Vimeo on Demand: I'm doing it.

The latest issue of MovieMaker Magazine (2014 Complete Guide to Making Movies) has a nice section on all the VOD services with Pros, Cons, and "best use of" for your film. These articles on not yet available online. Hit up your local Barnes & Noble. But to summarize, none of them offer marketing other than being available via search or on their front page for a period of time. Getting the consumer to click "buy" is the art of sales and marketing.

Michael
 
MichaelP said:
The latest issue of MovieMaker Magazine (2014 Complete Guide to Making Movies) has a nice section on all the VOD services with Pros, Cons, and "best use of" for your film. These articles on not yet available online. Hit up your local Barnes & Noble. But to summarize, none of them offer marketing other than being available via search or on their front page for a period of time. Getting the consumer to click "buy" is the art of sales and marketing.

Michael
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That's interesting. Not sure I'll be able to get MovieMaker Magazine in Sweden though. Any idea when (or if) that article will be online?

tmnt said:
Holy shimoly, that's huge! Wouldn't it be better at say 2.5gbish? Is that not an obstacle that'd put Joe Average off?

Oh and good luck!
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So far I haven't heard any complaints, but then I haven't sold many streams either. I'm sure they recompress the file as usual though, only this way they have a better file to recompress. 20mbps is their recommended bitrate.
 
You'll notice here again that there is no reference to additional marketing support, even on the bigger VOD platforms. They certainly can bring more eyeballs to the table, but it doesn't guarantee they will click on your film. But being on all or most of them is key to increasing the chances of being clicked on. Exclusivity is rare in the indie acquisition world and that would either be more money up front or a marketing efforts on their end. I don't know what Netflix and such are paying anymore as it has been a while since my last film, but at the time for out of left field no names, it was like $2K for the year total as it is a subscription model, and not a per-click. Redbox is pretty much in the same category. I read that for the smaller films like this, they buy 200 or so DVD's that get moved around. Perhaps that has changed, but the more material that gets generated, and the more platforms that are available, the "needle in the haystack" challenge kicks in.

I would suggest that a filmmaker who only wants to concentrate on the the filmmaking side, partner with a producer who just wants to concentrate on sales and marketing from the very beginning. I look at my son who is in his senior year at UCONN in business marketing, and think they need to be an integral part of the filmmaking package as much as director, DP, and editor in order to have a chance at the self distribution VOD channels game.

Michael
 
In the big picture, you're trying to steal enough eyeballs to at least break even (or make a living), and that means competing for people's time overall - not only are you trying to rise above the din of all the other indie films being created, but television as well that is in an era of fantastic programming that even top shows are competing for eyeballs. Interesting Hollywood Reporter on Boardwalk Empire.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/bastard-machine/hbos-boardwalk-empire-why-isnt-623341

"As viewers are time-crunched by so many offerings on television, the burden falls on shows - even the best of them - not to be taken for granted or risk being time-shifted or shelved for future watching."


Michael
 
MichaelP said:
In the big picture, you're trying to steal enough eyeballs to at least break even (or make a living), and that means competing for people's time overall - not only are you trying to rise above the din of all the other indie films being created, but television as well that is in an era of fantastic programming that even top shows are competing for eyeballs.
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Well, yes and no, I think.

I think a better way to look at it is, if you can create a demand for your product with enough people, and supply it to them at a price that will get enough of them to purchase, so that the cost of making, marketing and distributing the product (including enough of a salary for everyone involved to make a living during the time they're involved), then that's a goal.

But with independent feature films in 2013? That's difficult.

Just to create demand I think you need at least one person, but preferably several people, involved who have an active fanbase that follows what they do just because they're involved.

People like Bruce Campbell, Kevin Smith, Robert Englund comes to mind. Celebrities, basically, within the audience that are right for your film.

People say the best thing an indie filmmaker can do is create a brand name for their films. I'm starting to think the best thing is to just become any kind of celebrity.
If you can become an actual celebrity, you can create that demand around your own active fanbase.
 
