Can Australian Films Make Money?

*I first published this post for SPAA (Screen Producers Association Australia) on 3/10/2009.

It is a simple but very important question and in short the answer is yes they can!

If this is the case then why don’t more Australian films make money either domestically or internationally? As a consumer marketer & producer my professional view is that most of the Australian films being made are simply not the types of films the majority of Australian (or international) audiences will pay to see and filmmakers are just not in tune with what consumers and audiences want. Further, even when we do make films which should connect and appeal to audiences – Balibo is a great example – the marketing is either mis-targeted and or insufficient or left too late. This also then results in an inhibited release (very few screens) and a non-optimised distribution outcome (filmmakers largely focused on only securing a ‘traditional’ theatrical & video release).

I am not saying that Australia doesn’t make great films, I think we have some of the finest filmmakers and artists in the world and that we have made some brilliant films. It just seems that Australian filmmakers don’t really understand that audiences want to escape from the real world – they watch films for escapism, fun, amusement, diversion and pleasure. Consumers have a choice of entertainment and a choice of films. It is up to filmmakers and the industry to come to grips with the fact that films are about entertaining a paying audience and a little less about just making movies.

So, why aren’t Australian films resonating with audiences? Well, there are four* main reasons why a film fails to reach a significant audience:

1. The filmmakers fundamentally didn’t care whether or not the film reached a significant audience.
2. The filmmakers produced a film that fell short of the expectations of the intended audience.
3. The filmmakers produced a film that would have met the expectations of the intended audience, but they either marketed it poorly, to the wrong audience, or left it too late, or all of the above.
4. The filmmakers failed to develop and or optimise their distribution plan according to where and how their intended audience consumes content and the reality of the distribution opportunities available for their particular film.

*There is also a fifth reason why we are continuing to fail at creating a sustainable film industry in Australia and one of the root causes is the philosophy of our screen agencies and in many cases our writers and filmmakers. Dr. Karen Pearlman wrote a great essay in 2009 and she spoke more about this:

“…usually when the question of purpose is raised at the level of government policy making our fiction feature film industry is justified as being needed to tell our own stories. But this justification has worn out if indeed it ever energised us. Telling our own stories has led us down the garden path of naturalism to a rut so deep that is seems people would rather stay at home and fight with their own families than go and watch another Australian domestic drama on screen. The purpose of Australian feature film production I propose is not to tell our own stories. The purpose of our feature film industry is to make our myths. What’s the difference? Three things: scale, dynamics and ownership.”

Anyway, here is Dr. Pearlman in her own words from a Metro Screen seminar which I attended in Sydney in 2009:

I agree with all three of Dr. Pearlman’s observations;

1. Scale – not all stories will scale to cinema and the stakes needs to be high enough to engage us.
2. Dynamics – things need to move, cinema is kine, the story must move between hope and fear, between dark & light, it can’t all stay at one dynamic level.
3. Ownership – who’s story is it, a story needs to be owned by a much broader range of people and not just the writer/filmmaker.

Before we get into all these reasons in more detail we must first take a quick look at the overall context and nature of the film industry today and importantly how audience behaviour, distribution and marketing has changed.

Background:

One of the greatest challenges in the film industry whether in Australia or any other country is developing, financing, producing and distributing a film which will appeal to a specific audience – whether the audience is a niche one or a broad one. And, even when a film is made, a filmmaker / distributor then has to successfully reach and connect with the intended audience.

We see many Australian produced films like ‘Disgrace’, ‘The Proposition’, ‘Romulus, My Father’, ‘Balibo’ and ‘Beautiful Kate’ to name a few fail to make a meaningful dent at the Australian (or overseas) Box Office even with critical acclaim and seemingly favourable reviews. Is this a failure to market the film correctly or sufficiently? Is it a failure by filmmakers to understand what types of films audiences will pay to see? Is it a failure by the filmmakers to make a film which didn’t meet the expectations of the intended audience? Is it a failure of the filmmakers to develop an appropriate distribution plan based upon the strengths and weaknesses of the film and the opportunities available? Or, is it a combination of all of these?

By any logical definition, for a film to be ‘successful’ it would need to break even or make some kind of return to exhibitors, distributors, filmmakers and any investors, whether they are government or private. Is simply making a creative and technically proficient film, winning some awards and achieving favourable critical reviews without making a dent at the box office or ancillary markets a success?

