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Dear Filmmakers,

The book has arrived! Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul can be downloaded for FREE or a purchased, depending on your preference. Check out sellingyourfilm.com/store

I wanted to share why we wrote this book and how it came to be and why I think that is applicable for filmmakers. Below is a section of a letter I wrote in our new collaboratively authored book Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul (co-authored with Jon Reiss and Sheri Candler).

“We want for you what you want for yourselves, to have a sustainable filmmaking career, to find your audiences and connect with them, and to thrive creatively, professionally and financially…As the industry and business of film distribution and revenue streams changes in the face of new digital technology’s impact on distribution and changes in audience and consumer access and habits, we collectively encourage you to look at the source of success and then be liberated and empowered to discover that you don’t always need a line of gatekeepers or multiple middlemen to make your dreams come true. And even though there may be cases where to some extent the gatekeepers and middlemen make sense, it’s almost never a useful paradigm on its own anymore.

The more filmmakers try to release films in a more hybrid or even fully DIY fashion, the less of a stigma some may feel about it and the more useful and appealing DIY will be, even as an at- tractive and comforting strategy to future investors and producers, as opposed to the present frequent thinking that privileges the all rights sale even with deleterious terms. DIY or hybrid distribution need not seem like a last resort. It need not seem less sexy. It need not seem less successful. It need not seem like a negative or blemish in any way. What filmmakers need is to access audiences and revenues from all sources, both for one’s present work and one’s future filmmaking…

The point and purpose of Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul is to highlight the questions filmmakers can ask, such as: “What is my audience?” “Where is it?” “Is a distributor more capable of reaching it or less so?” “Is there something an all rights distributor can do for my film that I cannot do myself?” and “If so, are the terms worth the difference?” The answers will vary but we believe asking the question(s) is key in every instance. This case study book highlights many of the methods and techniques and practices film- makers can follow now and in the future to distribute one’s work in the most filmmaker-friendly and sustainable way possible. There are lessons about what and who worked well and others not-so-much. The more filmmakers practice this the more powerful and useful and rewarding the filmmaker practice of this will be.”

And I want to note how we financed this book and how I think that is relevant to filmmakers.

Over a year ago I decided I wanted to create a case study book and I invited Jon Reiss and Sheri Candler to participate and I am so glad they did, it’s been awesome working with them. The traditional model of book publishing is to find a book agent and get a deal with a publisher. There’s usually a lot of rejection and if or when you get a deal, the publisher normally gets the better end of it, especially if you don’t have a name as an author. And often one is frustrated that a publisher has not done this or that and usually the author does a better job marketing the work anyway.

It’s the author’s name and creativity that is selling the book, not the publishing house. The fact of how many publishing houses passed on Harry Potter is a great lesson about how the fat cat corporate gatekeepers don’t always know what time it is.

We did for about 5 seconds consider seeing if we could publish Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul in a traditional way, through a publishing house. Then we thought we would either be turned down since the book is for a very niche interest audience or receive a small advance (most first time authors receive less than $5,000 in advance money. There are 4 authors of this book) and never see another penny. Sound familiar?

Also, if we are going to champion filmmakers who are using some form of self-distribution for their work, It would be pretty hypocritical to go the traditional route with a publisher.

Here is what we did do and why:

We created a production budget that made sense for the scope of the book and the audience it was made for. We could have budgeted more money for it and waited until we scraped that budget together. It could have taken more than a year to do that. We decided to spend a reasonable amount that would ensure the book was available on all key digital platforms and now even in print. BUT, we decided not to do an iPhone App because that would have cost more and put strain on the budget given that this book is very specific and for a very specific audience.

We clearly defined our audience: filmmakers who are interested in DIY or Hybrid or P2P distribution methods. Not everyone and not even every filmmaker.

We set out to find sponsors to help pay for it. With this reasonable budget in mind, a clearly defined audience and a way to reach them ourselves, we knew what kind of sponsors would appreciate this. We also decided that the way to make it worth their while was to make the book FREE at least for a time and at least in one format always. It ensures the likelihood that the book will be shared widely. We also decided the sales price would be low cost in any case so that price was never a barrier to the book finding its audience and its readers seeking it out.

We did not pursue random sponsors, but rather carefully considered the ones that made sense given the defined audience target. This made sponsorship success much smoother and easier. We could persuasively communicate that our audience was their target audience and how we would reach them (through our many media and personal contacts) and when (launch during IFP Week) and where (New York and all over the world via the internet). We gave them clear information that they could feel good about and see as a perfect fit for their brand.

We published the book ourselves and it’s available today on all key digital platforms where eBooks are sold. It is about one year to the day from when I first conceived the idea to having it out for all to read. The print edition will also soon be in retail stores via an aggregator, much like going through an aggregator to get onto Netflix, Hulu and iTunes (though we managed our own iBookstore inclusion). So if you are making a film, there is a strong likelihood you can follow this model but you need to prepare for it well:

1. Who is your audience?

2. How will you reach them? Specifically as we did, targeting certain press, certain blogs, certain podcasts whose readers and listeners match those for the book.

3. What is a reasonable budget for your film that is fundable, recoupable and profitable via these methods of self-financing and self-distribution and/or financing via sponsorship?

4. If you want to try the sponsorship route, you will need to create a presentation deck and go out to companies a minimum of 6 months in advance of your release, but more likely more. Big companies make decisions a year in advance often.

5. For sponsorship to be attractive to a brand, they will need to know a specific distribution plan in order to see how being involved with your film achieves their marketing objectives. It takes planning and advanced thinking that doesn’t rely on hoping a gatekeeper “buys” your film.

This is how we did it for a book and some films can be done this way too, even if they cost 5 or 6 figures or even 7. It’s really just a question of the right pairing between content and audience and brands and above all things, advance planning and TIME and EFFORT that can and will pay off.

I am proud that we did not have to adjust our content for anyone, that we did not have to rely on anyone to give us access to our readers, that we have full control of the book we wrote and above all, that we are in the black before we have even released the book. How many artists can say that?

I would not have done it any other way.

The book’s site has a BLOG too www.SellingYourFilm.com/blog

and here is a link to an interview with Prescreen to explain their new platform. And you may want to read other blog posts there about case studies that are in the book and ones that are not.

Here’s a link to the Prescreen interview: http://www.sellingyourfilm.com/blog/2011/07/19/sponsor-spotlight-prescreen/

TFC is thrilled that HOW TO START YOUR OWN COUNTRY (TIFF 2010, Directed by Jody Shapiro who incidentally is also a producer for one of our faves, Guy Maddin) is NOW AVAILABLE via PRESCREEN (presenting sponsor for Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul).

I want to give Prescreen a little shout out since they’re just launching and we’re excited to be working with this new platform from launch stage. Prescreen, an innovative movie marketing and distribution platform, that officially launches today to give filmmakers an alternative to traditional advertising and distribution channels – through the mass marketing of curated content that is then shared by users through social media. Prescreen offers users the ability to subscribe to a daily email alert, view trailers and rent movies to stream on demand, as well as earn rewards and discounts for sharing movie information on their social networks. Their daily email service highlights one movie per day, enabling their featured films to reach a wide audience.

Prescreen also delivers a Prescreen Performance Report to each filmmaker and distributor whose movie is featured on Prescreen. The report offers aggregated analytics and demographics about the audience for each featured film.

How it Works:

Consumer subscribers receive an email alert featuring one new movie each day.
Users watch the movie trailer for free and can purchase a rental to view the entire movie to stream on demand for up to 60 days.
Users can earn discounts and rewards by sharing the film through their social networks using Facebook, Twitter, etc.
Prescreen aggregates the purchasing data, protecting the privacy of each user, and delivers valuable demographic and analytic information back to filmmakers and distributors for future marketing and distribution efforts.

To see their featured the film HOW TO START YOUR OWN COUNTRY go to:

https://prescreen.com/movie/How-To-Start-Your-Own-Country and sign up!

For more info about the fascinating documentary that we all love here at TFC go to:

www.HOWTOSTARTYOUROWNCOUNTRY.com or use this link http://www.howtostartyourowncountry.com/Country/Enter.html

or visit the TFC site: http://www.thefilmcollaborative.org/films/howtostartyourowncountry.html

To see a video about Prescreen works go to: YOUTUBE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pjh3F9ZbHYo OR – FACEBOOK

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10150285053926517

Today’s featured film is THE ROBBER.

Prescreen is now accepting full-length feature film applications on a variety of topics and genres. To submit, visit: prescreen.com/submit. To sign up for the daily email service, visit: prescreen.com

Bye for now. We hope you like the book and if you have any questions feel free to contact us at contactus@thefilmcollaborative.org

Orly Ravid September 15th, 2011

Posted In: Digital Distribution, Distribution, Distribution Platforms, DIY, Marketing, Prescreen, Uncategorized

The IndieWIRE panel I am commenting on was at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center on July 16, 2011. indieWIRE Editor in Chief Dana Harris moderated a discussion about the past 15 years of film distribution with (left to right): Richard Abramowitz, Amy Heller, Bingham Ray, Bob Berney, Ira Deutchman, Mark Urman, Arianna Bocco and Jeanne Berney. It can be found here:

The Sundance distribution announcement was just made today.

