mm versions. One version is for nontheatrical or service club release. The other version is for television release. The basic difference is that the service club version carries credit lines while the production for television release does not. >■ Let's Co to the Smokies — This is a 4' 2 -minute, excerpt from the "Happy Holidays" film. It is designed for television release only. The film can be broadcast in fiveminute time slots, thus flex , ibly expanding the potential distribution of the film story on free-time television. Mattco shot original film footaee in the Smoky Mountains on Eastman Color Negative Film, Type 5251, a 35mm color film aenerally used for theatrical release. It was then reduced to 16mm prints for television and service club release. Basically, the 35mm theatrical and the 16mm television and nontheatrical films have the same objectives. Both versions concern two families who go camping in the Smokies. However, each tells a different story. In the 35mm theatrical film, for example, a small boy is the "voice-over" narrator, while in the 1 6mm film, "voice-over" sound is handled by a separate narrator. .All versions show scenes at an .American Oil service station, but the theatrical and television films use no sponsor credit lines. In this kind of triple production, the value of co-sponsorship becomes even more apparent. For example, with Ford"s co-sponsorship, we were able to obtain the three Smoky Mountain films with a considerably larger audience exposure potential for less than we previously had spent for one film alone. However, sound evaluation cannot be made unless it is possible to obtain promotional results that are provable. In this instance, we obtained results from two sources: 1) verified audience counts provided by the film distributors. Modern Talking Picture Services. Inc.. and Paramount Pictures, and 2) our own independent surveys of film audience reactions. For example, as of November (Coiuimied on next page)