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Blockbuster ad clever but misses the mark.

November 25, 2007 | Posted by: Lee

Blockbuster has a new commercial for the upcoming Christmas season that's really quite clever.  It's a 30 second spot, which at first doesn't seem to be very special and in fact seems a bit random, but what Blockbuster has done is insert 35 different movie references into the spot. Some famous lines, and some other more subtle references.  (Watch Grandma at the end playing with her potatoes - a nod to Close Encounters.)

You want to view it over and over again to see if you can find all the references.  Very clever idea.  But Blockbuster misses the mark by not integrating this ad into their web site or anywhere on their site that I could find.

They're missing an opportunity to drive people to their site and start a conversation.  The video could be easily integrated into the home page or the browse movies page.  Viewers could see a list of all the movies referenced.  Better yet, they could have created a contest to see who could find all the references first - give away a free membership.  Or, have visitors vote on which movies they like the best.  What about creating links to each movie to see reviews, trivia, etc.  It was a great opportunity to push up content, engage visitors, and start a conversation with their customers, but they missed it.