So glad to know, as Mark Urman noted, that even big A-list cast films have a hard time getting listed properly on Cable VOD in terms of cast. We know that Sundance indie Adventures of Power also was not always listed properly in terms of noting its full cast (namely Jane Lynch & Adrien Grenier who both have massive fan bases were sometimes left off the film’s VOD description). What will it take the MSOs to get it together? Please let’s not all name or rename our films with numbers or start with the letters A,B,C,D, or E. If Comcast can insert ads into programming surely they and all the other dozens of MSOs (Multi System Operators) can find a way to help attract an audience for films on their system by categorizing them and filling in complete descriptions even on mammoth platforms.
The glut of content was discussed and the marketing challenges all distributors of cinema face. We all know it’s cheaper to make films now, there are more of them, they don’t die or go away, they just multiply annually and even some of the panelists spoke to younger generations not even committed to being filmmakers, but just making films because they can and it’s made to seem so cool. Indeed. And what I want someone to say, well ok I will just say it, is when the real numbers behind film distribution are revealed across the board perhaps we’ll see a trim in supply. The best, most creative and most committed will survive and thrive. Investors will be choosier because they’ll have all of the REAL information they need to make educated decisions. As for how to clear through the clutter, well, that goes back to the basics of know-your-audience, down to the “T” and don’t pretend it’s everyone. I look forward to even more lifestyle and interest oriented programming and content servicing and all the more reason for filmmakers to cultivate audiences directly, where there is no room for glut or confusion.
They joked about no one knowing VOD numbers, except for Arianna of IFC of course and Mark sometimes when his VOD client (Tribeca Films I presume) fills him in. Well, we have some from our forthcoming case study book Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul and I want to challenge ALL FILMMAKERS to share your numbers and stop the madness of mystery! And I agree, it’s time that these numbers start getting tracked and reported in a more automated fashion as theatrical box office and DVD sales are now. Still those number only show gross, and not the spend needed to achieve those numbers.
Amy of Milestone noted younger people have different habits in terms of what they want to view and how they view. So maybe we need younger folks running distribution companies now. TFC is hiring.
Arianna of IFC notes that piracy is a huge issue and that young people do not want to pay for content. So we can either be disturbed by that, or we can work with that knowledge and release in a way that will maximize revenues, instead of forcing audiences into outdated window methods. One film we recently observed tried to monetize its distribution via sponsorship, but waited way too long to get started, tried to do so without a distribution plan in place, is having its theatrical launch 6 months after its festival premiere and cannot seem to make a decision on the rest of its distribution whilst it awaits fat-enough-offers that are not coming. That sort of paradigm is a set up for failure and leaves the film open to piracy when a clear plan from the start and an immediate release after festival premiere could have led to quicker monetization (sponsored, DIY and/or via a donation campaign on VODO). We caution against proceeding with filmmaking or distribution when there is no viable plan in place.
A question via TWITTER that came in was: Where do you want to be 15 years from now? Richard Abramowitz is amazed he’s still in the biz now… and that’s honest in that it speaks to deep concerns about the changes in the business and the truth is, the more transparent service providers are about their numbers, the more likely they will survive. Those less transparent are not likely to sustain themselves. What I object to is the mythology in this industry and the mask of success that hides the real story of spending more than you made back because there are too many expensive services or middlemen. Who can tell me about their PROFIT? Not just for themselves, but for the filmmakers and investors they represent? Who will publicly admit the numbers on how much was spent for each service even on services they did not really need if they were better educated, and each middleman and what that yielded? When people do not, it’s largely because they want to get the next project funded and, to me, this is no better than a pyramid scheme. You know what eventually happens with those, right? See 2008 for an indication. Anyone who wants to challenge TFC on its transparency please do, I am ready.
‘Theatre going experience is in our DNA (like gazing at a fire)’, says Bingham Ray. The communal experience is what it’s all about. Amen. I say let’s bring back the drive-in. I especially want it for Sundance film Co-dependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same.
Ira speaks to the Opera audience. He noted, as audiences get older they crave that experience (communal screening) more. I love that Ira Deutchman grew a business out of this niche. Niche is golden. A lesson for us all.
Ira spoke to “eventizing” theatrical– several noted about adding Q&As, live music, director attendance, panel discussions– to enhance theatrical and all of those screenings do well. Indeed. We have observed the same and that speaks even more to filmmakers knowing their audience and being more engaged in their own releases. There is nothing of this that one cannot do.
Ira ends quoting Richard Lorber “everything is possible and nothing works” harking back to 25 years ago when distribs celebrated small victories and spent little – before the rise and fall of indie bubble and the studios dressing big releases in indie clothes. My comment is regarding the “professional” the middle man, the lack of transparency even still is a burden, the fees paid excessive if one analyzes from the point of view of sustainability and healthy business. Service deals are announced like acquisitions. That’s why they say “film business” is an oxymoron but it need not be. And that’s why TFC’s resolve now is to not work with unsustainable filmmakers. We do not want to feed the habit, enable unrealistic expectations. If you spent too much on making your film, if your expectations are unreasonable, if you are not committed to being educated about both film and engaging audiences, and most of all, if you are just a money bag and not a creator but rather buying into the dream that your film (which you did not even create) is going to make you rich or richer, please go home. And now, on a less cranky and more joyous note: What I love about the Sundance distribution initiative:

11. It’s offering filmmakers a truly filmmaker friendly set up by having a good partner and fair contract terms.

12. The terms offered by a truly excellent partner like New Video were already good in general, but are now even slightly advantaged.

13. That the deal is non-exclusive and allows filmmakers proper agency and control.

14. That I partly inspired it starting in 2009 and that the folks at Sundance listened, discussed, and worked it out slowly but surely and that there is more to come.

15. The Sundance brand connected with its alumni of filmmaker’s brands and on key platforms that function as the key portals to film lovers (and yet not at the exclusion of other viable modes of DIY and traditional distribution) is the model I have always championed even before TFC launched, because it makes sense. It’s good for filmmakers; it’s good for audiences and back to # 1 and #2, initiatives like this are the way to help clear a path through the content of clutter to the curious eyes of cinema loving consumers.

Orly Ravid July 27th, 2011

Posted In: Digital Distribution, Distribution, Distribution Platforms, DIY, Long Tail & Glut of Content

Tags: Amy Heller, Arianna Bocco, Bingham Ray, Bob Berney, Dana Harris, distribution panel, film distribution, indiewire, Ira Deutchman, Jeanne Berney, Mark Urman, niche audience, Richard Abramowitz, Sundance, theatrical distribution

Recently I was invited to be on a panel at the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) and participate in their mentoring sessions and the lab at Cinemart. Great experience. I am always amazed by the difference between the US and Europe. The whole government funding of films and new media initiatives as our government is about to shut down. Well, their policies and practices do take their own financial toll too but one I think is worth it. For all my europhileness I have to note that the Europeans can be just as guilty of not wanting to watch subtitles in fact some countries dub films instead. And of course we know that Hollywood is big business in Europe too. But all in all, art house cinema seems to reach more broadly in Europe and even some parts of Asia than it does in the US. Films in Cannes and other top fests can sell all over Europe and never in the US or success in opening theatrically only in NY and maybe LA and overall it seems to me box office is generally down for foreign language cinema.

International filmmakers want US distribution and it was painful for me to discuss their prospects at IFFR because for so many, the prospects are slim. But this one’s for you! (Please note this blog is focused on digital distribution and not healthy categories for foreign language cinema such as Non Theatrical including Museums, Films Festival, Colleges, Educational / Institutional).

Cable VOD was 80% of the digital revenue in the US in 2009 but it’s now declining little by little, now estimated to be in the high 70’s (approx 77%) and may decline further still. The reason for this change, which is expected to continue, is that Internet based platforms are growing. Regarding FOREIGN LANGUAGE ON CABLE VOD: Distributors and aggregators agree that foreign language cinema is very hard to get onto Cable VOD platforms and slots for non-English cinema are reserved generally for marquee driven films and/or films with a real hook (name cast/director, highly acclaimed, genre hook). A big independent Cable VOD aggregator notes a real struggle in getting foreign language films to perform on Cable VOD and even Bollywood titles that had wide theatrical distribution and a box office of upwards of $1,000,000 still perform poorly (poorly means 4-figure revenue, 5-figure tops). They have had some success with foreign martial arts films and will continue with those in the foreseeable future. Time Warner Cable (TWC) remains more open to foreign language cinema though it plays the fewest films, a range between 190 – 246 at any given time (with a shelf life usually of 60 days and with 2/3^rd of the content seeming to be bigger studio product, and the rest indie). By comparison Charter and AT&T play about 1,000 and Verizon plays 2,000, and Comcast plays about 4,000. [See below for the 2010 breakdown of Cable subscription numbers.] Hence, individual titles may perform better on Time Warner Cable for obvious reasons, Comcast may have more subscribers but there’s less competition and TWC is in New York, the best demographic for art house cinema.

Generally speaking, platforms overall are far more receptive to foreign films following the recent success of DRAGON TATTOO, TELL NO ONE, IP MAN, etc. than they have ever been before. However as one can see from the titles noted, foreign genre films are preferred because they have the opportunity to reach broader audiences than the usual foreign film. Genres that reportedly work include: sci-fi, thriller/crime, action, and sophisticated horror. Dramas have had limited success, and comedies often don’t translate, nor does most children’s content. In regard to Cable VOD – foreign box office is becoming an important proxy, because the marketing and pr tend to build US awareness on the larger titles prior to being available here. Many companies have built very successful VOD businesses pursuing a day and date theatrical or DVD strategy. Again, genre films work best, with horror and sci fi being the top performers. 3 of the top 10 non-studio titles in 2010 were foreign language subtitled releases. Small art house distributors say that at most it’s a small dependable revenue stream via services such as INDEMAND http://www.indemand.com (iN DEMAND’s owners are and it services Comcast iN DEMAND Holdings, Inc., Cox Communications Holdings, Inc., and Time Warner Entertainment – Advance/Newhouse Partnership.) Distributors and aggregators all site Time Warner as being far more open to foreign language cinema than Comcast, because it’s urban focused (NY, LA, etc) not heartland focused as Comcast is.

In terms of these titles finding their audiences on Cable VOD, Comcast announced improved search functionality by being able to search by title and Cable VOD is aware of its deficiencies and is said to be improving in terms of marketing to consumers but Cable VOD is still infamous for its lack of recommendation engines and discovery tools. Key aggregators work to have films profiled in several categories and not just the A-Z listing.

Top 25 Multichannel Video Programming Distributors as of Sept. 2010 – Source NCTA (National Cable Television Association)

Rank	MSO	BasicVideoSubscribers
1	Comcast Corporation	22,937,000
2	DirecTV	18,934,000
3	Dish Network Corporation	14,289,000
4	Time Warner Cable, Inc.	12,551,000
5	Cox Communications, Inc.¹	4,968,000
6	Charter Communications, Inc.	4,653,000
7	Verizon Communications, Inc.	3,290,000
8	Cablevision Systems Corporation	3,043,000
9	AT&T, Inc.	2,739,000
10	Bright House Networks LLC¹	2,194,000
11	Suddenlink Communications¹	1,228,000
12	Mediacom Communications Corporation	1,203,000
13	Insight Communications Company, Inc.	699,000
14	CableOne, Inc.	651,000
15	WideOpenWest Networks, LLC¹	391,000
16	RCN Corp.	354,000
17	Bresnan Communications¹	297,000
18	Atlantic Broadband Group, LLC	269,000
19	Armstrong Cable Services	245,000
20	Knology Holdings	231,000
21	Service Electric Cable TV Incorporated¹	222,000
22	Midcontinent Communications	210,000
23	MetroCast Cablevision	186,000
24	Blue Ridge Communications¹	172,000
25	General Communications	148,000

FOREIGN LANGUAGE CINEMA VIA OTHER DIGITAL PLATFORMS and REVENUE MODELS:

DTO (Digital Download to Own (such as Apple’s iTunes which rents and sells films digitally) – this space has been challenging for foreign films in the past, and most services do not have dedicated merchandise sections. Thus, the only promo placement available is on genre pages, so the films need to have compelling art and trailer assets to compete. iTunes and Vudu (now owned by WALMART – see below) are really interested in upping the ante on foreign films over the next 12 months. Special consideration will need to be made for the quality of technical materials, as distributors have encountered numerous problems making subtitled content work on these providers.

