Social Media Content vs Your Own Website

While waiting at the bus stop this morning I spotted a poster for a new movie called: "Kick Ass". One thing that struck me was that there was not a website address for the movie. Usually you see something like: www.thebourneultimatum.com or www.saw6film.com.

Instead, the poster had youtube.com/kickass and facebook.com/kickassmovie links. This is quite interesting in that the promoters have realised that it is so much easier to generate a social buzz via the most popular social networking website than it is from their own website. On Facebook, the page already has over 11,000 fans and YouTube has over 80,000 views of the Kickass channel.

This is slightly related to the recent Econsultancy post about Websites vs Facebook Pages: which URL should you promote?. In the case of promoting mainstream motion pictures to the younger demographic, I think the Facebook / Youtube approach is correct. The downsides don't really count:

1. There's no ownership
   True, if the movie is a complete duck then it will be made known on Facebook and Youtube.
2. Not everyone is on Facebook
   I would say that almost everyone interested in this movie is on Facebook, but even if they are not, you don't need an account to view a Facebook page.
3. A Facebook Page URL isn't any more appealing
   True, but does it matter with this particular content?
4. You miss out on SEO benefits
   Again, not really an issue because a website about a movie with the name as the URL and some decent inbound links should always rank well in search engines.
5. A great website is far more powerful than a Facebook Page
   I completely agree but in this instance, they do also have a movie website but they choose to promote the more popular medium.

If you are interested in seeing the actual movie website: www.kickass-themovie.com

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