#TBT - Grassroots Distribution: Offline Organizing Leads to Online Metrics

Last #TBT, we looked at growing campaigns, and identified three models, based on social action campaigns, that filmmakers might follow to boost their audience awareness and get their film out into the world in the most effective way possible. This Thursday, we dig into the digital elements of a campaign as outlined by Harvard professor Nicco Mele and, next week, we'll revisit Josh and Michael's suggestions for adapting Professor Mele's digital political campaign model to film. 

Why? Because Josh and Michael learned that offline organizing leads to online metrics. Offline organizing is already accessible to filmmakers who are taking their films on the road as they screen at festivals and alternative exhibition venues. Online metrics can help filmmakers know where to go next, where to return with the next project, which audience (or audiences) to engage as advocates and supporters, and - not least - online metrics can help filmmakers make the case for their next film to financiers, sales agents, and distributors (see our video with Stewart Thorndike and Alex Scharfman on Distribution as Marketing).

Plus, it's notoriously hard to get data once you give your film to someone else to market or distribute. Treasure the data you can produce for yourself. 

Now: Mele's Three Pillars of a Digital Campaign 

1. Build a substantially-sized email list. "People live overwhelmingly in their inbox."
2. Foster online community. "The care and feeding of evangelists is necessary for online success."
3. Complement online with offline. "Politics is really a face-to-face business and you really have to be able to use the internet to drive people to meet face to face."

Here's an example of these Pillars in practice, from the white paper: 

"Tom Quinn [...] made a film that is set during the Mummers' Day Parade in Philadelphia. Quinn recalls that to distribute his film he 'went around to a good chunk of the Mummers clubs, and talked one-on-one with them about we were going to donate a part of the proceeds back to the parade, and the Mummers organization got behind the film doing press as well, which was huge. I think our Facebook fans went from 200 people to 2300 people in one week."

Offline organizing can lead to a rise in online metrics. 

Online metrics can help you sell your film, or fundraise for your next one. 

Engage the communities that exist around your film, and make them your advocate audience!

NYU Think-Tank Awards Artel Great Fellowship To Aid Underserved Film Communities | Shadow and Act

Indiewire's "Shadow and Act" featured 2014 CRI Fellow Artel Great this week, delivering an interview in which Artel outlined his plans to reach underserved film communities via his CRI Fellowship. NYU Think-Tank Awards Artel Great Fellowship To Aid Underserved Film Communities | Shadow and Act.

As part of his Fellowship, Artel founded Project Catalyst  to "meet the needs of passionate, emerging communities of color who yearn to be inspired by new productions of culture that they can take pride in." Project Catalyst will serve as a platform that leverages technology, performance, and exhibition in the service of media diversity.

This is just the beginning for Artel and Project Catalyst - stay tuned for updates and invitations to events!

Crowdfunding - Patronage or Purchase?

I recently attended two great Aspen Institute events that dealt with society’s investment in the arts.

The first, entitled “What Are We Worth?: Shakespeare, Money, and Morals” combined Shakespearean monologues about money – performed by Matt Damon and Alan Alda, among others – with a town-hall style discussion led by Harvard professor and social philosopher Michael Sandel. The crux of Sandel’s argument is that while marketplaces are a necessary part of society, there are certain things that should be excluded from and protected from market forces. Up for debate was the question of whether arts should be among these. (A question that would, on average, be answered very differently in Paris than it would in Hollywood).

In thinking about the future of the Co-Production, I’m considering different types of film economies and their relationship to the global marketplace. One broad trend I anticipate is that there will be increasingly greater collaborations between private and public money the world over. Financing for the arts -- especially expensive arts like moviemaking -- will be subjected to the marketplace of audiences’ ideas and tastes. But films will also continue to be partially shielded from the marketplace by the patronage of those who are willing to pay for their existence without expecting financial gain in return.

So where does crowdfuding fit into all this?

Several CRI posts by the Grassroots Distribution team have dealt with the game-changing nature of crowdfunding – addressing the benefits of gift economies and the donor-versus-investor paradigm shift that many see occurring.

This brings me to the second Aspen Institute event, a discussion on “Democratizing the Arts” with Yancey Strickler of Kickstarter and Charles Best of DonorsChoose.org.

One of the things that struck me during this discussion was the blurring of lines between Non-Profit and For-Profit entities that has seemingly emerged with crowdfunding.  DonorsChoose.org, a Non-Profit that channels funds to specific need requests posted by teachers, functions very much the same way as (the For-Profit company) Kickstarter.com.  Both platforms facilitate the actualization of something that the audience/donor would like to see exist in the world.

Neither of these offer a financial return on investment for the donor, but they do both offer an assurance that by giving money, you are purchasing/funding the creation of a specific product or service. In the case of the now-ubiquitous rewards for Kickstarter Donors, you’re also likely pre-purchasing a DVD, digital download, or ticket to a screening of the film.