SVOD (Subscription VOD such as NETFLIX’s WATCH INSTANTLY) – this space is probably the best source of revenue for foreign content because the audience demos skew more sophisticated and also end users are more inclined to experiment with new content niches. Content in this space should have great assets and superior international profile (awards, box office), and overall should evoke a “premium feel” for the right titles, license fees can be comparable to high end American indies. Appetite for foreign titles will increase as the price for domestic studio content continues to accelerate. Genres are a bit broader than VOD/DTO, but thrillers, sci fi and action still will command larger sums ($). Good Festival pedigree (especially Cannes, Berlin, Venice, Sundance, etc.) will also command higher prices. Overall, it’s a great opportunity as long as platforms keep doing exclusive deals. NETFLIX has surpassed 20,000,000 subscribers and a strong stock price and is in a very competitive space and mood again. (See more below). Hulu expects to soon reach 1,000,000 subscribers “to approach” half a billion in total revenues (advertising and subscription combined) in 2011, up from $263 million in 2010. That’s from $108 million in 2009. (see more below)

AVOD (Advertising Supported VOD – such as SNAG and HULU) – Another great space for foreign content (as evidenced by the recent exclusive HULU – Criterion deal – (see below) although that deal is actually for HULU’s subscription service (Hulu Plus). These platforms are more willing to experiment with genres and content types and favor art films and documentaries over genre films. Depending on the film, annual revenues can approach low to mid four (4) figures in rev share. SNAG recently was capitalized to the tune of $10,000,000 but seems to be spending that money on marketing and not on “acquiring” so a film’s revenue is likely to be dependent on performance and rev/share unless one strikes an exclusive deal with SNAG and manages to get an MG. HULU’s revenues are covered above. Films report low 4-figures but sometimes 5 and 6 figure revenues but up until now those higher performing films have been English language and appeal to younger males.

TELEVISION / BROADCAST SALES: For foreign language cinema unless one has an Oscar™ winner or nominee, or an output deal, the prospects of a meaningful license fee are slim. Even worse, if you do secure a deal, it will likely preclude participation in Cable VOD, Netflix and any of the ad-supported VOD platforms such as Hulu and Snag.

KEY SPECIFIC TOP SPECIFIC DIGITAL PLATFORMS / RETAILERS:

AMAZON reportedly is readying a service that would stream 5,000 movies and TV shows to members of its $79-per-year Prime free-shipping membership program. Amazon being corporately tied to extremely popular entertainment information service IMDB and the film festival submission service WITHOUTABOX gives it a potential edge in the market, one that has never been fully harvested but easily could be and seems to be looming. And since its inception, Amazon has let film content providers open up shop on their site directly without a middle-man. Middle man aggregators get slightly better terms. Amazon presently offers 75,000 films and television shows combined and plans to soon exceed 100,000. It should be noted Amazon VOD has been US-focused though recently bought Love Films in the UK.

FOCUS FEATURES’ NEW DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION INITIATIVE: There is not much information out on this yet but FOCUS/UNIVERSAL are launching a new digital distribution initiative that may or may not brand their own channel on iTunes etc., but does seem to be focused on niche cinema to some extent and this may speak to foreign language titles. An option to watch out for.

GOOGLE is working on encroaching into the content delivery market with its launch of GOOGLE TV, which unfortunately has not created quite the fanfare the company planned for. It boasts: The web is now a channel. With Google Chrome and Adobe Flash Player 10.1, Google TV lets you access everything on the web. Watch your favorite web videos, view photos, play games, check fantasy scores, chat with friends, and do everything else you’re accustomed to doing online. GOOGLE TV does come with the Netflix App and others. Google partnered with some of the leading premium content providers to bring thousands of movie and TV titles, on-demand, directly to your television. Amazon Video On Demand offers access to over 75,000 titles for rental or purchase, and Netflix will offer the ability to instantly watch unlimited movies and TV shows, anytime, streaming directly to the TV.

HULU: Hulu’s numbers keep growing for certain films, which has to-date not been foreign language but that may change given the Criterion Collection announcement. Hulu is also now a subscription service (HULU PLUS) and announced the Criterion deal is for that. Criterion of course specializes in classic movies from the canon of great directors–Ingmar Bergman, Jean-Luc Godard, Federico Fellini, etc.–and has about 800 titles digitized so far, many of which are also available via Hulu competitor Netflix. It’s understood that this will be an exclusive deal, and that the Criterion titles that Netflix does offer will expire this year. Hulu Plus subscribers will initially get access to 150 Criterion films, including “The 400 Blows,” “Rashomon” and “Breathless.” Hulu says the movies will run without ad interruptions, but may feature ads before the films start; the free Hulu.com service will offer a handful of Criterion titles, which will run with ads. Hulu, owned by Comcast’s NBC, Disney’s ABC and News. Corp.’s Fox introduced the Hulu Plus pay service last year. Hulu CEO Jason Kilar says the $7.99-per-month offering is on track to reach one million subscribers in 2011. Competing for exclusive content seems to be on the rise as platforms compete for household recognition and top market share.

iTunes (APPLE): iTunes dominated consumer spending for movies in 2010 but that may not last long. One can get onto iTunes via one of its chosen aggregators such as New Video, IODA, Tune Core, Quiver… Home Media Magazine reported the findings of an IHS Screen Digest report that showed that Apple was able to hold off challenges from competitors like Microsoft’s Zune Video (via XBOX Kinect), Sony PlayStation Store, Amazon VOD and Walmart’s VUDU. Despite the new competition, the electronic sellthrough and video on demand market rose more than 60% in 2010, Apple iTunes still came out on top, perhaps due in part to the release of the iPad last spring and Apple TV last fall. Research director of digital media for IHS, Arash Amel, said, “The iTunes online store showed remarkable competitive resilience last year in the U.S. EST/VOD movie business, staving off a growing field of tough challengers while keeping pace with a dramatic expansion for the overall market.” However, it’s important to note that although iTunes staved off competition, the overall iTunes consumer spending fell almost 10% in 2010 to 64.5%. It was 74.4% in 2009. Insiders predict it will not hold its market dominance for long.

Microsoft’s Zune Video was one of Apple’s biggest competitors last year, accounting for 9% of U.S. movie EST/iVOD consumer spending in 2010 but this does not seem a key platform for foreign language cinema.

MUBI: www.Mubi.com having added Sony Playstation to its platforms reach, MUBI now has reportedly 1,200,000 members worldwide and is finally in a better position to generate revenue. Still its own figures estimates amount to 4-figures of revenue and that’s for all its territories. Mubi’s partnership with SONY does not extend into the US.

NETFLIX as reported in Multichannel News “as its subscriber base has swelled, Netflix has become a target for critics complaining that it is disrupting the economics of TV” is now a competitor to Cable and in fact Cable VOD companies won’t take a film if it’s already on NETFLIX’s Watch Instantly service. But Netflix is realizing it erred by losing focus on the independent and is now quietly offering bigger sums that compete with Broadcast offers and that are on par with the 5 and 6 figure revenues generated by Cable VOD for the stronger indie / art house films. Having films exclusively may be the driving force of future monetization in digital, or least in SVOD. Regarding 2011 outlook, Netflix’s “business is so dynamic that we will be doing less calendar year guidance than in the past,” the execs said. For the first three months of the year, Netflix expects domestic subscribers to increase to between 21.9 million and 22.8 million, with revenue between $684 million and $704 million and operating income between $98 million and $116 million. Internationally — meaning, for now, Canada — the company expects 750,000 to 900,000 subscribers with revenue of $10 million to $13 million and an operating loss between $10 million and $14 million.

REDBOX: Redbox, whose brick-red DVD vending machines are scattered across the country, is aiming to have a Netflix-like video streaming subscription service up and running by the end of 2011, company executives told investors mid February. Redbox is a wholly owned subsidiary of Coinstar. The Oakbrook Terrace, Ill.-based company claims to have rented more than 1 billion DVDs to date through vending machines at about 24,900 U.S. locations nationwide, including select McDonald’s, Wal-Mart Stores and Walgreens locations. It should be noted though that Redbox is very studio title focused and wide release focused but its streaming service will likely move beyond that.

WAL-MART bought VUDU and is expected to be a major player. Walmart is the world’s largest retailer with $405 billion in sales for the fiscal year ending Jan. 31, 2010. In the U.S., Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. operates more than 4,300 facilities including Walmart supercenters, discount stores, Neighborhood Markets and Sam’s Club warehouses. VUDU, is Walmart’s recently acquired online media source where consumers can rent or buy movies and TV shows for their internet-ready HDTV, Blu-ray Disc players or PlayStation 3 consoles. Like iTunes, there are no monthly fees. Consumers can buy and rent movies when they want, and 2-night rentals are only $2. It will be interesting to see how VUDU will rise as a contender in 2011 and whether iTunes will suffer as a result of their success. Wal-Mart advertises that regarding VUDU: “from Internet-ready HDTVs to WiFi enabled Blu-ray players, you’ll find all the VUDU ready electronics you’re looking for at Walmart.com. Whether adding a flat panel TV to your dorm room or upgrading your home entertainment center, our selection of VUDU ready HDTVs has you covered. You’ll also save money on our VUDU ready products when you select items with free shipping to your home. With VUDU, you’ll be able to stream HD movies directly from the Internet to your TV in dynamic surround sound for a great low price. Shop VUDU ready HDTVs and Blu-ray players at Walmart.com — and save. “ And the retail giant makes sure all relevant devices / electronics it carries are VUDU-enabled. 2011 and beyond will be telling. Wal-Mart caters to the average American so it remains to be seen if there is an appetite for foreign language film via VUDU in the months and years to come. In its inception VUDU was catering to early adaptors of new technology and those eager to watch HD but now it seems to be becoming more generic. New Video is a preferred aggregator to VUDU, among others.