Well, it seems that audiences and the reasons why they pay to go and see films are in some ways irrelevant to the vast majority of filmmakers in Australia. If this statement is wrong then why are we not producing films with better box office returns?

There were 21 Australian films released in Australia in 2008 and even with the box office success of the movie Australia ($26.5m), Australian films captured just 3.8% ($35.5m) of the Australian box office – down from 4% in 2007. In fact if it were not for the movie Australia, Australian films would have achieved a record low share of the Australian box office in 2008. 28 Australian films have recently been released with a combined production budget of approximately $76.1m but they have generated only $14.7m at the box office as of 29 September 2009.

As a marketer & filmmaker myself, I feel that Australian filmmakers are not being responsible or realistic if they keep thinking that their job is simply to make a movie (build it and then trust that audiences will come). Filmmakers (and film agency assessors) need to ensure they understand who the audience for their film is, why audiences watch movies and build the paths and bridges to get the audiences to their film. Ironically, every step in filmmaking is a collaborative effort and this should be no different when it comes to distribution & marketing the film. Sadly and all too often it seems that the audience is considered an afterthought and the primary effort is put only into the craft.

The realities of filmmaking: is filmmaking art or a business?

Whether filmmakers like it or not, the movie industry is a business. But, whether the business likes it or not the industry is made up of artists. The two are interdependent, not mutually exclusive. Everyone, from the audience paying to see the movie to the exhibitor, distributor / studio, sales agent, financier, investor and even industry service providers and suppliers are risking their money, resources and effort on the basis of gaining a return on their investment or payment for their services – in addition to the filmmakers. Of course I am not advocating that the creative side of the industry should just cow-tow to the business side. I am simply advocating that the creative side should take more interest in what audiences and consumers want and understand why they go to the cinema and consume content & entertainment.

Director Bruce Beresford told me the story of how the studios wanted to change the Driving Miss Daisy script but luckily for audiences and ironically the studio, the filmmakers stuck to their guns and we got a great Oscar winning film. But, there are also many more examples on the other side of the ledger with many Australian films being made with no real regard for audience tastes, desires and needs.

There are many stories which in the eyes of filmmakers should be made but in reality no commercially viable audience exists for that type of film in a typical theatrical release format. On the commercial side the cinema owner (exhibitor) has to be sure people will come and buy tickets and spend money on concessions from the candy bar (55% of an Exhibitors profit in Australia comes from the candy bar). Most importantly, an Exhibitor has a limited number of screens (there are a total of 1,980 in Australia as at Feb 2009) and if your independent film is presented alongside competition from a film like Transformers which has a $5m national marketing budget, which film do you think will get the screens? If an exhibitor doesn’t see an effective P&A (print & advertising) investment then the filmmakers & distributor won’t get enough screens in the right markets to reach the films intended audience.

One of the other key problems is very few ‘Australian’ films are getting a moderate to wide release. Beautiful Kate opened on 29 screens and has taken $1.4m after 8 weeks, Balibo opened on 23 screens and has taken $1.1m after 7 weeks, Samson & Delilah which opened on around 12 screens has taken $3.2m after 21 weeks and the latest Paul Hogan film Charlie & Boots opened on around 113 screens and has taken around $3m after 4 weeks. Mao’s Last Dancer* is opening on approximately 266 screens across Australia and of course other films like Australia and Happy Feet have opened wider in Australia on more than 600 screens. Compare these openings to films like District 9 (187 screens), Harry Potter (510), Ice Age (422) and Transformers (457 screens). *Update: Mao’s Last Dancer took $4.3m in it’s first week of release with a whopping screen average of $16,301.

There are exceptions but generally a film’s overall box office can be directly affected by the number and location of screens that the film opens on (Week 1 through 4). Even when a film does have great reviews, if it is not showing at a convenient time and location for the audience then this will be a huge problem for the film’s potential as people can’t see it or won’t because it is inconvenient. An exception to the general rule of a limited release opening would be films like Samson & Delilah, Pulp Fiction and Lost in Translation which initially opened as ‘art films’ on less than 100 screens but quickly expanded based upon positive word of mouth and opening attendance patterns.

