Archive notice: This article was originally published on November 5, 2007. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
After the business of video and DVD rental had continued to deteriorate in recent years, the trade association of video and media retailers (IVD) http://www.ivd-online.de is now going on the offensive with a cross-media campaign. For the coming seven months long, the advantages of video stores are to be advertised under the motto “Renting DVDs is clever and inexpensive”. In addition to print advertisements, special online and voucher campaigns as well as competitions worth around 2.5 million euros are being used to encourage customers to rent films again.
According to a statement by the IVD, the campaign is a reaction to a GfK study from the end of last year, in which growth potential was indeed held out for the German video store market despite increasing competition from the download sector. The advertisements for the campaign will from now on be placed in listings magazines such as TV-Spielfilm and TV Today as well as in the monthly magazine Cinema. In addition, every print advertisement contains a voucher coupon that makes it possible to rent two films for the price of one.
According to the association, cars and trips also await video store customers in online competitions. “Thanks to an integrated campaign concept, we can offer branded-goods manufacturers attractive platforms for cross-marketing measures. This in turn puts us in a position to run competitions in which video store visitors can look forward to exceptional prizes,” says André Meyer, Director of Marketing & Sales at the video store trading partner emp Hamburg http://www.emp-home.de and spokesman for the industry initiative. At http://www.die-videotheken.de, a dedicated homepage accompanying the campaign was also set up, where interested users can obtain comprehensive information.
The IVD is also supported by the German Federal Film Board (FFA), the film providers Warner Brothers, Universal Pictures and 20 Century Fox as well as the purchasing groups MMG and World of Video. With the help of the campaign, an end-consumer group of at least 120 million contacts is to be gained by May 2008.