VODO (Free / monetized Torrent): www.VODO.net: This has not been tried in the US by most distributors if any and not for foreign language cinema but it has worked for several projects such as Pioneer One which generated $60,000 USD by having the content made available for free and then getting donations in return.

Other emerging retailers entering the digital space:

Sears and Kmart are the latest over-the-top threats to pay-TV providers’ video-on-demand businesses. Sears launched its online movie download service, Alphaline Entertainment, which will let Sears and Kmart customers rent or purchase movies, including on the same day they are released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc, provided through digital media services firm Sonic Solutions. Titles currently available to rent or buy from Alphaline include studio and successful TV shows. Under Sonic’s multiyear agreement with Sears, the companies will provide access to Alphaline services through multiple devices including Blu-ray Disc players, HDTVs, portable media players and mobile phones. Sears and Kmart, said in a statement. “We’ll continue to increase the reach and flexibility of the Alphaline Entertainment service by providing consumers on-demand access to the latest entertainment from a range of home and mobile electronics.” Sears, which merged with Kmart in 2005, is the fourth largest retailer in the U.S. The company has about 3,900 department stores and specialty retail stores in the U.S. and Canada. It remains to be seen if they take on foreign language cinema. New Video is also an aggregator to them.

That’s all she wrote folks. Until the next time.

Orly Ravid March 10th, 2011

Posted In: Amazon VOD & CreateSpace, Digital Distribution, Distribution, Distribution Platforms, Hulu, International Sales, iTunes, Netflix, Uncategorized

Tags: Alphaline Entertainment, Amazon, Apple, AVOD, Cinemart, Comcast, Digital Distribution, DTO, film distribution, Focus Features, foreign language film, Google TV, Hulu, InDemand, International Film Festival Rotterdam, iTunes, Kmart, Microsoft Zune, Mubi, Netflix, New Video, PioneerOne, Redbox, Sears, SnagFilms, subtitles, SVOD, Time Warner, VOD, VODO, VUDU, Walmart

*This is Part III of “If I Were a Filmmaker Going Sundance…”

Post Sundance what I have to say is this: there were more deals done since I started tracking them along with the rest of the industry so for more deal counting and analysis please refer to that blog post.

But thank you Fox Searchlight, TWC and Oprah for injecting the biz with just the right amount of adrenaline to keep it dreaming big; we hope you’re buying big next year. What else is new? Focus has an emerging digital distribution initiative, Amazon is giving Netflix a run for its money (or not, depends on who you talk to)…. everyone is waiting on Wal-Mart to see how much voodoo VUDU can conjure up and SEARS and KMART are in the digital space just in case you though big retail was dead. Blockbuster is still for sale. Google’s stock price is high as ever and Apple is not going down any time soon judging from its 130,000,000 credit cards on file (and that was just the last time I checked) even though some speculate it will meet its match.

So now that there are almost as many digital plays as they are films (hahahaha of course not literally) how can we distinguish them? TERMS and MARKETING. I have made much fuss about terms before (how long, how many rights, fees and above all, what are the splits between platform/ service and aggregator/distributors).

We hope that filmmakers and their team build community and buzz around their films and start engaging audiences and potential audiences well before and leading up to and following the first public exhibition of their films. But after a distributor or aggregator comes on board, then what? What do they do for the fees, other than the selling and servicing of the film and its assets to the platforms / services.

Here is an overview of what a few companies do to market films for home entertainment release, either DVD & DIGITAL or just DIGITAL, and mostly in their own words:

FILMBUFF

“FilmBuff is an established leader in the development of innovative release strategies, digital merchandising and promotions. Our strong retail relationships allow us to emphasize merchandising and promotional placement on all platforms and video portals. Our internal marketing builds custom outreach programs to build audience awareness and activate the online communities that are ideal for each film. Custom promos and features on FilmBuff’s social media networks across Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and a host of online video portals work in concert to ensure that films reach the widest possible audience.”

Our dedicated programming and marketing teams will:

• Design a custom release strategy for each film across all digital platforms
• Work directly with online stores on a weekly basis to gain featured digital merchandising. Some examples of recent featured merchandising and promotions below:

–Exit Through the Gift Shop on iTunes

–Collapse on XBox

–One Too Many Mornings on Hulu

–Cemetery Junction on Charter

• Build a public relations program to drive audience awareness through national & international press and blog coverage.

–Nice Guy Johnny on AOL Video

• Execute custom outreach programs to activate and engage the online communities that are ideal for each film.
• Implement online promotional campaigns and features leveraging FilmBuff’s expanding social media community of movie lovers on Facebook, Twitter and Youtube and others. The community now includes 25K+ engaged fans, followers & subscribers.

–Savage County on Veoh

• Feature the film in various areas on our website (www.filmbuffondemand.com) which drives users and fans to digital transactions. The site features video clips, industry content, guest blogs, film extras and links to all portals where the film is available. The site currently receives an average of over 20K+ page views per month.

NEW VIDEO

“New Video’s suite of marketing services for films released on DVD, Blu-ray, digitally and on-demand includes:

Direct contact with retailers and platforms for developing and supporting in-store placements and point-of-sale promotions. (TFC notes: They have a lot of DVD volume so their relationships are more valuable than a filmmaker can get on their own dealing with the retailer).

A full-time in-house public relations team directing outreach to national and regional print, online and broadcast media for both industry and consumers-

Collaboration with partner organizations to drive grassroots awareness; a custom affiliate program for DVD sales referrals.

* Best practices to reach existing fan bases online and off with a solid emphasis on social media. * Strategic advertising to maximize ROI. * Promotion at consumer and trade shows.

The mission of New Video is to leverage 20 years of distribution and marketing experience to provide the broadest possible reach across all distribution channels, while raising awareness through major press, grassroots organizations, and everything in between. Titles we’ve distributed and marketed include GasLand, King Corn, Autism: The Musical, Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, Bob Dylan: Dont Look Back, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along Blog and The Secret of Kells. We collaborate with filmmakers, create custom marketing strategies and share our best practices to build on the momentum they have developed over the life of their project. With expert in-house publicity services, our campaigns cover long lead press, short lead, online, industry, and consumer press outlets (both national and regional, in print, online and broadcast media). Our press releases are media-rich and social media-ready for posting and sharing, and we offer next-gen screener service for press review. We have a proven track record in leveraging talent to maximize press and promotion through marketing opportunities such as podcasts and exclusives. We have a hands-on, strategic approach to grassroots marketing, and we employ social network marketing through our own presence on Facebook and Twitter, and through coordination with supporters’ social networks. We prize our longstanding relationships with store merchandising teams, and add enormous value in our ability to customize and create in-store marketing strategy, such as thematic shelves, customized artwork, and priority placements. We collaborate on selective online, print and radio advertising to strategically improve ROI through targeted buys, and we build opportunities around media events, consumer and trade shows to further press coverage and consumer awareness for a property. We complement these practices with a custom affiliate program for DVD sales referrals to incent partner organizations online. New Video is committed to building and maintaining buzz organically, through extended campaigns, early editorial pitching, and social outreach. We communicate with consumers through our website and blog, social media, and a newsletter reaching 15,000 subscribers.”

TFC NOTES: New Video is a key iTunes aggregator not only for its own titles but for many traditional distributors and even IndieFlix and Indie Rights and TriBeCa Films (remember filmmakers, always ask the questions that help you know how many middle men there are in any given category of distribution). I know that on the ‘Social Media Outreach’ front for iTunes releases for example, New Video sends out social-media releases with images & clips to sites such as Digg, Reddit, Stumbleupon and they post release on PR Distribution sites such as ClickPress, i-Newswire, eCommWire, The Open Press. From past experience we know they do a feed-based announcement made available on Google blog search, Technorati, Yahoo! News, Topix, tagged with keywords for easier discovery. New Video does email marketing to its subscribers as well and Trailer or Clip Tagging Promotional clips tagged with “Now Available on iTunes” and syndicated to top video sharing sites (e.g. YouTube, Yahoo!, MySpace, Google, Revver, Dailymotion, Blip, Veoh). They monitor and post reviews in-store Individual reviews posted about the content. On the online grassroots outreach front, they connect to digital portals; targeting topical, genre and talent fansites and blogs and service those with press release and special offers (exclusives, clips, contests, review copies). And they work fans and friends via the social networking sites. (TFC notes: on Facebook New Video as a company only has a little over 1,700 people. The page is largely used to promote titles, not facilitate dialog as Sheri Candler observed.).

WOLFE VIDEO

“25 years developing relationships with national retailers, VOD companies, the press and media, film festival programmers, LGBT organizations and our vendors. Over 25 years building traditional and electronic mailing lists, plus a wide social media presence. Wolfe believes that the key aspect to being an effective Distributor is marketing. In the absence of this expertise, a distributor is merely a middleman. Wolfe is widely known for mainstreaming films with gay content. The most invaluable asset Wolfe brings to filmmakers is experience. Wolfe has over 25 years developing relationships with VOD companies, DVD retailers, niche and traditional media, film festival programmers, broadcasters, LGBT organizations and our vendors. Wolfe has one of the largest channels in the gay niche market which includes traditional and electronic mailing lists and a wide social media presence.

One of Wolfe’s most notable assets is its direct access to gay consumers; better known as WolfeVideo.com. The website supports heavy traffic and is widely known as a commerce site for gay feature films. It should also be noted that Wolfe does not sell adult product, so the website is accessible for many audiences. WolfeVideo.com is supplemented by the QMovieBlog.com and Wolfe’s social network strategy includes a variety of ongoing campaigns across all major platforms. Wolfe has a particularly substantial and active following on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube; for example Wolfe’s work on Were the World Mine generated nearly 100K views on YouTube alone and the famous re-release of Desert Hearts promotion generated over 847,000 views! Wolfe’s direct to consumer assets also include significant opt-in mailing lists via email and traditional snail mail, which continues to be a strong sales tool for the company and its products. (TFC Notes Wolfe’s Facebook page has 3,368 likes).

