Jon Reiss

Guest Posts Start This Week

I am very happy to announce that this week I will start a guest posting program on this blog. We will hear from a variety of people that deal with audience connection and engagement of all types. More and more I am viewing film distribution and marketing as the 2nd necessary component of creating a film: The first component is the production of the film (conception, production, post). The second component is connecting that film with an audience (distribution and marketing). I used to refer to these as steps – but that implies that they would be sequential – eg first step: make the film, second step connect with audience. But you know I believe these “steps” should run as simultaneously as possible.

These posts will run a wide gamut of topics from social media to trans media and everything in between (from sources around the world!) First up on the guest post is Tyler Weaver on how busy media content creators can fit social media into their lives – in very practical steps. Upcoming Kim Garland from Scriptchat – using Twitter to create conversation around scriptwriting. Simon Pullman from Transmythology on transmedia etc. My goal is to have these run every Thursday – so stay tuned!

Ride the Divide Part 1: Set Your Goals, Identify and Partner With Your Audience

Tonight at midnight Hunter Weeks and Mike Dion launch a 2711 minute free access to their film “Ride the Divide” on You Tube to coincide with LiveStrong Day on October 2nd. The film is about three riders as they traverse the 2711 miles of the continental divide from Banff Canada to the Mexican border. I wanted to write about this film because of the smart use of free online content – the limited access actually creates an online event around which the filmmakers can generate publicity (this will actually be the subject of a later post.

In addition, I have a personal interest in the film because as Hunter told me, their strategy was kickstarted when I live workshopped the Slamdance Filmmaker Summit this past January. In that workshop I walked them through developing a distribution and marketing strategy (with the participation of the audience) based on the system that I developed for filmmakers in Think Outside the Box Office. I enjoyed that workshop so much, I then incorporated it into nearly all the workshops that I have done since then.

Continue reading →

Back to NYC: OVC and Raindance

Headed back to NY today – after a few days back in LA. First up tomorrow I will be at the Open Video Conference on a panel: “Future of Exhibition: Opening the Box Office” Friday, 3-3:45PM. This panel will look at how producers are bypassing traditional gatekeepers to reach out to their audience while exploring the tools that are shaping this process.

Then on Sunday October 3rd I’ll be speaking at Raindance NYC giving a quick class: “Real World Survival Skills for Independent Filmmakers” Sunday, 4-6PM. This workshop will be a survey and introduction to a fresh approach at film distribution and marketing. I will walk you through his modern, practical and unique game plan for efficiently connecting you and your film with the audience it deserves.

Hope to see you there!!

TOTBO Tip 6 Identifying and Engaging Your Audience

Here is the Jon Reiss TOTBO 3 Step Approach to Audience Development and Engagement:

1. Know WHO your audience is. This is not 18-25 year old boys/men. Or 35 – 55 year old women. As an independent filmmaker, if you cross over into a mass audience great – but you need to be much more specific. Tomorrow’s tip will discuss niche vs core audiences.

2. Know WHERE your audience derives information/congregates. In other words how you can contact them, engage them, communicate with them.

3. Know HOW your audience engages media, or HOW they will support you.

I want to know what you think! Comment here or on my blog, or @Jon_Reiss on twitter, or on the TOTBO Facebook page. Check out the book here. I look forward to hearing from you.

PS I was going to address budgeting this week, but I have shifted that topic to next week.

Developing Audience During Prep, Production and Post

What you do to help your distribution and marketing started out being one chapter in the book. Now it takes up 1/3 of the book! I feel that it is hyper important that filmmakers work towards their distribution and marketing during prep, production and post. Part of that work is audience development which was the topic today on @Jon_Reiss and on the book’s FB page. A couple of points came up – in no particular order (especially since I am trying to make these blogs as close to “automatic writing as possible”

1. The Attic Door have been documenting their process and posting on Vimeo

They put forth 3 suggestions: 1 Webseries – see link. 2. Social Networks and Video Profiles and 3 Blogged every step of the journey

2. Sean Jourdan has been crowdsourcing his script The Beekeeper out for feedback and developing an audience that way. He’s pretty happy about it.

3. I brought up crowdfunding as a form of crowdsourcing applied to film finance. A number of folks indicated that Indiegogo is having a lot of success for filmmakers – Go Slava! But also Indywood has raised $20,000 so far for their Zombie film – and its definately worth checking out how they are doing it on their site!

4. On the facebook page another filmmaker told about building their own facebook page by passing out cards while shooting their film. I think that’s great – but they should actively collect email addresses as well and start putting them into a email management system as early as possible.

Going to sign off – This is just a tip of the iceberg. Thanks for the feedback and keep it coming!

Jon
@Jon_Reiss
facebook.com/thinkoutsidetheboxoffice