Your marketing should begin with a sensible look at what you have to offer. In reality, film is not what you have to offer. What you have to offer are solutions to problems, using film as the medium for communication. That's what nontheatrical filmmaking is all about.
There are several areas open to the nontheatrical filmmaker-business, education, special interest groups, vacation resorts, governmental agencies. All have a use for sponsored nontheatrical films-films that teach, films that promote, films that pass along information.
Basically, there are three types ofcommunication problems: Those related to skill and knowledge, motivational problems, and problems of information; and, of course, some communication problems are a combination of the three.
Problems in the skill-knowledge area usually involve situations where someone lacks the understanding necessary to perform a job. People have to be trained to make products. People have to be instructed in safety procedures. People have to be coached in selling the product. The idea is this: People who know more are more effective. That's a good investment.
In the motivational area, the problem is that someone may not want to do a job. Most recognize that people who want to work are more productive and will work harder toward a solution to the problem. Motivational problems can also involve prospective clients. The solution in this case can usually be found in the area of more effective advertising and sales promotion.
In the informational area, the problem is what most people would refer to as public relations. Corporate and product visibility is very important to most companies, since exposure and goodwill help sell products. A company that perceives a need for solving informational problems will invest in a solution that best reaches its audience.
The point is, business spends money to make money. A smart business person will provide the money to make a film once there is an understanding that film will help solve a problem. Your job is to discover where a film will help.
There may be several people to contact in each company. Internal
structures are easy enough to penetrate if you keep the cornmunication needs
in mind. One way to get started is to call the switchboard or drop by the
lobby, and ask questions:
"Could I speak to the manager of the Training Department?"
"Who is in charge of Sales Promotion?"
"I'd like to talk to someone in Corporate Relations." ...and so on. It may
take a while, but most people are helpful once they understand that you are
trying to find someone you can show your talents to.
Within each company there may be several different departments that have a need for film. You will find that department names vary greatly-AV Services, Advertising and Sales Promotion, Media Services, Marketing Development-but their purposes are all the same: to solve communication problems. Somewhere in these departments you will find one or more prospects. They may deal directly with you; on the other hand, they may be required to request the work through a central medial department Don't forget, a company with one prospect for you probably has two.
A second way to get potential clients is to offer them a solution to a problem you perceive before you ever meet. This involves a good deal of homework. Look in trade journals, annual reports, and business papers and magazines. Each will give you an idea of current business problems. It may spark an idea that you can develop into a proposal. Once your ideas are thought out, place a few phone calls to the company until you find someone who is willing to briefly discuss you idea. If that person seems interested, you can send the full proposal for further investigation.
If the company is not interested in that particular proposal, you will have shown yourself to be someone interested in solving its problems, and that alone may help you get some work.
And don't forget that your prospects may be working with cyclical budgets. For example, the textile industry will probably be most busy twice a year and will have to introduce new products-in the spring and fall. Car manufacturers come out with their new products in the spring and fall. Summer recreation has an obvious selling period, as does winter recreation. Budgets for producing work becomes available before those selling periods. So, your marketing efforts have to coincide with the budgets, not with the selling periods. Direct your efforts toward the future; if your prospect doesn't save money now, the money will come eventually.
Before you ever reach a potential client's desk, you have to decide why you are going to meet with that person. Certainly you want to introduce yourself and, if possible, show some samples of your work. But you should be trying to do more than that so that you can best define what you have to offer. Among other things, you will want to find out what communications needs exist in the company, how these needs are currently solved, and whether the person you are talking to has the power or influence to hire you.
When you meet someone for the first time, you have the opportunity to begin a lasting business relationship. You know what you can do. Now is your chance to find out what you can do for your prospect. You can only do that by determining what your prospect needs.
Client's Communication Requirements
But it's not enough for you to discover your client's needs. You also have to help the client's needs. You also have to help the client really understand the needs and reach agreement on them. Only when you have reached that point can you begin to talk about solutions. You may have to hold several meetings before you begin to talk about film, which is just the medium for solving the problem.