Sales and marketing via mainstream outlets is key to the success of Wolfe films. Wolfe leverages client relationships with VOD, EST and DVD retailers to further market films. Strategic partnerships bring Wolfe’s films front and center in programs such as the Gay Pride month feature on the home page of iTunes, Internet promotions with Xfinity & dominant presence with DVD retailers such as Amazon.com. Wolfe has also engaged companies like Sony to develop marketing campaigns. The Sony Ebridge program was designed to add value to the DVD. E-bridge gave consumers cool stuff like the chance to win a trip to Australia. It also offered advertisers unique consumer access they would otherwise not reach.

Other clients that partner with Wolfe promotions include hundreds of non-profit organizations nationwide such as LGBT film festivals and political orgs like GLAAD. These organizations work with Wolfe to both screen films for hundreds of consumers and promote the subsequent VOD & DVD releases. These relationships expand consumer outreach and do the good work of promoting the important work of non-profits.

Publicity is a major focus in every Wolfe campaign. Wolfe’s publicists (not in-house) facilitate reviews, interviews and other coverage for all Wolfe releases across a wide range of media outlets from national and regional print publications to blogs and websites. Broadcast networks also work with Wolfe on publicity and marketing. For example, the Logo Network is presently airing Wolfe PSA’s to educate consumers about the effects of piracy featuring actors from Wolfe films.

Additionally, they not only market films on the Wolfe label, but work extensively with larger labels such as Sony, Universal, Fox, and Showtime to name a few. Every successful distributor with gay content has hired Wolfe to support their products. Wolfe has a “soup to nuts” approach to film marketing and they work hard to reach millions of consumers for every release.”

INDEPENDENT LENS

“Independent Lens has a strong social media community including nearly 70,000 engaged Facebook fans —the largest of all PBS primetime series, second only to Antiques Roadshow. Independent Lens social networking and online impact: Independent Lens believes social networking is one key component to reaching new, younger and more diverse viewers for our broadcasts, engagement work and online distribution.

Independent Lens is the second most popular PBS series on Facebook. We post daily, and our posts average 55,000 impressions each. We receive an average of 100 interactions (Likes + Comments) on each post. This engagement rate ranks first among PBS series and means that 5 out of 6 of our fans see each post.

(e.g. their The Calling Livestream event from the Chicago Art Institute in December 2010 attracted more than 3,000 viewers on their Livestream channel on their Facebook fan page.).

We have more than 11,000 followers on Twitter.

We post three or more new Blog postings each week, and they feature interviews with the filmmakers, documentary news, dispatches from filmmakers in the field, live chats with filmmakers and the subjects of their films, and more.

In the first quarter of our current season, Independent Lens had 18,000 page views from more than 15,000 unique visitors.”

GRAVITAS

“With there being thousands of films available in the VOD marketplace, here are four ongoing tactics we use to raise the profile of Gravitas films:

1. Traditional PR- As this The Wrap article shows we believe it important to convey to the industry and entertainment enthusiasts that Gravitas continues to innovate in VOD. In this instance, we will be releasing American: The Bill Hicks Story “day and date” in theatres and on VOD in April. This is a film was adored when it screened at SXSW in 2010 and having pre-release PR supporting the film will help us get wide carriage in 100 million North American VOD homes and marketing support from cable and online operators concurrent with the film’s debut.

We have an outside PR firm on retainer and we also do PR/marketing in house. None of these expenses are charged back to the filmmaker. We work in house, w/ our PR firm and with our Licensors to ensure appropriate messaging is being conveyed. Good reviews are crucial, but of paramount importance is letting the Licensor know when and where the film are being played in VOD. To this end, we communicate with our Licensors every time their film is on a new VOD platform.

Here are a couple recent links to coverage on IFC.com

http://www.ifc.com/news/2010/10/2010-holiday-movie-guide-online-vod.php

http://www.ifc.com/news/2011/01/winter-preview-2011-dvds.php

2. VOD Guide Optimization- As you know, there are over 100 cable, satellite, and telco operators in North America and each operator has their own VOD guide characteristics. As a result, we spend considerable resources internally making sure that our films are mapped so that customers can easily find them. As a result, we have Slingboxes set up in homes all across North America where we can remotely use our office internet connections to peer in to the cable boxes of friends and family to make sure our films are in as many VOD guide folders as possible. The enclosed images shows the layout of 8 different large operators. Our goal is make sure our films show up 4-5 times within each operator VOD storefront in folders frequently called “New Release”, “All Movies A-Z”, “Indy Films”, “2 Day Rentals”, “VOD Premieres”, “In Theatres”, and the appropriate genre categories like “Documentary” or “Comedy.”

Almost each guide (aka UI or User Interface) is a little different and we monitor as many of the UI’s as possible to ensure that we are aware of any guide changes that we should be taking advantage of that would be appropriate for our content so that it is merchandized appropriately. We do this for all of our licensed content.

3. Online Editorial Outreach: Gravitas’ marketing team has a monthly dialogue (including sending DVD screeners) with dozens of websites and bloggers that cover independent, genre, and new VOD content including:

IFC.COM

On Demand Weekly

Hammer to Nail

Twitch Film

Film School Rejects

Gordon and the Whale

28 Days Later Analysis

Fangoria

Dread Central

Arrow in the Head

VideoScope Magazine

Horrorphilia

Bloody Disgusting

Here are some recent samples:

http://www.ifc.com/news/2011/01/winter-preview-2011-dvds.php

http://ondemandweekly.com/blog/article/ip_man_-_on_demand/

4. Online and Social Media- Each month we host monthly marketing calls with filmmakers to help implement and grow the online presence of their film prior to and after VOD debut date. Here are just a few examples:

Gravitas Website-We run on ongoing Film Spotlight section off of our home page where we interview writers and directors of Gravitas films currently in VOD release. http://www.gravitasventures.com/films/

(TFC notes: no info on site traffic and Sheri Candler noted that Gravitas themselves only have a little over 500 people on their own FB page and almost no engagement from fans; few likes, few comments on the material posted there.)

ORLY asked: “Do you have any plans to expand your social network marketing? Any community engagement you want to speak to? I say this because for example Independent Lens does this very well, but most distribs and aggregators don’t. Since you mention it, if you have anything to say about it please do”.

GRAVITAS answered: “To the extent that our social media sites continue to grow, yes, but it’s equally important and effective to spread best practices with our Licensors. i.e. If Gravitas licenses a film with a FB page of 10K fans, we want to share best practices with that Licensor as to harness their social network to drive VOD activity”. Gravitas went on to explain that they don’t see themselves as a consumer-facing brand and they prefer to focus their efforts and resources on working with filmmakers’ Facebook pages etc and leveraging the filmmakers’ brands and outreach efforts, coaching filmmakers on having fans look for the film on the right platforms etc.

Back to the rest of the GRAVITAS info about their marketing ONLINE & via SOCIAL MEDIA:

“b.) Partner Portal Marketing- Hulu is one example of a key partner portal that we collaborate with weekly to raise the profile of Gravitas films. Here is a screen shot of the well-regarded documentary Circus Rosaire that is currently being highlighted in the top carousel off the Main Hulu Movies page.

Recently, we were able to work with the website www.Jesse-Eisenberg.com to have them cross promote one of Jesse’s earlier films The Living Wake right after he was Oscar nominated for his work in The Social Network.

http://www.jesse-eisenberg.com/news/2011/01/29/the-living-wake-now-free-to-watch-on-hulu/

We also frequently collaborate with many of our filmmakers to heighten discussion, interaction and interest in many of our Hulu films.

c.) Social Media- Gravitas and its film partners are active users of Facebook and Twitter. Here is one example where are Documentaries on Demand partner PBS tweeted about the VOD release of The Buddha to its over 500 thousand followers.”

http://www.indiewire.com/article/gravitas_ventures_to_launch_documentaries_on_demand_with_pbs/

BRAINSTORM MEDIA

Brainstorm submitted this campaign plan in answer to our desire to what they do on the marketing front. They work with Eventful.

Eventful

What Would You Give Up to Find True Love?

Submit Your Answer for a Chance to Win!

One lucky winner and three guests will win a trip to NYC, stay at the

luxurious Kimberly Hotel, get a pampering spa day and more!

Campaign overview:

Eventful will execute a social media campaign to engage consumers around the film, My Father’s Will. The campaign will allow fans to submit their answers to win a trip to NYC, see submissions from other fans, and watch the trailer for My Father’s Will. Eventful will execute digital, email and social media marketing to drive campaign participation.

The goals of the campaign include:

• Drive entries for the sweepstakes
• Build awareness for My Father’s Will through trailer views
• Build awareness for accommodations being provided, i.e. hotel
• Generate social media and viral engagement for the film and sweepstakes
• Create an engaged social community for direct marketing of VOD rentals of My

Father’s Will with including folder locations for each affiliate

Phase 1: Social media campaign – Win it!

1. Eventful will design, build and host:

• Campaign micro-site including movie trailer and hotel branding
• Custom widgets and social media apps for distribution across Facebook,

MySpace and other sites, enabling consumers to enter the sweepstakes

2. Eventful will execute a comprehensive targeted marketing and promotional plan to engage existing users from among Eventful’s audience of 16 million consumers:

• Demographic targeting by location, age, gender, and entertainment tastes
• Eventful will engage consumers via dedicated email, onsite promotions, and one-click social media sharing tools

3. Marketing by Eventful will drive participants to the campaign micro-site which will include:

• Campaign artwork branded for My Father’s Will
• Primary call-to-action to enter the sweepstakes by submitting an answer
• Live stream of entries from fans
• Official trailer for My Father’s Will
• Campaign details with basic rules
• Social media sharing tools for Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and email

Phase 2: Drive VOD rentals of My Father’s Will

1. Eventful will promote VOD sales for My Father’s Will through a digital and direct marketing campaign targeting all sweepstakes entrants plus a broader target audience within the Eventful user base. Campaigns include:

• Dedicated email
• Onsite promotions
• Email newsletter insertions

Proposed Timeline:

• “Win it!” Sweepstakes: 2/15/11 – 4/15/11

To see the campaign, access it here. http://movies.eventful.com/campaigns/myfatherswill2011

(TFC note: we look forward to hearing the outcome on this campaign)

—

So, in conclusion, you can see a range of what companies do. In general, some companies are more focused on consumer marketing and publicity and social network marketing than others and some are focused more on marketing to retailers and services and getting best placement and some may do both. We recommend the latter when you have a choice and of course, no one can market your film better than you can. In my experience most companies lack on the publicity side, though I will say First Run Features, for example, (since we did not cover them herein) seems to do a great job on that front working with a wonderful publicist, driving Netflix queue action, hiring outreach teams, posting the trailer all over, and take out ads, e-blast loads, as well as work social network sites etc.

