Wow, there’s quite a discussion going on over at the Film Specific Facebook page on giving films away for FREE. Yes, that’s F.R.E.E. All prompted by a Time Magazine article I posted about the indie movie “Star Wreck” and the filmmaker Timo Vuorensola who gave his film away for free and then made money (a nice amount of it) off merchandise and other ancillary sales.
The big question is – is this strategy right for EVERY film?
I think not. And here’s why — “Star Wreck” had a gigantic built in audience (rabid Star Trek fans). So they could afford to give the film away for free and be pretty sure that they could recoup money in the ancillaries. But here’s the deal – not every film has that kind of target audience, and EVEN IF THEY DO, who’s to say that that particular target audience will embrace the film the way Star Trek fans did with “Star Wreck”?
That’s one of the inherent problems I see with the FREE strategy. The film business is already risky, and this adds on a whole other layer of RISK. What if you give the film away and nobody cares? No sales of anything? Then you’ve shot yourself in the foot – you can’t go back and start charging for the film and expect people to attach any sort of value to it.
Then there’s the question of SUSTAINABILITY that has come up in the Facebook posting – how can filmmakers have a sustainable career, where they actually can earn a living making films, if they’re just making gimmicky films, giving them away, and hoping to make money on merchandise. Someone brought up the fact that that’s not real FILMMAKING….now we’re talking more about ENTREPRENEURSHIP.
So do you want to be a filmmaker? Or an entrepreneur? Or can you be both AND still make the films that you want to make?
Or does all this mean that you have to CHANGE the films that you want to make in the first place?
And the other question that has come up is about the VALUE of our films. If everyone starts giving away their films on the internet, consumers will become accustomed to getting indie films for free, and won’t ever want to pay for them. (that’s one concern people had in the Facebook discussion). One solution to this is to give the film away as a free download, but then charge for the DVD, special edition DVD, and so forth. Can this work?
So there you have it – the issues surrounding giving your films away for FREE. Bottom line is this: it all comes down to:
1. What your goals are as a filmmaker
2. What your goals are for the film
3. And a case-by-case analysis as to whether a free strategy can work for your specific film
What are your thoughts on this debate? Please comment below!
{ 25 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s the ol’ free sample gamble:
“Sir would you like a free sample of these yummy chocolates?”
Dude 1 – “Why yes miss, boy that tastes so good I’ll buy a whole box of the next chocolates you make too!”
Dude 2 – “Yum that was great. Ha! I have no intention of buying anything else!”
Star Wreck are very good at what they do, they didn’t get sued, they honed their craft and got loads of fans with their free productions and now all the fans are ready to buy into their next project “Iron Sky”. Based on what I’ve seen on Star Wreck, I’m ready to buy their next movie!
I know some people who have made an excellent short action movie “Zomblies” which they will give away free to use as a calling card to get the industry interested in investing in them.
If you can approach one project as a loss leader and use the publicity and experience you gain to set you up for a cash cow, then free movies can work.
Stacey–
I’ve been writing extensively this month on this very topic. I have two series of articles:
THE FILMMAKER’S ROADMAP TO FREE (8 articles)
http://rosspruden.blogspot.com/search/label/filmmakers_roadmap
THE FILMMAKER’S ROADMAP TO VALUE (6 articles)
http://rosspruden.blogspot.com/search/label/filmmakers_roadmap_value
The latter of the two series is concluding tomorrow and offers a fairly good answer to the question you pose here… Hope you enjoy reading it!
Every film title is in itself its own animal and too often indie filmmakers are seeking a ‘one size fits all’ approach to simplify their process–and understandably so when our primary focus is on making movies. We draft business plans and conceptualize marketing strategies that look great on the surface so investors are happy and we order ROI forecasts so we don’t have to compile it ourselves (http://www.filmprofit.com). Most of us are Artists without any idea how to market and sell our baby, so we look toward something that worked for someone else under an entirely different set of circumstances–and that’s dangerous.
As stated above–The FREE model works for some projects and most certainly not for all. It also means you’re production budget is relatively small and your investor (if you have one) is willing to take TWO risks–on completing a movie (which is hard enough) and using that to sell its products. This means you’ve hired a merchandise consultant or someone who knows merchandising to ensure you’ve got all the right products at the right price points in all the right places to make that make sense–why not hire a marketing consultant for your film instead? On top of that–nobody wants merchandise for a film they haven’t seen or don;t know about so you’re still forced to generate the very same exposure for your film. twice the work and twice the risk–this makes absolutely NO SENSE AT ALL TO ME.
