tfc_blog

by Sheri Candler

Every year, I compile a presentation for the TFC all-staff meeting to inform the group on what the latest social media trends are, what changes have recently taken place and what may be to come on the major social media platforms. This post will share the insights I gathered with that might benefit filmmakers in the coming year.

General Social Media Trends
  • People’s attention spans are short and the way they like to consume content has also changed. Content formats like Stories have become popular. They are short, engaging, and addictive in a way that people can spend hours scrolling through one Story after another. Facebook forecasts that sharing to Stories will surpass sharing to Feeds at some point in the coming year. Consider creating a 15 seconds vertical video as one of your trailers.
  • 1 out of every 4 Facebook Pages now use paid advertising as part of their social media strategy and Facebook accounts for 23% of total U.S. digital ad spending. If you’re trying to grow an audience via Facebook and Instagram, budget will be needed for paid social media placement.
  • 4 in 10 consumers say they are unlikely to become emotionally attached to a brand unless they are interacting via social media, but those interactions need to be authentic and personalized. This means refrain from only posting about your projects and really try to relate, on a personal level, to your audience.
  • Most popular mobile social networking apps in the United States as of September 2019, by monthly users (in millions). Facebook is still tops when it comes to users.Statistic: Most popular mobile social networking apps in the United States as of September 2019, by monthly users (in millions) | Statista
  • Approximately 223 million Americans use social media in 2019. This is a slight increase over 2018, and a slight decrease compared to 2017. Overall, however, social media usage is essentially unchanged over the past four years. The ONLY social network growing among young Americans is Instagram, up from 64% to 66% in the past two years. Social networks in 2019 are now nearly as likely to be utilized by people 35-54 years old, than those younger, which is good news for theatrical campaigns and documentary makers.
    social_media_usage
    Social Media Usage: Total U.S. Population, from 2008 to 2019

Facebook
  • Facebook is actually less popular now than it was four years ago. But it is still at the top of the list for daily users.
    The only demographic group that is using Facebook more than in prior years are Americans 55+.
  • The average monthly change in page likes is just 0.13% Building your Facebook audience is definitely a slow and steady game.
    The average organic reach for a Facebook post is 5.5%. Take the number of fans on your page and multiply it by 5.5% to see if you are reaching the average per post. If you are not, then re-evaluate what you are posting.
  • 60% of Americans who watch digital video do so on Facebook and the average engagement rate for Facebook video posts is 6.13%
    Among U.S. adults who use Facebook, around three-quarters (74%) visit the site at least once a day.
  • Sources: https://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-research/social-media-usage-statistics
    https://blog.hootsuite.com/facebook-statistics/#business https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/05/16/facts-about-americans-and-facebook

    Recent changes that affect Facebook Pages
    • Facebook has eliminated Post Scheduling for pages on DESKTOP. To access this function, you need to use Creators Studio or third-party scheduling tools like Hootsuite.
    • Groups are booming on Facebook. They’re pretty much the platform’s most popular feature, and engagement in groups is skyrocketing.
    • A change in Reach calculations. More on that here.
    • New Creators Studio insights called Traffic Source. More on that here .

    Twitter
    • Twitter’s U.S. user base is predicted to grow 0.3% in 2020.
    • Only 20% of Twitter’s daily users are American.
    • Compared to other age groups, Gen Z is most likely to be using Twitter. (By comparison, only 26% of 30- to 49-year-olds use Twitter.) That said, Gen Z is still much more likely to be using YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook. 65% of Twitter’s top 10% of users (by tweet volume) identify as women. And 69% of this group say they tweet about politics, and identify as Democrats.
    • Tweets with hashtags get 100% more engagement, but only 1 or 2 hashtags.
    • 93% of video views on Twitter happen on mobile so be sure to use mobile-optimized video that has subtitles or captions for sound-off viewing.

    Source: https://blog.hootsuite.com/twitter-statistics

    Recent changes that affect Twitter
    • No political advertising. Political ads are defined as content that references a candidate, political party, elected or appointed government official, election, referendum, ballot measure, legislation, regulation, directive, or judicial outcome. Ads that contain references to political content, including appeals for votes, solicitations of financial support, and advocacy for or against any of the above-listed types of political content, are prohibited under this policy.
    • Redesign of the Twitter layout on desktop happened in summer 2019.
    • Twitter lets you add a photo, video or gif to a Retweet. Read more about this here.
    • 2 rumored changes that could be coming in 2020. The ability to prevent other users from mentioning you without your permission and ability to disable a retweet on your tweet.

    Instagram.
    • 1 billion people use Instagram every month, though only 110 million are located in the United States.
    • Instagram is the most popular traditional social network among U.S. teens 13-17yrs. Only YouTube is more popular with teens. 72% of U.S. teens say they use Instagram, compared to 69% for Snapchat and 51% for Facebook.
    • The gender mix on Instagram is pretty even: 52% female and 48% male.
    • In case you were thinking of hiring an influencer to help with an Instagram campaign, brands pay Instagram influencers between $100 and $2,085 per post. For videos, they pay between $114 and $3,138, and for Stories they pay between $43 and $721.
    • Brands post an average of 2.5 Stories per week.

    Source: https://blog.hootsuite.com/instagram-statistics

    Recent changes that affect Instagram
    • Instagram is now hiding Likes on mobile devices for US accounts after testing in several other countries. Facebook may soon start hiding likes, too. Likes can still be seen on desktop.
    • Donation stickers available on IG. Instagram launched donation stickers for Stories back in May, giving accounts the capacity to raise money for non-profit groups via the option. A non profit must be registered on Facebook first in order to have this capability.
    • IGTV now supports Landscape Videos, though it is up to the user to actually turn the phone to watch them. Most people watch their IG feed in vertical position so uploading a landscape video is asking to go against consumer habits.
    • It is recommended to use Facebook Creators Studio on desktop to manage a brand Instagram account because it gives access to scheduling posts and expanded metrics.

    Source: https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/facebook-expands-access-to-brand-collabs-manager-adds-new-insights-to-crea/566765

    A word about TikTok

    For those who do not have teenagers in your life, TikTok is a video sharing platform where short updates, typically accompanied by music, are shared publicly. This is one of the fastest-growing social platforms and forecasted to continue to grow by leaps and bounds in 2020, but be cautious with any platform championed by teens. The very young are quite fickle and meteoric rise is frequently countered with equally quick crashes as the party moves to the next shiny thing. For a look at brands killing it on TikTok, read more here.

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February 21st, 2020

Posted In: Facebook, Instagram, Marketing, Social Network Marketing, technology, Twitter

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twitter

In the previous two posts, I wrote about changes I think most independent filmmakers should be aware of when it comes to using Facebook and Instagram for their marketing efforts. This post will talk about Twitter. Is having an account here still necessary?

Twitter

With 69 million monthly active users in the United States, 267 million worldwide, Twitter is one of the top social media sites that brands still actively use. We can’t go a day without hearing news of a certain someone ranting on the platform, and without a doubt, Twitter is the number one social media platform for breaking news. But is that helpful for the average indie filmmaker?

