Diary of a Film Startup: Post # 34: Secret 19 Point VoD Marketing Plan

By Roger Jackson

Previously: VoD: Frequently Asked Questions

We continue to ramp-up deliveries of Kinonation films — we’ll have 100+ movies live on beta partner VoD outlets by the end of August. So now I have 100 producers asking about VoD marketing. I’ve been working on a marketing plan — not a gimmick, but an actionable, effective system to really launch a film, every time it goes live on any VoD outlet. The “launch” metaphor is apt, I think, because a film needs a booster-rocket to get things rolling. VoD outlets are driven by algorithms — you need maximum thrust in the first days live to get a film onto their best-seller list. Today, writing this post,  I decided to nix the “secret plan” thing — it’s not like it’s rocket science anyway — and share pubicly.

Here’s Part I of our 19 point plan. The real secret is to get this done in a very compressed time horizon — a few weeks at most — so it has the biggest impact coinciding with each time your film goes live on an outlet.  Executing on this plan is NOT a trivial amount of work, probably 100+ hours.

1. IMDb: staggeringly important, everyone from consumers to VoD outlets to distributors make this site their first stop — and therefore their first impression of your film. Way too many films don’t even have a poster here. You must. It’s mission critical. I know, it costs $35. You have to do it. Next, get some people (cast, crew, friends, family) to rate AND review your film on IMDb. You need a credible # of people…9/10 is meaningless if it’s from a total of 4 people. Here’s the IMDb page for a successful Kinonation film. 8.9/10 from 80 users. Check. Forty critic reviews. Check. Only 3 user reviews. Needs work. Note that this film, like every film we distribute to Hulu, is now automatically available on IMDb via an embedded link. Cool.

2. Poster: it’s my opinion that poster art is the single most important factor in getting “organic” sales on VoD platforms. By which I mean viewers who are just browsing. Keep it simple, big, bold, readable. Sexy helps too. Or gross.There are many reasons why the health doc Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead is a VoD best-seller — love it or hate it, this is a provocative poster.

3. Synopsis: We invest a lot of time re-writing movie descriptions. I wish we didn’t have to. This is the 250 or so characters of elegant prose that needs to sell the film to the viewer who liked the poster enough to take a closer look. More sales than synopsis — not so much a summary of the plot as 1 or 2 genuine reasons why this is a must-watch experience. If you’re not a good writer, get some help.

4. Keywords: At Kinonation, the keywords conundrum is definitely a work in progress. We’re not good at generating them automatically, and we haven’t figured out how to teach filmmakers a) how important they are to VoD discovery, and b) how to come up with a dozen perfect keywords/phrases. A future post when we nail it.

5. What’s your marketing hook?  If you don’t know, you have some brainstorming to do. Sheri Candler from MovieMaker mag says “Hooks are the elements of your film that will be used during promotion to attract its core audience. Often hooks are comprised of things such as notable names, specific and recognizable locations, a title that can be visualized, gripping or familiar subject matter and something that solicits an emotional response. Hooks allow an audience to immediately recognize what is interesting about your story and decide whether they want to investigate further.”  The marketing hook is what you push in every press release, post, tweet, interview, etc.

6. Find your Mavens: These are the people with significant followings who will identify with your film. Seth Godin calls them sneezers. Not wild about that metaphor, but I guess it is  how most viruses spread, and you definitely want a viral effect for your film. You may already know your mavens. If your movie is about indie filmmaking then Ted Hope is a maven. If it’s a drama about domestic violence then find the top 10 published experts and reach out to them. Early. Maybe as early as script first draft — ask them for an opinion on the credibility of a scene. Get them involved, invested. Keep them informed. Then ask them to blog, tweet & Facebook the day you go live on VoD.

7. Make it easy for people to help: It’s a pain in the ass to be asked to tweet or Facebook about a film. Even if you worked on the movie. So, you have to make it super-easy for people to help you. We like to provide simple templates. Like this email to crew: “I’m asking you to tweet the following message today, before midnight  “The movie I worked on last summer ‘Rock Formations’ just went live on Amazon. Would mean a lot if you watch, rate it, leave comment.” That’s 132 characters, and makes it a no-brainer for people to take action and for others to re-tweet. Use a different template for family & friends. And for Facebook. You get the idea.

8. PR: write short, pithy press releases that lead with your marketing hook. Send to the local media where you shot your film. And the media that covers the subject matter of your film. And every film review site you can find. Journalists and bloggers have long-ish lead times. Send the release as an attachment, but include a super-brief (2 sentences max) cover email. Don’t leave this to the last minute.

9. Reviews are Powerful: once your film is live, job # 1 is to get reviews. Reviews tend to snowball. It’s hardest to get those first few reviews, hard to get the ball rolling. So you should ask your network — use a template — to comment on your film on Amazon, iTunes, Hulu, etc. Here’s a Kinonation film with a bunch of reviews on Hulu — take a look and you’ll see immediately why reviews (25 here including negative ones) drive passion & desire to watch your movie.

10. Pitch the Outlet: VoD outlets are just like exhibitors in the old world of theaters. They want to be shown HOW to sell a film. They want to be pitched. They like to promote films relevant to a news event, or the anniversary of an event, or a holiday or happening. It’s back to the hook. Or whatever compelling spin you can come up with. So for next year’s soccer World Cup in Brazil we will pitch Hulu on promoting the stunning doc Meanwhile in Mamelodi. And when Mark Boone Jr. wins an emmy, we’ll pitch Missing Pieces.

Next post -Part II: Facebook, Google, Contests, Giveaways, Mailing Lists, Provocative PR and other competitor secrets we haven’t stolen yet…

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Next Up: Post # 35: (scheduled for Tues September 3rd)

 
Roger Jackson is a producer and the co-founder of film distribution start-up KinoNation. He was Vice President, Content for digital film pioneer iFilm.com and has produced short films in Los Angeles, documentaries in Darfur, Palestine and Bangladesh, a reality series for VH1 and one rather bad movie for FuelTV. You can reach him at roger@kinonation.com.