Gordon Paddison is Senior Vice President of Worldwide Interactive Marketing and Business Development for New Line Cinema, and a master of Buzz.

Gordon Paddison has written more than a few pages in the history of online buzz. In just 18 months, The “Lord of the Rings” franchise has grossed more than $1.6 Billion worldwide at the box office and if the momentum continues for the third installment -- “Return of the King” with a Christmas release -- this trilogy could gross more than $ 2.5 Billion. According to theater exit polls, more than 45% of the opening weekend audience said they learned about the first “Lord of the Rings” movie from Web promotions.

QEIB (Quantifiable Early Internet Buzz) is about early planning and timing for the launch of your buzz campaign. Paddison built the “Lord of the Rings” Website www.lordoftherings.net two-and-a-half years in advance of the movie release and nine months before the first frame of film was shot. He identified more than 400 fan sites and gained their trust. Then he created an online event to show the first look at never-released footage almost a year before the theatrical teaser trailer. The result is 1.7 million fans downloaded it in 24 hours; almost double the number for the previous “Star Wars/Phantom Menace” trailer. Within that first week, the buzz generated more than 6.6 million downloads of this online preview.

Paddison shares with us an insider’s look at the online strategy for New Line Cinema.

iMedia Connection: What was the first Internet promotion you did at New Line?

Paddison: It started by making a proposal to create, basically an FTP service for journalists back in 1994 before Websites -- to do interactive marketing by FTP and diskette, servicing the press digital materials to save on FedEx costs. It turned into something completely different about a year later.

iMedia Connection: QEIB is about targeting the key multipliers, the folks who hunt for the latest and newest item on the Web. They bring it back to their not-so-online friends, which keeps them popular in their social group. For your business model, how do you find your key multipliers?

Paddison: In my world we call the key multipliers ‘Avids’. These are people who attend movies four times a month. They are the people who help influence their peer group. People who generally end up at your Website early are key multipliers because they have a pre-awareness and they are seeking your brand versus your brand seeking them. The great thing about the Internet is that it represents the entire base of marketing -- from awareness to exploration to conversion.

iMedia Connection: To reach your Buzz target and connect with the key multipliers or your ‘Avids”, how do you find them beyond your own Web properties?

Paddison: It’s nice simple science. Look for the combination of frequent moviegoers, and the highest index of frequent moviegoers in that specific outlet. I look for which Websites index highest for frequent moviegoers in this target demographic: 17 to 24 males who are 220% more likely to attend this movie based on genre.

iMedia Connection: Building a Web property for “Lord of the Rings” two-and-a-half years before the film’s release was unheard of in 1999. How did you convince the producer, the director and the key executives at New Line to buy in to this strategy?

Paddison: I wrote a memo in ’99 that laid out a suggested strategy for being completely open and working with the fans. It was a gut thing because New Line has been involved in grass roots marketing on many projects over the years. I believe in working with the fans and I believe in being open. Mark Ordesky was the executive producer on the film and he was completely supportive as was the director Peter Jackson. As the film went into production and began filming we had developed a legitimate dialogue with fans and were supported by management. Our approach was organic and honest.

iMedia Connection: Quantification is the first word of QEIB. How much is online ticket sales the factor in quantifying the buzz with your online campaigns?

Paddison: I am trying to drive ticket sales. I also want people to hopefully go through MovieFone.com, Fandango.com and MovieTickets.com. It is very difficult to drive the significant kind of transactional numbers that show the value equation. The thing is trying to get someone to ticket online when there is a service charge. Nobody wants to pay an extra buck. It doesn’t mean the people are not buying because they didn’t buy online. Online ticketing is just one of the metrics we use to evaluate success.

iMedia Connection: The online campaign for the “Lord of the Rings” franchise started in 1999 and will continue through the DVD release of “The Return of the King” in 2004. How do you sustain a buzz online for five years?

Paddison: The strategy was to develop a dialogue and give a continuous flow of information that was unique to the production and not reactive to the gossip surrounding the production. The best part of the “Lord of the Rings” campaign is the fact it was done with the passion of this project and the passion of the audience in mind. Although we are constantly recalibrating timing, the way the program was laid out in ’99 is exactly what worked throughout and will work throughout the next two years.

iMedia Connection: After building this massive online property for “Lord of the Rings”, how did you use this investment to continue to learn about marketing the next film in the trilogy?

Paddison: Prior to the release of the first film we were trying to attract young females because that was the weakest quadrant. It wasn’t until after the “Fellowship of the Ring” was in theaters that we had discovered over time an exponential increase in traffic for certain sections of the Website. We are always looking to optimize site section traffic patterns and in digging down in the stats we found there were tons of teen girl sites that were linking directly into specific sections of the “Lord of the Rings” Website. We suddenly found we had become the #1 destination online for Orlando Bloom (whose character is the Elf Legolas). Our downloads for Legolas & Orlando Bloom desktops and screen savers were through the roof. I was able to turn around to management and say, “We have a significant spike in traffic after the release of the trailer based on Orlando Bloom.” The young girls went nuts over Orlando Bloom and then he did a Gap ad last year and it went bananas. When they wanted to find out anything about Orlando Bloom, one of the best online repositories of photos and screensavers was our “Lord of the Rings” site.

iMedia Connection: What great online ideas can we expect with the release of “Return of the King”?

Paddison: A nice thing about this campaign is there is not a need for new strategy going forward. There is nothing that we have to do new and breakout that will garner an audience. I think we now have a 98-99% consumer awareness of the brand, which is amazing. There are lots of other movie sites that cover “Lord of the Rings”. We are just the official site and we have a unique insight into the production and the elements of the production. So everything about the site is always about the process. If people want to lift pictures and this and that, they cannot lift the soul of the process because we are the only one that has that. And in the constellation of “Lord of the Rings”, we take our place.

iMedia Connection: For the benefit of the iMedia audience reading this column, give us the ideal scenario for a sponsor/brand to be involved with your content for an online buzz campaign.

Paddison: The main thing would be making sure their stated campaign goals matched our products and help support their product and our intended awareness for our films. While we are always open to partnership on “Lord of the Rings”, we have other films that offer unique opportunities and for which we are focused on developing programs. We are currently looking for exposure and partners on Freddy vs. Jason in August and our November release of Elf, starring Will Ferrell. These are great films that reach different audience segments. The best programming opportunity will be integrated with both online and offline components. Partner programs can include the entire release cycle from theatrical through home entertainment.

iMedia Connection: Ok, let’s end the article with a simple question: What’s the most fun you have in your job?

Paddison: The most fun in my job would have to be … the job itself -- the fact that my post has been allowed to continue handling the integrated online program, which means publicity, promotion, advertising and content development. We’ve gone through a lot of changes in the industry. The online segment has grown and New Line has scaled with the industry without adding overhead. We are a very small department with a couple of people and I am still permitted to manage the process. I think there is benefit and leverage from not spinning off media, promotions and publicity to different departments. A great thing about working at New Line is the entire marketing department is on one floor. We have close communications with everything. And we are very open and we talk. We have a great president of marketing so it makes it much easier and enjoyable to do the job.

Ty Braswell is the former vice president of new media for Virgin Records, where he managed the online campaigns for a range of artists including Lenny Kravitz and Janet Jackson. During his tenure at Virgin, he created new online models for partnerships between brands and record labels. He is now senior strategist for iMediaStrategy, the new division of iMedia Communications providing industry-wide thinking that serves to advance the business of interactive marketing & advertising.