6Qs with Mickey Fisher of Summer Nuts & Autumn Mixtape

In true DIWO fashion, Mickey took his crowdfunding efforts up a notch and staged his own 24-hour webathon (think telephone) via Facebook and IndieGoGo.  Fun stuff!  Take a few minutes to read through what he learned!

   Q1. Tell us about Autumn Mixtape.  What was your inspiration for the project and its goals?
 

I currently have two Indiegogo film projects, AUTUMN MIXTAPE and SUMMER NUTS.  AUTUMN MIXTAPE has been on Indiegogo from the very beginning and I have raised all the money necessary to shoot this feature film on the site.  It's a collection of short stories about relationships that take place in the fall.

SUMMER NUTS was a completed feature that has already played festivals and had a number of public screenings, but there was still no distribution deal that the other producers and I felt were worth accepting.  So, I turned to Indiegogo to help raise funds to press a thousand copies of the dvd for us to begin self-distribution.  It's the first step towards raising the money necessary to get us on iTunes and Netflix and other self-distribution outlets. 

 

Q2. How are you identifying, reaching and building your audiences?

With AUTUMN MIXTAPE, we've been working to identify and reach our audience in a number of ways.  We've been searching out musical artists we know and like and have included their music in the movie to try and reach out to their fan bases.  What I personally discovered along the way is that it's hard to get some movie websites and blogs to carry your story if they don't know who you are, and have never heard of your movie, so you really have to work hard to build one on one relationships.  You can't just jump in to some new place or thread and just demand that people donate money to your movie.  You have to sell your story, and you have to be willing to participate and that takes a lot of time.

 

Q3. What role does the Internet and social media play in your DIWO (Do-It-With-Others) efforts? 

 I think of each of our social media pages as places to hang out.  You want to invite friends over to hang out on your Facebook page or your Youtube page and check out the new "furniture", and you want to make it a cool enough place that they want to spend time there and invite other people as well.  In the end, you really have to COMPEL people to participate by offering them some value for their time.  Instead of a normal trailer for AUTUMN MIXTAPE, I created a music video to one of the songs in the movie, a song that I knew people would like.  We also offered a free mp3 of the song on the same day, so that was a way of getting people to connect with the movie and the music of the movie, and hopefully compel them to send our message out to other people.  I still feel like I'm just using a tiny fraction of what is available, but I'm trying to balance the time I spend actually CREATING the film and marketing it as well.  Every day I discover some new thing to try, but so much of it is about timing.  Speaking of...

 

Q4. Tell us about your recent Telethon experiment?

 On Tuesday, May 11th I threw a one-man 24 fundraising telethon on Facebook for SUMMER NUTS.  I have approximately 700 fans on the movie's fan page and a thousand on my own.  My goal was to sell 100 pre-orders of the dvd in 24 hours by posting constantly for 24 hours.  I did a number of events to keep people coming back during the day, such as writing monologues on the spot for the actors who were visiting (which I gave away for free to anyone who wanted to use them), a man vs. food challenge (me vs. an eighteen inch pizza, broadcast live on upstream - that one didn't end well), posting clips from the movie and more.  In 24 hours I raised over $1,300 dollars towards my dvd pressing. 

I think this event was a success for a couple of reasons: 1.) I targeted my time and my resources and created a day long event that people were excited and somewhat curious about, so they could tune in whenever they wanted for however long they wanted and participate.  2.) It created a sense of urgency for the audience to contribute.  I think typically people are pretty lax when they get requests for donations.  I know I am.  "I'll do it later", or "I'll get to it next Wednesday when I get paid again."  By setting up a one day event and letting people know in advance, I gave them time to prepare and I also warned them I'd be bugging them for 24 straight hours for money.  My only promise was that I would be as entertaining as possible. 

The greatest part about the whole event wasn't the money I raised.  It was the constant moment to moment interaction with people.  To me, that's the perfect world when your project really takes off: you'll spend all day in communication with people who are excited about what you're doing, and in return you give them something of value.  You really create a community around your project.

Q5. How have your incorporated IndieGoGo into your funding efforts?

  Everything that I do, whether it be posting trailers or scenes, or going and speaking to classes and filmmaking groups, gets funneled back to Indiegogo.  It is all designed to go back to the hub, where people can click that button and donate to the movie.  I post the url at the end of every video.  My own website with the project pages has buttons that go right to IndieGoGo, because that is where people can really take ACTION to make your project a reality.  I think IndieGoGo offers not only a legitimacy but also a really effective infrastructure for raising money for and promoting your projects.  It's the best thing out there for it.

 

Q6. What is next on your radar?  And where can folks follow your efforts?

 My biggest goal now is to finish shooting AUTUMN MIXTAPE.  We're nearly all the way through the post production process for 3/4 of the movie, so once we shoot the final 1/4, we're pretty much done, and then it's on to screenings and spreading the word about the movie.  I have some fun grass roots marketing ideas that are designed to work outside of but somewhat in tandem with the online efforts, like making cassette tape usb drives with the movie on them to give away like you would an old school mixtape and more.  As far as the next movie I want to make, it's kind of up in the air, but I can safely say the first flag I plant for it will be right here on IndieGoGo.      

www.indiegogo.com/autumn-mixtape
www.indiegogo.com/summer-nuts
www.mickeyfisher.com
www.youtube.com/user/autumnmixtape