Merchandising is an ancillary revenue stream that must also suit the movie and genre–what do you sell for an edgy drama like “Precious”?
Nuff said–
Miles Maker
Story Author | Visual Artist (film/video/)
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1. What if you give the film away and nobody cares? No sales of anything? Then you’ve shot yourself in the foot – you can’t go back and start charging for the film and expect people to attach any sort of value to it.
And yet that’s the exact strategy employed by Dr. Horrible. Given away for free then sold on ITunes.
And under the old system, you wouldn’t have ANY distribution at all so you would be out of money, out of effort, and with no way to recoup.
2. Then there’s the question of SUSTAINABILITY that has come up in the Facebook posting – how can filmmakers have a sustainable career, where they actually can earn a living making films, if they’re just making gimmicky films, giving them away, and hoping to make money on merchandise. Someone brought up the fact that that’s not real FILMMAKING….now we’re talking more about ENTREPRENEURSHIP.
EVERY Indie filmmaker who’s made a name and money for himself IS an entrepreneur. They didn’t make all of that money on just merchandise – they sold DVD’s and the distribution rights to the films through regular outlets.
Is it a gimmick to make a film and handle the distribution yourself? NO. And let’s get one thing straight – these STAR WRECK guys were SMART. They made a movie for little money for an audience that was large, collector-oriented, and rabid for new content.
The scifi/horror/fantasy/ action audience is HUGE. They don’t have thousands of screaming fans who attend conventions, build websites, write fiction, make fan films, build action figures, costumes etc… for the romantic comedy do they? NO. I don’t see any GREY’S ANATOMY conventions anywhere…yet, I see ads for hundreds of conventions all around the world.
The SW guys went after their audience and enlisted them in the process – ensuring they would have an audience to sell to. Smart. Smart. SMART.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say you could make a movie for the “Scifi/ fantasy/ etc.” audience and make money simply by selling DVDs and conventions throughout the country during the year. Add a good website and social network component and you could have a real winner… if it’s well made and well marketed.
But even if you didn’t want to make it for that audience, you could make a movie and sell it after building its audience through “free marketing” AND DO QUITE WELL – because the bulk of the money would be passing right back to you the filmmaker.
The Christian film audience has known this for years. Movies made for little money and promoted through all sorts of spiritual outlets = the win. Kirk Cameron has no problem turning his back on traditional Hollywood – he’s making too much money!
It’s the same with Redbox and Netflix and selling DVD copies on the cheap. It’s what I call the “walmarting” of the film biz. It’s the whole “how cheap can we go to get you to watch” mentality. At some point we drop the value of a film to the point where everything is cheap. Then what’s next? Pay the viewer just to get them to watch?
What the Star Wreck guys did was actually to make a full length “advertisement” for their merchandise. That works for a rare few and it’s a gamble.
My concern is the continual downward spiral of “value” that is happening to the film biz. I had read something recently that the music biz, according to an expert, they expect to basically implode, based on the fact that they give almost everything away for free on the internet. The music industry makes money by giving songs away for free or on the cheap in hopes that you show up to their “event” (concerts). What about films? Give it away for free and what do they have to go to???… See More
Better idea. Give the first 5-15 minutes away for free. Give them a taste taste… but don’t give the whole thing away
Personal thoughts:
it devalues indie films yes but lets be honest this isn’t the first time indie filmmakers have done that, in fact we would do anything to get our films seen and make money from it, this is a long term business strategy that has been around in marketing for…ever, even Stacey does it on her sight, she offers a free something something and you sign up, its a great idea that has worked for years.
The next thing is if you are going to go this rout, be smart, you film has to have a niche like star wars or star trek to make it work. If the idea is original and has no built in fan base then the movie would really have to be spectacular to work under this model.
The bottom line is this, if you are ambitious enough nothing is going to stop you from making any proven model work in some form or another, the important thing is that you understand it takes more than one marketing scheme and one film, you need to employ all faucets of marketing and do everything you can not just count on the hot new buzz, the saying of all of your eggs in one basket comes to mind. Spread it out, if you have niche film like this then try it but don’t just leave it up if it isn’t working, have a plan to implement and hit it hard, other wise the model will become broken for those that do have that niche film.
