Zoe Parra • 2024 McNair Summer Research Symposium • July 8, 2024

Zoe Parra

Class of 2025

Major: Marketing

Mentor: Zecong Ma, PhD

St. Mary’s University

Social Media and Film Marketing: A study on Genre Marketing Pre- and

Post-Pandemic

In recent years the advancement of technology has created unprecedented connectivity among

people worldwide. With the new availability of information instantaneously the film industry’s

marketing plan has shifted from that of building anticipation and informing consumers about the

film; to maximizing audience engagement. Marketing managers at film studios with the help of

social media and a large push from the global pandemic now rely on marketing campaign

heavily reliant on various social media platforms such as YouTube, Tik-Tok, and Instagram.

Movies such as the Barbie Movie (2023), Avatar the Way of Water (2022), Spiderman No Way

Home (2021) and Bad Boys for Life (2020), all employ different marketing methods on social

media websites such as Youtube, Tik-Tok, and Instagram. There is a positive correlation

between audience engagement and the success of a film. There are also outside factors that could

affect the success of a movie such as how accurately and aggressively audience is targeted when

being marketed to in such as the case of Bad Boys for Life (2020). The pandemic had an

unprecedented effect on the film industry and how marketers engaged with audiences causing

major shifts in the goals of marketing managers. These four films show the different types

methods of marketing in order to encourage their specific target audiences. Films that are of the

Action/Adventure genre are the most prevalent in the highest grossing of box office. These films

have the widest appeal to a broad audience and can be marketed fairly easily due to their family

friendly nature. By ensuring these films are family friendly marketers are able to publicize the

trailers for these types of films across all platforms ensure the maximum amount of reach; which

in turn leads to more audience engagement.

Keywords: Genre, Social Media, Marketing, Film, Consumer Engagement, Social media

Campaigns