While it isn’t likely that filmmakers will post breaking news that is of interest to a broader public, one great reason to use Twitter is for video sharing. Over the last 12 months, tweets containing videos perform the best in terms of reach compared to posts with links, images, and GIFs. Filmmakers need to be able to produce a regular supply of short videos, ideally less than 1 minute long (Twitter mainly allows for videos of 2 minutes 20 seconds in total), with the first 3 seconds serving to capture thumb-stopping attention (thumb-stopping-causing someone on a mobile device to pause scrolling through their newsfeed). Give some thought to the kind of clips and trailers you will post to social versus what you would make for a theatrical experience (where the audience won’t be scrolling on their phones). Also, don’t forget to make these videos square (600 by 600 pixels) or vertical (600 by 750 pixels), instead of horizontal, to optimize for mobile viewing.

In 2018, Twitter has been grappling with slow user growth and has deleted thousands of fake and bott accounts, lowering follower numbers on most accounts. If you have seen a slight drop in followers, likely you had a few of these accounts following you.

A recent update to the Facebook Platform Policies ended the ability to automatically post Tweets to your Facebook profile or page. This was never a good idea as audiences on the two platforms are different and it was a lazy way of marketing. But for those who did connect their Twitter accounts and Facebook pages, a more manual process is now needed for posting to the different platforms.

As of September, Twitter has re-enabled the ability to see tweets in purely chronological order, if you change your settings. Two years after phasing out this ability in favor of top-ranked or “curated” tweets, Twitter gave back the functionality that most people loved about the platform. But you have to make a change in your settings, by unchecking the box that says Show the Best Tweets First. In a world where it seems your newsfeed is programmed by an algorithmic guess, finally having the ability to see news according to the time it was posted is refreshing.

Like Facebook and Instagram, Twitter has instituted its own political content policy on advertising. The platform considers ads that advocate for legislative issues of national importance to be governed by their new policy and in order to advertise, advertisers must go through Twitter’s certification process (https://business.twitter.com/en/help/ads-policies/restricted-content-policies/political-campaigning/US-political-content/how-to-get-certified-issue-ads.html). Most likely, if you are making a documentary with an issue of national significance at its core, such as abortion, civil rights, climate change, guns, healthcare, immigration, national security, social security, taxes, and trade, you will need to register your account in order to use Twitter advertising in the future.

Getting back to the question of whether indie filmmakers still should be using Twitter, it all depends on your ability to handle multiple social media accounts and what you want each account to do as far as your goals. If connecting with Twitter influencers, or perpetuating a campaign hashtag, or reaching a global audience outside of the U.S. are some of your main objectives, Twitter is still a great place to do that.

December 31st, 2018

Posted In: Marketing, Social Network Marketing, Twitter

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In the previous post, I wrote about changes I think most independent filmmakers should be aware of when it comes to using Facebook for their marketing efforts. This post will talk about Instagram, owned by Facebook, which has been growing exponentially since its debut in 2010.

Instagram

The preferred platform of choice for the millennial set and no longer just a space for image-sharing. In the past two years, the convergence of Instagram and Facebook has made them extremely similar in that they share an ad platform, both have Stories capabilities and increasingly product sales capabilities.

With over 500 million daily active users, Instagram skews more female and most of its users fall between the ages of 13-29 yrs old.  If this is an audience you need to reach, Instagram is a must have platform for your marketing efforts and you need to start thinking how to optimize for it.

Like Facebook, the platform is constantly evolving and this makes keeping up with the changes a challenge. Instagram also has instituted a political ads policy and now account administrators must register their accounts through their Facebook Business Manager’s Authorization section (find this section in Settings>Authorizations) in order to place advertising that has a political or issue of national interest  topic involved. As discussed in the previous Facebook blog, this is a wide range of topics which can be seen to advocate on legislative issues such as abortion, civil rights, climate change, guns, healthcare, immigration, national security, social security, taxes, trade etc. If you are a documentary filmmaker, this advertising policy is likely to be something with which you have to contend and if your page is not authorized, you will not be able to place any form of paid advertising on your posts (including boosts) unless you have gone through the verification process.

Algorithms on all social media platforms are constantly changing. Instagram is no exception. The news feed algorithms determine who actually sees the content you publish and who doesn’t. Instagram has shifted the feed from strictly chronological to showing users “prioritized” posts and takes signals like an account’s relationship to the consumer (if someone takes actions on your posts, they are more likely to see more of them in the future), a consumer’s past interaction with similar topics (this relates to the kind of content you share and the associated hashtags being used), and how recently a post was made from a specific account (accounts need to post on a regular basis in order to have their content seen). Continual engagement from your followers is now more important than ever for both Instagram and Facebook success, especially since it can earn you one of the top spots in their feeds.

Increasingly, paid promotion is needed on Instagram in order to reach a bigger audience and gain more of a following (only through paid promotion can you add an action button such as Watch More or Learn More with a URL to click, otherwise the only link that is clickable on Instagram is in the bio section). One great use of paid promotion on Instagram is to grow your following. You can promote a post that has done well in the past, target the kind of audience that should relate to your content, and select your CTA (call to action) as Your Profile. When consumers view the content, they can click through to follow your account. In my experience, Instagram does not drive off site traffic very well so if you are going to pay to get in front of an audience, you may as well build up your following within Instagram.

In May 2018, Instagram paired up with a number of booking sites (Atom Tickets, Fandango and Eventbrite) to enable ticket sales directly on those platforms through your Instagram profile which can be handy when your film starts its theatrical launch. In order to add these to your Instagram account, you must have a Business Account and have an account or URL to link your action button to. Learn more HERE.

You may have noticed that while the run time for videos on Instagram remains at 1 minute, a new service was launched in June that allows for longer run times. IGTV made its debut this summer, featuring vertical videos with run times between 10 minutes (for Instagram accounts with less than 10,000 followers) and 60 minutes. The jury is still out on whether consumers will flock to IGTV, but it is a great place to experiment with video.

Filmmakers may have a more difficult time adjusting as videos will need to be formatted for 9:16 rather than 16:9. Follow examples from Jimmy Fallon and NASA (who definitely has video originally meant for widescreen, yet somehow edits to optimize it for IGTV) to see how they are optimizing their videos and connecting with audiences on a platform that is too new to be competing with thousands of videos yet. Buzzfeed and Instagram have started an initiative called VerticalU to help video creators learn about making optimal videos in a vertical format. First round applications closed already, but click here to learn about the course and see if they will have a second round of applications.

The Stories format on Instagram originally started with Snapchat, but now Instagram’s Stories sees 400 million daily users as opposed to Snap with less than 200 million users in total. The Stories feature is meant to be ephemeral marketing in that a story only lasts 24 hours and then disappears. It is possible to archive a story, but consumers must come to your profile page to see the archive rather than having the story at the top of their news feed.

Think about using Stories to give a snapshot of an experience (like a festival or theatrical premiere) or to tell mini stories in the world of your film (things that are not in the actual film, but help set the stage for the story or extend the storyworld beyond your film). Instagram Stories can also be shared to your Facebook page to make a Facebook Story, but the functionality on Facebook is not the same. On an Instagram story, URL links can be added if the viewer swipes up on their mobile phone, but this function is not possible on Facebook. Things like polls or Spotify music links can also be added to Instagram Stories, but those functions do not travel over to Facebook if the same story is transferred.