So is crowdfunding a movie patronage or purchase?  It seems to be both. And it’s an important question because mounting a crowdfuding campaign and mobilizing an audience’s participation (financial or otherwise) is now a prime directive of many producers.  For these projects, the relationship between the filmmaker and their audiences/customers/supporters is now exercised to a great degree in the fundraising stage.

Last year was the first in which money given to the arts through Kickstarter outpaced funding from the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts. It will be very interesting to see how the landscape has shifted by the time this benchmark is reached in a European country with a more collectivist, government funded film industry. But I’ve spoken recently with a number of European filmmakers working on first features who are foregoing the (stable and) traditional public funds of their home countries in favor of a more flexible crowdfunding base – which they believe allows for a quicker turnaround time and more artistic control.

Perhaps what is so promising about the future of filmmaking, and expensive artistic endeavors in general, is that the modern Medicis can be anywhere in the world. And an audience member of modest means can patronize your film and purchase it in advance – which in turn allows it to exist in the first place.

In the rosiest view of crowdfunding, it is indeed a new kind of marketplace – one in which return on investment means getting to see a film you wanted to be made.

New Year's Resolutions & CRI Solutions

In the first week of the new year, most blogs and papers have published articles on new year's resolutions for the film industry and/or wrap-ups of last year's highlights and statistics. Some of The Wrap's resolutions are particularly relevant to the work that CRI fellows are doing now.

Some highlights and areas for consideration:

CHRIS MCGURK, CEO, Cinedigm: People have to re-screw their heads on about the way a film is released. It used to be that a movie had to be picked up by an independent distributor and get to 500 screens to be validated as a movie, but it takes $5 million to $10 million in marketing to do that, and it makes it difficult to get a return on your investment.

The way that a film can be released is an interesting consideration now from micro to ultratoobig budget projects. Ryan has designed his project to "address the lack of economic transparency in independent film with the ultimate goal of helping filmmakers better understand the options available to them when it comes to distributing their films." With a better understanding of the real costs involved in distribution, independent filmmakers will have a much easier time re-screwing their heads on in order to embrace changing release strategies.

FRANKLIN LEONARD, Founder, the Black List: I spend a lot of time thinking about data and how data can be used to improve the film business. One way that seems both obvious and interesting is making movies that already have an audience. Hollywood typically assumes that means, "Oh there’s a built-in audience for this board game." That’s wrong. It means determining ways to identify audiences for specific subjects or ideas via the internet, social media and surveys.

I agree with Leonard--the film industry has barely begun to collaborate with and learn from the tech world in order to harness data about what audiences want. Which is not to suggest that filmmakers should start making movies based on what audiences want. (That would be a cynical verging on gross thing to suggest.) Better tools to target individuals based on their interests and tastes mean better chances for filmmakers and grassroots distributers to build audiences around any film. I'm researching new digital platforms in this space, I'm trying to understand how to build community around film online and learn from that community, and I'm (hopefully) killing the word niche in the process.

GLEN BASNER, CEO, FilmNation: ...It’s much easier to have a hand in the creative process and in the development of a movie than when you're getting a big fee from the studios, making $20 million before you step on set. Don’t get me wrong, studios have a lot of strengths -- more advantages than disadvantages -- but they are not nimble. They can’t tailor each project to specific filmmakers. That has allowed smaller companies to enter the void and have a bigger impact than ever before.

Edward is aiming with his project to build "a new model of independent filmmaking focused on the production of feature films produced within the walls of the university system that will prove to make dollars and sense." Like Basner suggests, now is a perfect time for filmmakers working within a nimbler infrastructure than the studio system to "enter the void." And no one but no one is nimbler than a film student.

Full article here: http://www.thewrap.com/movies/article/how-improve-hollywood-9-experts-weigh-future-film-70126?page=0,0

All Those Online Videos, Still Chasing an Audience

By MIKE HALE

Published: June 17, 2011

DRUMBEAT would be too strong a word. But in recent months there’s been a steady patter of news indicating a fresh urgency in the world of original Web series: projects involving high-profile filmmakers, additional rounds of financing, redesigned and expanded video-sharing sites.

One thing that has characterized these developments is that they haven’t involved many actual, reviewable new series. (One exception was the Kiefer Sutherland vehicle “The Confession” on Hulu, which didn’t cause much of a stir but may be turned into a feature film anyway.) [thkBC id="933" height="800" width="1200" anchortext="Read More at TheNewYorkTimes" title="ThickBox Title" url="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/19/arts/television/original-online-video-is-still-talked-about-more-than-viewed.html" type="iframe" html_wrap="p"]