| The Marketing Plan: What, Why and When |
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| Robin Smith | |
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Page 1 of 3 So you’ve got a great idea for a movie that absolutely everyone will want to see. Now what?Most people believe that a good idea will sell itself. Not in filmmaking. Here, your idea is only as good as you can sell it. And you need to sell it, because that’s key to getting your project funded, produced and released into a busy marketplace. Production services, financiers, distributors, video retailers, television broadcasters and even your potential audience … they’re all interested in good ideas, but they’re often overwhelmed by the daily onslaught of submissions, pitches and sub-par product. Marketing is the way you keep your idea from being lost in the shuffle. Ultimately, it’s the way you deliver an audience to your film. Marketing: more than sellingMarketing has often been described as the process of selling a product to its desired consumer. The description is true, but incomplete. Sales is only part of it. Marketing is how you:
This is a perfect analogy for the film industry, which provides entertainment – a basic need for all humans. Entertainment can meet the need for escapism, levity, knowledge and even fear, among other things. Well-focused film marketing takes these needs and packages them into wants. Marketing a filmFilm marketing is a multi-step process for bringing a film to its audience. It not only defines your product in marketable or sellable terms, it provides the context for fitting the film into the busy marketplace. To be effective, the marketing process must address a great many factors – competitive, political, economic, social, cultural and technological as well.But it’s not enough to address all the right factors. You also have to start the process at the right time. Many filmmakers don’t see it as an early concern. They think a potential distributor or sales agent will look after marketing duties somewhere down the road. Continued... |
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