Redesign Aims to Improve User Experience and Highlight Marquee Cinematic Content
(New York – August 3, 2015) IFC Entertainment, the film distribution company owned by AMC Networks, is announcing today the launch of a new website. The company tapped digital creative agency Big Spaceship to design and build the new site, with the aim to create a modernized online destination for its content.
The company’s first redesign in seven years, the new responsive site features improved navigation and a more streamlined user experience, creating a more intuitive platform for visitors to find out how to view the movies they are interested in across the company’s three major distribution labels: IFC Films, Sundance Selects and IFC Midnight. The site strategy was created with three major goals in mind, all designed to promote discovery on the IFC Films site.
Knowing that the two most trafficked templates on IFCFilms.com were the film template and the home page, Big Spaceship optimized the user experience to help users find information faster. The site acts as a resource for film enthusiasts, theaters, film festivals and press alike – providing all the information and assets needed to screen, promote and view the films.
In the redesign, IFC Films and Big Spaceship chose to highlight the company’s marquee content – putting premier releases front and center with the addition of full-screen trailers that dominate the homepage. The new homepage uniquely displays trailers for five featured films that will rotate out over time, as new releases are available.
“We’re excited to launch the new IFCFilms.com and give users a visually striking, experiential destination to engage with our film labels and explore our extensive catalog,” said Shani Ankori, senior vice president of marketing for IFC Films/Sundance Selects. “Fans, press and partners across the creative community will be able to easily learn about our current releases, discover various titles from our library through uniquely themed categories, and find ways to watch any of our films.”
“We knew trailers were the strongest promotional tool IFC Films had for their titles. Along the path of finding the films they are interested in, users should be encouraged to play trailers at every step of the way. We designed the site with this in mind – there should always be an element of the page in motion,” said Big Spaceship Group Design Director, Dave Chau. “We wanted the site to feel alive and continue to move with you as you explore.”
Big Spaceship and IFC Films also worked together to migrate and catalog content on the backend – designed to facilitate the findability and discovery of all titles in the company’s catalog. The new website allows the user to watch or queue films via GoWatchIt. The widget easily allows the films to be purchased on iTunes, streamed on Netflix, and viewed on all other platforms on which the films are currently featured.
About IFC Entertainment
Established in 2000 and since becoming a leader in the independent film industry, IFC Entertainment consists of three distribution labels that are devoted to bringing the best of independent and foreign films to the largest possible audience: IFC Films, Sundance Selects and IFC Midnight.
IFC Films is a leading distributor of quality talent-driven independent film. IFC Midnight is the company’s genre label featuring features horror, sci-fi, thrillers, erotic art-house, action and more. Sundance Selects focuses on American independent, documentaries and world cinema. IFC Entertainment pioneered the distribution model of releasing films in theaters the same day they are available on video on demand. The company customizes a distribution strategy for each film, which may also include day and date, something that IFC Entertainment pioneered whereby films are available in theaters the same day they can be accessed through the On Demand platform. IFC Entertainment films are also frequently made available on all digital platforms, including iTunes, Playstation, X-Box, Amazon, Hulu, etc. IFC Entertainment is owned and operated by AMC Networks Inc.
About Big Spaceship
Big Spaceship is a Brooklyn-based digital creative agency, founded in 2000 by CEO Michael Lebowitz. A pioneer of Digital Dumbo, Big Spaceship focuses its strategy around the belief that a brand is the sum of its interactions. The agency fuses its three core disciplines – marketing communications, product strategy & design, and social strategy & content – using insights from human behavior to address clients’ business challenges. This convergence of creativity with data and analytics has powered clients including Google Play, Google Maps, Samsung Mobile, BMW North America, Organic Valley, Néstle Purina, and more.