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Peanuts fans become a part of the film with character creator

Film studio 20th Century Fox Animation has created a character-generator platform available through mobile to jumpstart excitement over the upcoming release of the new Peanuts Movie. 

The Peanuts franchise has been a staple within pop culture since the 1950s, which creates an opportunity for Fox to leverage fan frenzy surrounding discussion of the film and user generated content. Users on mobile and desktop can create a Peanuts character of themselves and share seamlessly through various social media platforms, which allows for the studio to hype up its release through peer-to-peer discussion. 

"By utilizing an interactive feature like 'Peanut-izing' yourself, you are exposing people to the film and its characters in a way that does not feel like a traditional advertisement," said Amy Leavitt, marketing director at Briabe Mobile."You are also creating something that is easily shareable, which allows consumers to become advocates for the film through a simple social media post. 

"This digital word of mouth can create additional buzz that might not be achieved through other forms of marketing and advertising due to the interactive nature of the campaign," she said. 

Peanuts popularity
The Peanuts brand has stood the test of time, starting with comic strips and foraying into various aspects of entertainment including the widely popular television specials. The computer-animated film has longtime fans exited to share in a bit of nostalgia while sharing it with younger new fans. 

Fans wishing to be apart of the Peanuts gang can access Peanutizeme.com on desktop and mobile to create a digital character of themselves coinciding with the typical comic strip look, but with the updated animation appearance. Users can select skin tone, hairstyle and color, clothing, accessories and eye shape to create a Peanuts character in their likeness, of friends and family or a completely new character. 


The generator allows users to choose a background of their liking as well, each depicting a new season. A backdrop representing an autumn landscape has been particularly popular, coinciding with the change of season and is enticing users even further to get involved. 


The downloaded picture is generated as the format of a typical profile picture on various social media platforms, to encourage users to change avatars to their new created character. 

Foxy mobile marketing
20th Century Fox is known for taking interesting approaches to marketing, in attempts to further engage fans. The studio recently marketed via mobile for the upcoming release of its remake of the classic film Poltergeist by terrifying unsuspecting social media users through its Fear Factory, targeting victims that shared their greatest fears on Twitter (see more). 

Also, in Uber?s first coordinated, multi-city event through the application, film studio gave users of the ride-sharing service a chance to win exclusive passes to an advance screening of the film, "Kingsman: The Secret Service? (see more).

"The most important thing to remember when using mobile for this type of initiative is user experience and quality of content," Ms. Leavitt said. "The mobile site needs to work flawlessly and be easy to use. 

"If consumers have difficulty interacting with the site, they are less likely to promote and share out their creation when they are finished," she said. "For many, mobile is the primary device where they engage with and consume content, so they expect top quality and usability. 

"And lastly, of course, integration with social platforms is key to make it as easy as possible for consumers to share."

Final take
Brielle Jaekel is editorial assistant at Mobile Marketer