Marketing: Facebook and Xbox Live combine forces

[Chamber005]

Kind of how Xbox and Netflix got together, Xbox Live has now turned Facebook into a Xbox-friendly experience.

This interests me because I'm only about 5 or 6 months into learning about filmmaking and all the business goodies that come with it, but I'd say that a large portion of my first "marketing" engagements have primarily been focused on Xbox Live and Facebook.

IMO Facebook is the only one of the four primary social networking sites (MySpace, Twitter and YouTube being the other three) that is really viable anymore. YouTube is packed full of crap with zero filter and MySpace is completely underwhelming in terms of being able to target and maintain an audience. Twitter is, to me, is just an echo of my facebook fan page as whatever I post there is then posted on the show's Twitter account. (A good site to check out is www.twendz.com when you're trying to find "hot words" to draw traffic to your tweets).

Facebook and the way it's social networking is designed feels, to me, the closest you can get to dealing with real people with real interests online (and have some kind of a garauntee that the people are, in fact, real people with real interests). I started my own fan page a few months ago and it's been going pretty well despite my first attempt at filmmaking (my webseries) being something quite less than professional (but hey, I'm workin on it!)

The other social network that I find invigorating is Xbox live. I started to think about it as a marketing tool after I saw what The Guild (an online webseries) had accomplished using World of Warcraft as a way of promoting (in game via other players) their series.

Now, obviously, World of Warcraft and a series based on gamers is going to be a pretty easy sell, but even had The Guild not been about gamers playing a game similar to World of Warcraft, I still think the "common bond" shared by the show's creator, Felicia Day, with her fellow WOW players would have been a motivating force to grow viewership. Obviously if you're film or short film or series is about anything action or sci-fi or gore oriented there are PLENTY of gamers interested in that kind of media. Heck, pick up the new Left for Dead and your audience will be sitting right there on the other end of the mic.

I decided my Xbox 360 gamer tag should be WatchMyWebisode. I primarily play Call of Duty Modern Warfare (which is probably the most popular "social networking" game the 360 has along with Left 4 Dead, until MW2 post-Christmas) and I find that since a lot of the time I am one of the higher scorers of the 12 players in each game, more people pay attention to my screen name during the intermission process and then ask me about the series and/or click on my name to view my profile where I have listed all of my website information, etc.

It sounds kind of hokey, but I've actually gotten messages on Xbox Live's instant messenger from kids telling me that they liked my show and can't wait for the next one.

Facebook and Xbox Live, just as all social networking media, WILL DO NOTHING TO SELL YOUR PRODUCT. Selling is a different game altogether. Selling is what you do after you've got the interest. Social networking sites are about creating that interest, but what's more, they're about BRANDING. No amount of sales skills or word of mouth is going to be truly viable if you aren't doing things to create a strong brand. Everything I do now (Mister Five Months) is to brand The Overs or my website, The Great Independent. Neither of these are what I want my production company or its titles to be, these are the test subjects to experience the branding process within the filmmaking community. Once I progress I'll be able to transfer my audience to my next brand or production.

Xbox Live allows you to have approximately 70 "friends" at any given time. It also allows you to message or friend request people you have recently played with. Obviously you could take it a step further than I do and message everyone you play with telling them to come take a look at the preview for your movie (your screenname being something to the effect of SeeMyMovie), but you might end up getting suspened from Xbox and, really, it's a little too much like spamming, IMO.

But let's say for instance you've gathered 50 friends on Xbox -- only composed of people who have looked at and/or have mentioned that they would take a look at your preview, series whatever. With this new Xbox Live Facebook connection you can actually send Facebook friend requests to everyone on your Xbox Live friends list and then can transfer them directly to your fan page. Once you've made the transition from Xbox to Facebook you can then remove them from your friends list to make room for new friends/viewers.