Advertising can be placed within Instagram Stories as long as you are working through Facebook Business Manager. Short videos and images can be inserted to the Stories of other accounts in order to reach a wider audience. For more about using Instagram Stories advertising, click here.

Next time, I will take a look at Twitter, a site that has seen flat user growth in the last year and has been plagued by numerous spam accounts and bots. Is Twitter still worth your time? I’ll let you know.

November 15th, 2018

Posted In: Instagram, Marketing, Social Network Marketing, Uncategorized

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If there is one constant rule in social media marketing, it’s that things are always changing. What might have worked a year ago, six months ago, possibly even yesterday, is not working today. Each social platform is continually trying to stay relevant to followers and increasingly trying to improve profitability for shareholders and business users.

At a recent all-staff meeting for The Film Collaborative, I was asked to present recent changes to the main social platforms most relevant to marketing independent films and to advise on how to take advantage of these changes. Here are the trends and changes I think most independent filmmakers should be aware of when planning for their marketing efforts. This is a multi-part series with the first part focused on Facebook, the biggest social network (by FAR) in the world.

Facebook

Reports of Facebook’s demise have been circulating for many years, yet despite all the controversy and concerns over account hacking, user privacy and election rigging, Facebook as an enterprise has continued to grow in the past months. Worldwide, there are over 2.23 billion monthly active Facebook users as of Q2 2018, an 11% increase year over year. In fact, a recent study projects that “Facebook will command 24.5% of all video ad spending this year … and be the top social media platform with an estimated 87% share of U.S. social media video ad spending.”

In order to optimize their profitability and relevance to Facebook users, as well as implementing their commitment to better policing the content that is distributed on the social network, changes are constantly being made to the platform which affect business pages. Here are the recent ones:

  • Introduction of Admin Registration: If a Facebook page or Instagram account you administrate is going to pay to boost or advertise ANY content of a political or national legislative interest persuasion, you will not be able to place ads unless you are personally registered with Facebook. This entails a scan of your driver’s license or governmental photo ID and a letter which will come in the USPS with a code that you have to use in order to register.
  • Admins may register and carry all pages they administrate under their registration. Admins who do not register will be unable to place paid ads on content that is deemed “political” and this is a broad list. Topics like education, immigration, environment, abortion, civil rights, etc.are all deemed political and in need of permission and labeling. See the broad list here.  I would imagine that many documentaries will need to be aware of this rule. All “political” ads will be cataloged into a Political content database for anyone to search.
  • All active advertising is now publicly visible under the Ads and Info tab on any public Facebook page: From the Info and Ads tab, people will be able to view the active ads a Page is running across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Audience Network, even if they’re not in the target audience. Any clicks on the ads do not contribute to the click count and clicks are not charged against the advertising budget. For more info on this go here.
  • Yet another change to the newsfeed algorithm. The new algorithm puts more emphasis on data points that show active interaction. That means comments, shares and reactions (in this order) are crucial. Also, personal posts are more valuable than business posts so if you want to do well in the newsfeed, strongly encourage individuals to post for your film organically. In order to create meaningful interactions, pages need to share things that are meaningful to their followers, not just to themselves. Only if followers engage emotionally and personally will they feel the need to comment, share or interact with your content. However, Facebook will actively demote any posts that explicitly ask for actions such as “tag a friend” or “leave a comment below” so try wording your posts as questions or use words, images or videos that elicit reaction. You might also ask your followers to set your page to See First so that they will keep seeing your posts in their newsfeed, even after an algorithm change.Probably the most important advice filmmakers should be aware of, with Facebook and all other major social media platforms is embrace the power of PAID REACH!
  • Pay to play is not new on Facebook. It has been happening for at least three years and still filmmakers are putting so little into it. With Facebook further de-prioritizing content from pages and brands, its time to be educated and more prepared for paid advertising in order to reach targeted audiences in the newsfeed, among many other places. Education is especially needed for using Ad Manager rather than just boosting posts. Ad Manager gives much more precise control over where ads appear, who can be targeted, cost per click, links where traffic will go and creative to be used, but it does need practice…or working with someone who uses it. Ad Manager also is constantly evolving, so taking a crash course will only begin to cover the basics.
  • It is important to note that paid Facebook advertising DOES NOT just encompass Facebook. It stretches to include Instagram, banner ads on Instant Articles and Facebook Audience Network, Messenger, Instagram Stories, and Facebook Stories. Perhaps IGTV will be coming as an ad platform in the future. For those who think their target audience is not using Facebook, likely you will be reaching them through Facebook Ad Manager on one of the many other places they are visiting online, so do not discount Facebook as an ad platform.
  • Create mobile first content. This is especially true for videos being posted to Facebook, but also to Twitter and Instagram. Filmmakers need to stop creating only one trailer, in a 16:9 aspect ratio. Most likely your trailer is not going to be shown on TV, so start thinking about how to optimize it for mobile viewing. Mobile viewers now do not turn their phones, and often do not watch with the sound on so provide caption overlays.

Videos on Facebook perform exceptionally well, so lots of compelling video clips and stories should be created. The chart below shows all of the different formats possible and filmmaking teams should bear these in mind when editing for social media use.

As examples, reference these clips, featurettes and trailers:

Colette

Lizzie

Love, Gilda

As I hit Publish on these updates, doubtless something new will be cropping up that will either expand your ability to reach new audiences or curb that ability in some way. It is important to keep up with the the changes or work with someone who handles social media marketing on a constant basis so that the efforts you put in to reaching audiences aren’t a waste of time, labor and money. Social media is the most cost effective and measurably impactful way of putting your work in front of those who will love it, but as with all forms of marketing, it takes a budget and consistent testing to perfect the right messaging and content that will capture attention and cause an audience to seek out your full work.

My next post will cover one of the next biggest social media platforms, Instagram, and take a look at what is changing and how to optimize your efforts there.

Sheri Candler will be participating on a panel at the New Heights Arts Symposium called “Top Marketing Tips for Indie Filmmakers.” The FREE, full day symposium will be held in Santa Clarita, California on October 20. Details here.

October 16th, 2018

Posted In: Facebook, Marketing, Social Network Marketing, Uncategorized

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If you missed our SXSW Case Study Discussion on The Light of the Moon, or if you just want a copy of the accompanying PowerPoint deck, you can download it here.

Case study discussion of the distribution of SXSW Winner The Light of the Moon diving into topics including: the platform theatrical release, educational, festivals and hybrid theatrical distribution, collaborative nature of the release involving key vendors, the filmmakers, grassroots partnerships, corporate sponsorships, use of social media, publicity firms on both coasts and representing lead actress Stephanie Beatriz, release timing analysis, and socio-cultural impact objective, all while coordinating TVOD and international licensing alongside utilizing the Amazon Festival Stars AVD offering and reconciling when to go direct-to-platform vs. license to buyers.

