PGA / VES / Technicolor Panel – Learn what you missed!

Thanks to all the Producer’s Guild of America and Visual Effects Society members who made it out for our Show Me the Money Panel last week at the Technicolor Cinema Theater. I will post the video of the event for those who couldn’t attend soon. In the meantime, I’ve recapped the night and provided some key highlights below….

NEW WORLD OF DISTRIBUTION

Moderator Peter Broderick kicked off the night with an overview of his recent article: “The New World of Distribution.” We are entering an era where self-distribution is not just a viable option, but at times a preferable alternative for filmmakers – depending on the film, filmmaker, and fans.

In the old world, distributors control distribution and market to mass audiences. In the new world, filmmakers can control distribution and market to their “True Fans.” The distribution strategy depends on the film and its audience, rather than on the audience the distributor knows how to target.

REAL LIFE OLD vs NEW COMPARISON
Mark Harris – the second speaker on the panel – illustrated the worlds through story. After he produced Darfur Now, he struck a distribution deal with a mini-studio. The studio provided a good amount of P&A, but the film fell flat at the box office. He realized the P&A targeted a mass audience, rather than the niche audience for which his film was suited. Lesson learned, he is now taking his next film Spirit of the Marathon around the festival circuit, collecting email addresses, and selling DVDs directly from his website. Because he’s distributing it himself, he keeps about $20 of the $25 sale price – nice margin, eh?

WHERE SELF-DISTRIBUTION STARTS
In my opinion, self-distribution starts far before a film is complete. It starts with audience-building during fundraising, development and production. The keys to self-distribution, then, include:

Identifying if your film is ripe for self-distribution
Building and engaging your own audience from the moment the idea is born, and finally
Selling to the embedded audience that you’ve built upon completion of the film

NEW WORLD CONCEPTS PUT IN ACTION

I spoke next and focused my talk on how to put Peter Broderick’s "new world" and “true fan” concepts into action. I walked through IndieGoGo, showing step-by-step how to use our tools to launch and manage an audience-building and fundraising effort online. DIWO (Do-It-With-Others) Filmmaking on IndieGoGo all starts with creating a cool project profile that shares the story behind the story, followed by grassroots viral marketing tactics (using GoGoWidgets, email blasts, blogger & organizational outreach, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) that find and drive fans to your profile where they can take action (contribute, endorse, promote, comment, etc.) and join your audience.

I discussed how audience-building continues as a filmmakers keep their fans engaged throughout production — posting fresh content (video clips, images, announcements, etc) every so often. Every announcement gets pushed out to a project’s community via email and serves as a great tool to keep the fanbase updated, entertained, committed and buzzing about your project… thereby turning your viewers into promoters. Who knows how many people they will tell your project about via blog, through Facebook or even at the watercooler.

For more tips on audience-building, check out our DIWO Resources:

Guide to DIWO Filmmaking (Step-by-step manual)
DIWO Download (IndieGoGo’s blog)
DIWO Live! (Weekly conference call for IndieGoGo members to learn more about IndeiGoGo and ask questions)

CASE STUDY

Anand Chandrasekaran, producer of Tapestries of Hope wrapped up the night discussing theaudience-building and fundraising tactics his team took to raise over $22K on IndieGoGo for the film and thousands of dollars more for the cause (which exposes the virgin rape crisis in Zimbabwe). Keys to his success:

Experimentation with online and offline marketing and fundraising tactics
A committed team

Overall, the audience realized that the “Sky Might Not be Falling,” but rather opening up to new opportunities for funding, promotion and distribution with the help of the internet, fans, and a willingness to learn.

Stay tuned for the entire video… coming soon…

To learn more about the PGA’s New Media Council, click HERE, the Visual Effects Society, click HERE, and Technicolor, click HERE.

Questions? Comments? Please leave them below or email us at: Feedback@indiegogo.com