The importance of good communication skills in determining your client's needs cannot be overestimated. Remember, you are in marketing as well as filmmaking. Marketing requires certain skills that you may never have considered.
Keep in mind that your job is to solve your client's problem. You may understand the problem one way; your client may understand the problem differently. You must learn to listen carefully and question your client skillfully so that you can both agree on a definite solution to the problem. You may be able to create a great film; but if your client isn't happy, it may be your last film.
Reaching Agreement on Need for Film
At the end of your first meeting with a prospect, some action has to be taken
if you are going to continue to work with the prospect and perhaps do a film.
This, again, is continuing your control. In business, this point in the action is
called a close.
What it means is that you must get your prospect to agree to do something. You may have to suggest what to do next. It may be to write a proposal, meet with other people, or continue discussing how you might help the company. You have to do something or the prospect is lost to you.
If you continue to work with the prospect, you will find that at every point along the way there are places where action must definitely be taken. For example, when you have submitted a proposal which in many cases is simply to ask: "Shall we go ahead with it then" or "Does it meet with your approval?"
When you ask for a positive action and the prospect says No, don't give up, not yet. First take the time to find out why your prospect has said no. It may be that the proposal you have submitted doesn't clearly solve the problem. In that case, your job is easy; just write another proposal. Perhaps the client isn't convinced that you can do the job. In that case, you can ask the client if references from other people would be helpful.
Whatever you do, don't let the word no stop you until you find out why. And when you find out why, close-that is, take an action that will get you a yes.
At some point in the filmmaking process-before you begin production-you will have to communicate with people who hold the purse strings ... you will have to get the proposal approved. Even though your client may understand the creative and technical aspects of filmmaking as well as you do, somewhere along the line you will have to talk to people who relate to costs differently than you. Keep in mind that your client's company doesn't need a film per see, it needs solutions to problems. The film you create will have to solve those problems in cost-effective ways. It goes back to the three kinds of communication needs. Ask yourself a few questions: Will the company be able to sell more porducts? Will it be able to train people better? Will it now be able to communicate information to more people more effectively? Will employees be sufficiently motivated by the film to justify the cost of producing it?
All of these questions are related in one way or another to profit. If the company can sell more goods and services, get more work done, disseminate more necessary information using audiovisuals, and if it can get more in return than it spends on your film, then that is a gain for the company and the kind of "bottom line" that interests those who have final approval of the project.
To summarize, finding and keeping clients is a sequential marketing process. Even though you are only marketing yourself, there is a logical order of steps to go through in order to get down to business of making a film.
Basically, it involves doing things one step at a time. First, you have to decide where the potential jobs are. Second, you have to find out whom to talk to. Before you ever see that person, you have to do some homework in two areas. Find out as much as you can about your prospect's organizational setup and communication needs. Then, decide what it is you have to talk about so you can present yourself properly.
When you see the prospect, you will go through a series of steps involving questioning and listening to find out the communication needs of the prospect and of the company. Once you know these needs, you have to present yourself as a person-a filmmaker-who can offer some solutions. And, if the prospect looks good, you have to close-which means that, if nothing else, you decide when to meet again to talk more specifically about certain projects or needs within the company.
After you have a project or perhaps an order to get a project, you have to write a proposal based on the objectives that you and your client have worked out. You may even have to write a second proposal detailing the business advantages to the company as well as alternative proposals.
And finally, you have to secure a contract before you begin production. At this point, your marketing job is not over. Even though you are now concentrating most of your efforts on making the film, you must still stay in close contact with your clients to keep them up-to-date on the progress of the film and secure the necessary approvals along the way.
Marketing a film is very much like producing a film; every step must be considered in order to meet the client's needs as the client sees them. Don't let the term frighten you...it's simply a matter of taking care of business.
Filmmakers tend to think of themselves as artists, apart from the clutter of the business world. But no matter how alien the concept of marketing seems, it is still a skill that must be learned and developed. Why? Because marketing is a skill that will help you make the kind of films you want.