Participants: Michelle Mower, Imagination Worldwide (Distributor • International Sales Agent), Orly Ravid, The Film Collaborative/MSK (Festival/Theatrical Distribution), Michael Cuomo, Gran Fallon (Producer of The Light of the Moon), and Myriam Schroeter, Stedfast Productions (Co-Producer of The Light of the Moon)

March 14th, 2018

Posted In: Amazon VOD & CreateSpace, case studies, Digital Distribution, Distribution, Distribution Platforms, DIY, education, Film Festivals, iTunes, Key Art, Marketing, Publicity, Social Network Marketing, Theatrical, Vimeo


Updated January 25, 2018 to take into consideration changes announced for Facebook and Instagram. 

As 2017 winds to a close, I wanted to take some time to evaluate what I’ve learned in the social media space this year, both in my work with independent filmmakers and working for public media.

Between those two endeavors, I have helped to create, test and connect audiences to over 350 short videos made specifically for social media. The vast majority of those were less than one minute in length, included captions burned into each video, and used a paid social approach to ensure that the videos were seen by a highly targeted audience who would be most likely to share them.

Here are the main things I want to share with you as you contemplate your use of social media in 2018:

    • Cardinal rule on social: The content you post must be interesting and relevant to motivate a reaction from the viewer. Boring links, boring videos, boring images, boring calls to action that clearly only benefit you WILL BE IGNORED [and will be demoted in the newsfeed by Facebook algorithm]. The organic videos that performed the best for me were a story in themselves. They weren’t trailers, they weren’t promo videos, they didn’t often include a call to action on the video, and they weren’t random behind the scenes footage. The stories took one main idea and presented it first, then explained the idea, then sometimes ended with a question to encourage people to comment. The more shares and comments the videos received, the more views it got.  But why am I mainly talking about videos? Because…
    • By 2021, 82% of global internet traffic will be attributed to video. As more and more newsfeeds are filled with short video content, your account will need to compete. You’re a filmmaker so generating quality video content should be easy for you. But remember, 90% of the videos people see in their feeds are watched with the sound off. Better to make a video that is not audio driven, but rather driven by images that can tell a story on its own. Also, it is best to present these videos in a square format, rather than in a horizontal rectangle. As most people now access social media platforms via their mobile devices, a square video (1:1) fills the screen and gives a much richer experience. Widescreen videos are crunched and make captions difficult to read. See good examples here and here.

  • Facebook Live, Instagram Live, Live Story for Snapchat, Periscope for Twitter, Youtube Live. Live or near live experiences will continue to proliferate on social. Some of this may be ephemeral content, that lives for only 24 hours. If you have an exciting event happening or you have access to a person with a large following, you should be utilizing live sessions on social media. Facebook, in particular, will be highlighting videos that receive lengthy interaction in the comment section. If you want to see a comparison between Youtube Live and Facebook Live, CLICK HERE.
  • Influencer marketing is a thing, but it isn’t free. It is awesome to think that if you tag a celebrity, they will share your tweet, but the real impact comes from those who have an engaged following instead of a vague, large number. Look toward influencers that have a niche following and are more willing to get excited about your project than a tweet from a celeb who has little connection to your project. Another idea could be to utilize influencers as social media content creators for your project. Rather than hoping to access their network, perhaps you can pay them to create for yours. Be advised, the Federal Trade Commission is now cracking down on sponsored posts that do not publicly disclose a paid sponsorship arrangement. It is better to work with companies that specialize in bringing influencers and brands together, like MediaKix  Mostly Sunny  and Heartbeat as they are usually up to date on the regulations and how to negotiate deals. For an idea on pricing for working with influencers, see this Digiday report.
  • Facebook organic posting is nearly dead. If you are still posting links, photos and videos that do not regularly receive multiple comments, you can stop. The company has just announced that it will stop showing posts by brands and publishers if those posts are not inspiring conversation (comments) as their new focus is on bringing people together, not pushing traffic and views. Facebook is not interested in sending traffic to other websites or providing a passive viewing experience (such as video views with no comments). This change will really hit pages that have not been inspiring conversation in their comment sections. However, don’t ask for comments in your posts. Engagement bait will be demoted in the newsfeed. This change will not affect paid promotion.
  • Which means that you MUST invest in social advertising. Yes, you could boosts your organic posts, but you really should be set up on Facebook Business Manager and running campaigns through Ad Manager. You need a monthly budget to spend. Anyone who has tried to build up a following or reach their following on social will know the time of reliable, free, organic reach has passed, and it isn’t going to return since social media platforms have shareholders who want to see revenue. The good news is this allows for smarter advertising spend for a trackable return than publicity or more traditional methods of advertising (posters, postcards, flyers, TV/radio/outdoor/print). While a marketing mix is important and if you can spend to hire a publicist for earned media, and place media buys in as many outlets as possible, then by all means do it. But try tracking that write up in the New York Times or Variety to any kind of monetary return outside of an ego boost or calls from your friends to say they saw it. It is nearly impossible unless you run a survey at the theater or on a digital VOD service to prove that your publicity spend or traditional advertising spend resulted in any measurable return. There is so much proof of awareness and actual revenue tied to a digital advertising effort, even over the number of Likes/Retweets/Favorites and “Impressions.” Added bonus for Facebook advertising, you can create Custom Audiences to keep remarketing to those who have shown an interest in your posts rather than spending to hit the disinterested. You’ll just need to install the Facebook pixel on your website, store, Eventbrite etc in order to track properly and accumulate that audience for later targeting. Also, if you are going to be setting a monthly budget, you need to be setting monthly goals for growth. How do you know if what you are doing is working if you don’t measure against a goal? I wrote a piece on tracking social media earlier this year.
  • Twitter growth is the slowest of all the major social media platforms. If you are building up a big following on Twitter, you may want to quickly branch out. Twitter is great for breaking news stories, but rather sucks for self promotional tweets.
  • Instagram is also making changes, but they have been a little less forthcoming in this news. If you are using Instagram for business, such as having an account related to your film, you should make sure that it is set up as a business account, not a personal account. Just as years ago, Facebook stopped supporting personal profiles that were being used for business, Instagram is starting to do the same. Besides, it is great to access analytics that are offered on business accounts, so go ahead and set your account up like that or convert. Also, you should be taking advantage of Instagram Stories, rather than just posting photos and videos. Stories can now be archived on your account so they won’t disappear after 24 hours, as long as you choose to feature them on your account. For instructions, go HERE. One last bit of advice, start following hashtags that are relevant to your project. Accounts now have the ability to follow a hashtag, not just other accounts. See more on that HERE.
  • This year, Facebook introduced Watch and rumor has it that they will start prioritizing shows rather than only short content in their newsfeed. With this knowledge (and the vast audience that Facebook reaches), have you considered turning that feature script into a series instead? A series of content with an ongoing narrative between episodes provides many benefits: increased audience retention, strict production schedule and time management, sponsorship opportunities, and being able to create a loyal community over the long run instead of starting over with each new project. Social media is a great place to ensure distribution of said series. It is also a low cost place to test out plots, characters, flow, audience reactions etc. without having to gather heavy investment for a feature that is untested and has no clear path distribution.

