Some interesting info I found on the movie stock exchange. It’s a few years old but still makes some valid points.
As The Hollywood Reporter points out, yes, advertising a movie is expensive:
Indeed, with the exception of in China, Hollywood continues to wrestle with rising marketing costs, particularly overseas, which can make up 70 percent of a film's gross thanks to booming markets in Russia, Latin America and Asia. Two years ago, the cost had crept up to $175 million globally. Now, studios say it has hit the $200 million mark per picture -- a 33 percent increase from the $150 million spent in 2007 on the first Transformers.
It has been an upward trend for years, even for smaller movies:
In 1980, the average cost of marketing a studio movie in the U.S. was $4.3 million ($12.4 million in today's dollars). By 2007, it had shot up to nearly $36 million. If the MPAA still tracked spending on P&A, that number would be north of $40 million today for medium-size films like The Fault in Our Stars or Tammy.
The reason is somewhat surprising:
Blame the cost of television, which remains the biggest line item -- except in France, where American movie ads aren't allowed, and in heavily regulated China. TV can make up half of any marketing budget, even as U.S. viewership splinters and few shows command huge audiences. And while studios have increased the use of social media to deliver a more targeted audience, they haven't decreased their dependence on the small screen.
As The Hollywood Reporter points out, yes, advertising a movie is expensive:
Indeed, with the exception of in China, Hollywood continues to wrestle with rising marketing costs, particularly overseas, which can make up 70 percent of a film's gross thanks to booming markets in Russia, Latin America and Asia. Two years ago, the cost had crept up to $175 million globally. Now, studios say it has hit the $200 million mark per picture -- a 33 percent increase from the $150 million spent in 2007 on the first Transformers.
It has been an upward trend for years, even for smaller movies:
In 1980, the average cost of marketing a studio movie in the U.S. was $4.3 million ($12.4 million in today's dollars). By 2007, it had shot up to nearly $36 million. If the MPAA still tracked spending on P&A, that number would be north of $40 million today for medium-size films like The Fault in Our Stars or Tammy.
The reason is somewhat surprising:
Blame the cost of television, which remains the biggest line item -- except in France, where American movie ads aren't allowed, and in heavily regulated China. TV can make up half of any marketing budget, even as U.S. viewership splinters and few shows command huge audiences. And while studios have increased the use of social media to deliver a more targeted audience, they haven't decreased their dependence on the small screen.