Critically for any deal to be made, the distributor has to be sure that they will recoup both the pre-sale / distribution guarantee and the P&A. It costs around $1,200 per screen for a print of the film so for a film like Mao’s Last Dancer which will open on 200 screens across Australia, the distributor is up for $240,000 right off the bat before a dime is spent on marketing. Lost in Translation premiered on just 23 theatres in the USA and then mushroomed to 882 theatres at its peak, that’s an approximate outlay of $882,000 just for film prints! The bare bones P&A investment required for a distributor in the USA would be USD$1.4m and this would be barely sufficient to support a limited theatrical release in just a few big cities. P&A is usually first out (first recuped) money but if the distributor isn’t getting any more receipts after recouping the P&A money they risked, they don’t recoup their pre-sale / distribution guarantee and if there is nothing left after that, then they don’t make any money as there is nothing coming in to earn a distribution commission from. An independent film distributor that pays $5m to acquire United States rights to a finished film (for example Saw or Wolf Creek) is really making a $10-20m investment. The distributor can easily spend another $5-15m in theatrical marketing costs if it opts for a substantial national release. Thus film buyers must evaluate whether a given film has the screen power to earn all of its expenses back.

Further, the film business lives off income from video & television, which is directly impacted by the marketing push in the theatrical window. Buyers of video & pay-television rights to independent films often specify in contracts that purchased films must have a minimum amount of marketing spend during the theatrical release for the purpose of creating a marquee value. Interestingly, the USA (38,794 screens) & Canada (3,546) account for 29% of the world’s 146,000 screens but more than 38% of global box office. If you don’t understand these economic realities, how the industry works and the relationship between the various players then you are already at a huge disadvantage when evaluating whether your story should be filmed and of course when it comes to negotiating the optimal distribution deal.

Distribution landscape:

Other Channels vs Box Office

What should filmmakers do to survive and prosper in this tumultuous ever-changing new world of filmmaking? The potential to distribute films via new and emerging digital channels begs filmmakers to seize the reigns and innovate. There is still a perception that a movie and Hollywood studios generate revenues largely at the boxoffice, but this has rapidly changed:

1. Average number of movies viewed in a theater per person per year 5.5
2. 2008 gross revenue for the film industry $8.31 Billion
3. Percentage of revenue from box office 19%
4. Percentage of revenue from basic/pay cable and pay-per-view/on-demand 13%
5. Percentage of revenue from television rights 23%
6. Percentage of revenue from DVD/ video rights 45%

Distribution via DVD and on-demand is the new growth sector, but of course theatrical exhibition still has a huge impact on how these and other rights perform. The biggest growth in theatrical distribution for US filmmakers is outside of the USA where they are still building screens. However, revenues from theatrical distribution in the US and international markets is shrinking dramatically as less and less people use cinemas as their primary source of entertainment. Two small examples of emerging new channels and opportunities for content distribution are the Xbox & NetFlix partnership and Hulu.

1. 1m of Xbox Live’s 20m active monthly members are already Netflix members and they have watched more than 13m videos, mostly movies (1.5b minutes of content) through the Xbox console directly into the home.
2. Within six months of launching, Hulu was already serving 142 million movies & TV shows a month online, making it the sixth-largest video site in the U.S., according to Nielsen’s Video Census.

It is therefore crucial for filmmakers to develop a distribution plan optmised for their intended audience and the realities of opportunities available to them. It is also important to develop a Plan B distribution strategy as this will be vital in the event you do not hit a grand slam and secure a significant distribution deal from a studio or a large distributor. The exercise of planning will also help you to better understand the current distribution landscape and will provide leverage and confidence as you assess your distribution options at the bargaining table.

Independent filmmakers must understand that theatrical release is the least of the economic motivations, other than to a build marquee value that will propel a film in downstream windows / channels.

In exchange for contributing typically 25%-40% of the production cost for U.S. rights to the films they distribute, the studio owned indie’s capture over half the economic benefit, when video & television income are included. (Foreign buyers contribute the remaining production costs.) In the U.S. it is becoming more and more common for small independent films to open in theatres and On Demand simultaneously, and we often see the latter generate greater receipts. Digital channels have changed how content is consumed and marketed and this presents new challenges but it also presents many new opportunities. The game has changed significantly from the old school film acquisition, financing and distribution models and Australian filmmakers need to catch up. ‘Risk’ money is much harder to come by and studios and independents now have access to less money to invest in developing and acquiring films. As outlined earlier, even when a film is made or acquired the marketing dollars required can sometimes be 2-3 times the acquisition / production costs of the film.

