Alice in your iPhone

I came across an interested article about how Disney has released a free, stand-alone “Alice in Wonderland” iPhone app, plugging both the movie and an upcoming game based on the film for the Nintendo Wii.

What’s interesting is the iPhone-centric mobile push and how much faith movie studio’s are putting in this device when promoting their movies. What about Nokia? Or Google Android based phones?

Well, who can blame them with 50 million units to target (not including iPod Touch devices), its becoming a smart choice for a distributional channel when planning for media. For example, the studio has a fair idea of the user demographic and location of the iPhone user. Its common knowledge that the majority of iPhones have been purchased in developed countries, with around 65% of users aged between 25 – 54 years who have a higher than average income.

Alice in Wonderland isn’t the first movie that has utilized the iPhone as a distribution channel with Saw 5, Star Wars, Terminator and Star Trek producing top quality iPhone apps to support its movie release. Saw 5 deserves a special mention with their ‘jigsaw your voice’ app. The  ’jigsaw your voice’ app cleverly morph’s the users voice, with the aim of sounding like the game master in Saw. Once the user has morphed their voice, they are then given the option to their ‘morphed voice’ to their contacts – viral marketing at its best.

The idea sounds spooky but its been downloaded a heap of times with a valuable fan base who keep using the app and sending their morphed voice to their contacts. Furthermore, the power of the iPhone allows movie studios to push out exclusive content, behind the scenes info, characters profile, release dates and even giveaways. Even if the movie was ordinary and failed at the box-office, at least the studio has the opportunity to blow the public away with a relevant iPhone app that the user will hopefully absorb and connect with well after the movie has gone to DVD release.