Working in harmony with Hollywood(2)

Second, differences also lie in their modes of operation. For Hollywood producers spin-off products are more important than product placements as they generate more revenue and they want the marketing plans for the film's deriviatives to be closely related to the film. So in their negotiations with Chinese brands, they will want details of follow-up promotional activities, the design of authorized products, their production and distribution, included in the contract. Those Chinese brand owners who lack experience in making long-term plans are usually unable to meet the requirements of Hollywood producers. Therefore, Chinese brands who hope to cooperate with Hollywood, may need to change their way of operating.

Finally, intermediaries are still necessary for Chinese brands to work with Hollywood. But at present, these intermediaries are not that professional and they simply act as brokers. They can hardly help Chinese brands learn from Hollywood's marketing experiences and build a related placement system in order to maximize the value of movie advertising. Some intermediaries have even cheated when facilitating the cooperation, such as in the case of Pangu, where an intermediary agreed some terms of the contract that were never approved by the film's producer, which caused mutual misunderstandings in the cooperation.

With the development of China's film market and the growing needs of Chinese brands to internationalize, more Chinese products will feature in Hollywood blockbusters in the near future. But, only with the full cooperation of Chinese brands, Hollywood filmmakers and their intermediary organizations can a healthy market order based on trust and respect be built up.

The author, Peng Kan, is the Research and Development director of the Beijing-based media-research firm EntGroup.