Mid-June, 2024. A full web page of indecipherable glyphs runs in The Seattle Occasions, with the one clue a typewritten-style observe on the backside: “Printed on the request of LONGLEGS.”
Per week later, a consumer named Mr_Downstairs leaves strings of glyphs within the feedback on Letterboxd.
Billboards pop up; {a partially} obscured face friends down at drivers. In giant pink sort, there’s nothing greater than a cellphone quantity and a date. 458.666.4355. 7.12.
It was all a part of an eerily good advertising marketing campaign from indie movie distributor Neon, and it racked up a decent $22 million for Longlegs’ opening weekend in July. Arguably — don’t come for me — the marketing campaign itself was extra provocative than Nicolas Cage’s madman serial killer.
I requested our spookiest HubSpot entrepreneurs: What made Neon’s marketing campaign so efficient, and what techniques can we carry to our (hopefully) much less macabre advertising efforts?
1. Construct a steady journey in your viewers.
“The Longlegs marketing campaign brilliantly invited individuals to step into the narrative, reworking them into energetic contributors reasonably than a passive viewers. By threading suspense and curiosity all through its development, the marketing campaign ensures a devoted and engaged viewers looking forward to what’s to come back.
“For entrepreneurs, this method gives a transparent lesson: Goal for greater than only a single peak of curiosity — construct a steady journey that retains your viewers engaged and eagerly anticipating what’s subsequent. By nurturing ongoing curiosity and curiosity, you create a dynamic relationship that results in deeper connections and better loyalty over time.”
—Carly CHILL-iams, director, media monetization
2. Construct neighborhood and shared experiences.
“What’s so sharp concerning the Longlegs marketing campaign is that it applies stress from two angles. Individuals don’t love unanswered questions however, on the flip facet, they LOVE being part of one thing.
“When the Longlegs viewers tries to reply these unanswered questions, SURPRISE, they’re now a part of a thriller sport.
“Which may be more durable to use in the event you’re advertising, say, drain plugs, however there are some classes right here that everybody can profit from.
- Give your viewers one thing to reply for themselves. Perhaps that‘s plugging their particulars right into a quote creator. Perhaps it’s discovering a coupon code someplace in your web site. Even mundane industries can get pleasure from a bit of thriller.
- Welcome them into being part of one thing greater. Perhaps that is a social neighborhood, a Slack channel, or a product discussion board. Even simply giving a reputation to your viewers is usually a highly effective solution to create that sense of ‘one thing greater.’ (Consider Swifties, the Payments Mafia, or Browncoats.)”
—Curt del PRINCE of DARKNESS, senior advertising supervisor
“I really like that I instantly need to share the expertise. I need to ship this cellphone quantity to my sister and look forward to her completely weirded-out reply. It feels so particular when a advertising marketing campaign evokes a need to tug extra individuals in.
“As entrepreneurs, we predict lots about tips on how to minimize via as we speak’s noisy market. However generally we neglect that creating an expertise our viewers needs to share with others is a good way to broaden attain (and get our viewers to do a little bit of the heavy lifting).”
—Meg PraterGEIST, managing editor, blogs
3. Domesticate suspense.
“At Los Angeles’ BeyondFest this fall, programmers spliced the trailer for the American remake of Communicate No Evil into pre-show leisure, a cinephile joke poking enjoyable at how typically the varied cuts of the trailer — which gave away a lot of the movie — appeared in film theaters main as much as its debut.
“Longlegs took an reverse tactic, reveling in minimalism. It by no means gave an excessive amount of away in its trailers, leaving viewers to surprise when and the way Nicolas Cage, its greatest star, would present up.
“Neon as an alternative invited audiences into its thriller via a sequence of cryptic codes and cellphone numbers, constructing the identical sense of dread and intrigue that Maika Monroe’s character — a younger FBI agent — experiences within the movie.
“Moreover, the advertising constructed an accessible, interactive various actuality sport (ARG) that may very well be freely loved by followers all over the place, sustaining curiosity within the film with out spoiling it or exhausting potential prospects.”
—GHOUL-iet Bennett Rylah, senior author, The Hustle
“I believe the advertising was efficient as a result of it cultivated a way of suspense by planting breadcrumbs. Neon lets its target market fill in the remaining with their creativeness, which could be essentially the most highly effective software in each horror and advertising.
“Sadly, I used to be disenchanted by the precise movie — as have been a ton of people I talked to on-line and IRL — so the advertising constructed up too a lot anticipation for me. The extra the marketing campaign let my creativeness go wild, the upper my expectations have been — and the larger the discrepancy between my expectations and my expertise.
