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Understanding Sales and Distribution in the Current Marketplace

By April 29, 2020Blog

The business is changing fast and so more important than ever for filmmakers to keep updated on industry changes.  It takes a long time to develop a screenplay or TV pilot script and bible so always good to be aware of current trends and what distributors are looking for.

If you have a finished film, in the current market place you are probably wondering now what?

The Marche de Cannes on of the biggest film markets where one normally gets an opportunity to meet sales agents and talk to film execs has been canceled and is now going online.

If you have been wondering what the online Cannes film market will look like – here is an informative article  that will fill you in

https://deadline.com/2020/04/cannes-marche-lays-out-virtual-market-plan-including-price-structure-1202911048/

However, it looks like it won’t be the only one. The major agencies and many of the indie film distributors have their own plans afoot – read more about this here:

https://deadline.com/2020/04/film-indies-u-s-agencies-set-dates-for-virtual-market-to-run-alongside-cannes-online-marche-1202910045/

We as filmmakers put a lot of time and love into making films and other content and we have all heard those horror stories of the filmmaker making zero for their years of work yet the distributors doing rather well for a much shorter time period.

Understanding how distribution works and how to distribute your film in a way that makes you money is key to making all that time and passion and love that you put into creating your content pays off.  You want to also make sure it gets the visibility that you want.

The good news for content creators coming out of the  COVID – 19 health pandemic is that an enormous amount of content is being consumed right now and the distribution platforms will need fresh content to keep their customers happy.

Now that live gatherings are currently not permissible – you need to consider if online festivals make sense for you and your project.  What conditions do you need them to have in place like geo-blocking so it does not get in the way of your distribution deals or potentially take away your potential paying audience?

What rights should you keep and what rights should you give away when making a distribution deal.

You wanted to have a premiere and raise some noise – the good news is you still can with all the new virtual technology available.

What’s the market looking for right now and what genre should you focus on for your next spec script?

We will be going over how to do this in our upcoming Sales and Distribution course.

Join us this Tuesday, May 5th and find out more: https://www.raindance.org/courses/sales-distribution-la/

 

Yours in filmmaking,

Julia