For everyone here at The Film Collaborative, I wish you a happy, creative, industrious, and prosperous new year. Look for members of The Film Collaborative at Sundance 2018 and at many other film festivals and events in the coming year.

December 17th, 2017

Posted In: Facebook, Social Network Marketing, Uncategorized

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Today’s guest post is from TFC member John Chi whose microbudget film Tentacle 8 was recently released by Grand Entertainment Group. We thank John for sharing his experience with TFC and the knowledge he gained during the distribution phase of his film so that all independent filmmakers might benefit.

Changing The Paradigm

The first thing every filmmaker should ask themselves before considering to make an independent feature film is: how badly do I want to do this?  Are you prepared to do everything it takes, and make the necessary personal and professional sacrifices to ensure your film gets made and seen by an audience?  Often times, filmmakers think the answer is yes, when in fact it’s something less clear.

You can make it easier on yourself by writing a script that’s marketable, fits the sweet spot of what other people think you should be doing, saying, feeling, and thinking.  Then Google “how to win major awards at Sundance, SXSW, Toronto, Cannes and start a bidding war” and click, “I’m feeling lucky.”   That’s definitely a path many people take.

But like most independent filmmakers, who aren’t answering to studios or huge investors, it’s against our nature to do what other people tell us to do, especially when it comes to what’s popular or in vogue.  We’ll be the one that breaks the mold; we’ll be the one that changes the paradigm.  That’s exactly what we said as we assembled our team for TENTACLE 8.  We would be the one film that would change the paradigm of what’s possible.  We were going to make a global espionage movie about the NSA, shoot it in 15 days, and do it within the Ultra-Low Budget SAG agreement.  While many saw disaster, we saw opportunity.  It was our chance to stand out from the crowd, and do something either truly brave or astoundingly idiotic.

Just Get Through Production

John Chi Tentacle *

Director John Chi on the set of Tentacle 8

I was determined to make TENTACLE 8, a film that addressed social and political issues that wasn’t being addressed anywhere else.  At least not in narrative features.  My job was to assemble a team of filmmakers that shared my ambition, my optimism, and my foolishness to attempt what appeared on paper to be an impossible task.  If we kept saying that we were going to be the one, and preached it often enough, it would become true.  We would be the film that would change the paradigm of what independent films were capable of.

For most first time feature filmmakers, like I was, I thought Production would be the most difficult part of the journey.  It’s what most filmmakers are pretty good at, and best prepared to do.  I won’t describe at length what it took to get TENTACLE 8 made.  Instead, I’ll just say that it took an incredible amount of ingenuity, effort, and hard work to pull off what we did.  It was an extraordinary synergy of trust, belief, attention to detail, and commitment that made it all possible.  There were many selfless acts of kindness from people who didn’t have any reason to help us, but did anyway.  They were our angels.  Without them, we wouldn’t have finished the movie on our budget.  You can’t plan on those things happening, you just need to make sure you treat other people with respect, be humble, and always act professionally.  Don’t make it easy for other people to turn you away when you ask for help.  You might get lucky.

Making a movie is a labor of love under extremely stressful conditions, which tends to bond people.  By the end of production, we believed that we had accomplished something very special together.  We had done it.  We were on our way to realizing our mantra.  We were going to be the film that changed the paradigm.

High Hopes and First Impressions

Several months later, we were ready for our coming out party.  We had worked really hard to put a solid, but not perfect, festival cut together for people to start looking at.  One of our first calls was to The Film Collaborative.  We thought they would probably put us in touch with all the festival programmers at Sundance, Cannes, Toronto, et al, and we could focus on our travel plans for the next year.  Jeffrey Winter, co-executive director of The Film Collaborative, was kind enough to watch our film, and give us some feedback.

I remember reading his comments the first time over, scanning it quickly looking for the words, “great, fantastic, ground breaking, change the paradigm”….but I didn’t see them.  So I read the email again a bit more carefully.  Maybe I missed it.  “Not a festival film.  Difficult to market.  No marketable name talent.  Challenging subject matter and run time will make it difficult to program.  Proceed with modest expectations”.  This had to be a mistake.  Maybe the DVD screener got mixed in with someone else’s packaging.  I read the comments over, and over again.  Maybe if I read them often enough, cursed them loudly enough, they would magically transform into the words I was looking for.  That never happened.

Filmmakers Are Often In Denial

We went ahead anyway and applied to all the major film festivals and some regional ones as well.  A year later, and a folder full of spiritless rejection form letters, we hadn’t been accepted into any film festivals.  Maybe Jeffrey Winter was on to something.

Putting away those dreams of being courted by rabid, hungry distributors, waving seven figure blank checks in the air, was hard.  It was more than a dream, it was almost an expectation.  Make a great film, and the rest will come.  Didn’t anyone know that we were going to be the one?

We asked our sales agent, Glen Reynolds from Circus Road Films, to start reaching out to distributors.  1% of all feature film applicants get into Sundance.  Maybe it’s less.  Out of that 1% maybe half get some distribution opportunity.  A long and painful eight months or so had passed waiting to get into a film festival, with no results.  It was time to roll up our sleeves, and take back some of our own fate.

What happens to films that don’t win the Palm D’Or or the Grand Jury Prize?  What happens to films that aren’t on the other end of Harvey Weinstein’s phone call?  The first thing we needed to understand was that no one was going to do the hard work for us.  There simply is no substitute for grinding it out, and doing the dirty work.  The Film Collaborative, along with other indie film organizations like Film Courage, IFP, Film Independent, San Francisco Film Society, and Hope For Film, to name just a few, all have archives full of useful information written by filmmakers for filmmakers.  We scoured them all, looking for nuggets of truth in every success story, hoping to recognize some shared path to that pot of gold.  The only thing those stories shared in common, was that there was no common path to success.  They were as unique as the films they made. 

Distribution For The 99%

Finding a distributor via our sales agent didn’t take very long.  After maybe two months of sending out screeners (or viewing online screeners), we had a handful of distributors that were interested in distributing our film.  Hallelujah.  Victory!  Time to celebrate and take a much needed sigh of relief.  We reached out to TFC again and sought out their counsel to help us make the best decision.  We explored DIY distribution, and traditional VOD/Digital distribution, making sure we understood all the variables and decisions that went into each approach.  I had a conversation with TFC founder Orly Ravid about our options, and she told us that our film wasn’t mainstream enough for any distributor to really go out on a limb for us.  We could:

1) bypass the traditional distributor and go with a DIY approach, put in a lot of additional time, energy, and money with no guarantees of success; OR

2) sign on with a traditional distributor and manage/lower our expectations.  Orly made it very clear that no distributor was going to spend a lot of money or expend a lot of energy marketing the movie.  Whatever we could get them to commit to, we should try to get in writing.

That bit of honest feedback was an unexpected buzz kill, and didn’t exactly sound like a reason to celebrate.  After going through our options again and really assessing the pros and cons of each approach, we ultimately chose to go with a traditional distributor, Grand Entertainment Group.  Grand is a new distribution company that focuses on championing unique and innovative voices, founded by long time home entertainment executives that had 20+ years of experience distributing independent films for Lionsgate and ThinkFilm, among others.  We felt they could help us reach a much wider audience than we could ever reach on our own.  There was just no way for us to get our DVDs onto store shelves at Walmart or Best Buy, or land a cable TV deal without their help and prior relationships.

