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Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

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11–20 of 24 posts

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#11
This is a novel concept. There's an emotional satisfaction that you get out of this. If you ran the ROI numbers on the advertising it probably wouldn't play out, but if you wanted to brag at a cocktail party that you had your company advertised on a Times Square Billboard, then yeah it's worth $10.

I don't think this is a cheap form of marketing for anyone because the ROI doesn't probably make sense. However, it might make sense as a novelty ad/gift or something to that effect.

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#12
There was a while ago the "1 second film" idea. I really liked that one and contributed as well. By donating money you received credit as a producer on IMDb. Unfortunately after the listing of producers went up into the thousands, IMDb stopped that game and the project died away. Might be interesting for you to read up on how they did it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_1_Second_Film

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#13
post #12

There was a while ago the "1 second film" idea. I really liked that one and contributed as well. By donating money you received credit as a producer on IMDb. Unfortunately after the listing of producers went up into the thousands, IMDb stopped that game and the project died away. Might be interesting for you to read up on how they did it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_1_Second_Film

Thanks for this. Very interesting. I know IMDB have clamped down on this sort of thing so that's why we offer the credit on the end titles of the film where we can control it.

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#14
post #10

I don't think anything is impossible. Heck, take a look at the Million Dollar Homepage: http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/ Nonetheless, you do have to convince 100,000 to do it (if they all took the cheapest option). That is quite hefty. I think you may have to set your sights a bit lower, but it is worth a shot. Try to raise some funds via Kickstarter or IndieGoGo - both have a heavy focus on indie films. Good lu…

Thanks for the words of encouragement. The feedback so far is actually favouring the more expensive options, which means we would need less people. But this is an experiment, so anything can happen.... Million Dollar Homepage was one of the ideas in mind when formulating this strategy. Another was the way movies were marketed originally: http://bit.ly/pgyGaR

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#15
post #9

Why not just sell the movie via itunes, if the movies good enough people will buy it and recommend it to their friends.

It's not that easy (or cheap) to get into itunes. Plus you would be competing with blockbusters who spend tons of money on marketing. We thought this could be a way to disrupt traditional film distribution. For more on our strategy check out: http://bit.ly/pgyGaR

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#17
post #11

This is a novel concept. There's an emotional satisfaction that you get out of this. If you ran the ROI numbers on the advertising it probably wouldn't play out, but if you wanted to brag at a cocktail party that you had your company advertised on a Times Square Billboard, then yeah it's worth $10. I don't think this is a cheap form of marketing for anyone because the ROI doesn't probably make sense. However, it migh…

Thanks....You are right, there is a certain novelty factor present, but isn't that the case with all (movie/entertainment) marketing? The pricing structure makes sure there is something for everyone and the sales we have to date actually show that startups would be interested in looping the recording of their Times Square message for display on their websites. Funnily enough, our marketing strategy was actually inspired by the promotions studios used to do in the early days of cinema eg a studio used to take a lion to towns and when people came to see the lion, they would sell them a movie ticket. For more on this see: http://bit.ly/pgyGaR

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#19
post #11

This is a novel concept. There's an emotional satisfaction that you get out of this. If you ran the ROI numbers on the advertising it probably wouldn't play out, but if you wanted to brag at a cocktail party that you had your company advertised on a Times Square Billboard, then yeah it's worth $10. I don't think this is a cheap form of marketing for anyone because the ROI doesn't probably make sense. However, it migh…

Thanks....You are right, there is a certain novelty factor present, but isn't that the case with all (movie/entertainment) marketing? The pricing structure makes sure there is something for everyone and the sales we have to date actually show that startups would be interested in looping the recording of their Times Square message for display on their websites. Funnily enough, our marketing strategy was actually inspi…

You might want to include in your offer some high quality picture or HD vid of the message on the Times Square screen.

Assuming you guys are great with capturing a "scene" in an impressive way, this would make it at least for me much more interesting. You could include there some photomontage of the final result already on the website.

Maybe in the end the most important shoot of the movie is going to be the one of the sponsors displayed at Times Square. A true money sho(o)t ;)

Re: Ask HN: Can a No Budget Indie Movie Make $1m Online?

#20
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks....You are right, there is a certain novelty factor present, but isn't that the case with all (movie/entertainment) marketing? The pricing structure makes sure there is something for everyone and the sales we have to date actually show that startups would be interested in looping the recording of their Times Square message for display on their websites. Funnily enough, our marketing strategy was actually inspi…

You might want to include in your offer some high quality picture or HD vid of the message on the Times Square screen. Assuming you guys are great with capturing a "scene" in an impressive way, this would make it at least for me much more interesting. You could include there some photomontage of the final result already on the website. Maybe in the end the most important shoot of the movie is going to be the one of t…

This was a thought I also had. An HD recording of the message stream, with enough of the surrounding environment to make it look / demonstrate its "liveness" and context.

Rather than trying to deliver individual fragments to all the contributors, see if the ads/messages are clocked tightly enough that you can simply post one or several videos somewhere (YouTube, Vimeo?) and then provide contributors the timestamp of the start of their particular ad/message.

Possible, the ad/message stream videos may take on a life or their own. Two results for the price of one, as it were.

P.S. Beware of liability, though. At your price point, that's a lot of content to vet. And you don't have just obscene content to worry about, but possibly also trademark infringement, accusations of hate speech, etc., etc. Some of which might be hard to catch in a cursory examination. (OTOH, one brief display might reduce the change of facing legal action. IANAL and all that.)

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