SXSW Panel Highlights: Audience-Building for Creatives (Video)

The folks at SXSW did a nice job plucking six minutes of highlights from a really jam-packed panel I moderated this past March.

The panel featured artist Natasha Wescoat, politics blogger Markos "Kos" Moulitsas, musician Jonathan Coulton, filmmaker Brett Gaylor, and animator Burnie Burns. (Everyone but Markos is featured in some way in Fans, Friends & Followers.)



I posted an MP3 of the complete panel earlier this year.... and in the current issue of SXSW World magazine, I have a short piece about audience-building on page 24.

New approaches to audience-building are a big focus of SXSW each year -- and it's obviously an issue I care a lot about.

The Four Kinds of Fans

One of the biggest questions circulating at DIY Days Philadelphia last Saturday was, how do you spur your fans to actually do something? Once someone has joined your Facebook fan group, friended you on MySpace, or started following you on Twitter, how can you actually get them to buy a ticket, a DVD, a download, or some merch?

An important starting step, I'd suggest, is to start thinking about four different kinds of fans.

1. The Impulse Fan. The impulse fan sees a video you've made, or hears about your band from their roommate, and signs up to follow you on Twitter or joins your Facebook group. This fan will never do anything else -- ever. They are good only for your ego: yesterday, you had 1000 followers on Twitter, and today you have 1001.

2. The Prospective / Occasional Fan. The prospective fan is someone who can be lured out to a show or screening, or convinced to buy a new CD/DVD, but with some effort. You may need to dangle free samples. You may need to offer a free ticket to a pre-release, top-secret, underground album listening party. You may need to mention that there will be free, limited edition t-shirts given to the first 25 people who show up. The prospective fan can be activated, with a little creative strategizing. They can be "converted" into an occasional fan, showing up every once in a while to your events or buying a book or digital album download every couple years. And they may even be transformed over time into a True Fan.

3. The True Fan. Kevin Kelly defined the True Fan as "someone who will purchase anything and everything you produce. They will drive 200 miles to see you sing. They will buy the super deluxe re-issued hi-res box set of your stuff even though they have the low-res version. They have a Google Alert set for your name." A True Fan will follow what you're doing on your own site, your blog, your Twitter feed -- wherever you choose to communicate. You shouldn't ignore their care and feeding, but these fans have already been activated.

4. The Super Fan. The Super Fan is a True Fan who is willing to help you out in some way. In Fans, Friends & Followers, the singer-songwriter Jill Sobule says she has a super fan who built and helps manage her Web site. Cartoonist Dave Kellett talks about super fans who have given him a lift from the airport in their city to a local event, or have been willing to accept shipments of books on his behalf and cart them to a book signing. Jonathan Coulton says that super fans have helped him find a great concert venue in which to perform. Super Fans, if you ask nicely (and offer them copious thanks and credit) will post flyers for you in their city, or point you to the best bar for a post-screening cast party.

I don't purport to have discovered all of the keys as to how you activate Prospective / Occasional Fans. But two things are certainly essential: making them feel part of your circle, and that you're grateful for their support. Incentives and discounts and give-aways can help. So can events that feel special, secret, unique, limited in space, or invitation-only.

What do you think the typical breakdown is between these four types of fans, for the typical artist? Just to throw something out that you might think about, I'd suggest:

- 25 percent Impulse Fans,
- 50 percent Prospective / Occasional Fans,
- 20 percent True Fans, and
- 5 percent Super Fans.

I welcome your comments below. If you'd like to read another take on different types of fans, here's a blog post from music industry guru Jason Feinberg.

Audio: SXSW Panel on Building Your Audience Online

I recorded Sunday afternoon's SXSW panel called "Marketing Meets New Media: Building Your Audience Online." I'm sure SXSW will post higher-quality "official" audio or video sometime soon...

The recording is about an hour long. Here's the MP3 audio, or you can just click play below.