Two long years after we finished shooting the film, finally our work was done.  Everything would be clearer, and all of our problems would get solved once we signed with our distributor.  Right?

Our Moment of Truth

It’s at this critical stage, that films either go on to thrive and find success or get completely lost in a giant swamp of never to be seen again films.  No one cares about your film more than you do.  Not your sales agent, your producer’s rep, your distributor, your publicist, no one.  To them, as committed and dedicated as they might be, it’s still a job.  To you, it’s your life.  This goes back to the question you should have asked yourself when you started:

How badly do you want to do this?  Are you prepared to do everything it takes, and make all the necessary sacrifices, personal and professional, to ensure your film will be made and seen by an audience?

My producer, Casey Poh, gave me a statistic from his studies at the Peter Stark Producing Program at USC:  It takes a $5M minimum marketing spend to make a dent in DVD sales.  I don’t know how true that is, but for argument sake, let’s say it’s only 10% of that, which is still $500,000.  There are no distributors in the world that will spend that kind of money on your movie if it didn’t win Sundance, SXSW, Toronto, etc., and definitely not for a film like TENTACLE 8.  But we still had some false notions that our work was done, and that our distributor was going to be out there marketing the film 24/7.

Thankfully, like most independent filmmakers, we’re obsessive.  So we plan, and plan, and plan, down to the very last detail.  Website updated, new content on Facebook every day up until the DVD release, maintain and energize the interest of our cast and crew.  Be active on Twitter, start tweeting things that make you an interesting follow.  Share interesting things about other people and other interests.  Repeat and accelerate.  List all the things you want to have happen:  NY Times review, University and College theatrical tour, major launch parties, DVD premiere at the Arclight, Spirit Award Nomination.  Didn’t people remember that WE were the one?

My Moment of Clarity

With only a few weeks to go before our DVD release date, we noticed that our wish lists were still only wish lists.  Our action plans were gathering e-dust, and we weren’t any closer to making them happen than the day we typed them into our laptop.  We had put years into getting the film to this point.  There was no one to blame other than ourselves if it tanked.  As the creator of the material, as the producer/director/writer of the film, there was no one else more responsible for marketing and promoting the movie than me.  No one else was going to come to my rescue.  Not my friends, not my family, not my producers, my sales agent, my distributor, no one.  I had to give them a reason to believe that my film was worth their time, their attention, their money.  Just maybe after I had done all the groundwork, someone might be inspired to help.  As soon as I came to terms with that, it was much easier to move forward.

We did an inventory of the assets we had:

  • We had made a movie about the NSA, which by an incredible stroke of fate, had been splashed across the headlines in the previous months;
  • We had several soap opera actors with very popular and loyal followings from their fans;
  • We had made a completely original and different kind of movie that I could articulate to others with clarity and passion.

We had to mobilize our assets as quickly and as provocatively as we could to all those outside our bubble of cast and crew.  Prior to our DVD release, there were three very influential moments that impacted our awareness:

1) NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden became an international headline;

2) Not so random acts of kindness and generosity from Soap Opera Network, Go Into The Story, and Film Courage;

3) I realized NO ONE WAS COMING TO RESCUE ME if I didn’t fully and actively solicit an audience for my movie.

Our Watergate Moment

Casey had mentioned months ago that we needed a Watergate moment to spark some interest in the movie, in reference to ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN, a movie that inspired TENTACLE 8.  I laughed off that notion, but as fate would have it, news of NSA whistleblower, Edward Snowden, splashed across every news headline around the world.  We finally caught a break.  As tragic and as difficult as it was for Mr. Snowden, it was something that we had to capitalize on.  We started branding the movie as the NSA-themed Independent Feature Film.  I used that as the header for every unsolicited email I wrote to every journalist, blogger, activist, and film enthusiast I could find on the internet.  I started making bold and provocative statements on Twitter regarding privacy rights, and the treatment of whistleblowers, always making sure I hashtagged #TENTACLE8 with #NSA.  Slowly but surely, we were building an awareness and interest in both the film, and us as filmmakers.

When Life Gives You Lemons, Make Soap

We also had several cast members who had a large soap opera following, as current and former stars on some very popular soap operas. Joshua Morrow stars on the very popular “The Young and the Restless”, Matthew Borlenghi had a long and successful run on “All My Children”, as did John Callahan on “All My Children” and “Days of Our Lives”, veteran character actor Bruce Gray was on several popular soaps, and Teri Reeves, who most recently starred in NBC’s “Chicago Fire,” was a one-time “General Hospital” regular.  It would be a huge mistake not to reach out to this fan base.

Two weeks prior to our DVD release, I reached out to the Soap Opera Network, and wrote them an email introducing myself and the movie.  A few days later, Editor in Chief, Errol Lewis and West Coast Editor Kambra Clifford responded.  We had several very enthusiastic email exchanges describing what we were looking to do, and they agreed to publish and promote an article on the film, and our actors.  We’ve continued to discuss ways in which we can cross promote our mutual interests.

Scott Myers and Go Into The Story

I had written close to a hundred unsolicited emails to almost every film journalist, critic, blogger, and movie enthusiast in the indie film world known to Google.  There’s something to be said for a well crafted email to introduce yourself, why you’re writing them, and a little about your film.  It’s probably no accident that influential screenwriter and screenwriting teacher, Scott Myers, was one of the very few people who responded.  His blog, “Go Into The Story” is widely considered to be one of the most influential screenwriting blogs on the internet.  It was a real break for us that Scott offered to do a brief write up on the making of TENTACLE 8, as part of his “Movies You Made” series.  This was exactly the right audience that would appreciate an intricately written, complex, and thought provoking movie like ours.  The feature was posted a day before our DVD release, and links tweeted continuously for about a week.  We continue to use that feature in our marketing efforts.

Film Courage

Lastly, I would say our feature on FilmCourage.com was the single most influential piece of internet marketing that helped our success.  Karen, David, and April were among the most gracious and hospitable collaborators we were lucky enough to work with, during the entire process.  They just inherently understood our situation and wanted to help.  Like The Film Collaborative, their followers are really loyal and dedicated to the independent film cause and help filmmakers educate themselves.  Being featured on their site gave us some much needed credibility and visibility with the community that we wanted our film to be a part of.

Early Exit Poll Results

After eight days of release, our initial DVD allotments sold out at WalMart, Best Buy, and Amazon.com.  IMDB put us on a list (#12 out of 192) of Most Popular Independent Feature Films released in 2014, based on their Movie Meter Rankings.  Considering there are thousands of movies made each year, this was an incredible feat, given we’re such a small film.  It goes to prove that a small, but dedicated following can move mountains, and probably has a greater chance at long term sustainability.

There’s no magic solution, you just have to grind it out and do the work.  Hundreds of tweets, unsolicited emails, creative Facebook posts, introducing yourself, your film, and your purpose.  There’s no fancy diet, no elaborate exercise machine to get around the fact that if you want to lose weight, you have to eat less and exercise more.  Similarly, if you want to build an audience, there’s no app, or software, or social media guru that’s going to magically build your audience for you.  You do it one follower at a time.

