Promotion of the next chapter of the Star Wars saga, “The Force Awakens,” began earlier this month with the release of the film’s first official trailer, followed by tens of millions of views online.
But now, the next chapter of Star Wars promotion has begun, and it’s pretty great.
Although the latest Star Wars sequel still won’t land in theaters for nearly a year, the anticipation – and, frankly, expectations – for the movie continues to build. So to keep audiences engaged in the meantime, and help put some names with new faces from the upcoming film, Star Wars co-writer and director J.J. Abrams and Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy have turned to an old medium – The trading card, featured exclusively in Entertainment Weekly.
Seldom seen in the mainstream these days outside of perhaps the world of sports (and even there, its popularity has greatly waned), the trading card was something that most kids of the 1970s and ’80s – myself included – passionately collected, and on occasion, traded amongst friends.
Nearly 40 years ago, the trading card company Topps created a series of collectible cards to tie in with the original 1977 Star Wars film, which is just one of several reasons why this 21st century marketing approach by Abrams and Kennedy is smart. Here are some others:
The force is strong with this effort – I only wish all of my own marketing campaigns were that savvy.
Brian Walker is the Founder and CEO of AE Marketing Group. Follow him on Twitter at @BrianWalkerCHI