Here's who we had:

- Scott Kirsner Editor, CinemaTech
- Natasha Wescoat Artist/Blogger, Natasha Wescoat Inc
- Jonathan Coulton Singer-Songwriter
- Brett Gaylor Filmmaker, 'RiP: A Remix Manifesto'
- Burnie Burns Rooster Teeth Productions
- Markos Moulitsas Kos Media

Three of those folks (Natasha, Jonathan, and Burnie) are featured in my next book, Fans, Friends & Followers: Building an Audience and a Career in the Digital Age. (The official pub date is in early April, but you can get the e-book now.)

South by Southwest: Panels on DVD, Digital Distribution, and Audience-Building

I'm looking forward to South by Southwest next month, in Austin.

I'll be doing two panels, and also hoping to see two docs made by people whom I've gotten to know: 'RiP: A Remix Manifesto' and 'Winnebago Man.'

I'll also be doing two panels...

On Sunday, March 15th: 'Building Your Audience Online.' The theme here connects directly to my next book, 'Fans, Friends and Followers': how do you build an audience for your work, and ideally get that audience to support you? Panelists include:

Natasha Wescoat, Artist/Blogger, Natasha Wescoat Inc
Jonathan Coulton, Musician
Brett Gaylor, Filmmaker, 'RiP: A Remix Manifesto'
Burnie Burns, Rooster Teeth Productions ('Red vs. Blue')
Markos Moulitsas, The Daily Kos

Then on Monday, March 16th: 'The Future of DVD and Digital Distribution. How long will physical DVD sales remain a viable business (and will Blu-ray help prolong their lifespan)? How are filmmakers selling digital downloads and rentals on iTunes and other outlets, and how do digital revenues stack up? Panelists include:

Matt Dentler, Cinetic Media
Rick Allen, CEO, Snag Films
Gary Hustwit, Director, 'Objectified' and 'Helvetica'
Steve Savage, President, New Video
Morgan Spurlock, Filmmaker, Warrior-Poets

Of course, I'll try to post notes and/or audio afterward. The full SXSW Film panel schedule is here.

I will also be doing the pre-release for my new book, 'Fans, Friends and Followers,' at SXSW. I'll have a few early copies for sale, and will be doing a signing at the SXSW Bookstore on Monday, March 16th at 1 PM.

Hope to see you in Austin!

What If You Had an Unproduced Screenplay?

This morning's panel at the IFP Filmmaker Conference, 'Turning Your Viewers On,' was a lot of fun. Laurie Racine sat in for David Dudas of Eyespot, and she was great (in addition to working for Eyespot, Laurie is also involved with Creative Commons and dotSub, which added a lot to the panel.)

Here's a question I posed to the audience, which sent the discussion off on a really interesting trajectory. My goal was to talk about how creative people think about the collaborative potential of the Internet.

What if you had an unproduced screenplay in your desk drawer? Would you put that screenplay up on the Net, where an aspiring filmmaker could take it and turn it into a movie -- with full credit to you as the screenwriter? What if you could be assured that if they made a movie (maybe they'd film the entire script, or condense it into a short), and they made money, you'd be guaranteed a percentage of any revenues? But let's assume the more likely scenario is that your movie would only show at a film school, or online, but wouldn't generate much of a return for the filmmaker...

(Afterward, Scott Macaulay of Filmmaker Magazine mentioned that Jonathan Lethem, a bona fide famous writer, has done this with some of his short stories.)

Here were some of the responses from the audience:

- If the screenplay is in my desk drawer, it probably isn't very good, and I wouldn't want my name attached to it if a film was made.

- I'd worry that someone would take it and make a lot of money from my work.

- What if I become famous, and someday a studio wants to make a "real" movie from that old script that I wrote in college?

- What if they changed my script while they were making the movie?

Have a look at The Jonathan Coulton Project, where a very good singer/songwriter allows anyone to produce music videos using his songs. Why wouldn't screenwriters want the same kind of thing to happen with their unproduced work?

I'd love to hear your feedback below... but one last quote from the novelist and blogger Cory Doctorow to get you thinking: "The greatest threat to an artist is obscurity, not piracy."