The Gray Man The idea was simple: the Gray Man is such an explosive film that it’s trailer alone will break your television. A way to make the trailer way more impactful.
Less media More impact
This is a good example of what I was doing at Netflix. Mainly, finding new ways to to marketing for films through a test and learn mentality.
Netflix does not have the media budget that other studios have and also did not want to do marketing the same way. So, the strategy was always do more with less.
Understanding through research that people like to watch the trailers to choose the films they are going to see, we were trying do make every trailer a super trailer.
The Gray Man is an adventure full of punches, gunshots and explosions, and no better way to show that than making your television explode during the railer.
By doing that, we turned the trailer into a cultural moment. People were fooled, Twitter exploded with comment s and the press talked about it. The subject even peaked at Google Trends.