I am sure other companies will want to chime in here about what they do and filmmakers too about their experiences, good or not-so-much. We want to hear from you so weigh in! Please offer specific examples, not just marketing speak. In the meantime, our resident social network marketing guru, Sheri Candler, has offered her take on what the above distributors have described.

Sheri Candler says: I am happy to see distributors explaining what they do to market titles under their control. Often, the text on their websites sounds like a generalization of typical activities conducted by any marketing department in any corporation. I urge filmmakers to press for a customized, detailed plan of EXACTLY what will be done on their films and how much it will cost. Ultimately, that cost will be deducted from your backend, so it is important to understand what you can expect from your distributor before you sign up with them. It also gives you an idea of what you will still need to do yourselves. This isn’t fix it, forget it and the money just rolls in.

As noted above, I think social networking activities by most distributors is minimal at best. If you already have 10K fans on your Facebook page and the distributor offering to perform social networking activities for your film only has 500, they really can’t offer much. Especially look at how they handle their pages. Is it mostly shill? Is there any engagement going on? Evaluate them on what they can bring you that you can’t do yourselves. I strongly disagree that distributors shouldn’t consider themselves consumer facing companies. All companies are consumer facing in this age of digital ubiquity. But if it is true, they aren’t consumer facing, most likely those distributors shouldn’t be using social media as a company at all. SOCIAL media is all about facing the customer and conversing with them.

The only impressive distributor in the above list with regard to social networking and utilizing it effectively is Independent Lens. Look at their page and see how they are using it. Very impressive. No wonder they have almost 70K fans. Ask if your distributor has a social media team (not 2 interns!) and ask to speak with those people to get a sense of what they will do with your title or how you can combine efforts effectively. Just getting a large entity to tweet about your title once is not going to do much; it is not a Twitter strategy.

Retail DVD placement (for the next few years anyway), iTunes, Netflix, and VOD marquee placement, relationships with major publications for reviews and feature stories, these are things a typical filmmaker cannot get on their own and are worth utilizing with a distributor. Sending out eblasts and unsolicited screeners to journalists is really spam; so if that is the extent of your distributor’s publicity efforts, it isn’t worth paying for. Be sure to ask EXACTLY which publications will be approached and evaluate whether those outlets reach your target audience. You should also be consulted on what story angles will be developed for the publications. This is especially necessary if you do not have notable stars or notable accolades from festivals attached to your film as publications will be more reluctant to cover it.

Since grassroots relationships were mentioned, press your distributor to name which organizations they work with. Are they just affiliate sales relationships? Are they just a member of the distributor eblast list? Real communication should be happening and for a relationship really to be fruitful, it has to be 2 way. Of the above mentioned distributors, only Wolfe strikes me as having actual relationships with target organizations. Their content is of value to the organizations they are affiliated with and I would venture a guess that Wolfe strongly champions the orgs cause and mission too. THAT is a relationship.

Advertising placement makes sense, but find out what the spend will be and what publications/sites. While I understand that distributors get better rates going with a media broker, the spend is wasted if the placements are in publications or on sites that do not reach your target audience.

My view on this is a distributor is a marketing partner. The bulk of what they should be bringing you is marketing prowess. Really dig into what their plans are for your film and ask to see examples of work on similar films. When deciding on which distributor to sign with, don’t just sign with someone offering you access to 15 million homes. It sounds great, but if few of those homes know your film exists, there won’t be many sales.

Orly Ravid March 2nd, 2011

Posted In: Digital Distribution, DIY, Marketing, Social Network Marketing, Uncategorized

Tags: community building, film marketing, self distribution

Don’t worry folks, I have not forgotten the 3^rd and final part of the blog series “IF I WERE A FILMMAKER GOING TO SUNDANCE”… it’s posting this week. But in the meantime, this just in, well actually not, it’s been brewing for a while…

Festivals getting involved in distribution is all the rage. For festivals with very strong brand recognition, it makes sense to move into this arena. We’ve been recommending it to fests for years (since 2005) and we are happy to see some, such as Sundance, are getting into the fray. It makes sense for the biggest brand festivals to be using their name recognition to bring attention to the films they screen. We at TFC have a Foreign Language Oscar Initiative with Palm Springs International, a festival known for its curation of world cinema. It makes sense that together we will bring the recognition of PSIFF chosen films to a wider audience.

The Sundance brand, being strongly recognized with consumers even outside of the independent film industry, is ideal for filmmakers to use to their distribution advantage as close to the festival as possible. With the festival getting involved in distribution, the time between festival premiere and release will only help. For festivals that do not yet have a very strong consumer brand or niche it may make less sense.

An article today in the New York Times talks about some of the fests’ distribution plans.

We’ll be drilling more into this in the coming months. For now, we wanted to address TriBeCa Films distribution.

TriBeCa Films is a for-profit company and in that way they are acting like a traditional distribution company taking rights, offering Minimum Guarantees (MGs) but charging interest, all the usual stuff. That’s the difference between TriBeCa and what Sundance has indicated its distribution will look like. The difference between it and let’s say a digital aggregator such as IndieFlix is that it has strong direct Cable VOD relationships (e.g. Comcast) and TriBeCa has a strong marketing partnership in AMEX (as noted in the article) which brings significant financial sponsorship support to marketing and we expect other partnerships are in the works. It’s been said that overages from TriBeCa Films have been quite healthy and that the Cable VOD distribution paid off.

They started with 11 films last year and they plan to increase to 26 this year. They partner with New Video for their DVD and for access on other digital platforms (iTunes, Amazon etc), an excellent partner but yet another middle man. The theatrical aspect of their distribution seems modest at this moment but that is no different than many other distributors and it may change in time.

Sundance is just starting to formulate its plans, but it is a non-profit and is not seeking to behave like a traditional distributor. Rather, their initiative will facilitate certain components of distribution access to key platforms under the strength of its brand and that would be a key difference.

The NYT piece cites Janet Pierson’s unwillingness for SXSW to join in the digital distribution business. As she rightly surmised, distribution is complicated, it is not always revenue generating, it can be cost-intensive, it can invite great scrutiny from filmmakers and industry and certainly does complicate a film festival’s activities and politics. So maybe for SXSW, it is enough to be at the top of the technology front and be a successful event for the convergence of art, technology and media happenings and leave well enough alone.

These are changing times indeed, with no shortage of options on accessing platforms where audiences could find your work. Branding and marketing are crucially important, and so on that note, until the next blog post.

Orly Ravid February 28th, 2011

Posted In: Digital Distribution, Distribution, DIY, Film Festivals, Uncategorized

Tags: Digital Distribution, film distribution, Film Festivals, independent film, VOD

*This is Part II of the “If I Were a Filmmaker Going Sundance…”

*Part III to will be written in the aftermath of the glow of the fest.

Sundance 2011, insofar as distribution was concerned, saw a spike on both the traditional sales and the DIY front. 42 deals were done so far and more to come. One difference between this year’s Festival and those of recent years is that several acquisitions were done prior to the Festival and more deals occurred right at the beginning of the Festival rather than taken several days or weeks to materialize. In addition, some of the acquisition dollar figures were bigger than in recent times. There was a definite sense of ‘business is back’ (though mostly still for bigger films with either name directors or cast or both – and this we address below). And DIY is seeing a new dawn with directors like Kevin Smith announcing a self-distribution plan and Sundance’s solidified commitment to helping artists crowdfund (via Kickstarter) and market their films (via Facebook for example) access certain digital distribution platforms (in the works and TBA).

Starting with the deals. So far I counted 42 (one at least was a pre-buy / investment in production) and two so far are remake rights deals.

I only list the deal points that were publicized… meaning if no $$$ is listed then it was not announced.

Deals done Pre-Sundance:

1. Project Nim (James Marsh who did Man on Wire) – sold to HBO for a hefty yet unreported sum.

2. Becoming Chaz – produced by renowned World Of Wonder and sold to OWN (actually we gleaned OWN invested in the film and at the fest Oprah announced her commitment to doing for docs what she did for books via a Doc Club).

3. Uncle Kent went to IFC

4. The Greatest Movie Ever Sold (Morgan Spurlock) – went to Sony Classics.

5. Septien: (Michael Tully) – was nabbed by Sundance Selects

6. Mad Bastards also went to Sundance Selects

Deals done at Sundance according to sections:

US Dramatic Competition:

7. The Ledge: sold to IFC – Low seven figures

8. Like Crazy: (Director of Douchebag) – Paramount for a worldwide deal – $4,000,000.

9. Martha Marcy May Marlene: sold to Fox Searchlight, congrats to TFC Board of Advisor EXP, Ted Hope – 2 mil

10. Circumstance: Participant is funding the release and will (along with the filmmakers) choose a distribution partner, we hope Roadside Attractions.

11. Homework: Fox Searchlight – $3,000,000

12. Another Earth: (Mark Cahill) – Fox Searchlight – a $3 mil deal, with an aggressive P&A as reported and for US and all English speaking territories.

13. Gun Hill Road: Motion Film Group

14. Pariah: Focus Features – $1 mil deal

15. The Flaw: New Video

16. Take Shelter: Sony Pictures Classics

Premieres (‘names’ in films):

17. My Idiot Brother: TWC – $7,000,000 for US and key territories with $15,000,000 P&A

18. The Details: TWC – $7,500,000 MG and $10,000,000 P&A

19. I Melt With You: Magnolia (reported mid-high 6-figure deal reportedly w/ healthy backend)

20. Life in a Day: NatGeo Films

21. Margin Call: Joint deal with Lions Gate and Roadside Attractions – $2,000,000 deal

22. Perfect Sense: IFC

23. The Future: (Miranda July) – Roadside Attractions

24. Salvation Boulevard: IFC

25. The Son of No One: (Dieto Monteil) – Anchor Bay

26. The Devil’s Double: (Lee Tamahori) – Lionsgate – a reportedly seven figure deal

U.S. Documentary Competition:

27. Buck: Sundance Selects

28. The Last Mountain: Dada Films (MJ Peckos and Steven Raphael)

29. Page One: A Year Inside the New York Times: Magnolia and Participant

30. Hot Coffee: HBO

31. Crime After Crime: OWN (this will have an Oscar qualifying run before airing on OWN)

32. Miss Representation: OWN

33. The Black Power Mix Tape 1967- 1975: Sundance Selects

34. Sing Your Song: HBO Documentary Films

Doc Premieres:

35. These Amazing Shadows: Sundance Selects

Park City at Midnight:

36. Silent House: Liddell Entertainment

37. Hobo with a Shotgun: Magnolia/Magnet

38. Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel: A&E IndieFilms

World Cinema Dramatic Competition:

39. The Guard: Sony Pictures Classics – $1,000,000 deal

40. Bellflower: Oscilloscope

Not distribution deals per se but Fox Searchlight bought worldwide remake rights to

41. The Bengali Detective

42. TWC bought remake rights to Knuckle.

Please let me know if I missed any deals and feel free to comment in this blog. Of course more may be announced even as this posts and I am on a plane.