I can certainly echo the “it’s not for everyone” sentiment, but I think Jarmo’s “what’s the worst that can happen” philosophy is definitely the way to approach it.
Without going into too much detail, we’re self-distributing our award-winning “true horror” Exhibit A and part of that strategy has involved making the film available for free.
This is a limited time only deal (2 months), exclusive to http://www.indiemoviesonline.com with ad revenue share – which unfortunately amounts to pennies unless you’re getting millions of views.
I think it’s worth mentioning that we’re only streaming the film, so freeviewers don’t actually own the film. They’ll have to pay to download or buy the DVD from our website http://www.exhibitathemovie.com.
The main idea is to get some buzz going, so giving the film away for a few months is taking the place of an expensive marketing campaign – which we couldn’t afford. And indie movies online have been marketing the film for us (including a full page ad in Sight & Sound magazine and featuring Exhibit A prominently on their homepage as an “Editor’s Choice” film), so choosing the right partner is very important.
You need someone who loves the film first and foremost, and who’ll really get behind it with the right branding. If they’re just going to add it to their already overstocked library with barely a mention, your film will sink without trace.
Which basically means your film has to be good to stand any chance. There’s an argument that says, if the film’s good it would’ve been picked up for traditional distribution, but that’s a simplistic view and certainly doesn’t apply in all cases. Exhibit A is a micro-budget British indie with no stars and deliberate “home movie” production values, so it was seen as a hard sell for a sales agent and not worth the effort.
That’s despite having won Best UK Feature at the Raindance Film Festival and receiving 3 British Independent Film Award nominations!
When researching the free streaming model, we were quoted various figures as to the ratio of people who’ll stream the film for free then go buy the DVD/download (either because they love the film and want it in their collection, or because they appreciate being able to watch it for free and want to support the filmmakers). The number ranged from 1-in-100 to 1-in-1000, from experience we’ve found it to be around 1-in-250, but we’ve only been live for 1 month and would hope that ratio improves as word spreads.
In fairness though, we’re not really expecting to sell huge amounts of DVDs while the film can be streamed for free, but as of February (when the film’s not available for free anymore), if we’ve got enough people talking about it, their only option will be to buy.
Obviously it’s a high-risk strategy. Sure people will watch it for free, but will they pay for it too? Only time will tell, but you have to give your film the best possible chance. To do this, we’ll be backing up the online release with a cinema tour with director and cast Q&A. We’re also sending out screeners to reviewers and bloggers, and publishing links to these reviews via facebook and twitter. We can be found on both (and myspace) at /exhibitamovie if you want to stop by and say hello.
It’s probably worth adding that since embarking on this self-distribution adventure, we’ve been approached by several international film festivals and distributors, who either stumbled across (or were told about) our website or streamed the film on IMO and liked what they saw. We’re in talks at the moment with regards to a US DVD/download release, which probably wouldn’t have come about had we not put the film on a streaming platform to raise awareness.
Although, you could argue that had the 10,000+ people who have already streamed the film not had that option, they might’ve bought the DVD instead, but really would they? Certainly not all of them.
Then comes the question, are you in it to get rich or to get the biggest possible audience for your film? Of course both would be splendid, but there are far easier ways to make money than filmmaking, so that can’t be anyone’s primary motivation.
So in short, everything’s heading in the right direction for Exhibit A, but it’s taken around 6 months of hard work pre-launch and probably a further 6 months (at least) now the film’s out there to get where we want to be.
To quote the old filmmaking adage “nobody knows anything”, but at least with the self-distribution route there’s room for manoeuvre with a bit of trial and error. A luxury that you certainly wouldn’t have with any other distributor. If something doesn’t appear to be working, tweak it and try again (and again and again) until you hit upon something that works for you.
That’s not to say it’ll also work for the next film… but surely that’s half the fun?
I think it’s bad on many levels.
First, successful merchandising requires a special kind of movie and few qualify. So better make sure you have such a movie before you even think about going this route.
Second, it remains to be seen how many movies this model will work for that aren’t parodies or rip-offs of a huge franchise that already had a gigantic fan base? So if you don’t have these elements going for you, odds are you’re just shooting yourself in the foot and throwing away any chance at ever recouping your costs, much less making any real money from your filmmaking.