Now, I also want to quickly play devil’s advocate around the major studios and the product they output, acquire, distribute and market:

The overriding objective of major studios is to distribute films that are profitable. If the films are engaging, witty, and thought provoking and win awards, that’s simply icing on the cake but not the first concern. Studios want films that are as creative as possible without sacrificing marketability. Because the majors occasionally produce artistic masterpieces, such as Paramount’s first two Godfather movies, some pundits mistakenly believe art is an integral part of the equation. It’s not.

Critics also rap the major studios for picking safe subjects, for ordering movie endings to be reshot after unfavourable audience response in test screenings, and for not catering to minority audiences. Faulting the majors for blockbusters is silly because creating glossy, crowd-pleasing films that generate large amounts of money is their primary business. What’s sometimes underappreciated is that majors attempt to balance their annual film-release slate with the occasional thought-provoking, personal films, such as the Sony Pictures’ father-son drama The Pursuit of Happyness or Warner Bro’s death-row drama, The Green Mile.

Marketing to Moviegoers: A Handbook of Strategies and Tactics, Robert Marich

Sadly, the reality of independent filmmaking is that the vast majority of independent films are unprofitable, despite occasional hot streaks. This means that the emphasis on defining and understanding your audience is even more critical to ensuring some form of success. Australia has had some financial successes from Crocodile Dundee, the Saw franchise, Strictly Ballroom, Babe, Happy Feet, The Dish, Lantana and Gallipoli to name a few.

Here is a list of the top 106 Australian films and their Australian box office revenue. The key outtake is that we have too few films on the moderately successful side of the ledger and way too many films on the unsuccessful side, particularly considering the talent and financial support available in Australia. Here is a list of recently released Australian films, their estimated budget and box office returns as at 28 Sep 2009:

Just a cursory look at the table above sees an approximate budget slate of AUD$76.1m across 28 films and box office returns of only AUD$14.7m to date. Just 7 of these 28 films account for 76% of the Australian share of the box office. This $14.7m in box office receipts is a return of only 19.3% against the production outlays. Now of course this doesn’t take into account any foreign sales / box office, sell through (DVD, Video etc) and ancillary markets such as Free to Air, Pay TV etc. But, even if we make an optimistic assumption and double the income to $29.4m, this still only equates to total box office returns of 38.6% against the production outlays. But, we have to remember that the exhibitor gets around 55% of the box office, then print & advertising dollars are recouped, then any pre-sales / distribution guarantees are recouped and then distribution fees are paid – all before any income is received to cover the negative cost (production budget).

In reality this means that in the vast majority of cases, nobody – the distributor, investors (government or private), filmmakers or artists – is recouping any money above basic fees and therefore these films are not contributing anything to help grow the Australian industry. From the year 1990 to 2007 Australian Federal and State Agencies have provided AUD$2.7b in direct & indirect investment to Australian filmmakers. In return, the government has recouped only 13.1% of this investment from Australian productions. Since 2000/01 the amount recouped from investments made in Australian productions has been steadily declining and in 2006/07 this recoupment was down to 8.1%. Government investment since 2000 has been $1.1b and the average recoupment over the past 7 years is 10.6% down from the 17 year average of 13.1%. If any studio or independent was consistently generating an annual recoupment of 10-13% of their production investments not taking into account the additional marketing costs then they would no longer be in business.

So, why do films fail to reach an audience?

As touched on in the beginning of this post, there are four main reasons why a film fails to reach a significant audience:

1. The filmmakers fundamentally did not care whether or not the film reached a significant audience.
2. The filmmakers produced a film that fell short of the expectations of the intended audience.
3. The filmmakers produced a film that would have met the expectations of the intended audience, but they either marketed it poorly, to the wrong audience, or left it too late, or all of the above.
4. The filmmakers failed to develop and or optimise their distribution plan according to where and how their intended audience consumes content and the reality of the distribution opportunities available to their particular film.

These four reasons: lack of interest in commercial viability, failed production, poor distribution and miss-targeted or a lack of marketing are fatal for a film. What’s the lesson here? Well, everyone at every stage of the project , from script outline through to release, must correctly identify & understand the paying audience for the film.

