• USA Today, Tuesday, May 16, 2006 11:30 AM

Movie studios have always relied heavily on television advertising to market their films, usually running commercials on popular Thursday night TV shows the day before the films open in theaters. Now the studios are turning to an even smaller screen to promote their wares, as traditional advertising methods begin to lose their impact. Internet, video podcast and mobile marketing campaigns are becoming more popular, especially for the summer films, like "Superman Returns," "Poseidon" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest," that hope to attract younger audiences. "People aren't quite as influenced by mass-media campaigns anymore," says Ian Schafer, CEO of marketing firm Deep Focus, which has planted trailers for films such as "Scary Movie 4" on video-sharing Web sites such as YouTube and Google Video. Consumers "now rely more on buzz and word-of-mouth" in movie choices, he says. The strategy seems to be working. When Warner Bros. posted behind-the-scenes production video diaries of "Superman Returns" on its SupermanReturns.com, iTunes and the hard-core Superman fan site BlueTights Network, the response "was beyond our wildest expectations," says Warner Bros. interactive marketing head Don Buckley. On iTunes alone, there were nearly 60 million downloads. Next, Warner will package the diaries for cell phone distribution.

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