In retrospect, one of the biggest mistakes we made was being a bit too precious about who we followed and didn’t follow on Twitter.  We didn’t quite know how to exploit Twitter at first, but like everything else, we learned on the fly, and were able to course correct in time to build a strong following for the film, and us the filmmakers.

Are we the film that changed the paradigm of what micro-budget independent films are capable of?  We defied the odds in many ways, making a movie without a strong marketing hook, for a niche audience that wasn’t easily identifiable, and we secured DVD and VOD/Digital distribution without getting into one film festival.  We listened and valued all the guidance we got, from TFC and others we sought input from, even though we didn’t always follow their advice.  So did we break the mold?  I’m not sure that matters so much anymore.  We never stopped believing that we could.

April 23rd, 2014

Posted In: case studies, Digital Distribution, Distribution, DIY, Marketing, Social Network Marketing

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Recently, I made a post on my personal blog about why I am advising filmmakers to reconsider their use of Facebook to connect with an audience. There are lots of changes going on and it is important to understand that Facebook is a public company with shareholders to appease and a very large user base to exploit. A Facebook page is increasingly pay to play, so if you aren’t budgeting money to spend on growing your page and reaching your fans on a regular basis, you should find another way to reach them.

It’s too crowded

You may not believe it, but only 4 years ago it was not commonplace for businesses to use Facebook. Studios didn’t really get the point (most still don’t) and large corporations thought the whole social media thing was a fad that would fade. Small business pages used them to constantly talk about themselves and their products, but at least they were in the under utilized position of reaching consumers for free via a channel few put much stock into.

Now there are more than 25 million small business pages on Facebook! It isn’t easy to stand out in that crowd and only those with the most creativity, time and money can hope to compete. Sure, it feels safe now to say you have a Facebook page and you can still open a new one for free for every new project you start. But are you really going to put in the time, effort and money on a regular basis to make the page work? If the answer is no, don’t even start one.

Overcoming the Facebook algorithm

Some have said that Facebook perpetrated the biggest practical joke of the internet age by convincing brands and advertising agencies to spend money building up a large following only to restrict the ability to reach that following unless further payment is made. Others have said without the restriction, a user’s newsfeed would be inundated with useless promotional crap from companies who have no other interest than to use Facebook as a free advertising tool, ruining the ability to connect meaningfully with things users care about. However you see it, it is no secret that Facebook does indeed throttle the reach of your posts through the use of their complex and ever changing algorithms. Assume a day will come when the organic (ie, free) reach is zero.

Be platform neutral

Realize that social media channels are only tools in the long game toward building a base of support. Sure, people peruse your Facebook and Twitter follower numbers and make quick decisions about how “successful” your work is, but ultimately it is how interested, engaged and loyal your audience is that will make the biggest difference to your sustainability. None of these tools will last forever. One will eventually be usurped in popularity and the users will move on. The central idea behind all of them is the connections, the trust and the loyalty you are building and to bring that audience to the channel you do control–your own site.

Choose a social channel that you actually enjoy using, one that allows you to express your creativity on a daily basis, and where you can find like minded individuals to truly connect with. If that channel is still Facebook, then just be prepared to pay to participate.

 

 

 

 

 

March 26th, 2014

Posted In: Facebook, Social Network Marketing

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My friend Charles Judson wrote a recent post chastising filmmakers about their marketing materials. In a post entitled “Your Film’s Marketing Materials SUCK at Helping Audiences Find You,” he explains why filmmakers have a poor understanding of how films are found in online search results and why it doesn’t bode well for their chances at festival inclusion, distribution offers, further career opportunities and, ultimately, audience sales.With his permission, we are reprinting some of his points.

“A film no one has heard of may not exactly be burning news for the average person searching the web. However, no matter what hat I wear [festival programmer, blogger, critic], this is information relevant to me. It’s likely going to be the same for the Georgia film critics and bloggers covering film. Festival directors who track news on festivals they love – and often share programming philosophy with– would be interested. Filmmakers who have their trailer, website, Facebook page and Twitter account ready to go before they begin submitting their film to festivals are light-years ahead of their peers. But having just those materials is not enough. The vast majority of filmmakers overlook the crucial step of crafting language that can improve their chances to be discovered online, as well as differentiate their films from others.”  Takeaway: Lots of different audiences are looking for information on your work, not only the viewing audience. Waiting to build up awareness of your work until right before premiere or release is a very outdated idea. There is no time like the present to start connecting with people online.

“Increasing the specificity and variation of the words chosen should be a priority for every bit of marketing material you create. Carefully thinking about how your potential audience interacts, talks and searches online shouldn’t be skipped or undervalued. First, scrutinize your film’s story, theme and genre. Who are the core fans of your film? What is your film’s niche? Then move out from there.” Takeaway: In my workshop sessions, I talk a lot about this too. If you don’t have a clear picture of who your potential audience is, that problem will plague your efforts in the marketplace. If anything, start with analyzing yourself as the model audience member because something drew you to the story you are telling.You can move wider once you are well connected with a certain audience. Don’t try to hit a wide, vague audience all at once.

photo credit M Car

photo credit M Car

“Begin generating a Language List for your film. The words and phrases you’re adding are the ones that would catch the attention of the audience you’re going after. I’m using the term “Language List” as opposed to keywords to reinforce that this is about creating a conversation. This should be an extension of how you will share and talk about your work offline, as well as online. With that goal in mind, the places to use this “Language List” will go beyond your website’s metadata. Examples of list headings would be Emotions and Emotional Words; Movies similar to this film; Genre and Genre related words/phrases; Character traits; Character actions; Character motivations; Character types; Character relationships; Character names; Themes; Setting; Influences (directors, films, etc); Film Title(s); People Connected to the film; Cast; Crew; Shooting locations; Cast and Crew’s past film credits; Production companies.

As you build your list, Google is the one-click away buddy you should rely on when you’re stumped for language. Searching the term “emotions”, I found a page on Sonoma.edu with 265 words. Wikipedia’s List of Genres includes descriptions and their subgenres. Don’t use I-couldn’t-think-of-anything as an excuse. Research films, novels and TV shows similar to your movie. Go to the sites your audience frequents and look for words that stand out, that show up repeatedly. Note how your audience identifies itself.

These questions should be in your mind as your list grows:

Who is my primary target audience?

Who are the different audiences that would be interested in my film?

What makes this movie different?

Who would spend money to see this movie?

Who would come see this movie opening weekend (pretend you scored that distribution deal)?

Where does my audience get its information?

