{"id":8776,"date":"2011-06-21T19:15:22","date_gmt":"2011-06-22T03:15:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/?p=8776"},"modified":"2022-04-03T08:56:15","modified_gmt":"2022-04-03T08:56:15","slug":"9-practical-film-marketing-tips-indie-filmmaker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/9-practical-film-marketing-tips-indie-filmmaker\/","title":{"rendered":"9 Practical Film Marketing Tips Every Indie Filmmaker Should Know"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><![CDATA[It is an undeniable truth that most independent filmmakers are not effective at marketing their own films. \u00a0Every filmmaker, and every film fan, can list dozen \u201chidden gems\u201d, most with star talent, that no one knows about. \u00a0One can go on to IMDB and look up any star and see films they\u2019ve made that no one remembers they\u2019ve made, many of which are rather good. \u00a0There are documentary filmmakers who have great projects about very important topics, and their films almost never get seen. \u00a0And yet . . . some films with no name talent and with very low production values manage to get seen by everyone (ala The Blair Witch project).\nGenerally, these \u201csurprise successes\u201d are identified as flukes, but really they are examples of marketing done right. \u00a0If you\u2019d like your film to be a \u201chappy accident of great marketing\u201d here are some building blocks to get you started.\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Make the film you and your talent want to make.<\/strong> Inherent in that is finding talent who wants to make the film you have in mind, and making that talent very happy to be working with you on your project. \u00a0A good name makes for great marketing, and often name talent has got a following because they do great work. \u00a0So design a great film, with a cool script, a great budget, make sure there\u2019s rehearsal time, give your talent a producers cut on the back end as well as cash to shoot, and ensure they\u2019ll be around to talk about the film post release. You really do need their support. \u00a0This is true for documentaries to. \u00a0Get a narrator with a recognizable name and your project becomes far more marketable.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Make sure your film is good.<\/strong> Sounds stupid doesn\u2019t it? \u00a0But there are good films and bad films and a good film is a film people want to watch. \u00a0So hack your film together in such a fashion that it is actually entertaining. \u00a0Show it to people, get their notes, and hack it together even better. \u00a0People have to actually like your film for it to sell well. \u00a0Plan for this refining process to take 3x as long as shooting, and to cut the film three times. \u00a0Because the first cut is yours, the second incorporates feedback from the audience, and hopefully the final one is the \u201cgold\u201d version that people really enjoy and recommend to others.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Figure out, based on having let people watch your film, what they liked about it and who they are.<\/strong> If your film is about the Satyr Motorcycle Club of West Hollywood, and you discover that gay men who ride motorcycles like it . . . you have a pretty good idea of who your target market is. \u00a0Every good film has a target market. They may not be the market you expected them to be when you started out, and they may be kind of nebulous, but they exist. \u00a0You need to know who they are before you market. Juno and Little Miss Sunshine get marketed differently from Chainsaw Massacre.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Design your artwork to appeal to your target market.<\/strong> Pay someone good to do the cover and other graphics for your movie. \u00a0You\u2019ll need the DVD case cover, the signature image for sale on websites. Skip the poster unless you\u2019ll be buying distribution for it. Look at the covers of similar films. People\u2019s eyes are trained to identify certain kinds of images with certain films. \u00a0Show the covers you get made to members of your target market. \u00a0See which one they like best. Refine your poster until people really go crazy for it.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Build a website for your film<\/strong>. \u00a0Generally you should build it using WordPress or another open source content management system like Joomla. \u00a0I like WordPress. Avoid Flash like the plague. \u00a0Google loathes flash, and if you market your film with it you are simply \u201cun-marketing\u201d it. \u00a0If WordPress themes don\u2019t make it fancy enough to suit you, go to\u00a0<strong>www.elance.com<\/strong> and hire a programmer to make it prettier. \u00a0Incorporate your artwork into your film so your \u201cbranding\u201d is consistent across the board. \u00a0Make sure your Twitter account is listed on your website. \u00a0Tweet at least once a day about your film. Make sure you include, as a hash tag, your star\u2019s name (Ex: #stevienix). \u00a0That will get new people to your site every day.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Ensure you can sell your film through your website.<\/strong> Check out Kunaki.com and CreateSpace.com. \u00a0Both will let you sell your film directly to the public. CreateSpace will let you sell it as Video on Demand as well. You can also have a link that shows people where to watch the film in person if you are doing screenings (perhaps using\u00a0Cinedigm). \u00a0Don\u2019t market something you can\u2019t sell. It\u2019s pointless.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Start running press releases through free press release sites that incorporate your actor\u2019s name as the first two words, and New Film as the second two words.<\/strong> Run about 50 of those over the course of a year. \u00a0 The actor\u2019s name must be first because people search for them online, and you want your press release to be one of the first things they see when they search for his name.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Contact people who talk to your target market and ask them to do reviews of your film.<\/strong> Give them a link to the film online. If they do a review, publish a blog on the review and link to it on their site. \u00a0Reward them for coverage with PR.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n&nbsp;\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li><strong>Email people who do interviews and ask them to interview your name talent.<\/strong> Ask your name talent to mention your film. If they do an interview, publish a blog on it, and link to it on their site. \u00a0Once again, reward them for their coverage with PR.<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\nIf you do all that for a solid year, your film will get the attention it deserves. \u00a0If it is a good film, you\u2019ll find other folks will actively start marketing it for you, just as you probably tell people about your phone, or your car, or your last vacation. \u00a0What else is there to talk about?\nOne of the reasons NOT to get an average distributor for your film is that they will almost never do all this and thus you will earn very little from your film. \u00a0If you can get cash up front for distribution for a Theatrical Release or Direct to DVD film, that might make sense. \u00a0Otherwise, just market it yourself. You\u2019ll be happier, your talent will be happier, your audience will be happier.\n_______________________________________________________________________\n<strong>Unified Manufacturing<\/strong>\u00a0is an L.A. -based one-stop-shop that offers very affordable CD\/DVD\/USB replication, custom printing, promotional products, warehousing and fulfillment and many more. If you need an Instant Quote on a project and you want FREE SHIPPING, simply\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/instant-quote\/\">CLICK HERE<\/a>.]]>    \t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Make the film you and your talent want to make. Inherent in that is finding talent who wants to make the film you have in mind, and making that talent very happy to be working with you on your project. \u00a0A good name makes for great marketing, and often name talent has got a following [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":8777,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-musicmakers-filmmakers","category-unified-manufacturing-news"],"contentshake_article_id":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8776"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35178,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8776\/revisions\/35178"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unifiedmanufacturing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}