Many Australian films like Balibo, Bright Star, Beautiful Kate and many others are simply leaving what little marketing they are doing too late. Releasing a trailer 4-6 weeks before a films release or launching a website 30-45 days prior to release are almost a complete waste of money. You cannot build a ‘groundswell’ of interest 30-45 days out from a films release. And, even when Australian films do utilise digital marketing elements like social media, they have no strategy. All we see is the usual focus on tools & networks like a Facebook & MySpace fan page, Twitter account and basic website with a synopsis & trailer – this is not a strategy. All of these pages & social network accounts remain static without any real insight into the story behind the film, the filmmakers or anything else. They also take time and need cultivating.

Like a movie you cannot simply build it and expect people & fans to come. You need to inspire the conversation & interest (usually through advertising & videos) but you also need to keep energising the groundswell and conversation. You need to think of TV, Radio, Print & Outdoor advertising as a contact strategy to get potential eyeballs into your engagement channels / tactics. Special or exclusive content also needs to be given to fans on these networks on a regular basis and importantly the ‘filmmakers’ must engage with the fans.

Social media by any definition is about engagement and interaction and treating the digital channels / networks simply like newspaper advertisements is a waste of time and money. A Twitter account is not an RSS feed! Lord of the Rings is a great study in engaging with fans during pre-production & production 12-14 months in advance of the films release. There was an online platform (website forums & more) to facilitate conversations about the story and film and filmmakers like Peter Jackson himself had regular behind the scenes webcasts, videos and blogs etc. I outline more behind digital marketing and in particular social media / social influence marketing in the PowerPoint presentation deck embedded below.

Now, if you’re a writer, director or producer you may now be thinking, wait a minute, isn’t it the distributor’s job to identify the audience and figure out how to entice them to spend money on my film? Wrong! Positioning the film for an audience begins with the creative team. It is impossible* to attract finance (public and private, the latter includes distributors) unless the creators have an audience in mind throughout the development of the project. *Having said that, Australian film agencies have assessed and handed out some $2.7b to fund directly or indirectly approximately 695 Australian projects since 1988 (features, doco’s, short’s and TV) – most of which have been unsuccessful financially (avg recoupment of 13.1% over past 17 years). The point of all this is not to discourage you from making independent films, it is the opposite. I just think that filmmakers and assessors need to expand their skills and insight and:

1. Start with the audience in mind at the very beginning of the creative process
2. Optimise distribution plans (don’t just think about theatrical distribution)
3. Focus on who the film will be marketed to and how
4. Understand that unless you are putting up all of the money for your project yourself that it is other peoples time & money being invested and risked and you have a responsibility to maximise returns
5. Respect and understand why audiences go to the cinema, watch DVD’s and consume entertainment generally – they do it for escapism, fun, amusement, diversion, pleasure.

Audience behaviour

The two single biggest marketing & audience takeaways for filmmakers are:

1. You are not your customer! Translation: your likes, dislikes, tastes and behaviour are not representative or your audience / customer. You must be objective, who will want to pay to see your film?
2. 79% of paying audiences say, “Going to the movies is a good escape from everyday life.”* Translation: audiences pay for entertainment & escapism. Do I think a film like Transformers is a film worthy of high critical acclaim? No, but this movie took $701m at the box office because people want to be ‘entertained’ which included me. Equally, films like Driving Miss Daisy or The Green Mile can also do well financially even without a storyline based on blowing things up and lots of visual effects.

*Moviegoers 2010 Research, Stradella Road. September 2009 If marketing mavens want to reach younger moviegoers when promoting their films, they need to embrace social networks or risk being ignored. This is the overall message of Moviegoers 2010, the first report on moviegoing habits produced by Stradella Road, the entertainment marketing firm founded by former New Line New Media guru Gordon Paddison that hopes to assist film marketers in determining how to reach consumers over the next decade. The study found that teens and twentysomethings are especially focused on being able to customize entertainment and are quick to share their opinions with others digitally — especially as usage of the Internet, mobile devices and DVRs has become more widespread. An estimated 94% of all moviegoers are now online. The younger demo is especially key in spreading word of mouth, with 73% of moviegoers surveyed having profiles on social networking sites. Here is a great article from AdAge about the impact of social networking:

How Twitter Makes or Breaks Movie Marketing

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Can the so-called Twitter effect boost a movie’s box-office performance faster than any traditional form of word-of-mouth? Not yet, say many top movie marketers and researchers, but the social networking platform’s impact on a studio’s media mix and campaign management has already taken shape.

