The advantages of the BMWFilms campaign are that it gets the product out there without spoon-feeding or forcing information or logo down the consumer’s throats. As one consumer posted on the website, “BMW lets the directors do whatever they want and they’re not constantly shoving the BMW logo in your face.” The films were directed by famous film directors, starred an A-list actor, and were very entertaining. As the article states people were becoming highly interested in the character of the driver. It also was an advantage because even though, as shown in exhibit 7, most BMW consumers are married men with no children from the ages of 45-64, it also reached out to a younger generation. The average visitor of the films website, according to exhibit 11, were males ages 25-34 who owned non-luxury cars. Getting these short films out to this market can influence them to buy one now or in the future where BMW will be in their minds.
The disadvantages is that the amount of viewers could not of been as high as if it on TV, some people just wouldn’t go online and watch something. Also the fact that you needed to register to watch the films could of made it unattractive. People tend to not want to give information, or even bother filling it out. Also without a high-speed internet it would take a really long time to load the films and if you want to download a really long time as well.
I believe it was a successful campaign because the advantages clearly outweigh the disadvantages and the BMW market was expanded to other segments. I don’t see BMW as a car for only 45-64 year old married men with no children most BMW drivers I see are ages 25-50 both male and female and with children and the new BMW SUV. Also by showing short trailers on TV and putting movie ads in the newspaper was a great idea to get the website and the films out there.
I would have recommended producing a feature-film. If people enjoyed the series of shorts, they felt attached...