Promoting something completely different - movie

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jason407

jason407

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So, some of you know that I made a low-budget cheesy zombie movie.
It will be coming out on DVD on September 9th in stores, Netflix, etc...

Zombies! Zombies! Zombies! - Official Site

So...I need to start figuring out how I am going to start promoting the movie. The more attention I can get it the better...plus I also retained the rights to sell it off my website myself, and when I do, I make a much bigger profit than I do from any sales we get in stores. :)

I have some ideas, and of course already have the myspace thing going, and have a nice email list from our website and conventions, etc...
I plan on re-doing the website soon, it is kinda a temp site right now.
I am even thinking of setting up an affiliate program and hopefully getting help selling from awesome peeps like you.
***any advice on how to setup an affiliate program for a physical product??? Payment processors???

But maybe you guys have some sweet ideas on how to promote it that I could never even imagine. So feel free to help me brainstorm.
Thanks in advance!!!

P.S.
Yes, I know there is a movie called Zombie Strippers...it is actually very different, and I shot mine first...I just didn't have Sony and a million dollar marketing budget like they did.
 


Search for various Zombie Shuffle events.
Post links to it on their various forums, in the Facebook events pages, etc.

Then, actually go to your local one and hand out some copies to people. This in turn will get them talking on their own sites (because how many people don't have a Forum membership, MySpace or Facebook page and would still go to one of these things?), which will hopefully provide backlinks, but at the very least will provide you some online reviews.

You might also want to seed a torrent of it, in fairly lo-fidelity (saves your bandwidth and makes people want a higher quality version) with a thing at the beginning of the movie, and just before the credits roll, with
"This movie is provided free, but if you enjoyed it, please help us make the sequel by purchasing a legitimate copy from our site after you finish watching the film.
The DVD contains many extras not in this DivX and helps us continue making films you enjoy.

If you really enjoyed the movie, please share this lo-fi version with friends."
Click to expand...
Surprisingly, it's worked nicely for a number of bands and short film makers... Hell, it worked for the guys that made the game Galactic Civilizations.

You'll also want to have merchandise on your website, in case people would prefer to have that instead of the DVD.
Get a CafePress account so you don't have to shell out heaps for merchandise that might not sell. Substantially lower margins, but no capital outlay.
 
Good ideas...I have already looked into t-shirts and stuff.
Anyone else?

Anyone have experience setting up affiliate programs for physical products?
 
If there's any hint if porn, simply cut up a bunch of 20/30 second MPEG money shots, throw your URL on the watermark, and start copying the file to milf.mpg, barelylegalteens.mpg, inthebutt.mpg, and throw it on Piratebay, Limewire, and other P2P networks. The key is to name the file what folks are searching for.

Can't tell you how many sites and projects use this technique. Free advertising, people keep these files and watch over and over, and often times you'll get a lot of visitors based on the sample video.

This is what Stileproject did way back when and it really worked well.
 
trigatch4 said:
Find webmasters who are into zombie type stuff, shoot them an e-mail and ask to send them a copy in the mail for free.
Click to expand...

Beat me too it. Also look for bloggers in the stripper and/or zombie niche. Send free copies to the more popular ones in exchange for a review.
 
Lol, I just watched the trailer. It actually looks VERY entertaining.

As per promotion, everything already said pretty much sums it up. Right before your release date, I'd make an extended trailer for youtube to attract the masses.

PS - The chick who shoves a chain saw in the zombies head = pure movie brilliance.
 
make a killer cheesy trailer and put it on youtube and put a link to your site in the info section.
 
HarveyJ said:
Search for various Zombie Shuffle events.
Post links to it on their various forums, in the Facebook events pages, etc.

Then, actually go to your local one and hand out some copies to people. This in turn will get them talking on their own sites (because how many people don't have a Forum membership, MySpace or Facebook page and would still go to one of these things?), which will hopefully provide backlinks, but at the very least will provide you some online reviews.

You might also want to seed a torrent of it, in fairly lo-fidelity (saves your bandwidth and makes people want a higher quality version) with a thing at the beginning of the movie, and just before the credits roll, with Surprisingly, it's worked nicely for a number of bands and short film makers... Hell, it worked for the guys that made the game Galactic Civilizations.

You'll also want to have merchandise on your website, in case people would prefer to have that instead of the DVD.
Get a CafePress account so you don't have to shell out heaps for merchandise that might not sell. Substantially lower margins, but no capital outlay.
Click to expand...
A modification on this. Show the first 15-20 minutes in the torrent, then cut to black. 15-20 minutes isn't so far that people won't want to re-watch that part(doing it 45+ in would make them not want to), and will make them want the rest.
 
I can't believe I forgot about this:

Fangoria magazine!
www.fangoria.com
 It's got an international distribution of something like 120,000 copies, and nearly 500,000 in the USA.
Anyway, they're all about this sort of stuff, and might quite happily give you a free article in an issue, as they like to promote new talents.
That's how the Aussie guy that made Undead got it so widely promoted.

Anyway, it's EXACTLY the market you're after, and if you get an article, it'll basically insert the idea of buying your movie into about half a million people.
 
HarveyJ said:
I can't believe I forgot about this:

Fangoria magazine!
www.fangoria.com
It's got an international distribution of something like 120,000 copies, and nearly 500,000 in the USA.
Anyway, they're all about this sort of stuff, and might quite happily give you a free article in an issue, as they like to promote new talents.
That's how the Aussie guy that made Undead got it so widely promoted.

Anyway, it's EXACTLY the market you're after, and if you get an article, it'll basically insert the idea of buying your movie into about half a million people.
Click to expand...
I actually already have had press in Fangoria, and they are going to do another article closer to the release date. :)
We also had a screening about a month ago at the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors convention in LA. :)

I think I have most of the NORMAL "how to promote a zombie movie" stuff already in the works...I was mostly hoping that maybe you savy internet marketing geniuses would have some crazy ideas that I hadn't already thought of.
 
Fair enough... I'm not a regular reader, I just know the mag's out there. Nice to know you got cover in it though :)

Well, the Zombie Shuffle idea gives rise to crossing over another with another idea I posted up here. http://www.wickedfire.com/traffic-supreme/30622-idiots-leave-bluetooth-discoverable-mode.html
Use the zombie shuffle as cover for promotions via bluetooth messaging.
The zombies are your target market so they'll be in 100% when they view the message, and the people watching the parade go by might think it's all a publicity stunt for your video!

Mmm, feel the congruence hahah

Also, have you thought about eBay bombing the video?
There was something about it on here a while back, a great tutorial on getting it into the eBay pulse list. Can't remember the thread name though.
 
jason407 said:
Good ideas...I have already looked into t-shirts and stuff.
Anyone else?

Anyone have experience setting up affiliate programs for physical products?
Click to expand...

If you don't mind ebooks, you can set up your affiliate program at paydotcom. They also allow physical products there. Pretty easy to get things up and going, though they only use Paypal as their payment processor.
 
Thanks guys.
I checked out Paydotcom...that is kinda what I was looking for, but I now I am thinking that I will most likely just custom code an affiliate tracking script and use paypal or something.

Once I get a pre-order page up, I will start trying to find interesting ways to promote it...on and off the net.
Thanks for the ideas so far....keep em coming. :)
 
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