“My takeaways:
- Know when to depart a significant clean. What’s left unsaid and unshown offers your viewers house to think about.
- Plant breadcrumbs. Entrepreneurs can encourage individuals to actively have interaction in your advertising marketing campaign with out them even realizing it. Give new info with every iteration of your marketing campaign, and also you’ll have your viewers craving for extra.
- Use multisensory advertising. The cellphone quantity, audio clip, music, and so forth. contribute to the atmospheric success of this marketing campaign, which the movie did ship on.
- Repurpose your content material. A two-hour film can spin out a whole lot of mini content material sorts, whether or not it‘s a nonetheless picture, a quantity, a clip, or a sequence of puzzle items. You don’t even have to create new stuff — simply make a meaty product and use the product itself to create advertising property.”
—DYIN’ Zhong, senior advertising supervisor
4. Unite analog and digital advertising methods.
“Neon did film advertising, particularly horror film advertising, proper.
“Film promos are infamous for exhibiting all the nice elements, however Longlegs fantastically captured the suspense audiences would get within the film and piqued curiosity with out giving something away.
“I really like how the movie’s advertising united the analog and digital worlds. Individuals may see the billboard with its eerie imagery and transfer alongside, but when they referred to as the cellphone quantity, they might really expertise it.
“This technique introduced them into the film in a manner, and made its worth extra of a actuality. It’s not troublesome for entrepreneurs from all backgrounds to imitate this with the usage of URLs and QR codes.
“Plus, Neon’s trailers used behind-the-scenes footage and precise recordings of lead actress Maika Monroe’s coronary heart charge the primary time she noticed Nic Cage as Longlegs.
“It makes the fear that rather more tangible. They didn’t simply inform viewers the film was scary of their advertising, they proved it.”
—Ra-MOAN-a Sukhraj, principal advertising author
5. Lean into creativeness and interactivity.
“I am an enormous horror fan, and I used to be actually impressed at how Neon took a wholly fictitious menace (Nicolas Cage’s Longlegs) and introduced it into our dimension. (The nonfiction menace of Nic Cage himself predates the film trade.) It’s a inventive and immersive solution to achieve fan consideration and construct curiosity for moviegoers.
“Smile 2 did one thing comparable, breaking the fourth wall in its advertising marketing campaign by putting odd smiling individuals in random sports activities occasions or information broadcasts to attract consideration to the film.
“In that film, the sinister smile portends a murderous menace. Bringing parts of it into our world provides legitimacy and makes the film really feel all of the extra believable. That technique additionally performed into word-of-mouth advertising, as common social media customers would publish the completely different smiling individuals they’d see on TV, igniting much more curiosity.
“What I take away from these frightful advertising campaigns is that the extra imaginative and immersive your advertising crew will get, the extra you stand to realize from letting your viewers unravel the thriller or story.”
“Faucet into their curiosity, use enigmatic symbols or particulars, and supply interactive parts that encourage investigation and sharing amongst buddies — and you’ll rework a paid advertising marketing campaign into an actual sizzling matter.”
—Tristen Tay-LORD of the UNDERWORLD, Service Weblog editor and advertising supervisor
“What made this marketing campaign so efficient is that folks got lots to work with — ciphers to decode, numbers to name, backstories to discover — however none of it gave individuals what they actually wished: a face reveal of the titular villian. You might solely get that by watching the film, which made individuals keen to point out up.
“My favourite factor was the audio of Maika Monroe’s coronary heart charge when she first laid eyes on Longlegs. I anticipated him to be so agonizingly grotesque and off-putting that I used to be nearly relieved when he was largely simply ugly. Since he wasn’t as hideous as I anticipated him to be, it made the true horror of the film (which was additionally hidden from the trailers) hit even more durable.
“Longlegs’ advertising is a lesson within the significance of interactivity. Giving your viewers one thing to try this pertains to your services or products makes them need to have interaction. And pre-engagement makes a product reveal, launch, and so forth., all of the extra thrilling.”
—GORY Needle, senior advertising supervisor
6. Belief your viewers.
“Longlegs’ minimalist drip advertising is an train in restraint. A couple of strains of glyphs right here, a cellphone quantity there. It’s straight out of the scream queen playbook: The extra that’s left to your creativeness, the extra horrifying it’s.
“However for that to work, it’s a must to belief your viewers. That’s not all the time the simplest factor to perform, particularly in the event you’ve been elbow-deep in advertising copy for days or perhaps weeks on finish. However do not forget that your viewers is made up of actual human individuals, not numbers — the payoff could be large.
