In an industry where the publicity surrounding a production is almost as important as the production itself, it’s a little surprising that financially strapped production houses allow their promotional dollars to be cut first.

With the increasing costs related to producing film and television programs, balancing production and publicity costs has become an ongoing challenge for the majority of Canada’s prodcos.

While larger companies can generally afford a publicity department and extensive campaigns, midsize and smaller production houses hire independent publicists on a per project basis.

‘It’s worked really well for us in the past,’ says Mary Young Leckie of Toronto-based Tapestry Films. ‘By having someone focus completely on publicizing a single production, they can often develop and pursue creative ways to promote it as well as give it a push in the marketplace.’

Such was the case in 1997 when the company released The Arrow, a miniseries coproduced with Toronto’s The Film Works and Winnipeg’s John Aaron Productions. Tapestry, recognizing the project’s audience potential and the appeal of its cast, hired independent publicist Betty Michalyshyn.

The four-hour miniseries, which stars Dan Aykroyd, Christopher Plummer and Michael Ironside, was broadcast on cbc early in 1998. In addition to acting as a liaison between Tapestry and cbc publicity, Michalyshyn created an extensive campaign for The Arrow, which included all the written material, suggesting story angles for the media, and developing interview opportunities for the series’ stars.

During the promotion period, The Arrow was advertised nationally on cbc, with radio and print ad support. As well, posters appeared in bus shelters and subways in urban centres. Macleans, TV Guide, Broadcast Week and TV Times featured The Arrow on their covers and it received reviews in all the major Canadian dailies.

Cast members made appearances on entertainment programs including Pamela Wallin Live and Gabereau. A Winnipeg newspaper even ran a ‘Dan Watch’ column while Aykroyd was in Manitoba.

‘We would not have been able to achieve this kind of publicity for The Arrow if we hadn’t gone outside for help,’ says Young Leckie. ‘Having that extra person with expertise made launching the series that much better and freed our staff to concentrate on other aspects of the business.’

Low-budget strategies

Promoting programs that cast celebrities evidently offers an advantage to publicists. For production houses peddling documentaries or low-budget films, the challenge to get a little piece of the media pie is much greater.

Often, for these companies, the publicity strategy begins when the productions are still being thought out.

‘We certainly consider how well we can promote a program when we are considering what we will produce in any given year,’ says David Lint, chairperson and ceo of CineNova, a Toronto-based producer of non-fiction programming. ‘Our production lineup is based on a deliberate selection of subjects that will be of widest possible interest.’

CineNova favors a close working relationship with distributors and broadcasters over hiring publicists.

‘Broadcasters know their audiences and market much better than we would,’ says Lint. ‘So we let them take the lead on how they want to publicize the programming and we offer the additional support they need.’

In-house option

New technology and business-friendly computer programs, such as Photoshop, have made it easier for companies to produce promotional materials at the office and within the means of limited publicity budgets.

‘We do a lot of the basic publicity in-house and try to develop as much as we can with our internal resources,’ says Adam Block, director of business affairs, new media, at Summerhill Entertainment in Toronto. The 25-year-old company’s award-winning production portfolio includes The New Red Green Show, Inside Country and A Repair to Remember.

For Cambium Entertainment, creative promotion has come in the form of quarterly newsletters developed for the major trade shows. The Toronto company began the colorful four-page pamphlets in 1997 as a way to highlight its production and distribution list to the industry.

‘It’s been a very successful way for us to maintain ongoing publicity for our programs,’ says Hasmi Giakoumis, vp production at Cambium. ‘But it also allows us to create an image or identity for the company over the long term, which is not something you can really do when you hire an outside publicist.’

The Internet is also proving to be an efficient and cost-effective way for companies to extend the promotion and branding of projects, particularly long-running series. This virtual billboard offers an opportunity to be creative and nontraditional in advertising.

Cambium, for example, is launching a Monster By Mistake Website to complement the 3D animated series which runs on ytv. The site, a joint venture with series coproducer Catapult Productions, features interactive games and links to additional sites.

The independent

publicist route

Despite the future possibilities of the Internet, traditional advertising methods are still seen as the most powerful. Once in-house creativity is exhausted, production houses find themselves turning to the services of independent publicists for special projects.

‘There are times when you definitely need someone solely dedicated to publicizing a project,’ says Block. ‘The challenge then becomes knowing which projects would benefit the most by bringing someone in.’

While a hired publicist may know how to attract media and audience attention, getting a feel for the way a production company works takes a little longer.

When Summerhill was looking for an independent publicist to promote the 100th anniversary episode of Inside Country, which spotlights country music stars, the company wanted someone familiar with its brand. The logical choice was a publicist who’d worked for Summerhill before and understood how the show should be positioned.

This is where the larger production houses have an advantage. Their staffs are already aware of the subtleties of how the company works and what is needed when working with broadcaster publicity departments.

‘Having more publicity money to work with every year would be the ideal solution,’ says Tapestry’s Young Leckie. ‘But as long as producers remember to include costs for a good independent publicist in their annual budgets, they can make the most of their promotional dollars.’