I think we're saying the same thing - a celebrity is a form of marketing which is why getting a "name" of some kind in a film helps. But it's a challenge in today's landscape of lots of media, lots of channels, lots of celebrities, and only so many hours in a day to watch it. Certainly targeted audiences, with careful nurturing of the fan base from the start is a key tactic to the overall strategy. The question is also, what do you need to say you're making a living? I have to kids in college, one about to be, mortgage and the like. My break even point will is different than a just out of school filmmaker still living at home or in a roommate situation and doesn't have the same overhead.

Michael
 
It's just a different day.
In the digital era content itself as a sale-able product only has value in the context of convenience, and different people value convenience differently. For those who are chomping at the bit to see something as soon as it is released, they gladly pay a premium for it (theatrical). These are the folks who pre-order a game for $60, for instance. For those who value that first adopter status less, or who are not ardent fans of the content creator- they are willing to wait until the price point matches their value for the product. These are the people who gladly wait for a Steam Summer Sale to pick up that hot game at 80% off 8 months after it released. The trick is to recognize these different convenience windows and price the content accordingly. For your died-in-the-wool true fans you charge more for immediate, high quality access to the media. For those who are mere browsers or looking for a way to kill time on a random Thursday night they can't sleep, you price it so they can become one of your died-in-the-wool fans (ie: give it to them free 6 months after release as brand marekting).

That's just the evolution of our social fabric. Add in the fact that digital content is infinitely copy-able and share-able you face further uphill struggles trying to pay the bills off of content sales alone. For better or for worse the higher prices can best be extracted through scarcity (ie: non-infinite things), and certain things are finite. Physical goods, time, access, attention. That has greater value, and thus can pull greater revenues, For that to reach critical mass you need enough core fans of your personal brand who are willing to pay for that access/time/attention to you. Or at the very least willing to buy a T-shirt with a slogan from your latest film on it (as a quick example). Kevin Smith did this with his Red State film, doing his scheduled screenings where he attended and did Q&A. What the people were buying was not the film itself, but time with and access to the physical, real person Kevin Smith. Kevin Smith is scarce. He is singular. His films- they are infinitely copy-able. So until you reach that critical mass the most logical strategy (at least to me) is to price your stuff in such a way as to build your fanbase as best as you can.
 
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Managing windows is a tactic used by content owners to maximize revenue over a period of time. But getting that core audience you refer to is the marketing aspect we are all referring to here that takes time and money to reach a level that breaks out from the noise and answers the basic question of why click on your movie versus something else? It's usually not based on price. Even if free, there is a still a time decision to be made - am I willing spend the next 90 minutes watching your film, or "____file in the blank___".

Yes, Kevin Smith can make it happen, I referenced that one in a blog I wrote. Kevin also gets sponsorship from large companies to cover the cost of the city to city tour. He is not paying from his own pocket. So while it looks good to he rest of us indies, just hitting the road four-walling your movie may not be as successful. How many here went to go see Emilio Estevez' "The Way" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1441912/) when it did it multi-city tour with both he and his father hosting the event? How many people even knew that happened? Every method takes time, planning, and execution, and all I'm saying is that most filmmakers here don't know how do to this, don't want to do this, or don't have the time do it right. Pricing is only a exercise in next best available alternative.

Even VOD is getting saturated as described in this just released article: http://www.thewrap.com/movies/article/has-vod-become-over-saturated-114201
And those concerns are coming from films with stars, etc. Of course they have a different break even point than an we "indies" but it is relative and and to the end consumer, we all compete for the same eyeballs.


Michael
 
GaryinCalifornia said:
How is it going so far...
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I've sold 17 rentals since I put it up July 1st.
Haven't been doing much advertizing about it on twitter lately though, I'm working out a better marketing strategy. I've also played around a bit with various prices and rental periods, and finally settled on 7 days.

So it's not much. Especially considdering I've got over 11,500 followers on @Jamtfilm.
I used to auto-tweet review quotes with links to reviews and the VOD site, and although it got some traffic to the site and some trailer plays it just didn't sell the film.
It was mentioned on a major French website, and the trailer was embedded there, and that got thousands of trailer loads, some plays and some site traffic, but no sales.

I can only speculate about what's keeping people from buying of course. Might be that they don't like Vimeo. Might be that most non-filmmakers haven't heard of it and don't have an app for it, or know how safe it is or don't want to sign up.

