By Roger Jackson
Previously: Secret 19-Point VoD Marketing Plan, Part I
Here’s Part II of our 19 point plan…
This post was going to be Part 2 of Two. But I try to avoid overly lengthy posts. And feedback over the past couple of weeks has convinced me to focus this post on just a couple of points: VoD Windowing, and Facebook Marketing. So…here are points 11 & 12 of the 19 point plan, with the final 7 to follow in a fortnight. It’s not bait & switch, just that, as the Dude said, “new shit has come to light.”
11. VoD Windowing: The film industry is adept at double, triple and quadruple-dipping. They are one of the few businesses that have found a way to sell the same product to you over and over …and over again. It’s genius if you think about it. You pay to watch a movie in theaters, and then maybe you buy or rent the Blu-Ray or regular DVD, or you catch it on Cable VoD or subsequently online Transactional VoD. And even on iTunes or Amazon or Vude there’s a form of mini-windowing by this oh-so-devious business — the choice of watching the film in Standard Definition, or pay a buck extra for HD. A few months (or, these days, weeks) later it’s on television pay-per-view, which more or less lines up with Subscription VoD, like Netflix. And somewhere in there you also “pay” (via your airline ticket) to watch it on that flight to Paris. And while this is definitely a business model under pressure, with shrinking windows (and therefore profits) it’s still very much the way Hollywood does distribution…and VoD is no exception.
So it’s important to understand the various VoD windows, and how they fit together. In an ideal world, your film will be fantastic enough — and you & your distributor will be savvy enough — to follow a VoD release trajectory something like this. i. Cable TV VoD (Comcast, Time Warner, etc.) ii. Online Transactional VoD (iTunes, Amazon Instant, Vudu, etc.) iii. Subscription VoD (Hulu Plus, Amazon Prime, Netflix.) iv. Advertising Supported VoD (Hulu Classic, SnagFilms, Viewster, etc.) Having said all that, the huge caveat is, frankly, how good the film really is? Most films will NOT get selected by cable TV outlets, and often it makes sense to jump immediately to ii and iii, even iv. This is a complex and nuanced discussion that you need to have with your distributor or sales agent — and if they don’t get it, it may be time to move on.
I’ll be the first to admit that initially at Kinonation we didn’t “get” VoD windowing. Imbued with a spirit of “change the world and to hell with the status quo” we wanted simply to help filmmakers get their films out to their audience, via as many platforms as possible. And while we will always be passionate about getting good films seen by hundreds of thousands of people, globally, we also want our content owners to make as much money as possible. And we’ve learned that windowed releasing is an important part of the revenue equation. More on this in future posts.
12. Facebook Marketing: Now to social media, specifically Facebook. Most people have a little knowledge about Facebook, this marketing behemoth that reaches a billion plus people. To really leverage this (or any other) social network you need a LOT of knowledge. Much of my knowledge is thanks to the indomitable Linda Nelson at VoD distributor Indie Rights, who really gets what it takes to win with Facebook. Thanks to Linda for much of what follows, and in a future post she has promised to share more Facebook marketing tactics.
a. Movie Page: when you create your Facebook page, it must be a Movie page, not Personal or Business or Non-Profit, or whatever. This is a crucial foundational step that many filmmakers get wrong.
b. Interest Groups: Facebook allows you to seek out and hyper-target to the affinity groups that will love your film. For example, the Indie Rights thriller “Delivered” features a vintage Ford Mustang. Linda reached out to Mustang clubs around the world, who loved it, got excited, linked and promoted. Simple, easy, and thousands of viewers. Identify the “affinity groups” for your film and make contact with them.
c. Admin Posts: It’s critically important — when you reach out to a site — that their Admin does the post. So, for example, Linda could have posted on the site of the California Mustang Club. OR, she could get the site admin to post…and get a hundred times better result. It’s the difference between a political campaign asking for your permission to promote…or just jamming a sign onto your lawn. Bottom line: admin posts show on the “front page” of a facebook timeline, whereas your post will get buried on the “back page.” Huge difference.
d. Pics & Tags: Too many movie Facebook pages are full of dense text. Yours should be full of images, properly tagged. Optimize those pics in Photoshop so the page looks like a magazine.
e. Paid Ads: Facebook lets you buy highly targeted ads. Exploit this, even if only $5 a day for a month. It make a huge difference, and FB tools allow you to hyper-target. Use this to give your film an immediate VoD bump.
f. Upload don’t Link: A classic Facebook mistake is to link to external video or images. Don’t do it. Instead, upload your video, photos, etc. Exploit the fact that you have unlimited space on FB to upload & store hi-def video and images. As link bait it’s a LITTLE more work and WAY superior.
g. Sales Funnel: successful online marketers often refer to the “Sales Funnel.” You need a sales funnel for your film on VoD. You can get sophisticated here, but basically it’s a page with links to your film on all the VoD sites where it’s live. Everything on your FB page should be designed to drive people to the funnel. That’s your objective.
h. Cover Image: Finally, the cover (opening) image for your film on your FB page. This is the first thing viewers will see on Facebook. Make it spectacular, but simple. Use it to ask for Likes — because FB likes are your currency of credibility. If you don’t ask, you don’t get.
VoD Marketing Secrets 13-19 to follow…
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Next Up: Post # 36: Secret 19-Point VoD Marketing Plan, Part III
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.