But let’s say you did have the right kind of movie that works for good merchandising profits. If your movie is based upon a huge franchise like this one was, be ready for potential lawsuits to quickly relieve you of those merchandise profits. Had they been sued, the legal costs alone to defend would likely have eaten up any profits made.
And then there is the bad example it sets for the general public. We already have enough people thinking everything on the net should be free. This model will fan the flames of that expectation and make it a staple of online releases. So those of us who will not have a theatrical release for our movie (most of us) will suffer when we’re asking people to pay after they’ve been conditioned to expect to see online movies for free. We’re creating a monster here folks. Let’s stop it while we can.
I like the idea of “free.” Most people do. Unfortunately, people associate value with cost. If something is free, there is no inherent or implied value – this is based on my marketing experience. The exception can be community-driven content and entertainment. I have been involved in numerous indie films and productions and I love each of them because I had a direct hand in its creation. If you combine the idea of community driven content with crowdsourcing or other public funding, I think you can have a great model, BUT you will need to buff up your public persona to the point where everyone involved (monetarily or voluntarily) knows exactly where you are and how things are coming. It’s a gradual buildup to success. Pretty much the same as hyping a film.
The old models died a while ago. For art’s sake…let them go already. I’m all for free streaming a la Ted Hope’s vision of the future of filmmaking: http://www.trulyfreefilm. The filmmakers who let go of the old ways and embrace a borderless flow of narrative mixed with commerce will have fruitful, abundant, and satisfying filmmaking careers.
Let’s try that again…here’s Ted Hope’s correct blog site: http://trulyfreefilm.blogspot.com/.
First the film has to be awesome… Beyond that little detail. Get the free online audience excited and use the numbers as a unit of measure to present, like any other factual data. I’m thinking this would work for marketing a ‘series’; give away the first to sell the rest.
Seeking a marketing partner.
Dan:
“We already have enough people thinking everything on the net should be free … We’re creating a monster here folks. Let’s stop it while we can.”
To continue on your metaphor, the monster is already out and swatting planes on top of the Empire State Building. Only way to stop it now is to nuke it and the whole city with it.
The only world where “intellectual property” can exist in the way that physical property exists (ie. as a scarcity that can be owned and sold) is a world where there is no freedom. Humans, maybe even all living things, by nature copy everything that can be copied. It has been the reality that artists have had to live with until the first decades of the previous century.
Yet, there is no denying these coming years will be difficult ones for film. And it could be that movies as we know them will not survive. Just like the monks lost their livelihood when the printing press made copying books by hand obsolete. Film is especially endangered because of the cost and complexity of creating the final piece of work. While bands can go on tours you can’t really take a 200 person film crew on a tour of Europe and have people pay to see them.
But people want to watch movies, so the form will survive somehow. Maybe the business won’t really end up changing that much. Or maybe everything changes.
I often ask myself a simple question: How many DVDs have I personally bought of a film I’d never seen before? The answer is very, very few. I think most people (minus the opportunity for theatrical) look to cheaper means of discovery. They rent, they stream via Netflix, they use some kind of VOD service. And if they really like it, then they’ll buy the DVD, the poster, the soundtrack, etc.
So I can see FREE as a way of lowering resistance to getting an audience to see it. But my fear would be killing revenue streams like iTunes, Netflix and VOD in the process. Perhaps FREE and ad-supported (like Hulu) should be saved for the last release window?
@zak Forsman – and yet we have plenty of films as examples that weren’t killed by the idea of putting it out online for free.
We even have examples of movies funded by studios doing it (ANGEL OF DEATH). The free model is here to stay.
The fact is – as contrary to common wisdom as it may be – the more a film or tv show or product is out in the public consciousness the more opportunity for sales. How better to get it out there than through the value of “free”?
I think the trick will be for people to slice out a bit of theatrical with this. That will be the last window of release. That is, your die hard, core fans will demand a theatrical screening (using something like withoutabox.com or demandit) and they’ll get them, creating a ROCKY HORROR like experience out of it after all of the other windows have been exploited.
