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Pass The Popcorn: 'Straight Outta Compton' Is Now The Highest Grossing Music Biopic Ever
Pass The Popcorn: 'Straight Outta Compton' Is Now The Highest Grossing Music Biopic Ever

Pass The Popcorn: Universal Pictures Cops To Whitewashed Trailer For '...Compton'

Pass The Popcorn: 'Straight Outta Compton' Is Now The Highest Grossing Music Biopic Ever

Doug Neil, Universal's Executive Vice President of Digital Marketing, recently noted that the cinema giant used Facebook's analytics tools to target certain demographics with distinctly different trailers for the N.W.A. biopic Straight Outta Compton, one marketed to black users and the other crafted to appeal to white users. The revelation came on Thursday during a SXSW panel featuring Neil and Jim Underwood, Facebook's Global Head of Entertainment Strategy. Using audience segmentation tools offered by Facebook, Universal offered a trailer that focused solely on Ice Cube and Dr. Dre with no mention of N.W.A. - the group the film was actually about. A decision they attributed to the lack of familiarity with the the group amongst members of the white or "general population." Black Facebook users were fed a different trailer, which not only opened with the text "N.W.A." but also featured the group prominently. Users presumed to be in the Latin American demographic were fed shorter spots featuring bursts of text in Spanish. The campaign is considered by both companies to have been a success, according to Business Insider.

Since Facebook doesn't ask people to self-identify as a particular race, a campaign like Universal's uses what are called "affinity" groups. To construct an "African-American affinity segment," Facebook would look at indicators like whether someone was a member of an African American Chamber of Commerce Facebook group. When many of these indicators are taken into account simultaneously, it allows Facebook to define the "affinity" segment.

Neil characterized this marketing effort as a complete success.

Spotted at BI & DD.