So we see mostly name filmmakers or cast but also definitely a few non-names generating deals the details of which are not publicized thus far.

AND NOW ON the DIY side:

RE: SLITTING RIGHTS & DIY: Andrew Hurwitz and Alan Sacks wrote an article in the Hollywood Reporter addressing all the same stuff TFC has talked about before, splitting rights, working and sometimes conflating windows and not settling for bad deal terms when one could do better on one’s own working with consultants etc. It’s nice to see trades addressing this in a context that speaks to more traditional industry players.

THE FLAT FEE MODEL EXPANDS: Distribber (now owned by IndieGOGO) announced a partnership that has been brewing with one of our Cable VOD partners, and TFC Board of Advisor Meyer Schwarztein of Brainstorm Media. Basically it expands Distribber’s flat fee digital distribution offerings to include Cable VOD (and also Hulu). If a film gets onto all key MSOs the fee is set for now to be $9999 and there are prices per platform if a film cannot make it on to any given platform so that one is not paying for a platform or service they are not getting onto. As per the press release: “The films will be presented to audiences on the new “Filmmaker Direct” label; consumers who purchase films on “Filmmaker Direct” will know that 100% of profits go directly to the filmmaker, instead of to a parade of “Hollywood Middlemen.” For more info check out: http://www.distribber.com. My only cautionary note: this is not a great idea for smaller films for which the gross revenues that would not justify the flat fee. One must remember and always know to ask about the splits that the Cable VOD aggregator is getting from the MSOs. They range, to the best of my knowledge to-date, between 30% and 60% depending on company and films. Studios get the higher splits for the obvious reasons. And so one has to do the math. And of course also evaluate MARKETING (which will be the focus on the 3^rd and final part of this Sundance Blog series). In any case, we work with both Adam Chapnick at Distribber and Meyer Schwarzstein at Brainstorm and are fond of and trust them both.

BRAND NAME FILMMAKER DIY: Kevin Smith fueled the torch of DIY in his own flame-filled way. He auctioned off the distribution of Sundance Premiere Selection RED STATE to himself and has pre-booked theatres and plans to be his own decider in distribution, sans print ads (Amen). We wish him well but caution his very “old world” production and release budget (4mil Prod & and 2.5mil to release (for prints etc)… immediate launch broad release plan… a slow build never hurt anyone. David Dinnerstein formerly of Paramount Classics and Lakeshore consulted on the release. For more on this topic just search the WWW.

ABOUT THE SHORTS:

DIY Hats off to the Sundance SHORTS filmmaker such as Trevor Anderson and I believe 11 others who are on Sundance’s YouTube Screening Room Initiative with tens of thousands of views. Anderson exceeded 94,000 views as of the other day and has put all his shorts including this year’s HIGH LEVEL BRIDGE on www.EggUp.com which allows him to monetize them via transactional digital sales. TFC refularly refers filmmakers to EggUp and now also TopSpin though our guru Sheri Candler advises TopSpin works better for filmmakers with an already robust following. Whilst Anderson may not be getting rich just yet, it’s a perfect model for a prolific and vibrant filmmaker who is building a brand and getting his/her work out there.

Last but not least, Sundance announces its DIY oriented initiative.

Sundance Institute announced (I’m now quoting from its press release) its “Three-Year Plan with Kickstarter as Creative Funding Collaborator / Facebook® to Provide Guidance to Institute Alumni… A new program to connect its artists with audiences by offering access to top-tier creative funding and marketing backed by the Institute’s promotional support…The creative funding component was announced today with Kickstarter, the largest platform in the world for funding creative projects. A new way to fund and follow creative projects, tens of thousands of people pledge millions of dollars to projects on Kickstarter every month. In exchange for support, backers receive tangible rewards crafted and fulfilled by the project’s creator. Support is neither investment, charity, nor lending, but rather a mix of commerce and patronage that allows artists to retain 100% ownership and creative control of their work while building a supportive community as they develop their projects… In the coming months, Sundance Institute will build an online hub of resources related to independent distribution options, funding strategies and other key issues. The goal is to provide for filmmakers a central location to explore case studies and best practices, in addition to live workshops and training opportunities with Institute staff, alumni, industry experts and key partners. As the first of these partners bringing their expertise to the community, Facebook will offer Institute alumni advice, educational materials, and best-practices tips on how to build and engage audiences via the service…Further development will include access to a broad and open array of third-party digital distribution platforms backed by Sundance Institute promotional support. In the future, additional opportunities for theatrical exhibition will be explored in collaboration with organizations such as Sundance Cinemas, members of the national Art House Project, and others.”

I have been championing festivals getting involved with exhibition since and distribution beyond the festival itself since 2005 and discussed some options and ideas with Sundance staffers last year and am thrilled about this powerful and liberating announcement that so connects up with TFC’s mission whilst having some serious muscle and we look forward to being involved in some way hopefully.

MARKETING IS KING: One thing no one talks about in much detail is MARKETING. Of course the big guns have the cash to buy marketing but the small distribs and aggregators are starting to be difficult to distinguish at times, and yet sometimes distributors do earn their fees by investing real talent and expertise and even money in marketing. So comparing what one can do oneself (if one does not get the big fat offer) with what traditional but small distribution deals bring will be the focus of the 3^rd and last post in this series to come after Rotterdam but hopefully before Berlinale.

Over and out for now. Questions and Comments always welcome!

Orly Ravid January 27th, 2011

Posted In: Digital Distribution, Distribution, DIY, Film Festivals, Marketing

Tags: Digital Distribution, distributors, film distribution, Film Festivals, film marketing, independent film, Kickstarter, Sundance

“Discerning the difference between a film that can actually sell well enough to justify having a third party sales agent and going to markets vs a film that is best served by DIY methods that should be planned and employed BEFORE the film’s first exhibition”

We get questioned all the time by members and others about which markets should filmmakers attend and which sales agents should they go with. Having unrealistic expectations is dangerous. It sets people up to do nothing on their own but wait for some third party to make their dreams come true.

We’re just coming off of AFM. indieWIRE reports growth attendance at the market. See this article

http://www.indiewire.com/article/2010_american_film_market_wraps_with_positive_numbers/# if you want to read the stats. They are however only relative to last year, a real low, and not addressing the question on everyone’s mind, what about the sales themselves. AFM has always been known more for genre films and cast-driven films. Troma films do well for the genre category and Henry’s Crime starring Keanu Reeves, James Caan and Vera Farmiga is a cast driven narrative being sold this year, for example.

It was decently busy from my p.o.v and buyers were there a bit more to buy than they were at say Toronto, according to our foreign sales partner, Ariel Veneziano of Re-Creation Media. But, the question is what are they there to buy and at what price? The shift in the business from the 80’s and 90’s till now is not reversing itself and I don’t think it ever will. Prices have come down, dramatically because ancillary business has shifted so much, retailers have gone under, and supply has grown. That is the case across the board.

Digital services such as Fluent, Gravitas, Distribber, Brainstorm (all of whom we work with) were all at AFM, digital is where the business is now, not in getting big MGs per territory for most films anymore, not for most art house films. Of course there is some of that business still but the people benefiting from it are the Sales Companies with big libraries and the aggregators with the same. The individual sales prices, after expenses are deducted, are more often than not, not making money for the filmmakers, not given the terms most companies offer, at least not from our vantage point, . Of course we’re not in the business of selling big genre films or cast-driven films so we are not addressing those. Docs do sell best to TV at doc markets such as Hot Docs and IDFA, to name two, and those so far still seem to be worth it and that business still has value. And of course a lucky few theatrical-potential docs sell at Sundance and TIFF etc.

Why do I bring this up? Because we get questioned all the time by members and others about which markets should filmmakers attend and which sales agents should they go with and the truth is, very often the films are not viable for a sales agent because the sales would be too small and if a sales agent did take the film on, the filmmaker would never see a dime after the sales agents recouped their expenses and fees and after one has paid for Delivery. And then the sales agent / sales company would have the right to do the DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION DIRECTLY that the FILMMAKER SHOULD BE DOING. That is the point of this blog. Discerning the difference between a film that can actually sell well enough to justify having a third party sales agent and going to markets vs a film that is best served by DIY methods that should be planned and employed BEFORE the film’s first exhibition.

Stacey Parks of Film Specific www.FilmSpecific.com recently sent this missive out to her members: “So AFM is coming to a close and the overall good news for everyone out there is that business is picking up from last year. Sales are brisk and even Pre-Sales are brisk for the right projects. I’ve met with several clients who are here at AFM and all of them are reporting good results in meeting a variety of people and companies as potential financiers for their projects, or sellers, or both.”

That’s exciting and we know Stacey knows her stuff and she’s a friend so all good. But I still want to know the numbers from everyone who sold a film, or didn’t after spending money trying, and ask all of you readers to share the real numbers, as we will of course (you will soon see), so that people can know what expectations are reasonable and what is not reasonable to expect.

Having unrealistic expectations is dangerous. It sets people up to do nothing on their own but wait for some third party to make their dreams come true. And then time goes by, months and even years, and one has done anything to build community around the film or get it out there. Then filmmakers are disappointed and blame others instead of making it happen for themselves. There is no excuse for that anymore.

We announced a partnership with Palm Springs International Film Festival to help its filmmakers distribute and we will be working with other film festivals to do the same. Filmmakers are embracing Jon Reiss and Sheri Candler’s PMD concept and that can really create success via DIY distribution or get an audience started to give leverage in negotiating a deal. The options for accessing Cable VOD and digital platform distribution and also having mobile Apps distribute the film are only growing, though of course the space gets only more glutted too.