It’s a point that’s been made a number of times as sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter have grown in popularity. But the study is one of the few to break down specific age groups and how they consume movies and the marketing messages leading up to their releases.

1. Teens (age 13-17) are “all about sharing information and group thinking,” the report said, with social networking a critical communication tool. They go to movies in large groups and are heavily influenced by their friends’ opinions. They also prefer texting over having phone conversations. More than 70% also surf the Web and text while watching TV, and 67% of them socialize with friends online.
2. Twentysomethings (age 18-29) “are digital natives that have grown up with technology” and are more likely to go online for movie info and to share what they think about movies via social networks (58% socialize with friends online). They use the Internet to find any kind of information and place a high value on online consumer reviews and sites that aggregate reviews.
3. Audiences in their 30s are time-constrained, with parenthood dominating their decisions. They split their moviegoing trips between their children and their spouses. They “spend the highest number of hours online and rep the highest use of technology (Internet, broadband access, DVR ownership and cell phone).” They also view the most recorded TV and skip the most ads via their DVRs.
4. Those in their 40s embrace traditional media like magazines and newspapers, with moviegoing dominated by special family occasions and influenced by teens.
5. And fiftysomethings avoid crowds, prefer matinees and “skip ads because they think there are too many commercials on TV.”

Given the increased influence of websites on which consumers buy movie tickets, AOL, Facebook, Fandango, Google, Microsoft, MovieTickets.com and Yahoo were enlisted to supply data for the study. This study was conducted by surveying 1,547 moderate-to-heavy moviegoers over eight days in July, with an additional 2,305 questioned by phone or online during July. Nielsen NRG managed the research fieldwork. Although many moviegoers are going online to get info on upcoming releases, TV still dominates as the leading tool to generate awareness for films, with 73% of those surveyed saying they first heard about a movie by watching a 30-second spot. In-theater trailers were close behind with 70%, followed by word of mouth (46%) and the Internet (44%). Most films are now considered critic-proof, especially among the younger set, with 84% of moviegoers saying, “When they make up their mind to see a movie, it doesn’t matter what the critics say about it.” It may depend on who’s giving them the thumbs up or down, however.

Of those surveyed, 75% said they trust a friend’s opinion more than a movie critic; 80% said they were more likely to see a movie after hearing a positive review from other moviegoers, while only 67% said a thumbs up from a professional critic had the same weight. Yet only 40% said negative reviews from their peers would dissuade them from seeing a movie, while an even lower 28% would be kept from theatres because of a critic’s opinion, meaning that at the end of the day, negative word of mouth doesn’t have as much influence. While 62% now get their reviews online, only audiences over 50 rely on newspaper reviews.

Now, in all fairness not every producer or filmmaker is an experienced Australian or global marketer. But, the days of filmmakers thinking that filmmaking is simply about making a product, getting a theatrical & sell-through distribution deal and expecting audiences to show up are over. Today’s filmmakers have to be one part creative, part marketer, part distributor, part business manager and part magician but if filmmakers want to be truly successful they need to pay more attention to defining their audience before they make their film, ensuring that the film will meet the expectations of that audience and ensuring the appropriate distribution plan and sufficient marketing apparatus is in place.

Movie Marketing: from Monologue to Dialogue

The days of old school movie marketing which relied largely upon publicity, critical reviews in the media and above the line advertising are now over. If independent filmmakers think that they can get Australian or other audiences into the theatre through a few reviews and a bare bones website with a trailer & synopsis, then they are simply kidding themselves – relying solely upon publicity and word-of-mouth is a recipe for disaster. Marketing changed significantly a few years ago with the advent of digital channels, devices and social networking and this change has significantly fragmented the audiences and changed audience behaviours. The old marketing communication model was a monologue and the new model is a dialogue. We have seen the rise of ‘information democracy’:

From an era of ‘information asymmetry’:

1. Information was scarce
2. Customers were ill-informed
3. Exchanges were monologues
4. Marketing was ‘command-and-control’

To ‘information democracy’:

1. Information is ubiquitous
2. Customers are well-informed
3. Exchanges are conversations
4. Marketing is ‘connect-and-collaborate’

Here is some more perspective on Digital and Social Influence Marketing with lots of Australian research and some case studies: