Create a website that best represents your short film

To start promoting your film, there needs to be a “home base”. One place that you can send people to, that has all the information about your movie, including the premise, cast/crew info, where they can see it, etc.

Don’t feel like you have to go flashy. Keep it simple and succinct.

Your movie website should have the following:

An easy to remember name like GoneWithTheWindMovie.com.
Your trailer should be very, very easy to find.
A synopsis or summary of your film.
Prominent display of festivals, awards, recognition, etc.
Still / photos from both the movie and behind the scenes.
Cast and crew information, with links to IMDB.
Registration page to gather fans and email addresses.
Links to other social media and online resources.
Links to reviews, awards, interviews and articles.
Email sign-up.
Where to see the film.
Where to buy the DVD (ideally right there on the website).
How to contact you.
Anything else you can add to build out the universe of the film and the filmmakers for your hardcore fans.
A very clean, easy-to-use interface.

You can use WordPress for the Fissure TV website:

It’s free.
It allows viewers to post comments.
Embedding YouTube videos is easy.
It comes “out of the box” SEO ready – Search Engine Optimized.

A great resource is to check into local universities to see if there are any students who are willing to work for less to generate content for their portfolio. There are many people who ask students to work for nothing, if you can pay even a little, the results will be so much better.

Once you have the site up, submit it to sites like Digg and Del.icio.us to get a wider viewing audience and high search engine hits.

In general, while marketing, you should keep in mind the following picture:

If you want to fail your marketing campaign don’t put press photos on your site or put them in slideshow galleries that can’t be copied.

Keep a process journal about the making of the film.

Who knows? Maybe one day you will get the opportunity to publish it to help budding filmmakers, like Spike Lee did with “Spikes Gotta Have It” which is all about making and promoting his own film.

Instead of only writing it on paper with pen, post it publicly online. People love being compelled by someone’s journey. There are many students and amateur filmmakers that want to create their own short film. When they see someone else making it happen, they feel empowered to do it themselves too. Not only that, they are more likely to share it via social network or word of mouth to their friends. A lot of short film websites don’t keep up with updates and don’t give out “behind the scenes”.

Capture email addresses.

Now that you have your fancy website, make sure to capture your audience’s email addresses. It keeps the audience in the know with what’s going on with your film, and your fan base is suddenly growing and traceable.

Social Networking.

Create a Facebook fan page and Twitter feed. Encourage your friends, family, and new fans / followers to share it. Sending out milestone cheers like “We’re at 186 fans, help us get to 200!” encourages more active sharing.

The point of Social Networking is creating this open online discussion. A great way of interacting with your network is by holding contests. Connecting it to be relevant to your film is even better. Have a deadline. Have a fair process of picking a winner- either based on awesomeness of their answer or by random (pieces of paper in a hat). Of course, there needs to be a prize. Maybe, a signed poster from the cast or anything else. You’ve got the idea. The best marketing connects the audience with the material. Think of it as a Story.

Say positive or stay silent. If people attack you, ignore them. If they attack you twice, block them from seeing your posts. And don’t look back. A social media voice should primarily be a positive one, I believe. I don’t mean that you can’t be critical, or express disapproval.

Do you want to decrease press interest and the size of your audience? Then include, but fail to utilize, your social links, let your blog or Facebook page lie dormant.

Don’t take your followers for granted.If you do venture into the realm of social media marketing, understand that your relationship with your followers goes both ways. That means you need to respond to their questions and acknowledge their feedback, even if it’s just in the form of a “like” or a “favorite.”