But solutions are being worked out for that. Companies such as Gravitas are working with Cable operators vigorously to better program and highlight various categories of cinema, making it easier for audiences to find what they might be looking for. Comcast debuted a VOD search feature that imitates Google’s, and this will help in time: http://www.multichannel.com/article/459677-Comcast_Debuts_VOD_Sear

Verizon introduced Flex view to help consumers manage content on all their devices and all the players involved in digital are competing with each other to get as much good content to consumers in the most useful and user-friendly way to grow that market further, so whilst the space gets more glutted, there are more solutions in play to manage the paradox of choice a bit better and that’s why it’s imperative that filmmakers get engaged with their own success more and more, and sooner and sooner. Lastly, these days, aggregators such as Cinetic and many distributors openly rely on filmmakers to do a lot of their own community building and marketing so if you are already doing the work, you might as well keep your rights.

Again, we do sales ourselves, we know there is still value in that, but we implore you filmmakers to do the research before you give up the rights and before you just forge forward trying to figure out which market to attend or having organizations like us do that for you, for many many films, there is no market you can attend that will be worth your while. Create your own market that will pay off in the long run.

Orly Ravid November 11th, 2010

Posted In: Digital Distribution, Distribution Platforms, DIY, International Sales, Long Tail & Glut of Content

I recently posted on our Facebook page a note about the fact that one has to be mindful about when to initiate a NETFLIX VOD window. Sheri Candler asked to me blog about it. I do everything she says.

We have heard consistently from Cable VOD operators and aggregators and Broadcasters such as Showtime that the Netflix VOD window is considered a cannibalizer of revenue for Cable VOD and TV so know that before licensing rights and resolving windows. When it comes to Netflix they have gotten so successful that they are a more selective platform than Amazon. Amazon wants has recently passed the 80,000 titles mark and is racing to aggregate as many as possible. Netflix has over 100,000 titles on DVD and over 17,000 titles on its streaming service but is now getting more and more selective. Netflix SVOD rights are sold for a flat fee, at least for now. To get onto Netflix, first one has to get on their radar and into their system, and then get that demand up in their queue system to get a good fee offer. One has to then resolve everything else before risking inadvertently killing any chances of a Broadcast sale or Cable VOD distribution. However, depending on the film, you may make more money from Netflix than by selling to let’s say EPIX which will want your Netflix SVOD rights anyway. And you may make more money distributing directly then doing a small Broadcast deal or going with a distributor or aggregator that will take all your digital rights anyway. Though it should be noted most filmmakers cannot get to Netflix directly.

As with anything in film distribution, there is no one rule that applies to all films. This is a case-by-case business. Some films are big enough that one can stagger windows and monetize them all. Some films are better served by being available on all platforms at once or close to it. Some films lend themselves more to rental or ad-supported free-on-demand and others can really generate the transactional (pay per download) business.

The point of this little missive though is just to note the conflation of TV and the Internet is happening. Google TV is here and retailers, Television and device manufacturers, cable operators and telcos are all competing to aggregate and offer as much content as possible. Even print media companies are following suit wanting channels of content on their websites. And soon enough it will be less a discussion of rights and more a discussion of PAYMENT METHODS or MONETIZING METHODS and I think that will always depend on the film and its demographic targets. The options will always be: 1. Ad-Supported / Free on Demand, 2. Subscription 3. Pay Per View 4. Download to Rent, and / or 5. Download to Own. And now instead of focusing on packaged media the focus is is on whether one can play content back on as many devices as one wants and that aspect related to all the various payment methods options. The content providing industries are all racing to aggregate as much content as they can and for it to be playable across as many devices as possible and payment methods vary so far depending on service and distributor choices. Hulu (a platform backed by studios and that was once only ad-supported is now beta testing its Netflix imitation subscription model).

Brands will attract customers just like they always did when video stores were king and just like when you choose which cell phone provider to use or whom to get your Internet connection through, assuming you live in an area with choice.

The other day on a Digital Hollywood Conference panel, I learned a stat from Erik Opeka of New Video: iTunes has 130,000,000 credit cards on file. Some of you are thinking right now, “I’m in the wrong business”.

Orly Ravid October 21st, 2010

Posted In: Amazon VOD & CreateSpace, Digital Distribution, iTunes, Netflix, Uncategorized

Tags: Amazon, Digital Distribution, Digital Hollywood, Epix, Erik Opeka, film distribution, GoogleTV, Hulu, iTunes, Netflix, New Video, Orly Ravid, Sheri Candler, Showtime, SVOD, VOD

We have been slowly communicating about our GLOBAL SHORTS INITIATIVE. There are companies such as Ouat Media and Shorts International and consultants whose business it is to focus on short films. When shorts filmmakers approach us we do the best we can to educate them about any deals they’ve been presented with and otherwise we refer them onward to shorts specialists. We at The Film Collaborative focus on shorts to the extent that certain niches that fulfill our mission but leave much of the more commercial work to the shorts experts. We are fulfilling our mission of serving under-served audiences and of helping filmmakers not get screwed. We also encourage filmmakers to organize and aggregate themselves and follow our example if one wishes.

We do have a GLOBAL SHORTS INITIATIVE and it starts with an LGBT program. Here is how it works:

1. It’s non-exclusive and we do not take rights, as you all know by now.
We’re also the most transparent distributor I know of. Wait till we start publishing numbers and posting a graph on our site about revenues and allocations, with filmmakers permission only though of course.

2. First window of the Global Shorts Initiative is a 6-month exclusive window with our mobile / IFOD partner BABELGUM

Babelgum. The revenue is via an ad-supported model (ad and sponsor driven). Babelgum has been a great platform for some of the films we have worked with. They pay 50% of net revenues (very modest expenses and capped) and we will take a 15% fee for marketing and putting this together. Festivals are not a factor in the exclusivity and we are timing everything to accord with each filmmaker’s overall distribution strategy. Lastly, Geo-Filtering is possible if necessary except for in US. This will start end of this year / beginning of next (we are just coordinating festival windows for our filmmakers)

3. Then we are doing a few other components all at once (May 2011):

An iPhone App. It will be worldwide to the extent that iTunes is. If a short film needs to be geo-filtered it can be. The App will be free. Each short can be priced at say $1.99 (less or more if a filmmaker wants that). We receive 55% of the gross revenues (after Apple and the developer take their fees). We are taking a maximum of 10% of this revenue and that is to cover our time in servicing this and marketing too (5% Fee & 5% max for marketing).

We will also have an HD-Rental Channel on YOUTUBE and the details of that will be resolved soon but filmmakers can select their own pricing.

4. DVD release in US & Canada through our esteemed home video (till its dead) partner First Run Features . As is quite typical, they will remit 25% of the Gross revenues to the filmmakers on a pro-rated basis, no deductions. The DVD would be made available on Netflix and Amazon etc.

5. We do not compete with Ouat Media or Shorts International or anyone else for that matter, meaning other companies license shorts to television stations in Europe and to airlines and we do not do any of that and do not intend to. We do recommend one get several references before signing with any shorts distributor.

The initiative however is meant to be a supplement to anything one may doing with your short yourself or via another company. There are fewer buyers buying shorts (though we also for free connect shorts filmmakers to our buyers who do buy shorts) and for the ones that are, the revenues seem to be fewer than once was the case. We are doing the best we can to offer a supplementary solution at least for some.

We are doing what we can to support shorts filmmakers and enhance their opportunities to connect with audiences and of course to recoup their investments. We’ll keep everyone posted on the success of this initiative. Our newsletter has showcased most of the films that will be part of the initial initiative launch.

We are thrilled to have added Kim Adelman to our our Advisory Board so we can be sure to be doing this rights, and of course we invite feedback from all.

Kim Adelman is the author of Making it Big in Shorts: The Ultimate Filmmaker’s Guide to Short Films, the 2nd edition of was published July 2009. She also reports on short films for indieWIRE and co-programs the American Cinematheque’s Focus on Female Directors screening series. Ms. Adelman currently teaches Making and Marketing the Short Film and Low Budget Filmmaking at UCLA Extension and has conducted short filmmaking workshops throughout the United States, Canada, New Zealand. She also produced 14 DVD compilations of short films released by Warner Home Video under the series titles Short 1 – 11 and International Release 1 -3. Previously, Ms. Adelman launched the Fox Movie Channel’s short film program. The 19 short films she produced for Fox won 30+ awards and played over 150 film festivals worldwide, including the Sundance Film Festival four years in a row.

Stay tuned folks!

Orly Ravid September 27th, 2010

Posted In: Digital Distribution, DIY, SHORT FILMS, Uncategorized

Unfortunately, a great number of key digital platforms must be accessed through the use of an aggregator. Of course there are always exceptions, but the general rule is that to get your films onto Cable VOD, iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, Sony Playstation and other device oriented options and retailer digital platforms , you will have to go through an aggregator or a distributor. We either directly or via partners offer both a commission or a flat fee option (range depends on platforms).

However, you can get onto Amazon directly. Also, you can access DIY oriented ones such as Mubi, Fans of Film and other platforms like them. To the best of our knowledge, more money is made on the key high trafficked platforms, if one can get on them.

Once again we remind you, MARKETING, MARKETING, MARKETING is key to your film’s success no matter what distribution outlet you use.

This concludes our series of tidbits for the time being. As always, if you have questions or need guidance to figure out your film’s distribution path, we would love to hear from you. No rights taken.

Orly Ravid August 27th, 2010

Posted In: Amazon VOD & CreateSpace, Digital Distribution, DIY, Hulu, iTunes, Marketing, Netflix

Tags: aggregator, Digital Distribution, DIY, Fans of Film, Hulu, iTunes, Marketing, Mubi, Netflix, Playstation, VOD

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15 comments regarding the indieWIRE panel at Film Society of Lincoln Center “15 Years of Film Distribution” and Sundance’s Distribution Announcement

Subtitles in Digital America

Festivals Getting into Distribution

DEALS & DIY: A Film Distribution Duet

GREAT EXPECTATIONS: Not Just a Dickens Novel. What Filmmakers want from film markets and what they can realistically get?

NETFLIX vs. Cable VOD & TV – It’s a question of timing

GLOBAL SHORTS INITIATIVE / What to do for shorts!

TFC Tidbit of the Day 50 Digital Distribution Through an Aggregator