American Airlines And Hilton In 2 Hour Ad

Over the holiday weekend many of you may have put the laptop to the side and spent a bit of time with family and friends, but how many of you saw the extended advert for both American Airlines and Hilton Hotels?

Or should I say the latest George Clooney movie, 'Up In The Air'?

Clooney plays a corporate downsizing consultant who crosses the States laying off a myriad of employees from Detriot to St.Louis. He claims to have spent 45 days in the past year in his rather drab home and gives talks on what he carries in his bag. This is a man who lives in hotels and planes armed with a stack of privelege cards collecting airmiles like they are going out of fashion. His dream? To get to the magical number of 10 million airmiles.

This is where American Airlines and Hilton Hotels come in to play. As Clooney's character flits from airport to airport we see him jump queues, receive gracious welcomes and feel at home in lounges. Likewise with Hilton.

Amazingly, all the promo was 'free': “We did not spend any money,” said Dawn Turner, manager of promotions at American Airlines. Foregoing the usual fees reserved for production houses to use planes and premises, American Airlines saw the benefits of some very worthwhile global PR. Promo extended to in-flight trailers, taking over the cover of its in-flight magazine and offers on its website.

Hilton similarly extended their reach on the back of the movie by holding the premiere party and promoting the movie through its properties. They also used it to motivate staff as a worldwide contest asking staff to recount how they have personally accommodated guests with the winners winning a trip to the premiere in LA.

Why did they do it? Remember the film could have flopped and been a major corporate embarrassment. “If a production isn’t putting together a project that fits well with our brand image, we don’t participate,” Ms. Turner said. “Movies nowadays can be really violent, and if they have a plane blowing up, that’s not good.” So how much of the movie did each company influence?

A fictional American Airlines graphite card was owned by the main character and he was presented with a personally engraved metal card when he achieves his golden mark which suggests some influence. Was this the writer's idea or will the airline introduce these perks?

Whatever the case the movie is an interesting example of how the corporate world, with the right vehicle, can put a global marketing campaign together that reaches their target in quite a different form. Is this the real corporate lesson of social media marketing?

More on the story here