Obviously illegal streaming and torrent websites is a major issue too. Wonder how many people watch the trailer on my website and then go stream it for free somewhere else.

I've made a deal though that will get MARIANNE up on all the major VOD platforms including iTunes, Amazon and Google Play in a few months though so that should change everything I hope.
 
Thanks for the update! I commend you on all your back end work getting your film sold. It is interesting to see the translation of followers versus actual purchasers, should you even be able to confirm that a tweet led to a purchase - but assuming they did purchase from a Tweet - the response rate is 1 out of every 646 followers makes a rental. It would be easy to come up with the formula of number of followers to break even at a given price. For example, every $10,000 dollar of revenue (at $5 per rental) would need 1,292,000 followers. Kind of an eye opener which is why getting it on every platform with every means of marketing is needed - and why it takes so much time. Keep up the fight/challenge/battle!

Michael
 
MichaelP said:
Thanks for the update! I commend you on all your back end work getting your film sold. It is interesting to see the translation of followers versus actual purchasers, should you even be able to confirm that a tweet led to a purchase - but assuming they did purchase from a Tweet - the response rate is 1 out of every 646 followers makes a rental. It would be easy to come up with the formula of number of followers to break even at a given price. For example, every $10,000 dollar of revenue (at $5 per rental) would need 1,292,000 followers. Kind of an eye opener which is why getting it on every platform with every means of marketing is needed - and why it takes so much time. Keep up the fight/challenge/battle!

Michael
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I think if you're going to come up with any kind of formula from twitter to purchase you have to go per individual tweet and how many people it reaches. If I have 12000 followers, and tweet once, and that tweet is retweeted by five followers who each have between 20 and 20 000 followers, then that factors into it.
Of course not all tweets reach all followers because if a follower in turn follows more than 1000 people than that stream is too heavy and you really need luck to be even noticed.
So you need actually a constant stream of tweets, often enough to be noticed by the followers who follow a lot of tweeps, but not too often to spam those followers who only follow 100 tweeps. The twitter stream also needs to be 24/7 to reach all time zones.

So it would be a very difficult formula, because you need at least 50-100 different tweets and every time you tweet you get different retweet results.
 
Thanks for the Tweet lesson. I am not on Twitter - so my scenario is the most simplest and I can imagine the branching complexity to the formula. A multi-dimension wheat and the chessboard story.

Michael
 
Jawa Ex Machina said:
I've sold 17 rentals since I put it up July 1st.
I can only speculate about what's keeping people from buying of course. Might be that they don't like Vimeo. Might be that most non-filmmakers haven't heard of it and don't have an app for it, or know how safe it is or don't want to sign up.
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I hate to say this, but... Maybe it's just not good enough?
I haven't seen the film but looking at the trailer, it looks very amateurish to me. Maybe people just aren't willing to take a chance parting with their hard earned money on something that don't impress right away? It could very well be a great film but without good footage it's very hard to sell it and/or get people to watch it in the first place.

I've read most of your blog about the making of the film, and it is really rather interesting, but I get the feeling you are a bit in denial. Maybe you would be better off just accepting that you made an heroic effort but the result just isn't up to standards, and to write it off as a very expensive lesson? Then move on to the next project, instead of spending even more time on this one. If sales don't pick up after you get it on more VOD platforms, maybe just make it available for free so at least it gets seen by more people...

If not, here's some suggestions:
Try to get it subtitled into more languages; German, French, Spanish, Dutch, Russian etc... I think Europeans in general are more open minded to foreign films than the USA/England market is. And a film in Swedish with english subtitles might be too much of a hinderance to many people in none swedish/english speaking countries.

Try to market it to the area where it was made, those are the people who would have an extra interest in seeing it. Unfortunately, it's not a very big market though...

On a project like this, you need a lot of help promoting it from the people involved. Are the camera-, audio-, make-up-, actors, editing-people pushing for the film? If not, it's a pretty good sign that they aren't really happy with the results. Everybody loves to boost about great projects they were part of, not so if they think the result isn't very good.

Best of Luck!
 
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