Honors Program

Midway Honors, Honors in Business

Date of Award

5-2017

Thesis Professor(s)

Dr. Kelly Price-Rhea

Thesis Professor Department

Management and Marketing

Thesis Reader(s)

Dr. Dana Harrison, Prof. Rustam Sheridan

Abstract

This paper explores the value of using metaphor based marketing research methods (most notably Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique) in the development and green-lighting processes of filmmaking. A review of literature reveals that even large blockbuster films lack any marketing research employed in the developmental stage. Audiences are extremely difficult to analyze when considering something as abstract and subjective as what makes a “good” film. Metaphor based marketing research methods (e.g. ZMET) offer a solution by examining the minds of consumers through language markers called metaphors. Using a metaphor based marketing technique early in a film’s development process may help to predict the success of a film as well as help to inform other marketing promotions for the film. The purpose of this study is to show how using an adaptation of ZMET will help film developers better predict the market potential for a project before the green-lighting phase.

Publisher

East Tennessee State University

Document Type

Honors Thesis - Withheld

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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Copyright

Copyright by the authors.

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