As you build your list, it may begin to look like this example:

Emotions: devastated, insecure, distracted, temperamental

Movies similar to this film:* Fargo, In Bruges, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang

Character motivations: greed, fame, love

Character archetypes: tortured artist, comic mentor, shapeshifter, the judge

Settings:  Minneapolis, car dealership, Fargo, North Dakota

Influences (directors, films, etc.): Preston Sturges, Howard Hawks, screwball comedy, film noir

Cast: William H. Macy, Frances McDormand, Steve Buscemi, Peter Stormare. Jerry Lundegaard

Crew: Joel Coen, Ethan Coen, Roger Deakins

Shooting locations: Chanhassen Dinner Theatre, Chanhassen, Minnesota, USA

Past Film Credits: Blood Simple, Miller’s Crossing

* Use your list of Similar Movies judiciously. Comparing your film to a well known film can turn off people. It can raise expectations to a level you will never meet. So, inside metadata, in the about section of a website, and after the plot synopsis, are good places to use those titles. Placed up front, before you’ve allowed your audience to make up their own mind about your film, is dangerous. Until an audience has seen your film, they may not always peg what kind of movie they are reading up on. Compared to a well-known film or two, your audience may get a bead on the tone and feel of your movie. That’s okay.”   Takeaway: By actually sitting down and writing out a list of words your audience might be looking for online, you will get a better understanding of your audience’s intent to see the film you are making. As Charles said, these words are not only used in the online space, but also in your publicity efforts and in helping you frame that language you use when speaking about your film in the offline space (such as festivals or pitch meetings). You can also use these terms in Google Keyword Planner to get an estimate of how much online traffic they could attract to your website and alternate words to use. The keyword planner is also used for PPC advertising campaigns which is helpful in your film’s release phase.

Ultimately, anything you can do to make it easy to find your film online will help you in the long run. Don’t just think of marketing materials as poster and trailer, there are many different audiences looking for your film besides viewers (journalists, festival programmers, cinema programmers, agents, grant making organizations, financiers etc) so be sure to include as many potential keywords as you can think of that will fulfill the search needs of all kinds of audiences.

 

 

February 20th, 2014

Posted In: Digital Distribution, education, Film Festivals, Marketing, Publicity, Social Network Marketing

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Part 5, the final in our series on social media tools. Find the rest of the series on these links  Mindset Change, Myths, Facebook, Twitter

In its 8 short years of existence, Youtube has managed to become a powerhouse online destination for all things video and, according to Nielsen, reaches more US adults ages 18-34 than any cable network. However, 70% of Youtube traffic comes from outside of the US. The site is so active, over 100 hours of video are uploaded every MINUTE and over 6 billion hours of video are watched each month on YouTube—almost an hour for every person on Earth!

Setting up a Youtube account and channel is fairly straightforward. It is generally based on having a Gmail account, which is free, and Youtube channels are also linked to a Google Plus account. Here is a video on creating a Youtube channel

Here is a video on how to create a Youtube channel if you DO NOT want to use a Gmail account:

http://youtu.be/NHRkpYbvSys

In March, Youtube started implementing their new channel layout so if you have a channel that was launched before this time, you will probably find that it looks very different now. Now, there is only one large cover image, just like on Facebook, and it matches the dimensions seen on G+ 2120px by 1192px. All channels have this layout and it is supposed to make it easier for mobile devices to see the channels in a uniform way. Pay special attention to the middle section of your image because on mobile devices, that is what will primarily be seen. Those measurements will be 1280px by 350px.

Your cover image is the face of the channel brand. Choose an image that tells a viewer exactly what she is in for when she visits your channel (your brand personality) and what to expect from the project. Also Youtube will prominently display a little “intro to your channel” video for those who haven’t subscribed to your channel yet. It is like a channel trailer or pitch video which lets you highlight your channel’s value and encourages subscribing.

Examples of personality branding on Youtube channels:

Conan on YT

Kevin Smith on YT

As with most things online, you will want to integrate all of your online channels so that the viewer is aware you have them. Add in links to your Youtube channel that include your main website, iTunes URL, Amazon URL, Facebook, Twitter etc. Don’t forget to add new ones all through your production process since you won’t initially have  iTunes/Amazon/Hulu etc links.

Be sure to include a call to action on your videos. This can be “subscribe to our channel” “join our email list” with a URL to the sign up page, or “Like us on Facebook.” These calls are best used as speech bubble annotations that flash on the screen while the video plays. You can set this up inside the Youtube video manager setting.

When you don’t yet have a large stockpile of videos created, build up playlists of videos that were not created by you, but suit the interests of your core audience. You can elect to feature these playlists when viewers visit your channel. There is the ability to configure what viewers see on your channel when they visit. Here is a tutorial on how to configure your channel sections:

Ultimately you are trying to build up subscribers on your channel, not just views. In fact, Youtube has recently redone their algorithm to favor videos from channels with a lot of subscribers because they want viewers to keep coming back to the site. If you plan to have a trailer and that’s all on your Youtube channel, you won’t attract many subscribers and you could be penalized in Youtube search. Also, subscribers give you the ability to be in contact with those who liked your video. They can be notified via email and within their homepage news feed when you have uploaded a new video.

A factor in making sure that your video can be found in Youtube search is tagging. Upon uploading a new video, you will be asked to add a title and description for your video. Write titles using a relevant and, hopefully, unique keyword. You can look for keywords using Google Keyword Tool. These same keywords will be used for your tags. Place the most important keywords and keyword phrases at the start of your tags fields. Include common and specific keywords (but not spam) and their misspellings because you want your videos to be found in any way they could possibly be spelled into the search bar. Write 12 or more tags and use as much of the characters as possible. Be sure to use appropriate keywords that will attract interest from potential viewers in your core audience.

Youtube is social, just as all social media is. Interacting with other channels, leaving  comments on other’s videos, subscribing to channels, answering comments on your page will help you see better results than simply using the site to host your trailer. If you have other channels hosting your trailer (ie MovieClips or a distributor’s channel), be sure to drop in to those channels and answer comments there too. The most common question is “When can we see this film?” and it will be surprising how little those comments receive an answer. You want people to know when and where the film will be available right? Be sure to answer! Engage your audience!

Having a lot of video responses in your comment section, as opposed to only text comments, will also help indicate to YouTube that your video is popular and relevant and will help with rankings. Respond to comments in the first hours after your video is published because building comments early helps build rankings in YouTube search.

Of course, everyone likes to see their videos getting a lot of views. In fact, having millions of views can turn into media coverage and reaching the trending topics section of Youtube which then perpetuate even more views. There are paid services you can use (see Virool.com or Channel Factory) to help seed your important videos across a network of online sites. These services can be very expensive to use (often $.10-$.15 a click with very high minimums to reach), but this is the way many corporations and Hollywood studios get millions of views to their videos and trailers in a very short amount of time. You didn’t REALLY think that was all organic, did you? Video seeding in essence is paid advertising, but if you need your trailer to go viral, this is the quickest way.

Youtube can be a source of revenue for your production company via embedded advertising if you are generating a lot of views. Revenue will only be significant if you are dedicated to creating video on a consistent basis and growing your subscriber base. For distribution companies, this should be something to add to their revenue streams since they are likely to have the ability to generate a lot of video. Check into joining the Youtube Partner Program for more information.

Youtube has created The Creators Playbook with all kinds of useful information regarding using the site.  The Playbook is free and updated regularly.

Sheri Candler

June 26th, 2013

Posted In: Marketing, Social Network Marketing

Tags: , , , ,

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