Summit Entertainment’s Dauntless Social Media Campaign

When a Lionsgate-Summit film was created for Veronica Roth’s 2011 novel, Divergent, many compared it to the next Hunger Games Saga. However, with the help of fearless social media efforts, and $56 million at its weekend premiere, Divergent earned its own adventurous identity. Summit Entertainment dove head-first into cutting-edge social media by hitting its target audience right in their comfort zones. They helped their audiences smoothly transition from their own locations, to reclining chairs lined with popcorn. Here’s how:

Divergent Official Site: The Center of All Things Social

Summit constructed their Divergent website in a way that seemed to make Veronica Roth’s story come alive. Divergent is an action-packed story with the idea that people are divided into 5 groups–or factions–based on their virtues and beliefs. Summit, in order to reflect this theory, divided its website into essentially 5 parts. Each section, signifying each faction, displays a feed that flows from multiple social platforms–including Spotify, Pinterest, Tumblr, Instagram, and other mediums. The feeds are created by fans and advertisers who simply tag #Divergent, #DivergentMovie, and what faction they are representing. As a result, the content appears on the feeds.

Social Gaming Meets Social Sharing
Along with sections for trailers, galleries, soundtrack, and links to buying the novel, Summit also included in its website two social games. Both allow fans the ability to step into the world of Divergent and imagine a world like those of the main characters.

Aptitude Test

In the beginning of Divergent, the main character, Tris, must take a test to find out what faction she belongs in. Fans are able to do the same thing by taking their own aptitude quiz. They can share their results on the social media of their choice, and take the quiz multiple times.

Faction Your Friends
Another social game allows fans to connect to Facebook, and click and drag their friends into different factions that suit them. Once they are done, they are provided with a variety of social media sites to share their creation on. Fans can utilize the game as a funny and entertaining way to connect with those they trust, and pass along the Divergent message.

Social Media Sharing
The Divergent main site connects fans to a large selection of social media. Social media, in turn, provides fans with links back to the main site. This circle of communication connects the audience with trailers, games, music, photos, and most importantly, the link where they can purchase tickets.

Twitter: Currently 250,610 Followers
Beyond the norm of twitter movie posts, @Divergent continued to promote the movie even after it arrived in theaters by allowing fans to tweet or post their own reviews. In order for others to see, fans could tag #DivergentReview. This gave ratings and reviews a sense of authenticity, and fans can continue to view these reviews to see what fans, other than experts, thought.

Fans can also tag #IamDivergent and post fan apparel that can be retweeted by @Divergent.

In order to give off a sense of transparency, @Divergent also frequently tweeted at John Green, author of The Fault in Our Stars. Divergent cast members Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort are also starring in the movie adoption of FIOS, and jokes between both authors proved to be a hit among fans.

Facebook: Currently 1,821,940 Likes

Along with postings of trailers, clips, and pictures, the Divergent Facebook also included in their countdown a “Faction of the Week.” Each week before the movie came to theaters, a post would display a new faction. Anyone who “liked” the Facebook page could click on the picture and experience a new behind-the-scenes look at the cast, crew, and creation of Divergent. The links of these features usually brought them back to the official site, where they could check out the games, feeds, and variety of links.

Google+: Currently 19,134 Followers, 2,061,790 Views
Google+ is increasingly becoming a popular medium for video chats, document sharing, and information gathering. Summit decided to post on this social media site as well, in order to reach this expanding amount of members. One way they marketed was using Google Play as a way to promote the Divergent series–for a limited time they offered e-books, with photo galleries and an exclusive inside look at the thought behind Divergent.

YouTube: Currently 44,768 Subscribers
YouTube specialized in exclusive interviews, movie trailers, and cast behind the scenes. However, an especially innovative strategy was YouTube’s “Face Your Fears” section. YouTube invited fans to post videos of themselves facing their own fears, and top YouTube viewed videos were placed on Divergent‘s page.

Pinterest: Currently 13,235 Followers
Pinterest is utilized by grouping together all Divergent content found on every social media site, to organize and allow viewers a faster way to view information.

Instagram: Currently 252,482 Followers

Divergent‘s Instagram, while posting photos on their own site, also took over @yahoomovies for an entire week–promoting their site with two accounts. The Instagram account also posted parts of one picture per post. By doing this, they added a sense of mystery to their posts, while also creating what looked like the entire image out of the different parts when users went to the browse version of the account.

Divergent On the Go
With the Divergent Mobile App, fans are notified of recent news, given a description and video reel of main characters, and allowed an inside look at photos and video clips. Accessibility helped the Divergent campaign earn high ratings by placing content in the hands of mobile device holders. By only moving a finger, fans can get up close and personal with Divergent and use the same app to purchase movie tickets. With so many choices in one place, fans are getting more divergence than what appears on screen.