Social networking sites aren't viable for everyone. Some people need to hire other people (or ask a friend) to handle all that mess for them, but since I work from home and have most of my day open to play with, I find myself playing lots of video games and spending a lot of time on these sites trying to figure out how they can work for me in regards to creating an audience for future projects.

I don't see myself abandoning Facebook as a compotent social networking site (and great business tool) anytime soon. And Xbox Live is in its infancy in terms of self-promotional marketing. Combining the two seems like a winning element.

Any other experiences and/or comments on this or any other kinds of online marketing would be awesome.

 

[filmman]

Lots of people are selling products on Twitter ... many affiliate programs, video clips explaining how-to's. Somebody must be making money.

With me, the main problem I see with Twitter is that I don't have all that much time to put out my messages about my products.

Do you think if I bought a program that puts out tweets about my DVDs and books all day long will be successful? There are many programs selling for $100 to $200.

 

[Chamber005]

Lots of people are selling products on Twitter ... many affiliate programs, video clips explaining how-to's. Somebody must be making money.

With me, the main problem I see with Twitter is that I don't have all that much time to put out my messages about my products.

Do you think if I bought a program that puts out tweets about my DVDs and books all day long will be successful? There are many programs selling for $100 to $200.

Well, I think Twitter only allows you to follow, what, 2,000 people? Most people achieve followers by becoming a follower of someone else, waiting for them to follow you and then axing them from their list to make room for more people to follow.

If you had, say, thousands of followers, then sure, spamming might be an option. Depending on what you're selling though (just your movies, right?) you could probably spend the same money on Google ads and see a higher return.

Usually people stop following people who spam, though, on MySpace, Twitter or otherwise. If you post the same message within a week you'll probably get dropped.

Also, I think we talked before about this, but about 50 bucks will get you something like 250,000 unique views on facebook and about a 1/2 million "impressions" if you structure the ads correctly. Compare that to the 100-200 bucks you spent on a DVD that didn't actually DO anything to create more awareness for your product, it just spammed. Your better off going with some marketing campaign via India and have them spam email for you.

I know you're saying people are making money on Twitter, but I wouldn't doubt if the people who are making money on Twitter are the people selling books on how to make money on Twitter. Just my opinion.

To me, social networking sites are about branding. It's been proven time and again that social networking ads fail in regards to ROI because the people coming to socially network are not there to be sold on your product. Google ads (and the like), however, perform remarkably well because people are going there to find a thing to purchase.

In regards to creative properties, I really and truly believe it's about time. Time and the investment of time (and a little money). You have to build a brand name or a product that people know and that has trusted content and then you have to A) Market directly to people who would find your product interesting and B) Market in a specific geographical location. When you're talking about a creative property (be it CD, DVD, whatever), you will always, always, always have a better chance of making a "name" for yourself if you limit the geography involved.

So, for those living in a large city, the entire object of your marketing should be to create an audience for your product in your neighborhood and then the ajoining neighborhood, then next and the next until you have blanketed the entire city. In conjunction with this you DIRECT market virally (e.g. going after an audience who likes properties similar to your own).

If you can get your property known and sold in one of the major cities in the US, you probably will never have to work a day job again. Anything above being known in a major city is all frosting on the cake and shouldn't be financially pursued other than the aforementioned viral marketing. If your product will appeal to a larger audience it is up to the citizens of the city that endorses you to put the word out and to grow your audience.

This is all theoretical, mind you. This is applying what I know of business and what I know of the creative arts to a definitive marketing direction. But I think I have the unique position of not actually caring about getting an audience outside of Chicago. I just want Chicago. I never want to make a film anywhere else and I don't really care what the rest of the world is doing. Anything beyond Chicago, for me, is extra. So when some chick in Great Britain tells me how much she likes my series, that's completely awesome and unexpected, but it's not what I'm WORKING for. For the rest of my filmmaking career I will be working for CHICAGO, that's it. Everything else is sweet extras.