@Jonathan – the “value” is that fans of movies will find themselves socializing more – whether on the web or live, and they’ll discuss these movies. They will embrace and fund the good and teach the bad that this isn’t the type of film they want. There are currently fans out there waiting to embrace a new property and give it “fan value” – meaning, their devotion.
@Dan – they had a pretty good inkling that they had a fan base to work with as well as a legal leg to stand on – it IS a parody after all. You don’t have to make a fan film about Buffy or Star Trek / Wars or whatever. You can make a movie that incites that same feeling within the audience and generates the entertainment value they see.
We want things to change. For too long the distributors have been carving an unhealthy inequitable share of monies from filmmakers efforts. Do I want to tear Hollywood down? No – but clearly showing the studios and other financing entities that there is a dollar or two to be made in a new way, with new financing is not a bad thing. The more people making good films the better the audience for all film will be.
Is free going to be the sum total of that change? No, but it certainly a start toward a healthier,diverse film industry that currently has a deep chasm running through it between huge blockbusters and no-budget productions. With no middle ground, it seems the business may collapse on itself.
Everyone is looking at this the wrong way. You all have presented really good ideas and well thought out concepts of working with past or current business models. The fact of the matter is that no one can do free for ever and the worry about that changing a mind set is wrong. In the 50′s and 60′s many major companies gave away soap, you found it on your door step when you came home and it was enough for you to try it and become aware of the packaging so when you went to the store you could purchase it. Film is no different. But no one can give away their product forever. You are worried about the wrong end of the model. The end you need to be worried about is the pirate side of the situation. There is where the real problem lies. If, and I feel many have already come a custom to downloading pirated copies, this is the really big problem. Stiff penalties should be imposed on anyone selling someones property over the internet. Don’t worry about people/filmmakers that are looking for new ways of marketing, that will not change a mind set. Pirating will!!!
“Perhaps FREE and ad-supported (like Hulu) should be saved for the last release window?”
In the UK, under the old model, your distributor would manage to book your film into a few London independent screens as a way of buying reviews. This exercise would lose you a lot of money.
We did an internet premiere of “Diary of a Bad Lad” as a one week event on dailymotion.com. The film had over 185,000 views – which was about 4 times their average – cost us nothing and generated some advertising revenue, web traffic, vastly increased awareness and so on. We did not leave the film lying around, but the trailer is viewable on Daily Motion, where it ranks very high in their various charts.
On top of that the week long give-away was a factor in our securing a ‘hybrid-model’ UK & Ireland DVD High St retail DVD contract + limited UK theatrical + a ‘breakthrough’ jointly run web-initiative through which the distributor operates the ‘nuts and bolts’ and we supply the creative content. We retain all other rights.
What are your thoughts on Sita Sings the Blues? Animated film released for free that got a profit via merch. Roger Ebert named it one of the best animated films of the year.
It made some money and got high critical acclaim. Currently online for free. Check it out: http://www.sitasingstheblues.com/
there’s an interview on her site somewhere, the gist of it is while Sita was available for free, the DVD still sold very well. She had to take the free movie down for a month or so leading up to its showing at a film fest (part of their requirements for showing it). While it was unavailable for free the DVD sales dropped to zero. Once it was back online the sales picked up again. interesting, eh?
Joe
That is really interesting, thanks for posting Joe. I saw Sita at Nashville Film Fest and loved it. The only thing is that she now blocks herself from doing any kind of broadcast or Cable VOD deal since the film is available for free, but if she doesn’t care about that, then more power to her!
I think the trick will be for people to slice out a bit of theatrical with this. That will be the last window of release. That is, your die hard, core fans will demand a theatrical screening (using something like withoutabox.com or demandit) and they’ll get them, creating a ROCKY HORROR like experience out of it after all of the other windows have been exploited.
Tint
Loved reading everyone’s input.
Planning to do an internet premiere of our movie (free of course) for a set period of time (around 1 week or 2 weeks). Goal is to get some reviews at least. Of course we may be shooting our self’s in the foot ..but that’s a risk we are willing to take.
Jon Williams mentioned they did a premiere on Dailymotion ..not sure what the process was (I could not figure out how to do a premiere on Dailymotion – wrote an email to them – no reply yet)
Like to hear – What would be the best strategy to get your film seen for free (outside of your facebook community) -Youtube has size restrictions and I don’t have a partner account.
Your input is appreciated in helping out us Indie folks.
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