Where the Magic Happens

Business Challenge:
Located in Queens, Lifetime had to win business from studios located in Manhattan, where producers and crews preferred the City’s panache and convenience.

Target:
Professional B&W photographers

Customer Insight:
Producers, the primary decision makers, were highly influenced by the convenience and panache of being in Manhattan.  Yet, their abiding stress and fear was a lack of control in delivering a hit show.  Producers sought any advantage to deliver that elusive “chemistry” — a certain kind of cool and magic that just might make a hit show. As it turns out, Lifetime’s location was in the Kaufman Astoria lots, famous for producing films before the film industry moved to Hollywood.

Strategy/Brand Position:
Where the magic happens. Position Lifetime as the studio that offered the best technology in a place where magic — that rarity in entertainment, a Hit Show —  could happen. Express this through images that echoed the feeling, the magic, of famous Hollywood legends and shows.

Creative Solution:
A campaign that would spark in producers that ever-present hope against hope of producing that illusive magic that makes a hit show happen. On my tour of Lifetime Studios, beyond Lifetime’s superior technology, I was blown away by a large photo on the cafeteria wall of Rudolph Valentino sitting alone at a table studying his script over coffee in the very same same spot in the same studio. And other examples of famous actors whose inspiring, bigger-than-life presence could be felt here at Lifetime. So, to make that illusive magic happen, do it in a place that is alive with the magic already.

Result and Business Value: Breakthrough awareness in trade publications like Variety. An emotional connection with producers who were called by sales representatives. And a feature story on studio technology by Variety, who asked me if they coud use one of our Lifetime ads as their cover. I said yes. And the client said, Wow.

To set up a meeting and learn more, contact janzlotnick@gmail.com