 

[filmman]

Nate is in Chicago! I'm tellin' ya! LOL Just kidding, chamber. That's from the other thread -- OT
But I believe you're right as far as what's practical, and this is valuable info.

... even though I don't like it; because I want to be world famous as a filmmaker LOL -- well, most filmmakers want that also.

So, I'd better get on to Google and do some advertising with them. I think I'll make a few banners for my movie and see what they will cost me to run them.

But as for Facebook, I wasn't able to create a Group page and I didn't see Fan Page, although I am a fan of a few pages.

I ended up deactivating the new page I created. It turned out to be a personal page but I have another personal page, so I don't want another personal page. The funny thing is that every time I put in the new email address, FB reopens the new page and again I must deactivate it. It won't let me delete it permanently.

 

[Chamber005]

Nate is in Chicago! I'm tellin' ya! LOL Just kidding, chamber. That's from the other thread -- OT
But I believe you're right as far as what's practical, and this is valuable info.

... even though I don't like it; because I want to be world famous as a filmmaker LOL -- well, most filmmakers want that also.

So, I'd better get on to Google and do some advertising with them. I think I'll make a few banners for my movie and see what they will cost me to run them.

But as for Facebook, I wasn't able to create a Group page and I didn't see Fan Page, although I am a fan of a few pages.

I ended up deactivating the new page I created. It turned out to be a personal page but I have another personal page, so I don't want another personal page. The funny thing is that every time I put in the new email address, FB reopens the new page and again I must deactivate it. It won't let me delete it permanently.

Yeah, FB won't let you delete a page once you create it.

And remember about Google ads, if you're looking to sell a PRODUCT or SERVICE I think they work best, but if you're looking to sell a movie, for that you have to first build an audience (online or off but preferably both). I personally would never use google ads to sell a DVD unless it was a How-to kind of production.

 

[Zak Forsman]

spamming will kill you on twitter. people will block you instantly. its value lies in nurturing a genuine point of connection with your audience and allowing that audience to spread the level of participation to their friends, growing an even larger community around your work. if i had to choose between twitter and facebook, I'd choose twitter's immediacy. I've seen more audience growth there than on FB.

 

[Chamber005]

spamming will kill you on twitter. people will block you instantly. its value lies in nurturing a genuine point of connection with your audience and allowing that audience to spread the level of participation to their friends, growing an even larger community around your work. if i had to choose between twitter and facebook, I'd choose twitter's immediacy. I've seen more audience growth there than on FB.

By immediacy do you mean the quickness in which your text is posted or the quickness of collecting "followers"?

We might be talking about different things, but facebook fan pages and group pages are much more viable sources of distributing information to an audience. In one stop they can view your YouTube videos, read discussions and reviews (or even review your product themselves), have entire conversations about your product amongst themselves, view artwork, pictures, etc. and whenever they "like" or interact with your fan or group page everyone who is a friend of theirs is notified. And, if you do happen to have a group page in conjunction with your fan page you can actually use that to send direct messages that go to your fans' inboxes (instead your posts just being posts on their wall). And being that Facebook is not exclusive from Twitter (as I mentioned you can link your facebook account to your twitter account so that everytime you post something on facebook your Twitter page is automatically updated with the identical post), I'm not sure how Twitter is better at nurturing an audience.

Also I think there's an age divide that happens with Twitter. I think most boomers and older people (or, those in positions to have purchasing power) are more apt to use facebook. Whereas Twitter potentially has more potential in organizing younger groups of people to navigate them to, say, a specific destination at a specific time.

I'm not discounting Twitter at all, but it really seems to me as just an extra to Facebook unless you are dealing with a real world real time event and are trying to literally navigate your fans on their cell phones.

If you have more on your experiences with Twitter, though, and how you've utilized it that'd be awesome (e.g. bringing your followers together for a premiere or some other event? That seems to be Twitter's strongest asset IMO) I'd love to hear more about it. I think we're all always about getting the most bang for our social networking buck!